When we are small, really small, we sew up wounds so well and with such magical skill.
We huddled together after art class, under the stairs that senior students walked up to study spotted frogs killed in the name of knowledge.
J… silently wept and told us his mom and his dad were fighting, always fighting. Divorce…he said and we moved closer to him, me catching the new word and the other two curious to know what that would make him.
Words always held a wonder to me and I asked “what is die –vorce?”
“I will be staying with my mom then with dad, then with mom, then with dad” he replied while the rest of us marveled at his new knowledge.
That sounded cool at first, like a rhyme, then the loneliness and oddity stuck. A home had dad, mom and J’ s would always be less one hereafter.
“Two houses” J…said not looking at us and I offered the brighter side of it, “Two houses would mean more rides on the streets up and down, so you can get both to buy toys, ice creams, chocolates...”
But j--- was feeling too single to smile at the doubles and whimpered still. And so we whimpered with him to acknowledge the grief as one.
Then he turned and looked at me(being the sole girl in the group and since boys propose to girls) “ will you divorce me when you grow up?”
I was at a loss because I was just becoming familiar with a word that sounded close to die. Then, I hated anything that was die able.
“No” I answered a hesitant ‘no’ since why I was refusing was equally strange as what I was refusing
S---was a helper by birth and said, “but you have to marry to divorce. Are you marrying J---”
“No” I was more sure of my answer . Instead I offered my powers to evoke a fairy wand to heal wounds.
J---- glared at my refusal then said, “Alright, pray for a fairy”
I prayed, no fairy appeared but then the four of us still felt a fairy wand in the way we huddled up daily under the stairs.
I prayed, his parents divorced, J learnt to count life in the double and the fairy watched us wherever she was, whoever she was and she stitched our wounds with the ease of a wand, the magic of our minds.
