9.

9.

A Chapter by Emily Atteberry

 

My fingers slide down the slick, wet plastic of the slide. I can feel my pants starting to get damp, but it’s a familiar feeling. The contrast of the bright red slide and my pale fingers pulling along is vivid, and it is almost painful to look at. My hair is flying in the wind, wavy, thick, and a warm blonde. I look around where I am. My elementary school. The slide pulls me around, slowly, my wet butt dragging me down a little. I thump to a halt at the bottom of the slide, and, of course, land in a large puddle at the bottom. What a familiar feeling. Uncomfortable, but it happens. I look over at the edge of the slide, covered in colorful markings, drawing, and graffiti.

            Standing up and awkwardly trying to throw a little water off my pants, I look around in bewilderment. This has to be another dream, I console myself. I trudge a little away from the slide, the gravel crunching angrily beneath my shoes. I look down at my shoes, I have on pink lacy socks, and Velcro-strapped sandals with Tinkerbelle on them. Alright…. I take another step and when my foot makes contact with the ground, the heel of the sandals dances with little red lights. I look up, and around. There is nobody else here. An eerie quiet. I step off the gravel onto the mushy grass, and look at a huge puddle. I look into the puddle, and my reflection looks back at me.

            I don’t know who I am…but I’m not Jill. My hair is long, and blonde….My eyes are blue, shimmery and energetic blue. My skin is tanned to perfection; I am wearing a blue corduroy jumper and a sweater underneath. I would guess I am about six. Things just keep getting weirder. I look up distractedly from the reflection in the mud when I hear crunching behind me. I slowly turn around, not sure what is going on. Maybe I spoke too fast, I think, when I see the person. The person I am looking at is me, but a five year old me. Jill. As a little kid. It is undeniably me…I can tell. My hair is long, wavy, and black. Just like it always has been my green eyes so familiar…although they look happier, younger. This girl, my body, is looking at me with a great big smile.

            “Do you want to play tetherball? The PE teachers forgot to take down the tether on Friday after school! I love when that happens.” The girl grasps my hand and pulls me to the tetherball, and our matching shoes are flashing like fireworks as the pound across the gravel onto the blacktop of the playground. I remember in elementary school, I loved tetherball…although I wasn’t very good at it. But, when I was little, I didn’t notice what I was good or bad at, I didn’t care. I was brave.

            I stutter, deciding if I want to try out this weird body’s voice that I am in.

 “S-s-sure.” I half whisper and I frown. The sound of my voice is like a book I have read before, but I can’t remember the title. I know it is not my voice, but who’s? The wind blows a little and my hair ripples around my face. As we run down to the tetherball court, I look up at the sky, a blue with hints of purple, on the edge of turning dark. I just ogle at my surroundings when we come to a halt.

            “Ok! I serve!” The girl says eagerly. I never serve. I don’t think. She skips to one side of the court, and holds the heavy, leather ball in her hands.

“Okay, rules! So do we want to do baubles or no baubles?” Surprisingly, I understand this playground slang. Baubles is when you are allowed to lightly tap the tetherball with the tips of your fingers, as kind of a stall, under you are ready to push it up and strike. With no baubles, there are no hesitations. I don’t really care…whatever is fine to me. I just want to know where we are.

            “Uh…whatever is good to you?” My voice is so high and vibrant. It feels so out of place coming from me…but, I’m not me. At least not right now.

The girl ponders for about half a second then declares, “Baubles!” She grins, and I attempt a weak smile back. She holds the ball, arches her small child back, pushes the ball up with her left palm, and in one movement pulls her body upward, strikes the ball with surprisingly force, and lands again, her shoes blinking, almost in a congratulatory manner.

            Then I realize the ball is swinging from her side to my side. Frantically, I lift my hands up, trying to remember what to do. So when it comes to me, I remember baubles. I catch it with my fingertips, almost nervously tapping the ball with my fingertips, stalling, looking for an answer. Then I remember I need to send it back. I push it up into the air, and I strike it with any emotion I have. The ball whirls around the pole, the string taught, the ball flying high. The girl I am opposing is staring in wonderment, not even attempting to jump up and stop the ball from making a full string’s length of twisting around the pole. When the rope was done rotating around, I instinctively screamed out “Tether!”

            And then I hear a voice.

 “Good job, B!” B? I turn, and look. It’s my dad….probably around 10 years younger, though. I can tell, because the wrinkles around his eyes and forehead are not as apparent, he looks happy, and he is slim and clean shaven.

“Good job, Jill!” He extends towards the other girl. I was right. That is me…but not really. Because….that is my body, but so then…who’s am I in? A woman appears are walks up next to him, holding what looks like an ancient camcorder.

“Say hello, girls!” I hear a smile in her voice, but I am just looking at “Jill” in confusion.

            The other child smiles and quickly waves at the camera.

“What about you, honey?” The woman with the camera asks playfully. I look back over at the camera, pointed straight at me. Who is filming me?

 Dad just smiles and gestures back to the tetherball. “You busy playing, B? Go on back to playing, I bet she’ll get some great video.”

            So robotically I play along with this girl, not really knowing why, how, or when this is taking place, but as I tap the ball against my fingertips, I realize I haven’t been counting everything. I always do. Why wouldn’t I now? Counting things makes me feel better.

 “Come on!” The girl insists, hands held up, waiting for the ball to come swinging back her way.

“Hit it, hon!” Dad yells. It is so weird that he would be so happy and nice. I haven’t seen him like that in forever. The girl receives the ball and without hesitation smacks it back. I have stopped thinking about the game, my mind is wandering to a random corner of its space, and then SLAP!

            The ball smacks me square in the face. I let out a little yelp of surprise and pain, and fall back. I feel as if I am falling off a cliff, a free fall, to land in the rocky ocean below. I can almost smell the salty air; feel the spray the ocean gives off. The air sweeps past my body as I accelerate, and my skull connects with the ground, and I feel my neck spring up, then the heavy weight as my body hits the ground. And it all goes black.



© 2008 Emily Atteberry


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Added on February 9, 2008


Author

Emily Atteberry
Emily Atteberry

KS



About
I'm Emily Atteberry. I love to write, I love movies, music, photography. I play a couple instruments. My main love is violin. However I also play banjo, (I kid you not,) guitar, piano, the recorder (h.. more..

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A Chapter by Emily Atteberry