Jack Lyons
Each blade tickles her feet. They are tiny green pinpricks, the world’s rough and raw shag carpet. Peering down into the mesh of the thick grass, she thinks of it as a jungle for the world’s smallest beasts, home to the vast creepy crawlies. It is where the spindle legged creatures seek solitude-the enemies of the wild fortress. She watches an army of microscopic raisin people file out of their underground hut, and march single filedly. It’s morning, so they have probably just woken from their nightly slumber, enjoyed a bowl of cereal, and watched some TV. Now, their day begins with parents rushing their kids off to day school, she assumes. Sometimes, when she’s lucky, a family of furry little dogs will crawl by-at least, they look like dogs but have slankly, pink tails.
Behind the girl is a house, and inside is a boy just waking from a night’s rest-he is much older than her. While she examines a tiny world of green, he sits on his bed, assuming no activity. No summer fun. No time with friends. Nothing. He is biding time, awaiting the end of the day. No time for entertaining his mind with imaginations. Right now, his mind is a strange blend. Swirling sensations of anger and sadness that he cannot seem to harness. There is something wrong, but he cannot figure out what. So, he bides his time, scrolling mindlessly through social media on his phone, occasionally punching his pillow in a strange fit of fury and tears. He is emotionless, yet wallowing.
A woman knocks on his door. She asks him if he would likeanything to eat for breakfast, and receives the typical response. Then, she asks if she can come in, and again receives the typical response. That’s okay, David, she says and walks downstairs. She would have liked to have said more to the boy, yet she wasat a loss for words. It’s an issue that she cannot figure out, an enigma that is beyond her skillset to solve. Patiently and sensitively, she has been trying to pry him out of his heavily guarded shell for months. And for months, she has been unsuccessful. She does not know the boy upstairs anymore, and understands that she will soon have to resort to further expertise to connect with him. For now, she heads downstairs to the kitchen and makes eggs and bacon for two. Dearie, it’s time to eat, she calls outside to the little girl playing in the field behind the house. She smiles as the girl clumsies into the house, humming a happy, la-da-da tune. As the girl runs through the back door adjacent to the kitchen, the woman scruffs her hair and reaches down to kiss her head. The woman chases the young one around the kitchen for a bit, teasing and playing, before scooping the girl up in both arms and setting her down to eat.
The girl hums and scarfs down her breakfast in her typical fashion, often missing her mouth and spreading it across her cheeks. She asks her mother curious questions, like if the animals in the field go to school during the day, and what they learn. And if life was black and white when the woman was younger, like some of the shows the woman watches on TV. And what David is doing-the woman answers all her questions patiently, except the last one. It seems, to the little girl, that the all-knowledgeable woman truly had no answer for that inquiry. But before she can press further, the young girl’s attention is diverted from her curiosity, and is overwhelmed by a rumbling sound originating from the field behind the house. Then she sees him, a man with a bright orange shirt tearing through the green jungle on a large, black, four-wheeled machine. He is destroying their home, destroying them, she panics to herself. Immediately, she is a hysterical mess of tears, flailing her hands at the man outside. The woman swoops her up and pats her hair. Sniffling and teary-eyed, the little girl rambles on about the destruction of the multi-legged raisin people, the furry little tail waggers… even the spindle legged creatures. Those creatures, will they die, mama?
Sweetie, sweetie, those animals, those tiny friends are smart, the woman comforts her child. She hears the door of the boy above creak open, but no footsteps emerge. That machine, there, its sound is a message to the animals to scatter for a few minutes so it can clean up their home. They need their house cleaned too, you know? The woman smiles. Once yougo back, you’ll find that all the little creatures of the field will still be there to play and do their jobs, and they’ll probably be happier than before now that their home is all cleaned up. She continues to pat the girl’s head, and sets her down once she stops crying. It brings the woman laughter how the little girl instantly assumes her happy-go-lucky nature.
The boy upstairs peeked his head out of his room to listen to the woman’s story. He recalls when he was her age, how she fed his creativity the same way, and wishes that he could travel back to those years, to when he was positively naive and gullible. Those days, he knows, are gone, and now believes that the time surrounding him is that of monotony and boredom. He cannot recall when life was exciting, and he doesn’t know when it will return-and this thought scares him.Yet, he listens in on the scene downstairs, the little girl singing playfully, the woman filling the kitchen with a delicious aroma. Perhaps, he thinks, some eggs and bacon would be nice. Perhaps, he has been missing the whole picture. Did I miss breakfast?, he calls down to the kitchen, and trots down the stairs.