Elephants

The wind rolled around me as though it were a great roaring sea, threatening to sweep me away. I held my hands out, feeling the rough golden grasses that swung around my waist. I was swimming, in a sea of shining gold. I felt like a princess from one of papa’s stories, where there were lakes of gold that wept with riches, and fiery dragons whose wings wrapped around the sky, swallowing the world in embers. Like the stories, the sun breathed down, its final breaths were spilling across the distant mountains, and the air smelled like cinnamon and hot mud. I tucked myself into my mother’s side, feeling the warmth of her skirts with my face. I’d been relentless. The moment grandfather told me of the giants that roamed the golden sea, I had to see. He had told me of their magnificence, and strength, their thick leathery skin, and ivory horns. The ride was long, but the sun was beating on my face, and they were getting near. I looked across the plains, and back at my mother, a wide toothy grin leaking across my face. I cried out, my insides leaping with joy, “Mummy, they’re really coming! They’re really real”. She looked down at me, smiling with warmth,
“Yes sweetheart, they’re real”.
The neared, great beasts, skin like dragons. Red sun flowed hot from behind them, and I could almost imagine the fire was rushing from their mouths. White tusks gleamed like fangs, and I grinned so wide I thought I would perish. As soon as they were here, they were gone. I wanted them back. Mother must have wanted them to turn around too, because we stood there for a long time, staring after them.