Girls, Boys and Ants

The yellowy light of the morning sun smelled weird because of the tree in the middle of the school patio, the kids would say. What a dumb idea, the kids would say; all they wanted to do was play boys-get-girls, and the huge tree took up too much space from the patio. 

She didn’t mind the tree. She actually liked to watch the ants running on the roots, wondering where they were going in such a hurry, wishing there was a little bit more of snack. 

The snack would always end so quickly. There was never more of it to bring to the school, and she wouldn't dare to ask her daddy for more while they shopped for it. There were even times in which he would just get the liquid part of the snack, the sweet yogurt, and forget the solid; no, daddy, she would say, the solid's missing, because she knew words like liquid and solid, because she was smart. So her daddy would get her a pack of six chocolate cookies and all she would think at school before 9 o'clock was the sweet yogurt with the chocolate cookies, that tasted so delicious when she dipped them in the sweet yogurt and waited until they were a bit soft. They were so good, so really good... And it felt even more really good to wait a bit more than what she would rather do... those little three seconds longer... five... six... TEN! before fitting the entire cookie quickly into her mouth, hmmm… she wondered if it was nasty to dip cookies into yogurt but damnnnnn... they tasted so good that 9 o'clock was the best time of the day. 

It was a shame that she was always so hungry before 9 o'clock that she could barely focus on that good feeling of newly-taken shower that everybody had before recess, even the sunlight (although it did smell a bit weird because of the tree in the middle of the patio, she had to admit). 

When 9 o'clock finally arrived, the kids would want to play boys-get-girls and eat fast so they could go play boys-get-girls already, and sometimes the girls would make a big picnic where everybody would share their snacks and she would gladly join them because it was ok to keep eating even if your own snack was eaten up, which was often her case. Then everybody could finally go play boys-get-girls, although the girls would sometimes get the boys too, but everybody just called it "boys-get-girls". 

"Let's play boys-get-girls", someone would say, then "bora", everybody would accept, and then the girls would run all over the school to avoid the boys, who would catch them and bring them back to the tree in the middle of the patio, where they couldn't leave until another girl touched their arm and freed them to run all over the school again and again until someone decided the boys were defeated and it was time for the girls to get them. 

But that day, that day out of all the other days, the sweet yogurt and the cookies ended even quickier; boys-get-girls had never been so much fun and she had already run all over the school but was now alone near the tree with nobody to save her, nobody but the ants, where were they going?, she was there alone with the ants and nothing else was happening when she saw the boy. He looked at her with the sunlight smelling weird on the air between them both. Where are the girls, she asked, and he said it is girls-get-boys now. They stayed in another long silence looking at the sunlight and his eyes were the same color as the chocolate cookies that would always end so fast.

The ants kept running, don’t they ever get tired?, and she didn't know what else to say. He was a bit weird. He was from São Paulo and used funny words sometimes, so she could never speak too much to him before her mouth wanted to smile, because of the funny way he spoke, and it was hard to speak and smile at the same time. Good thing there were ants on the roots of the tree, so he couldn’t see she was smiling.

It's girls-get-boys now, he had said. The way he said "meninos" and "meninas" always sounded so funny, the ants never stopped running, where could they be in such a rush to go?, if he sounded so different, like people on TV, so strange that she couldn't say anything but smile? Get me, he said, it's menino-pega-menina now, and suddenly his chocolate eyes were very close to her face and she said, run, boy, run, because she was smart and could speak and smile at the same time; then he didn’t say anything and started running on the nearly-empty patio and it would be better if the patio was not so empty, so she could just keep running and running and running forever like the ants forever running on the roots of the huge tree up to the highest branches, up to the very sunlight and its weird smell with that boy, that funny boy, his funny words and the funny way he said them; that weird boy that made her forget how to speak and remember how to smile with his delicious cookie eyes and his funny words from TV and his wet lips on her sweaty cheek and his soft hand on her hand and the way they were now namorados although he was just a menino and she was just a menina and her daddy would never let her have a namorado but now they would be together and have snack together and play boys-get-girls forever like the ants were forever running on the weird-smelling tree in the middle of the morning sunlight of the patio; too bad she couldn’t go to school that morning because her daddy had nothing to give her for a snack, liquid or solid.