The Playground

The playground. A gauntlet for children. A parents call out that the park is on the itinerary brings out a battle cry in children. The park awaits and with it comes slides, swings, see saws and other adventures. Like the military the children are placed according to their ability. The small and slender kids occupy the top of the jungle gyms where speed and agility are a must. Slower and plumper kids roam the bottom. 
     A kid named Johnson enters the playground. He was big but agile. Which one might think is an advantage. Johnson decides to enter the top of the playground today. It was the more exciting of the two. But being between divisions he never felt comfortable on top. He runs up a wooden plank and into the fort.
The playground changed theaters at night. Teenagers use it as a hang out. Dark and with little foot traffic they are able to conceal from the authorities amongst the slides and jungle gyms. A perfect venue for underage activities. They leave garbage, debris and other evidence lying about.
Parents sit on the perimeter of the playground. They talk with each other and only pay lip service to their children. “Billy put that down.”, a mom flipping a cigarette ash in the air says to her son. Billy drops a broken beer bottle found as he was foraging in the playground rocks. The mother goes back to her cell phone,“Shirly........sorry. Billy picked up some garbage and was thinking about eating it.” She puts the phone in her purse and calls out to her son to whisk him away. Billy puts up a struggle to stay. He picks up a handful of rocks and flings them in the air. But that only makes it worse. His mom promises he won’t be back for a month. Hard time. Solitary man. Poor kid, should have left easy.
The playground is not as dangerous as it was years ago. They had none of these high tech materials. Foam rubber, rubber foam, material constructed from years of research and millions of dollars. The slides are made out of plastic used on the space shuttle to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere. Not scalding metal heated from the sun. But there are still dangers to be found.
In the fort Johnson gazes at the swinging ropes. He takes a step and grabs on. Dangling from the playground canopy eight feet above the ground he moves from one rope to another to get to the lookout point nearly 15 feet away. 
His arms begin to tire as his big, but agile, body wears on them. His hands slip from the ropes and he starts to free fall. Two bottom dwellers are running in a frenzy towards his falling body. One with ketchup stains on his shirt. The other with hand me down pants that say the previous owner had eaten too many Big Macs. The collision sends a visual shockwave through the playground. Johnson's body goes head over heal and ends up a crumpled mess.
His mother races over, grabs the mess and brings it to the perimeter. She pumps him with kool aide and candy to try and revive him. He will eventually be all right. But everyone knows the kid won't be the same. He will never fit in.

Author's Note

First story. Messed up the format posting. Just trying to get some feedback. Yo.

Reviews

[KAOlmsted]

I grew up in the 70s, and you're so right about the playground not being as dangerous today as it was back then...back then they didn't give a s**t, just sent you out to play on asphalt...alone...unsupervised...just head home when the street lights come on.

That bit about Billy made me grin. "Hard time. Solitary man. Poor kid, should have left easy." Reminded me of my own daughter...I wonder why she thinks the tantrum helps her cause...???

*laugh* that Johnson's mother rushes the kid to the perimeter...that is so true. First aid is never administered at the scene of the accident; the kid is always whisked away... And then Johnson grew up and made some Super Bowl burgers from the meat of an alcoholic cow...

For a first story, it was quite good...very cute premise.

-kimmer

[Marie]

Well, not bad for a first story. But your later stuff is better.

[SpeedOfTaste]

Thank you. I think I can edit this to make it better. Cheers.