Photo by Laura Rivera on Unsplash
Lift the unconnected from the gaps, let the words stream down the page, watch three girls drawing chalk squares in the schoolyard, watch them sliding an empty polish tin into each numbered square, watch them skipping and hopping and land laughing on the square, watch them with their skipping ropes, one at each end, one in the middle, watch them chalking a pattern on their wooden spinning tops and whipping them with a leather strip, watch them playing two balls against a wall, now juggling three balls in the air.
Note their shining faces, their sparkling eyes.
Watch them rush to form neat lines when the teacher’s whistle blows, watch the girl watching from behind a wall join the line, carefully keeping her distance from the girl in front who sneers like a cat ready to pounce on a mouse.
When the bell rings at the end of the afternoon she sprints out the door to catch the bus to nanna’s, where she’ll burst through the kitchen and smell the wood fire and the freshly baked cake.
She’ll tell nanna about the girls and nanna will tell her to ignore them.
Nanna will tell her stories about dragons and princesses and magic, and she will stop caring about those girls and she will feel happy, at least for today.
Sandra Arnold is the author of eight books including fiction and non-fiction. Her work has been widely published and anthologised in New Zealand and internationally, placed and short-listed in various competitions and nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best Microfictions and The Best Small Fictions. She has a PhD in Creative Writing from Central Queensland University, Australia.
