Love People

Love People

by Laura Robertson                                                             

  It was moving day. Sharon was ready. She had all her toys in boxes. The clothes from her chest of drawers were packed. Everything was out of her bathroom, except the toilet paper on the roller. Mommy had told her to leave her clothes in the closet alone because the moving men would hang them all in a special box to take to the new house.

  The moving men were coming this morning with a big truck. Everything in Sharon’s house would go into the truck.

   Well, not quite everything. Sharon had a lovely collection of portraits hidden in a special place beside her bed. She had been making them for a long time, since she was very small. The portraits were of people who had helped her in some way as she grew up.

It was hard being a kid when you looked different. She looked in her mirror and saw her slanted eyes and chubby cheeks. She saw her pug nose and thick lips.

Mommy said she was beautiful, and so did those people on the wall.

Her friend, Alicia, liked to laugh with her on the play ground at school. Tom, the groundskeeper at school, always let her help pick up trash on the playground. He always told her how helpful she was and that made Sharon feel special.

Mrs. Endicott, her teacher in first grade, was so patient with her that year. It was so hard to learn to read, but Mrs. Endicott never gave up on her. Now that she was in fourth grade, she read really well. Sharon also thought about her tutor, Vivian, who made learning fun, even when it was a real struggle to understand the concepts.

Sharon's Sunday School class, all six of them, children and teacher, were on the wall. They were sitting in the prayer circle and Sharon put herself in the middle of this circle of friends. She was so happy when she was with them. They made her feel loved.

  Sharon felt sad, because she hadn’t known how to pack her collection of people. She was afraid to ask Mommy for help. She knew Mommy would be angry about the wall. Sharon tried to figure out a way to take them with her, but she was out of ideas.

She couldn't cut them out, they were not in frames so she couldn't take them down, she puzzled about it as she sat on the floor in her room, waiting for the moving men to come.

  Sharon thought maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if her things didn’t fit into the truck at all. If she had to stay at the old house, at least she would have some friends to keep her company. She would miss her family though.

  Now with her blond bangs pressed against the window, Sharon watched the moving van pull up in front of the house. She didn’t think it looked big enough to hold all the family’s belongings.

  The men were busy all morning. They emptied the living room. They took everything out of the kitchen, even the refrigerator. They packed all of Joe’s things from his bedroom. They packed Mommy’s and Daddy’s things from their bedroom. They took the dining room furniture and everything from the family room and from both bathrooms. They emptied the garage. There was a lot of stuff in the garage.

   The truck was almost full when they got to Sharon’s room. She was starting to worry that her things wouldn’t fit in the truck.

   The men moved Sharon’s chest of drawers. They hung everything from her closet in a huge cardboard 

closet on wheels. They rolled it to the truck and came back.

   Sharon sat in the corner of her room. She watched the men take her bed apart and carry the pieces out carefully.

   Mommy came in with coffee for the movers. She turned to set the paper cups on a box. That’s when she

saw the pictures lined up along the baseboard.

   “Oh no! Sharon! What is that on the wall where the bed was?”

   “Those are my love people, Mommy. Each one has a story. Do you want to hear one?”

   “Love people? Oh, Sharon, on the wall? You know better than to draw on the wall. Now you will have

to help me paint this room before we can leave. I’d better put getting paint on my ‘to do’ list. I don’t have time for this, Sharon.” Mommy sounded angry. Sharon had known Mommy would be angry.

   Sharon’s big brown eyes filled with tears. Her lips trembled.

   “Oh, honey, I’m sorry. I just don’t understand why you would draw on the wall.”

   “Well Mommy, you keep your love people on the wall. I thought that’s where love people belonged. See here is Mrs. Endicott and Tom and Vivian from school. And this is Alicia, my friend from down the street. Here is my Sunday School class, they are praying for me. I put my love people on my wall like you did with your love people.   

   “Are you talking about te pictures of family and relatives that were hung in the hallway?”

   “Yes. Aren’t they your love people?”

   “I guess they are, but what is different about my love people and yours, Sharon?”

Sharon thought hard for a moment. She had started collecting her love people when she was very small. She thought about why she had put them behind the bed where Mommy wouldn't see them. She finally looked up at Mommy.

   “Yours are in pretty frames and you get to take them to the new house,” Sharon answered sadly.

   “Why?”

   “Because yours come off the wall.”

   “That’s right,” said Mommy.

Suddenly, Sharon had an idea!

   “What if I put my love people on paper?” Sharon asked. “Then I could put them in frames like yours and hang them on my bedroom wall.”

   “I think that would be better than drawing them right on the wall,” Mommy said. “Don’t you?”

   “They would be much easier to pack if we ever had to move again,” Sharon said, smiling at her mother.

   Mommy laughed and gave Sharon a squeeze as they sat on the floor together. The movers had come back for the last three boxes.

   “Are they going to fit?” Sharon asked on of the men while he drank some coffee.

  “Yes, ma’am, with room to spare.”

  “Good,” sighed Sharon. She snuggled into Mommy’s arms.

  “Let’s go get that paint, be thinking about what color you would like to get. ” Mommy said. “We might need to get an ice cream cone, too. Would you like that, Sharon?”

  “May I have a double chocolate fudge?”

  “Why not? Go get Joe and meet me at the car. I’ll get my purse.” Mommy stood up and left the room.

   Sharon walked slowly to the wall. She knelt, touching each picture gently. “Good-bye,” she said softly. " I will miss you."

"Joe, Mommy is waiting for us at the car. Let's go!" Sharon called as she saw Joe in the empty kitchen. "We are going for ice-cream!"