Girl Stuff

Inside, she wore pink. Inside, she trounced around the room in her favorite tiara and pink feather boa. The boa, a gift from her grandmother, always made her feel like a princess. Ariel had nothing on her when she had that boa wrapped around her neck. Outside, though, she was something else. As soon as she walked out the front door of her house, she was another creature. She shape shifted into a warrior. Her boa, strong as it is, was used to through over tree branches and hang like a monkey. Her pearls were laid out along worms that she found under rocks to measure their length. The pointy part of her heels were used to dig holes in the earth to stake her flag because this Earth belongs to her. Tommy next door might have an armies worth of nerf guns, but she had something greater. She had her ingenuity.

On days when the rain fell in sheets, or her mother simply had too much to do, she entertained herself indoors. It is there that she learned. Her mother was always more focused on the shiny things in life. Her jewelry, her makeup, and her clothes all spoke of a woman who simply wasn’t at home outdoors as she was in. Outside was reserved for two things, taking the trash out to stop the smell from collecting in the house and sun tanning in the backyard.

The girl always thought that sun tanning was a poor use for their excellent backyard. Bigger than their front yard and lined with tall, branching oaks, the backyard seemingly stretched for miles after the boundary of their weak wooden fence. The girl would climb the unused picnic table, and stand on her tip toes to peer out over the fence to the wonders beyond. A small hill led to a forest of trees and sounds and birds and creatures that the girl was only partly assured were not magical in nature. When her mother wasn’t looking she would slip between two loose boards in the fence, and there, her adventure would really start. The tools that she used inside to please and satisfy her mother were useful here as well. Her mother may have wished that she was one thing only, one being with singular desires and thoughts, but she wasn’t.

No, she was two creatures. She was princess and explorer, and that was okay. She was as fierce in her pink boa and tiara as she was with muddy knees and matted hair. She claimed two thrones, her home and the world beyond. She was master and commander of the world outside the fence. But lately, someone had come to claim what was hers.

She knew that Tommy Bernard was going to be trouble. The first nerf bullet hit her square in the forehead. She had looked to the left at precisely the right moment for Tommy to hit her again, this time close to her left eye. She dodged, and ducked underneath the picnic table. She removed her tiara, and growled. He thinks he’s so smart.

She holds her tiara up and sticks it out, and Tommy shoots another bullet at it. Then before he can reload she rolls out from underneath the picnic table, and hides behind the biggest tree in the yard.

She can hear him laughing behind his spot on the fence. No doubt he’s bouncing on his trampoline. Oh which, she certainly is not jealous. It merely gives him a superior vantage point with which to attack her. Or, at least that’s what he thinks. Her mother has taught her the superior art of the perfect angle. She had meant camera angles, but once again, she would use what her mother taught and prized her for inside to win the battleground outside. Odds are that he will be going for a double jump so that he can aim really high because he assumes that she will go low. So, with that in mind, she knows that she has to get higher. She turns to the tree, but the branch is too high for her. She pulls the boa from her neck, and throws it above her head to the branch above. She uses her arms to pull up, and she climbs until she can throw her body around the branch. The balance that she has gained wearing her heels comes into play, and her balance on the branch is impeccable. If you can walk in three inch heels, you can balance on a branch. Thankfully, the rest of the branches are all clustered together, and the width of the tree is so great that Tommy in all of his cackling glory still can’t see her. When she’s high enough, she can peer out between the leaves, and can hear Tommy bouncing lowly, no doubt waiting for her to make a run for it. Tommy should have paid more attention when his mother talked about feminine wiles because he was about to get smacked with a whole load of them. There is a bee’s nest right in front of her that is hanging precariously above Tommy’s precious trampoline. It won’t hurt him, only scare him, and she hopes, it will teach him a lesson about shooting unsuspecting adventures in the wild.

Tommy should have known that this is a dog eat dog world, and territory isn’t won without a little blood. She removes her heels. She holds one in the left hand and one in the right as she moves closer to the bee’s nest. She can hear their buzzing, and see their little, yellow bellies as they flit around their home. She has to be precise.

She counts to three in her head and then simultaneously, and with balance that gold medal gymnasts would be jealous of. She drops her shoe on the ground, alerting Tommy that he’s ready to fire, and then she chucks the other shoe as hard as she can at the bee’s nest. It falls with a flop, and she can hear Tommy scream louder than she ever has before the echo of his backdoor slamming shut sounds through the neighborhood.

The girl smiles. She stays on top once again. Undefeated.

Later, when her mother asks her what she’s been up too. She replies, “Girl stuff.”