Overthrowing Queen Bee

“Hey! Hey, wait up!” Called a little boy. He rushed air in and out of his lungs, pleading his little legs to carry him faster through the tall grass. “Kay! Kay! Hey, you guys, wait up!” 

He practically doubled over by the time he reached the trunk of an old oak where a skinny girl a few years his senior stood, picking the bark off the tree. She pried loose a long piece and waved it at the boy like a wand. 

“It's ‘Your Majesty Kay’ to you! Come quick, Sir Jaxon! Sir Micheal is awaiting your arrival!” 

The girl tossed the bark aside and began climbing an unsteady rope ladder hanging from the tree. The small boy tried to follow suit, but the ladder swung viciously after the girl and when he went to grab a hold, he obtained nothing but a fistful of air. He watched the girl’s dark curls bounce in time with the ladder as she disappeared in the lush green foliage. He tried again, successfully, carefully placing one stubby leg and then the other until he, too, reached the top of the ladder to their destination; a small, slowly rotting treehouse called Kay’s Castle. 

Once securely standing on the wooden platform, he tried to open the door to the treehouse. No luck. It was locked. The boy sighed then knocked on the door three times, snapped twice, clapped twice, and then whistled the tune of “happy birthday”. He tried the door again. Still locked. 

“C’mon guys!” His whine was answered with Kay’s giggles from the other side of the door. The boy's little face contorted, his eyes were shiny with frustration and his bottom lip puckering out into a pout. 

“I changed the password!” Kay sang in reply. 

“How am I supposed to know what it is, then?” the boy asked. 

“I dunno.”

“Micheal!” He cried. “I know you're in there Micheal! Please let me in!” 

“That’s not it! Keep guessing though!” Kay broke out into a giggling fit. 

He sat on the platform, defeated. 

Why does she always get to make the password, He mumbled to himself. 

A honey bee buzzed by his ear. He didn't flinch or flick it away; he just stared at it with inquisition. 

How do you do it, little guy? He asked the bee telepathically. How do you just keep buzzing around and making honey with the queen bee bossing you around all the time?

The door opened with a start revealing Micheal, a skinny boy who’s thin face is framed by thick blue glasses. He resembled Jaxon quite a bit but is nearer to Kay’s age. 

“You were being so quiet so I made Kay--”

“‘Your Majesty Kay!’” The girl interrupted from behind him. 

“-- Open the door because I thought you might have fallen off,” Micheal said, gesturing towards the wooden banister which, rotting and termite-infested, had seen better days. 

“Nope,” Jaxon watched the bee fly away to another tree and then stood to go inside the treehouse. 

“Not so fast!” said Kay, coming to the door. “You must learn the new password. It goes--” She snaps once then claps then snaps again then knocks on the wall three times followed by a stomp. “Now you.” 

“Why?” said Jaxon, defiance in his voice. 

“Because!” Kay demanded. 

“Because why?” He pouted again. 

“Because… because I’m queen, that’s why! And you are entering my castles,” Kay stood up a little straighter, confident in her response. “And! And if you don't, I’ll banish you. Or! Or lock you up in the dungeons!” 

“But why is it your castle, Kay,” Jaxon asked. 

They all think about that. 

“Yeah,” Micheal agrees. “We all found it together at the same time so shouldn’t it be all of our castles?” 

“But--but you need a leader or else there will be chaos!” Kay spat. 

“Then let's have a new leader! I vote for myself! Call me… King Jaxon! King Jaxon, King Jaxon,” Jaxon taunted. 

“What? No! Sir Jaxon, you cannot be our leader! I am the oldest so therefore I am the leader. It only makes sense! Queen Kay, Queen Kay, Queen--” 

“Nuh-uh!” Jaxon whined. 

“Yuh-huh!” Kay rebutted. 

“Nuh-uh! Nuh-uh! You and Micheal are the same age so you're not the oldest!” 

“Yuh-huh, because Sir Micheal and I are in the same grade, not the same age. I am four months and twenty days older so therefore, I am the oldest.”

Micheal who had been silently spectating up to this point, chimed in, “Well if I’m in between both of your ages then wouldn’t I be the best leader because I would know what’s best for both of you.” 

The children all pondered this for a while, letting the information slosh over their taste buds before swallowing. 

“Well, actually, no,” started Kay. “Actually if you were the leader, you would have favoritism towards Jaxon because you two are brothers. Do you know what favoritism is? No, of course not! But I do because my mom says she doesn’t have favoritism between me and Lexi. And because I know what it means and you don't, just proves that I am older and wiser and more fit to be queen!”

There’s another pause.

“We have all made our cases on why we should be the leader so now we must vote,” stated Micheal. 

“But how?” asked Jaxon. 

Micheal crossed to the trunk of the tree, pried off a large sheet of bark, and broke it into three pieces. Snap! Snap!

“Here. Now carve your vote with your fingernail. ‘M’ for Micheal, ‘J’ for Jaxon, or ‘K’ for Kay.” 

The children did. Jaxon dug his pointer fingernail into the wood and drew a long curve resembling a ‘J’, Micheal made a squiggle representing an ‘M’ and Kay connected three lines into a ‘K’. Micheal collects the bark slabs and frowned. 

“What is it? Who won?” Jaxon asked, impatiently. 

“We each got one vote,” replied Micheal. 

The other children matched Micheal’s frown. 

“What are we supposed to do now?” Jaxon groaned. 

“It’s simple; we’ll vote again,” proposed Micheal. 

“‘It’s simple,’” Kay said, mocking Micheal’s formal tone. “If we can’t agree on a new leader, then the old leader gets to be in charge. It’s the law.” 

“Nuh-uh! Says who?” said Jaxon. 

“Says me! And since I’m the queen, my word is the law so there!” 

“Nuh-uh!”

“Yuh-huh!”

“No, we have to vote again!” insisted Micheal. 

“Fine. Let’s vote,” Kay ripped one of the bark slabs from Micheal’s grasp. It was Jaxon’s bark displaying the letter ‘J’. Kay dug her nail into the wood and engraved two lines that stemmed from the center of Jaxon’s curve turning the ‘J’ into a ‘K’. 

“There,” she showed her craftsmanship to the boys. “Now there are two votes for Kay so I am the queen.” She waved the bark like a wand, barking orders to the boys. “You! Sir Micheal, you are on lookout duty and you--” she pointed the bark at Jaxon and waved it within his reach. Before she could say another word, he grabbed the bark and yanked it. 

“Hey!” Kay yelped, tightening her grip on the bark and yanking it back harder. Just then, Jaxon let go. Kay stumbled backward on the platform, her arms flailing behind her for something to catch her balance. 

But the only thing to catch her was the rotting, old banister which disintegrated under her weight. 

Then all that was there to catch her was the ground. 

***

In a neighboring tree, a honey bee returned to the hive after a long day of harvesting nectar. The queen bee disapproved of his return, for his work had not met her standards. She gave him two options. One, redo the work until it proved satisfactory or two, leave the hive and find a new home. To much the queen’s surprise, the honey bee turned around without hesitation and stung her.