Esprit | Spring 2009

            A voice called, "Kate!" Apparently, the name belonged to a five, six, or seven-year-old girl, as well as me. Her sister (most likely, because of the matching dirty blonde ponytail and guiltless, contemptuous screech) was the tallest of the three, the other being a pigtailed brunette. The girls sat on a chipped wooden swing—a slow, squeak-creaky one that fits three small girls perfectly. It seemed to clash with the rest of their metal swing set, but maybe that was the reason why it caught the girls’ interest rather than the sliding board. The swing faced away from the yard, the kind of yard that had plenty of room for Easter egg hunts and neighborhood games of freeze tag. There was an imprint in the grass from what must have been an above-ground swimming pool.
            Kate, ignoring her (alleged) sister's reprimand, dangled her legs. Her infuriated sister pumped vigorously, attempting to rocket the trio over the crumbling silver-brown fence into the outside world of baseball fields and geese and intersections.
            As the determined pilot did her best to transform the leisure swing into an electricity-powered carnival ride, the remaining two continued to haphazardly swing their legs, one limb lolling forward and the other backward (not very conducive to propelling a swing, or anything really). It looked like a rowboat with only one working oar, the left side motored by two small, splashing hands.
            I stared at the sidewalk and let the girls continue their failing attempt at flight when a rattling of chain and abrupt ga-thud implied that the chair had either miraculously flown over the fence, or, somewhat less poetically, just crashed.
            It proved to be the latter. The three girls sat in shock for a minute, still seated in the splintered used-to-be-swing. The little brunette seemed out of place and wore a worried look, as if she did not want to lose dessert privileges for a vandalization that was not even her fault. The younger sister, Kate, also held a frozen stare, until she tucked her head in and started to laugh, her shoulders bobbing. It sounded like an old woman's laugh, a knowing and appreciative one. The little brunette's face remained worried and the oldest girl threw an accusing, squinting, eyebrows-tightened-toward-nose glare at her sister. It seemed that she was accustomed to doing this—this stare, this blame. The livid sister quickly thrust herself up from the ground and ran past the house and into the front yard.
            The brunette mumbled something to Kate and waddled toward the house, small and confused until she reached the door and opened it, possibly in hope of rummaging through a candy drawer or playing with a favorite doll.
            Kate remained on the broken swing. She turned her body to rest on the arm and laid her legs straight, although they did not reach to the other end. Perhaps she was apathetic. Maybe she didn’t mind taking the blame, or figured that all swings must break at some time and at least this one went out doing its job. I think that she realized that this was the last time that she would sit exactly there, so she might as well enjoy it while she could.