Short Stories

The Small Child

                  

The small child skipped as she crossed the busy road, full with joy. Her faded pinky-red skirt bounced with her as she bounced from side to side. She wasn't really sure how what colour her skirt was when she first was given it, it seemed it had always been this dull colour.

She continued onto the path and was confronted by stares as usual. For what kind of mother would dress her child like that? The small child continued on, not bothered by the stares of disgust and on many occasions, pity. She never really understood why she was stared at, but it had become the norm. People looked at her mother the same way.

"Under the bridge, under the bridge." She sang to herself. Hugging the straps of her school bag around herself, she began to skip to the beat of her tune. "Under the bridge", two skips, "under the bridge", two skips. She kept up the tune for a long while, singing different melodies and trying them out with the beat of her skipping. She had become so caught up in the music that she realized she wasn't supposed to make too much noise in this part of town. "Yeah, go live under the bridge with all the other trolls." Growled an unfriendly voice. She had learned to ignore these sorts of remarks. "Just keep walking, don't make eye-contact." Her mother had always said. And so, her shoulders shrugged, she began walking as steadily as she could. She no longer had an expression of joy of her face, in fact, it seemed quite the opposite.

The path became littered with old gum and cigarette butts. She knew she only had a little way to go, maybe half a kilometer or so. She began to feel some happiness and excitement, she always loved this part. She couldn't wait to show her mum what she had learned at school today. As she walked down the last piece of path, she ran toward the old piece of cardboard and saw her mother inside asleep. No, not quite asleep. She had a bottle lying beside her. Her sleeping potion that made her a bit silly sometimes. The small child sat down next to her mother, reached out her hand and attempted to shake her mother awake. "Come on mum." "Come onnnnnn." She whined.

Her mother moaned and grumbled, wondering what could possibly be wanted of her. This day has already been long and disastrous. With no more than a few dollars in her jacket pocket, she gazed up into the small child's hopeful eyes. How she longed to nod excitedly. How she longed to even just smile. How she longed to feel the joy between a mother and her child. But nothing could defeat the undying addiction that she had been assigned. With regret, she shook her head and lay back down on the sodden, rotting cardboard knowing there was nothing she could possibly do for her small child.