The Beggining

We are walking down a road filled with summer and butterflies and honeysuckle smells. Sammy asks me if I’m hot, but I say no. I’m cold all over with missing someone. I don’t say this to Sammy ‘cos she has been nice and I don’t want to make her feel bad. We keep walking and listening to colourful birds sing pretty songs. I tell Sammy that the colours are a rainbow and that my life is a rainbow, filled with happy and sad. Sad colours like blue and happy like yellow. She says that I’m mature for someone my age, but I say lots of people are when they’re eight. She smiles a secret smile when she thinks I can’t see. Her eyes aren’t smiling though. They’re blue and clear with sad. I say that her eyes are pretty to make them smile. She grabs my hand then, and holds it tight. I think she is missing someone, too. My someone. My mum and her were sisters that looked the same. Mum was hurt in a crash. I was in the car with her. I held her hand until the people put a white blanket over her and pulled me away. And then I can feel Sammy’s hand, all warm on mine and I pull away. She asks me what’s wrong; did I get stung by a bee or stand on something sharp? I yell at her that she is not my mum and run all the way back to the house. My hand is cold with mum, now.


The lady I have to see on Friday’s after school has nice red hair and a freckly nose. She smells like flowers in spring. I tell her that and she asks if I like flowers. I tell her I do, but not roses ‘cos mum liked roses and we gave some to her grave at the funeral. Her mouth turns down a bit and I think she’s going to say something mean, but she doesn’t. She asks me what I’m drawing. I tell her I’m drawing the room and can she see her sitting one the couch and me drawing at the table? She smiles and says that there are more cushions on the couch then only the one I have drawn. I quickly scribble some more and ask if that’s better. She laughs. It sounds like a wind chime in a warm breeze. We used to have a wind chime at our old house. It was on the front porch where it faced the beach and caught the salty breeze that made it sing. I tell her about our house by the beach and her green eyes go all sea colour, bright and free. She asks if I want to draw it for her. I say yes, just for her. Then I pick out sea colours, blue, yellow and green. When I finish I ask her if she likes it. She says yes, of course she does. But then she asks who is standing on the front porch. I tell her that it was me and mum under the wind chime. She wonders out loud why I didn’t draw Hope. I tell her ‘cos Hope is still with me. Then her eyes grow big and lose their sea colour. She says that I’m very brave for my age. I smile at her and she smiles back.


I think Sammy is sad with me for running away from her the other day, even know she didn’t have to walk that far back by herself. I heard her crying that night. She was sitting on the balcony in the swinging chairs. She was being quiet, like she didn’t want anyone to hear. I don’t mind if people hear me cry. The lady I go to on Friday’s say it’s good to cry if you are sad. At breakfast I asked her if she was sad at me. She looked shocked and said no, it wasn’t me and that I should never think that she was sad at me or anything ‘cos she likes having me around. I tell her I won’t run away again and she says thank you. Then I ask if we are driving to school or walking. She asks what I want to do. I say walk because I like to feel the air and hear the pretty bird’s songs. She laughs and says that she does too. I tell her that she looks pretty like the birds and so is her laugh. It’s a tinkling laugh, like when a tiny bell is rung. She thanks me for the compliment. And then I finish my breakfast and we start walking to school.


I don’t think I like school. Or my teacher. Or the kids in my class. My teacher thinks I don’t learn properly at writing things and says I dream and think too much. I tell her that writing things isn’t that important like dreaming and thinking is. She tells me I can do that at recess and that it’s better to talk to people about the things we think of. I tell her that my thinkings are private and only my mum could know them but now she is dead so she can’t know. Then the teacher sends me to sit on the lino ‘cos I kept talking back. I ask her isn’t that what a conversation is? She glares at me really mean so I go to the lino before she yells at me more. And the other kids are laughing at me for getting in trouble with Mrs. Wytch. I say under my breath that the name suits her and sit down on the floor. It’s cold and hard with her personality. I still have to do my work, which is writing and it’s messy from leaning the book on my knees. I’ll probably get more in trouble now. And then a thought comes into my mind and tells me that everything is okay, that there is lots of Hope left.


I have a day off today. I have a cold. I ask Sammy if we can still go for a walk. She says we can as long as I drink my cough medicine. I don’t like the cough medicine. Sammy says that she doesn’t either. We go to the park and sit on the seat and watch the little kids’ play, the ones that don’t go to school yet. I kind of wish we had of stayed inside ‘cos I have a bad headache and my throat is hurting. I tell Sammy this and she puts her arm around me. I almost pull away. She smells like something I know, something that is nearly all forgotten. It smells sad. I don’t pull away though. I let her arm make me feel better. Then she starts to say that I have nice hair, the colour of golden honey in the sunlight. She says the curls are pretty like vines that twist and spiral skywards. She says my eyes are like that sky. I tell her no but she says yes. Then I say that Hope’s eyes were like that, but better, bluer.


The lady I used to see on Friday’s doesn’t work there anymore. Now I have a new one. I don’t like her as much as the other one. She doesn’t have the sea eyes or the freckles or rose smell. And she doesn’t like hearing about the house by the beach. She only wants me to talk about mum and Hope when I don’t want to. But she keeps saying talk about your family. So I say mum was just a mum and Hope and me were just sisters that look(ed) the same! Then I yell that she doesn’t care anyway and knock all the blocks off the table. She wasn’t happy then. She starts writing really quick on her clipboard paper. The old lady never used to do that. She used to put it on the shelf to show that we were friends. When Sammy came at last to rescue me, the lady goes over and says stuff to her really quietly. I yell that it’s rude to whisper and they share a glance like they know something but I don’t. Then Sammy takes my hand and we go to the car. On the way home Sammy asks if I’m angry. I tell her that of course I’m angry. She asks what about and I say that I miss mum and Hope. She tells me that it’s alright to feel angry and that she is too.


The first thing I notice on the roof is how tall I am and the summery breeze that is warm on my skin. Then I hear Tommy calling me a fraidy cat and to go closer to the edge or I can’t fly. I tell him that he’s the fraidy cat cos he’s not even properly on the roof yet! Then I see two butterflies dancing just in front of me and I want to catch them but the roof doesn’t go that far. But I want them and I want to fly and Hope is telling me that it’s okay and so are the people on the ground. I watch the butterflies’ pretty colours and I can’t see or hear or smell anything else so I take two steps towards something I don’t know and never have known and fly with the breeze.
But then I’m falling quick and I hit the ground hard. I hear a snap and I feel winded but then I don’t cos I feel something worse. I don’t cry cos I never cry when I’m hurt. And even when Tommy stapled my arm and I picked it out and bled everywhere I didn’t cry. Not even at the hospital when they were putting in the stitches. I’m tough like that. Pain is okay. Like, you can tell your brain that it’s meant to feel good (even when it feels like fire!). Once I let someone pinch me real hard and didn’t flinch. Not once, but I had to see a school councillor cos a teacher found out and thought I was psycho or something. But that doesn’t matter cos I just said what I wrote before about pain and she nodded and wrote something in her book and said I could go! And now, my arm sticking out at a funny angle with the bone showing and hurting like anything, I tell my brain that it feels good. But pain comes screaming through my veins real fast trying to make me cry and scream and yell for someone to make it better. I bite my lip and feel the saltiness on my tongue and wait for the teacher to come and say that’s what happens when you try to jump off roofs to fly (even if it was Tommy’s idea and he said he would do it, too!). He didn’t yell for jumping off the roof though. He picked up my bag and took me to the office, asking the whole time if I was okay and am I hurting? I said to him that it didn’t hurt one bit then he went to phone Sammy to pick me up. I thought Sammy would be angry cos of me jumping but she was all pale faced and worried about how she’s supposed to take care of me. I told her I was okay all the way to the hospital but then I started feeling sick and she carried me inside. I said that’s what mum used to do and I could see teardrops on her cheeks, almost invisible. When the doctor came over I held out my arm to him and said that it’s broken, see? He said I was very brave not to cry even though I almost cried when twisted it back. The pain was bad like a million degrees Celsius and tearing over every centimetre of my arm. But I just let the saltiness into my mouth and waited for the plaster. He asked if I wanted pink, that it’s a nice colour for a little girl. I said no, I wanted blue and green cos they’re sea colours. He smiled and now I have half of my arm green and half blue and I’m not going to let Tommy sign it.


Well today I’m at school and everyone wants to sign my cast. I told them sure and even the teacher signed and drew a witch’s hat and wrote get well, love Mrs. Wytch! And when everyone went away Tommy was standing there really shy and said that he thinks I’m brave. I said thanks and let him sign it. He drew a wonky smiley face and wrote, ‘you’re brave’. And the best thing was him saying sorry for having the flying idea and stapling my arm. I told him I have a scar from the staple and it makes a smiley face cos it’s near two freckles and they’re like eyes. He laughed and showed me a scar from when he fell off his bike.