Sally

this is a short story i wrote. I tried to convey the emotions of a young child whose parents are going through a tough time in their marriage. hope you like it :)

 

 

 

She stared at the trees and houses and the green rolling fields as they passed outside the window of the car she was in travelling in and she thought to herself how nice it would be to be out there instead of cooped up in this car with her two parents who had been arguing since mile marker 79.

It was always like this nowadays. Whenever Sally and her parents would do something together, things would turn out like this no matter how hard she tried to keep both of them happy. Of course it wasn’t her fault that her parents were fighting so much nowadays but then again Sally was a six year old girl and six year olds generally have difficulty thinking about others instead of themselves. these days Sally stopped doing a lot of the old things she used to do. she had stopped going out to play, running around the house and whatever else her parents' didn't like in hopes that they would be happier.

This was second of the twice yearly trips the Goodson’s would take to Mr. Goodson’s ancestral homeland of Detroit, Michigan. It was the fourth of July and the other trip would normally take place around Christmas. Sally thought about the trip she took last Christmas. Things weren’t so bad then. Her mommy was still working at the department store and her father had just received that new promotion. She didn't know what a promotion was but she thought  it was some kind of toy . They used to hug each other and laugh and they would always cuddle together with her and she would love and sometimes Sally would even see touch their faces to each other. She didn’t know what it was for but they seemed to like it and it made her happy to see that. Not like now though. Sally didn’t know what had happened in the time between but she knew it was something she did. Maybe it was the vase she broke two months ago or the time that she almost fell out of the tree in the King’s backyard while she and the King’s youngest boy Steve were playing.

She remembered her mom was really mad that day. But underneath her anger she saw that mommy was sad too and she didn’t know why. To her it didn’t seem so bad that she slipped while she was climbing the oak tree in Steve’s house and besides she wasn’t hurt that much. she just had a little scrape on her knee. When her mom came to pick her up in the afternoon after she had done her errands, she saw there were dark lines under mommy’s eyes as if some black water came out of her eyes and made a mess of her face. She tried to show mommy she was okay by running to her but her mommy shouted at her to be quiet and she quietly followed her back home.

That was one of times when she noticed things between mommy and daddy weren’t like they used to be. She remembered that day when she and her parents were having dinner, she with some yucky peas and her parents with roasted cow, mommy and daddy were barely talking to each other. Daddy seemed tired and sad and really sorry and mommy seemed really really mad at Daddy. She remembered thinking that maybe Dad had broken mommy’s favorite toy and that if he fixed her toy things would get better between them.

But as time went on mommy and daddy were never like they used to be and Sally got sadder and sadder

Her reverie was interrupted by her father swerving the car to the side to avoid an overzealous driver, passing by on the right. Her father’s frustrated and expletive filled reply upset her but she did her best to hide her tears, wiping them away before they could be seen by either of her parents. She didn’t want them to fuss over here. Not while what they had was so broken and in disrepair.

Sally looked out the car window again, trying to lose herself in the miles passing around her and beneath her. She liked car journeys because there was always something do distract her from the bad feelings she had in her life and from her parents constant bickering. Right now she looked at a truck which was passing by her in the next lane. It was a large truck, much larger than their car  and she remembered Steve having a toy truck which looked it, only it was much smaller. She glanced at the driver of the truck and saw that he had red hair. She remembered Daddy had a friend who had red hair, only her hair was much longer and prettier than this man’s hair. She also remembered Mommy getting very upset whenever they would talk about that lady. Sometimes she would even cry whenever Daddy would mention her name and she remembered Mommy once threw Daddy’s favorite plate at Daddy when they were arguing. Sally was very glad that it didn’t hit daddy and then she ran from there and hid under Daddy’s study. She didn’t remember what else happened that night. She must have fallen asleep in the bed. When she woke up she saw that mom and dad had stopped fighting and she was so glad about that that she hugged both of them before leaving for school that day.

Sally looked up. It was almost dark. She realized she had dozed off in the middle of the journey to Detroit. She looked for her parents in the front of the car but they were not there. She started to get scared. An icy fear gripped her and she struggled to breathe. A myriad of thoughts rushed through her head and she started sweating. Maybe somebody took them or even worse, maybe they were finally fed up of what was wrong between and left Sally to start anew.

She put her knees on the seat and boosted herself so that she could get a better view outside. The sun was almost setting and the sky was painted crimson and gold. It was getting cold, the outside windows were fogged up. She looked to the left and right of the car but couldn’t see her mommy and daddy. She looked out of the back of the station wagon they owned and saw her parents standing outside, holding each other and gazing up at the stars.

She smiled a knowing smile, a smile of relief and joy. A single tear rolled down her cheek and she didn’t bother wiping it. She sat down and went back to sleep.

Maybe things would get back to normal after all.

   

Author's Note

this was an experimental story i wrote, trying to see if i could get inside the mind of a six year old girl. hope it turned out all right :)

Reviews

[Barbara Walker]

I think you captured this from a six year old girl's point of view very well. i enjoyed reading it.

[Mia]

This is such a wonderful story. I'm really glad it had a happy ending because it was breaking my heart to think of little Sally blaming herself for her parents troubles. There were a couple of sentences where I thought you'd left words out. It didn't make it difficult to read, its just something you might want to look over :)
Also somethings I thought you should consider...
“to Mr. Goodson’s ancestral homeland of Detroit, Michigan.” Wouldn’t it be better to just call it his hometown? Ancestral homeland makes it sound like you’re trying too hard.
“Her mommy was still working at the department store and her father…” either use mommy and daddy or mother and father.
“under Daddy’s study.” Don’t you mean his study desk?
Hope it helps :)

[Zubier_abd]

Thanks for finding those out. i will definitely fixing those and yeah the ancestral homeland does sound like its trying too hard. :)

[Mia]

I'll be looking at more of your stories! I really enjoyed these two :)

[DarknessPeering]

I like how you made the child so observant of the conflict. Kids see so much more than adults give them credit for and are usually forgotten. I enjoyed the complex emotions of her obvious troubled young mind woven with the more childlike thoughts, an example being the yucky peas, and how she's reminded of a toy truck. Great start! :)