Disclaimer: I don't know about the others, but I found this month's prompt to be extra challenging. But as an author, sometimes you just have to trust the story to lead you, sometimes you're just flying blind.
So let's strap on those crash helmets.
--
Ma kept no mirrors in our home, only painted pictures strung up in thick, lacquered frames, shielded by glass. In fact, I had never seen a mirror until the day Ma sent me to school.
Ma gave me a little metal lunch box, the cartoon faces that had
once smiled up at another child had long been worn away. But when I traced the polished
surface with the tips of my fingers, I could feel the curves of the lips,
googliness of the big round eyes.
I peered into its metallic sheen and saw blobs and shapes and
skin tones. But when I got in super, super close, I could see an eye.
“Ma. Look. There’s a girl in my lunchbox!” I held the lid
just millimetres from my face and blinked. The funny looking eye was still
there. “I can see her.”
Ma had sighed loudly, not looking up from her mending. “Miya,
don’t be ridiculous. You can’t go to school saying such nonsense.”
“What’s your name?” I whispered. The girl said nothing, but
her watchful eye blinked. I put my other eye up to the box. The girl had
shifted and was peering at me through a different eye. I pulled back and the girl
was gone. This made me frown. “I think she’s shy. She must be lonely.”
Ma just clucked her tongue and sighed again.
The girl was definitely a shy one. “Well if you won’t tell
me, I’ll call you Shiloh,” I said matter-of-factly. Shiloh was the name of a
dog I saw on TV last week. It was a boy dog, but I didn’t think the girl in the
lunchbox would mind.
I was happy to be taking the shy girl in the lunchbox with
me to my first day at school. I was making faces as Shiloh’s staring eye while Ma
was slathering tuna fish onto a piece of bread for me.
“Miya, stop goofing
around,” Ma scolded as she took the lunchbox from me. She plopped the sandwich
in, slapped together in Glad wrap and I could tell that the tuna was already
making the bread soggy. I made a face.
“Miya, stop that. You’re going to be late, come on. Put your
shoes on,” Ma barked.
She clutched me by the hand when we got outside. She had on a
light pink scarf, pulled close across her leathery skin, covering the veins that
ran along her cheeks. Her thick heavy hair fell in a straight line just above
her perfectly sculpted eyebrows, like the edge of a sleeve. She didn’t glance
down at me as we weaved through the crowds and crossed the streets towards the
big stone building that I knew was the school.
Ma left me by the front of the school gates, lunch box in
one hand, a plastic bag holding my school supplies in the other. She scurried
away, peering over her shoulder not to check on me, but as if she was being
followed.
I saw another little girl standing by the front gate. Her
mum was giving her a fierce hug and a kiss. She had a pink backpack and a
matching plastic lunchbox in her hand. I went over to her and held up my little
tin chest.
“Is there a girl in your lunchbox too?” She just stared.
I had to put Shiloh away in a cubby hole when I got into the
classroom, along with my coat. Miss frowned when I showed her the plastic bag that
had a few short pencils and a ratty old notebook that Ma used to write down the
week’s lottery numbers. Miss was young and very pretty, and her soft auburn
hair flopped around her ears as she shook her head.
“Why don’t you take a seat, Miya?” Her voice was kind and
gentle.
I sat down next to the girl with the pink lunchbox. I could
see that her pink jumpsuit was the same colour as well. She pulled out a pink
pencil case that held a row of pink pencils, all new and shiny. They were
already perfectly sharpened but the girl took one out and ran it through her
(pink!) sharpener, turning and turning. I thought the lead would surely break but
when she pulled it out, the tip was still there, long and thin like a needle.
The girl beamed with pride and started on the next one.
I stared down at the little orange and brown bits of wood in
front of me, their ends all round and stubby. Ma got them when she filled out
the forms at the TAB. I felt funny in my stomach, and my mouth a little dry. I
wanted to ask the little girl for a pencil, I wanted one really bad, but my lips
felt pasted together. I had to make myself really small on my side of the desk.
The squeak squeak
squeak of the sharpener rang in my ears, like someone rubbing a balloon. I
shuddered, goose pimples running up and down my neck and along my arms. I turned
away, casting my eyes to the colourful posters along the walls and closet doors
where Miss had made us stash our lunches and coats.
And I gasped.
I knew it was Shiloh, she had the same brown eyes and I could
see that her hair was big and brown and curly. Her clothes were grey with giant
purple and brown stains on them. They were much too big for her. But she had a
big goofy grin on her face and huge freckles on her cheeks. She was waving her
arms at me, to say hi. I guess she wasn’t so shy after all.
“Miss, miss!” I waved my arms excitedly. “There’s a girl in
the closet waving at me. She must have gotten out of my lunchbox.”
And the whole class burst out laughing. My cheeks flushed
red hot.
Miss held up her hand. “That’s enough children.” But the
whole class continued to whoop and hollder. Miss cleared her throat and crossed
her arms, glaring. She looked so mean, almost as mean as Ma did when she caught
me doing something I wasn’t supposed to be doing. The laughing finally died
down and everyone stared up at her quietly.
My face burned with embarrassment. I stole a quick peek at
Shiloh, her eyes were red and her lower lip was quivering. She looked so sad
and alone. It made me feel a tiny bit better, even if my classmates’ cackles
still echoed in my ears.
Miss turned to me. Her face was no longer angry and her
voice was soft as she explained. “Miya, that’s a mirror. It shows you what you
look like.” She came over and held out her hand to me. We walked to closet door.
Shiloh was walking towards us, her little hand clasped in her own teacher’s
hand. She had stopped crying but she was snivelling a little.
“See,” Miss said, pointing to Shiloh in the ‘mirror.’ “That’s
you. That’s what you look like.”
I frowned. Shiloh frowned back. I pouted and Shiloh pouted
too. I squished my eyebrows together and went right up to the little girl. Her brown
eyes stared back at me, bold and daring. I stuck out my tongue.
The little girl’s tongue tasted cold and smooth, like the
frost that I licked off the window in the winter time. I ran my tongue all across
the surface, smearing my saliva around like icing on a cake.
I could hear the whole class gagging and retching behind me,
even Miss let out a small gasp. “Miya, that’s quite enough,” she exclaimed.
I pulled away and peered at the little girl’s face. She was
blurry now through the film of spit but I could tell she was giving me a big
toothy grin.
Behind her, I saw the girl in pink making a face.
I went back to my seat as Miss returned to the lesson.
Throughout the day, I kept stealing glances at Shiloh in the mirror. She was always
there, waiting, ready to give me a wink or a smile. She even stuck out her
tongue a couple of times which made me laugh.
It was good to know that on my first day, I had already made
my first friend.
Love this story Wai! I could really imagine it turning into another story like Chook Chook - such a gorgeous main character. Very surprised to hear you found the topic challenging when you wrote such a beautiful story - well done!
ReplyDeleteThanks Sarah. In the end, I fell back into what I was comfortable with - that whole thing of write what you know. :)
ReplyDeleteHi Wai. I loved your story. And, like you, I found myself also being lead by my story, not quite sure where it heading as I wrote it. I really enjoyed being challenged by this topic :)
ReplyDeleteThanks Hannah! I really liked yours too...I loved how the kettle was also a kind of mirror as well.
ReplyDeleteThe overall theme I'm drawing from this month's stories is - mirrors are depressing!!!