The First Day of School: Read the winners of our August Writing Challenge
Our Southern Christian Writers Conference members always show up and show out each month for our writing challenges. And August was no different!
Our challenge for this month was to write a fictional story based on the first day of school; the first day could be anything (kindergarten to college, from a teacher's or student's perspective; the topic was wide open for our writers' creativity).
We had so many wonderful submissions and, as always, it was very difficult to pick a winner. But, we narrowed the selections down to these top finalists. We think you'll be as inspired as we were when you read what they've created.
Congratulations to the following writers for their awesome stories:
1st place: Cheyanne Hanlon
2nd place: Madison Hope Lawrence
3rd place: Aimee Graham
Honorable mention: Marla Price
Enjoy reading the stories below, and thank you to everyone who wrote a story for the challenge.
"The Bell That Learned her Name"
by Cheyanne Hanlon
The bell over Maple Ridge Elementary’s front doors chimed like a polite teaspoon against a teacup—too gentle, Mrs. Green thought, for the chaos it was meant to marshal. She had asked the district for something louder, something decisive, something that could slice through the first-day thrum of sneakers and squeals and parents practicing bravery with their faces. The district sent back a bell that sounded like a lullaby apologizing for waking you.
“Good morning, good morning,” she sang anyway, because principals, like bells, had jobs to do regardless of tone. “Line up by the rainbow cones, kinders!”
The little ones swelled into a tide of backpacks. Dinosaurs yawned across fabric. Unicorns stared into space with glitter-shocked eyes. A boy dragged a bag shaped like a taco. Someone’s zipper was a wind chime. Someone else’s shoelace was a story about to happen.
The little ones swelled into a tide of backpacks. Dinosaurs yawned across fabric. Unicorns stared into space with glitter-shocked eyes. A boy dragged a bag shaped like a taco. Someone’s zipper was a wind chime. Someone else’s shoelace was a story about to happen.
A woman stood half-hidden by the crepe myrtle, hugging a pink jacket to her chest though the Florida heat had already suggested otherwise. Beside her, a small girl with a dandelion puff of hair bounced on her toes, then stopped, then stared at the school as if it were a ship about to ask her to captain it.
“Emily?” the woman said—softly, not to call her, but to test the name against the morning. The girl tilted her chin like a sunflower considering the sun.
Mrs. Green noticed them in the way she always noticed the ones who were both ready and not. “You must be Emily,” she said, gliding over. “And you must be Mom.”
“Chelle,” the woman said. “Short for Rochelle. We’re, um… we’re new at this.”
“Everyone is,” Mrs. Green said. “Even me, every year.”
Emily peered up. “Do the bells have names?”
“Not yet,” Mrs. Green said. “Would you like to name them?”
The child considered this with grave attention. “That one”—she pointed at the entrance—“is Whisper. The one in the hallway is Echo. And the one in the classroom is Listen.”
“Perfect,” said Mrs. Green, who would later label them on the maintenance chart in tiny pencil: Whisper/Echo/Listen. “Miss Hart’s class is inside. She has the blue door with the bees.”
Chelle knelt to zip the pink jacket into Emily’s backpack. “You got this, Em,” she murmured. It was not a cliché when she said it; it was a promise she had rehearsed for years without language. There had been so much practice in becoming okay.
Emily took her mother’s hand anyway, then let go in the small, brave way that breaks and mends you at once.
Inside the classroom, bees the size of saucers hummed across the bulletin board. Some wore tiny paper crowns. Some had penciled-in smiles. All had names beneath them in careful print: Kai. Noor. Jayden. LucÃa. Blessing. The letters were proud and trying not to wobble.
“Hi, sweetpea,” Miss Hart said, kneeling to eye level. She had a sundress with pockets (which is a teacher’s version of armor) and hair pinned back with a pencil. “What’s your name?”
“Emily,” she said. “Like the poet in the old book at my grandma’s.”
Miss Hart’s smile doubled. “Well, that’s a beautiful name to share. Would you like to put your bee up?” She gestured to a blank paper bee waiting near the top, as if this particular bee had saved the highest branch just for Emily.
Emily studied the room first. The glitter table sparkled like a galaxy. The blocks were stacked in a perfect tower that begged to be imperfect. A poster near the sink showed a cartoon soap bubble wearing a crown. The classroom goldfish, Mr. Mango, regarded her with the half-lidded skepticism of someone who had seen at least five first days and could not be astonished unless lunch included peas.
Emily’s fingers hovered above the paper bee, then landed with determination. She pressed it under the letter E on the chart where words like Empathy and Explore and Everybody lived.
“I like your bee’s wings,” she told Miss Hart. “They look like they’re listening.”
“Wings are good at that,” Miss Hart agreed. “So are ears. So are hearts.” She put a gentle dot of glue where the bee would live. “Find any table you like. We’re drawing our superpowers.”
Emily’s hand tightened around her pencil before she had even chosen a seat. Superpowers she understood. She had learned to count heartbeats by the way her mother’s fingers tapped her wrist during checkups. She had learned to sleep through beeps. She had learned to notice the exact moment—between fear and bravery—when the light changed color but didn’t change at all.
At Table Three, a boy with hair that looked like he’d outrun a hurricane scribbled lightning bolts. “I can run fast,” he declared. “Like a cheetah that drank coffee.”
“I can hear far,” said a girl with beads braided into stars. “I heard my cat yawn.”
“I can make friends,” Emily said quietly, drawing a pair of shoes. She outlined them, double-knotted them, and filled the laces with the word Hello, over and over, because sometimes hello is the power and sometimes it is the cape.
Outside the window, the car line dissolved into waves of hands, some shaky. Chelle stood a beat longer than most, a statue with a breath inside it, then turned to go. She did not cry until the brick curved around the building and she couldn’t hear Whisper anymore. Then she put a palm flat against the wall and exhaled the kind of breath that remembers tubes and wires and the way a tiny mouth first learned the shape of home.
By 8:20 a.m., the classroom was a symphony. Pencils tinked against the rim of a jar. Someone laughed into their milk carton and made it snort. Mr. Mango approved of everything with an expression that implied mistrust. Miss Hart walked between tables like a gardener trimming anxiety and watering courage.
They read a book about a small seed. They learned to stack voices like pancakes: syrup on top, warm all the way through, and only one at a time. They practiced asking for help the way superheroes ask for backup. They toured the school so it wouldn’t feel like a maze that only grown-ups understood.
In the hallway, the older kids sluiced past in loose shoals of gossip and deodorant. A fifth-grade girl slowed to grin down at the kindergartners. “Welcome to big kid school,” she said, monarch of her own hallway kingdom.
“Thank you,” Emily replied, because kindness was a verb in her family. The fifth-grader blinked at being thanked, then stood taller than her backpack would allow.
At the library, a cart of picture books wore a sign that said, Borrow Me. Emily ran her fingers along spines the way some children touch piano keys. Her hand paused on a book with a bright red kite.
“I like kites,” she told no one in particular.
The librarian, Mr. Rowe, overheard. “Wind you can see,” he said, “is just a kite teaching you it exists.”
“I used to have a tube that taught me to breathe,” Emily said matter-of-factly. “My mom kept singing until the machine learned my name.”
Mr. Rowe’s eyes glistened. “Machines are slow learners,” he said softly. “But they get there.”
At recess, the playground was a democracy of speed. There was a line for the slide, which Miss Hart called a ‘practice patience machine.’ There were negotiations over who would be the dragon and who would be the brave kid who discovered the dragon just wanted to learn trapeze. There was a game in which the ground was lava, the mulch was a ship, and the ship was also a pony named Maple.
Near the swing set, a girl in a purple shirt stood apart with her fingers woven together like a net. She watched, eyes wide, as if the playground were a TV show she didn’t have the remote for.
Emily walked over. “Hi,” she said, because capes unfurl best when they are simple. “Do you want to push me and then I can push you?”
The girl didn’t answer at first; her gaze flickered to the sky, the slide, the painted hopscotch squares. Then, slowly, she nodded. Her hands loosened. She moved to the back of the swing and wrapped her palms around the chains as if they were the handles of a chariot.
“What’s your name?” Emily asked.
“Nova,” the girl whispered, voice like the inside of a shell.
“I like stars,” Emily said. “When I was little, I had a window that didn’t open and I watched them anyway. They looked like the good kind of freckles.”
Nova made a sound that was almost a laugh. She pushed—too gently at first, then with a rhythm that found itself the way a heartbeat does. The swing began its pendulum, forward and back, forward and back, teaching the air to hold you.
“Now you,” Emily said, hopping off when Miss Hart’s whistle chirped to remind everyone about the art of slowing down. She leaned her weight into the chains and pushed, finding the cadence, the stretch, the moment when the ground traded places with the sky.
Nova did not kick her feet. She folded them beneath her and let the wind calendar the pages of her hair. When the swing reached the apex, she inhaled. When it came back, she spoke—softly at first, then loud enough that the wind could carry it all the way to Whisper and Echo and Listen.
“Higher,” she said. “Please.”
Emily grinned and obliged.
By lunchtime, the cafeteria was its own continent. The smell of pizza pretended to be Italy. Apples were just shy of being brave enough to roll. A boy at Table D used carrot sticks as drumsticks until the music teacher materialized like myth and gave him a real pair with the warning: “Only if your rhythm is kind.”
Emily unzipped her backpack. The pink jacket tumbled out, and with it, a note folded into a butterfly. She unfolded it with the ceremony such things deserve.
Dear Em, the loopy letters read. If the world is loud, remember you can make a quiet. If the world is quiet, remember you can make a hello. Love, Mom.
Emily put the note under her milk so it wouldn’t fly away. Across from her, Nova lined up her grapes like planets.
“I never had school before,” Nova said. “Not with this many people. My mom says it’s okay to take breaks. She taught me a stare that means ‘I need a minute.’”
Emily tried the stare. It made her look like she was solving a puzzle only she could see. “I like it,” she said. “I have a breath my mom taught me. Want to trade?”
They did: stare and breath, breath and stare, something to keep in pockets along with rocks and stickers and spare bravery.
After lunch came rest time, which was a brilliant lie and the most honest thing the schedule did all day. The lights dimmed. The hum of the air conditioner sounded like the first page of a good book. The children sprawled on mats that smelled faintly of soap and summertime. Miss Hart read a story about a mouse who opened a bakery and learned fractions by slicing kindness into equal parts.
Emily lay on her side, facing the bookshelf. Her eyes gathered sleep but didn’t keep it. She thought about her mother’s hand against brick, about Nova saying higher, about the bell named Listen. She thought about the way the school held all their separate heartbeats and made them into something that sounded like a place.
In the front office, the intercom buzzed. “Mrs. Green?” came the secretary’s voice. “We have a delivery.”
“First day flowers?” Mrs. Green asked, already moving. “Or cupcakes we can’t legally accept but will ethically enjoy?”
“It’s a shoebox,” the secretary said. “From a grandma.”
Mrs. Green smiled. “That is the most powerful sentence I’ve heard today.”
The shoebox was wrapped in brown paper and tied with yarn that was likely once on a sweater that had a story. Inside, on a bed of tissue that sighed like a very small forest, sat a bell. It was not polite. It was not apologetic. It was, if a bell could be, true.
A note lay on top in careful cursive: For the school that will teach my granddaughter to hear herself. I found this at a yard sale twenty years ago and saved it for a day when someone needed to be called back to their name. Ring it when you must. Sincerely, Joan (who answers to Jo, Nana, and Hey You).
Mrs. Green lifted the bell. It had weight. It had a voice like a silver line through a cloud.
She took it to the kindergarten hallway, where Miss Hart was coaxing sleepers awake with the gentleness of rain. “We have a new Listen,” Mrs. Green said, and the children’s heads popped up like prairie dogs who had agreed, reluctantly, to rest.
“Can I—?” Emily asked, sitting cross-legged, palms on her knees like a yogi who took snack time seriously.
Mrs. Green considered, then knelt. “On the count of three,” she said, and covered Emily’s hand with her own so that the bell would learn both their names at once. “One, two, three.”
The bell sang.
It was louder than Whisper, clearer than Echo, and when it rang, it did not scold. It searched. The sound went down the hall and into the cafeteria and out to the car loop and up to the flag and over the playground where the swing remembered momentum, and it told everyone: here you are. Here you are. Here you are.
In Room 104, Nova smiled so wide her eyes nearly closed. “That one’s Star,” she whispered.
Emily nodded. “Star knows how to listen.”
The rest of the day walked forward the way new things do—with a few scuffs, a handful of triumphs, and a nap that was more about hope than sleep. At dismissal, parents stood on the far side of the fence with faces like windows at dusk.
Chelle pressed her palms to the chain links as if to learn what the metal knew. When Emily came into view, carrying a paper crown that said I am five and also a universe, Chelle’s relief arrived in her bones first, then her breath, then her eyes.
“How was it?” she asked, voice steady only because it had practiced.
“I named the bells,” Emily announced. “I pushed a star higher. I traded a stare for a breath. I met a mouse made of fractions. And the new bell learned me.”
Chelle knelt. “Learned you what, baby?”
“My name,” Emily said simply. “It learned all our names.”
Chelle closed her eyes and opened them, the way you do when the past and present shake hands. “Did you like it?”
Emily thought with the seriousness of queens and scientists and kindergartners on the first day of the rest of everything. “I think,” she said, slipping her hand into her mother’s, “I will like it again tomorrow.”
The bell over the door—Whisper—gave its delicate chime to bless the decision. Above their heads, the new bell on the blue-bee door waited for its next chance, the hallway holding the echo of its silver voice like a promise.
On the sidewalk, a breeze lifted the note from under the milk in Emily’s lunchbox and tucked it deeper into the pocket where she kept her stare and her breath. Stars would be out later, the good kind of freckles, and tomorrow the playground would need pushing again.
For now, the first day was finished, and it had learned her name.
“Emily?” the woman said—softly, not to call her, but to test the name against the morning. The girl tilted her chin like a sunflower considering the sun.
Mrs. Green noticed them in the way she always noticed the ones who were both ready and not. “You must be Emily,” she said, gliding over. “And you must be Mom.”
“Chelle,” the woman said. “Short for Rochelle. We’re, um… we’re new at this.”
“Everyone is,” Mrs. Green said. “Even me, every year.”
Emily peered up. “Do the bells have names?”
“Not yet,” Mrs. Green said. “Would you like to name them?”
The child considered this with grave attention. “That one”—she pointed at the entrance—“is Whisper. The one in the hallway is Echo. And the one in the classroom is Listen.”
“Perfect,” said Mrs. Green, who would later label them on the maintenance chart in tiny pencil: Whisper/Echo/Listen. “Miss Hart’s class is inside. She has the blue door with the bees.”
Chelle knelt to zip the pink jacket into Emily’s backpack. “You got this, Em,” she murmured. It was not a cliché when she said it; it was a promise she had rehearsed for years without language. There had been so much practice in becoming okay.
Emily took her mother’s hand anyway, then let go in the small, brave way that breaks and mends you at once.
Inside the classroom, bees the size of saucers hummed across the bulletin board. Some wore tiny paper crowns. Some had penciled-in smiles. All had names beneath them in careful print: Kai. Noor. Jayden. LucÃa. Blessing. The letters were proud and trying not to wobble.
“Hi, sweetpea,” Miss Hart said, kneeling to eye level. She had a sundress with pockets (which is a teacher’s version of armor) and hair pinned back with a pencil. “What’s your name?”
“Emily,” she said. “Like the poet in the old book at my grandma’s.”
Miss Hart’s smile doubled. “Well, that’s a beautiful name to share. Would you like to put your bee up?” She gestured to a blank paper bee waiting near the top, as if this particular bee had saved the highest branch just for Emily.
Emily studied the room first. The glitter table sparkled like a galaxy. The blocks were stacked in a perfect tower that begged to be imperfect. A poster near the sink showed a cartoon soap bubble wearing a crown. The classroom goldfish, Mr. Mango, regarded her with the half-lidded skepticism of someone who had seen at least five first days and could not be astonished unless lunch included peas.
Emily’s fingers hovered above the paper bee, then landed with determination. She pressed it under the letter E on the chart where words like Empathy and Explore and Everybody lived.
“I like your bee’s wings,” she told Miss Hart. “They look like they’re listening.”
“Wings are good at that,” Miss Hart agreed. “So are ears. So are hearts.” She put a gentle dot of glue where the bee would live. “Find any table you like. We’re drawing our superpowers.”
Emily’s hand tightened around her pencil before she had even chosen a seat. Superpowers she understood. She had learned to count heartbeats by the way her mother’s fingers tapped her wrist during checkups. She had learned to sleep through beeps. She had learned to notice the exact moment—between fear and bravery—when the light changed color but didn’t change at all.
At Table Three, a boy with hair that looked like he’d outrun a hurricane scribbled lightning bolts. “I can run fast,” he declared. “Like a cheetah that drank coffee.”
“I can hear far,” said a girl with beads braided into stars. “I heard my cat yawn.”
“I can make friends,” Emily said quietly, drawing a pair of shoes. She outlined them, double-knotted them, and filled the laces with the word Hello, over and over, because sometimes hello is the power and sometimes it is the cape.
Outside the window, the car line dissolved into waves of hands, some shaky. Chelle stood a beat longer than most, a statue with a breath inside it, then turned to go. She did not cry until the brick curved around the building and she couldn’t hear Whisper anymore. Then she put a palm flat against the wall and exhaled the kind of breath that remembers tubes and wires and the way a tiny mouth first learned the shape of home.
By 8:20 a.m., the classroom was a symphony. Pencils tinked against the rim of a jar. Someone laughed into their milk carton and made it snort. Mr. Mango approved of everything with an expression that implied mistrust. Miss Hart walked between tables like a gardener trimming anxiety and watering courage.
They read a book about a small seed. They learned to stack voices like pancakes: syrup on top, warm all the way through, and only one at a time. They practiced asking for help the way superheroes ask for backup. They toured the school so it wouldn’t feel like a maze that only grown-ups understood.
In the hallway, the older kids sluiced past in loose shoals of gossip and deodorant. A fifth-grade girl slowed to grin down at the kindergartners. “Welcome to big kid school,” she said, monarch of her own hallway kingdom.
“Thank you,” Emily replied, because kindness was a verb in her family. The fifth-grader blinked at being thanked, then stood taller than her backpack would allow.
At the library, a cart of picture books wore a sign that said, Borrow Me. Emily ran her fingers along spines the way some children touch piano keys. Her hand paused on a book with a bright red kite.
“I like kites,” she told no one in particular.
The librarian, Mr. Rowe, overheard. “Wind you can see,” he said, “is just a kite teaching you it exists.”
“I used to have a tube that taught me to breathe,” Emily said matter-of-factly. “My mom kept singing until the machine learned my name.”
Mr. Rowe’s eyes glistened. “Machines are slow learners,” he said softly. “But they get there.”
At recess, the playground was a democracy of speed. There was a line for the slide, which Miss Hart called a ‘practice patience machine.’ There were negotiations over who would be the dragon and who would be the brave kid who discovered the dragon just wanted to learn trapeze. There was a game in which the ground was lava, the mulch was a ship, and the ship was also a pony named Maple.
Near the swing set, a girl in a purple shirt stood apart with her fingers woven together like a net. She watched, eyes wide, as if the playground were a TV show she didn’t have the remote for.
Emily walked over. “Hi,” she said, because capes unfurl best when they are simple. “Do you want to push me and then I can push you?”
The girl didn’t answer at first; her gaze flickered to the sky, the slide, the painted hopscotch squares. Then, slowly, she nodded. Her hands loosened. She moved to the back of the swing and wrapped her palms around the chains as if they were the handles of a chariot.
“What’s your name?” Emily asked.
“Nova,” the girl whispered, voice like the inside of a shell.
“I like stars,” Emily said. “When I was little, I had a window that didn’t open and I watched them anyway. They looked like the good kind of freckles.”
Nova made a sound that was almost a laugh. She pushed—too gently at first, then with a rhythm that found itself the way a heartbeat does. The swing began its pendulum, forward and back, forward and back, teaching the air to hold you.
“Now you,” Emily said, hopping off when Miss Hart’s whistle chirped to remind everyone about the art of slowing down. She leaned her weight into the chains and pushed, finding the cadence, the stretch, the moment when the ground traded places with the sky.
Nova did not kick her feet. She folded them beneath her and let the wind calendar the pages of her hair. When the swing reached the apex, she inhaled. When it came back, she spoke—softly at first, then loud enough that the wind could carry it all the way to Whisper and Echo and Listen.
“Higher,” she said. “Please.”
Emily grinned and obliged.
By lunchtime, the cafeteria was its own continent. The smell of pizza pretended to be Italy. Apples were just shy of being brave enough to roll. A boy at Table D used carrot sticks as drumsticks until the music teacher materialized like myth and gave him a real pair with the warning: “Only if your rhythm is kind.”
Emily unzipped her backpack. The pink jacket tumbled out, and with it, a note folded into a butterfly. She unfolded it with the ceremony such things deserve.
Dear Em, the loopy letters read. If the world is loud, remember you can make a quiet. If the world is quiet, remember you can make a hello. Love, Mom.
Emily put the note under her milk so it wouldn’t fly away. Across from her, Nova lined up her grapes like planets.
“I never had school before,” Nova said. “Not with this many people. My mom says it’s okay to take breaks. She taught me a stare that means ‘I need a minute.’”
Emily tried the stare. It made her look like she was solving a puzzle only she could see. “I like it,” she said. “I have a breath my mom taught me. Want to trade?”
They did: stare and breath, breath and stare, something to keep in pockets along with rocks and stickers and spare bravery.
After lunch came rest time, which was a brilliant lie and the most honest thing the schedule did all day. The lights dimmed. The hum of the air conditioner sounded like the first page of a good book. The children sprawled on mats that smelled faintly of soap and summertime. Miss Hart read a story about a mouse who opened a bakery and learned fractions by slicing kindness into equal parts.
Emily lay on her side, facing the bookshelf. Her eyes gathered sleep but didn’t keep it. She thought about her mother’s hand against brick, about Nova saying higher, about the bell named Listen. She thought about the way the school held all their separate heartbeats and made them into something that sounded like a place.
In the front office, the intercom buzzed. “Mrs. Green?” came the secretary’s voice. “We have a delivery.”
“First day flowers?” Mrs. Green asked, already moving. “Or cupcakes we can’t legally accept but will ethically enjoy?”
“It’s a shoebox,” the secretary said. “From a grandma.”
Mrs. Green smiled. “That is the most powerful sentence I’ve heard today.”
The shoebox was wrapped in brown paper and tied with yarn that was likely once on a sweater that had a story. Inside, on a bed of tissue that sighed like a very small forest, sat a bell. It was not polite. It was not apologetic. It was, if a bell could be, true.
A note lay on top in careful cursive: For the school that will teach my granddaughter to hear herself. I found this at a yard sale twenty years ago and saved it for a day when someone needed to be called back to their name. Ring it when you must. Sincerely, Joan (who answers to Jo, Nana, and Hey You).
Mrs. Green lifted the bell. It had weight. It had a voice like a silver line through a cloud.
She took it to the kindergarten hallway, where Miss Hart was coaxing sleepers awake with the gentleness of rain. “We have a new Listen,” Mrs. Green said, and the children’s heads popped up like prairie dogs who had agreed, reluctantly, to rest.
“Can I—?” Emily asked, sitting cross-legged, palms on her knees like a yogi who took snack time seriously.
Mrs. Green considered, then knelt. “On the count of three,” she said, and covered Emily’s hand with her own so that the bell would learn both their names at once. “One, two, three.”
The bell sang.
It was louder than Whisper, clearer than Echo, and when it rang, it did not scold. It searched. The sound went down the hall and into the cafeteria and out to the car loop and up to the flag and over the playground where the swing remembered momentum, and it told everyone: here you are. Here you are. Here you are.
In Room 104, Nova smiled so wide her eyes nearly closed. “That one’s Star,” she whispered.
Emily nodded. “Star knows how to listen.”
The rest of the day walked forward the way new things do—with a few scuffs, a handful of triumphs, and a nap that was more about hope than sleep. At dismissal, parents stood on the far side of the fence with faces like windows at dusk.
Chelle pressed her palms to the chain links as if to learn what the metal knew. When Emily came into view, carrying a paper crown that said I am five and also a universe, Chelle’s relief arrived in her bones first, then her breath, then her eyes.
“How was it?” she asked, voice steady only because it had practiced.
“I named the bells,” Emily announced. “I pushed a star higher. I traded a stare for a breath. I met a mouse made of fractions. And the new bell learned me.”
Chelle knelt. “Learned you what, baby?”
“My name,” Emily said simply. “It learned all our names.”
Chelle closed her eyes and opened them, the way you do when the past and present shake hands. “Did you like it?”
Emily thought with the seriousness of queens and scientists and kindergartners on the first day of the rest of everything. “I think,” she said, slipping her hand into her mother’s, “I will like it again tomorrow.”
The bell over the door—Whisper—gave its delicate chime to bless the decision. Above their heads, the new bell on the blue-bee door waited for its next chance, the hallway holding the echo of its silver voice like a promise.
On the sidewalk, a breeze lifted the note from under the milk in Emily’s lunchbox and tucked it deeper into the pocket where she kept her stare and her breath. Stars would be out later, the good kind of freckles, and tomorrow the playground would need pushing again.
For now, the first day was finished, and it had learned her name.
"The Crossing Guard"
by Madison Hope Lawrence
“Don’t forget to eat something,” Meredith had smiled over his shoulder as he swung his legs over the bed that morning. “I don’t want you to pass out in this heat.”
“I won’t,” he grumbled. Meredith rested her head back on the pillow and fell back asleep. A pang of grief flashed through his chest as he remembered in their younger days when they always greeted the morning together, cup of coffee shared and devotion read before the kids got up. They’d started the tradition when the chaos of tiny children ended with Emmy starting kindergarten, climbing the steps of the yellow bus with their other three. This gave them twenty minutes of silence before he had to leave for work and they made the most of it.
Now Meredith’s hair, usually cut in a shoulder-length bob, was absent and she was too tired to get out of bed some mornings. The doctors said they caught the cancer early enough, though, so after she beat it, they could continue as usual. For now, he would bring coffee and the Bible to her bed when he returned from his job.
He had dressed, thinking how his mind didn’t feel a day over 35, but the mirror and the eye rolls from his children when he said something “old” told him otherwise. He liked to work, but his knees kept him from doing as much as he liked. But overall, he didn’t mind being old. He liked the freedom of retirement.
After slipping on his shoes, he slid on his hi vis vest and a superhero hat. The kids loved his superhero hats. It gave him a conversation starter to connect with the kids. Today he was Superman, just in time for the new movie.
The last thing he grabbed was a granola bar from the pantry on his way out the door. He chewed on the granola bar, chocolate chip was his favorite, as he padded down the street to the crossing.
Henry the fresh feeling of mornings. Somehow, he’d always been a morning person, even as a young man. In his 68 years, he’d slept in past eight only when he was sick or had been traveling. This morning was muggy, and stickiness in the air before breakfast meant it would be a day unlike the crisp fall mornings Henry associated with the first day of school when he was a student. Then, of course, they didn’t start until after Labor Day, but school started earlier every year, he thought. At the current rate, the next generation would associate the return to school with the day after the Fourth of July.
He stood on the corner and waited for kids to come. He loved seeing them in their first day of school clothes. There were the excited kids and the scared kids. There were the indifferent kids, the social kids, the shy kids. He always remembered Jesus’s words about children as he led them across the street every morning, and Henry, too, loved children.
Except the kids with the bad behavior.
Henry struggled with the kids who defied him, cursed him, and tried to steal his sign. Those kids tested him in every way and were the focus of many prayer sessions.
He tried to love them, too, but they made it difficult.
Fortunately, there were only two or three of them every year.
“Mr. Henry!”
He turned to see Lila Daniels running toward him. Second grade had made her bold and confident, he realized. His first year as a crossing guard had been her first year of school, and they had grown together. Her parents had to work early, so she was often the first kid to get to the crossing, getting to school the moment the doors opened.
“How was your summer?”
“We went to Oregon!”
“Was that fun?”
She wrinkled her nose. “We had to visit my great aunt Jennifer and she doesn’t have kids and she was boring.”
Henry laughed. “Uh oh.”
The light changed and Henry guided her across the street.
The morning ticked on and he guided other kids and their parents safely across the street, chattering and laughing at the prospect of the day ahead. New school years always held new possibilities, Henry thought. He missed that about school.
His shift was almost done when he spotted Logan in a crowd of kids walking toward him. He straightened almost subconsciously and drew in a deep breath.
Logan was one of the Bad Kids Henry struggled with. 10-years-old and already defiant, testing boundaries. He bullied the other kids at the traffic light and he tried to bully Henry. Henry didn’t know anything about Logan’s home life but imagined parents who set no limits and did not discipline him. At least he only had to deal with Logan for two minutes. He felt bad for Logan’s teacher who had to deal with him all day.
Henry managed the kids as they waited for the walk light to turn in their favor.
“Mr. Henry, look at my new shoes!” Violet called.
“Very nice—” Henry stopped as Logan darted out from the sidewalk. “Logan!” he yelled, running toward him.
“There aren’t any cars!” Logan yelled, running into the street.
Logan didn’t see the car turning left, but Henry did.
Henry didn’t know he could run so fast.
He heard the shrieking of brakes and the squeal of wheels on the pavement. Henry lunged and pushed Logan out of the way of the oncoming car.
Pain exploded in his shoulder as the bumper clipped him, driving him straight down into the asphalt.
***
A broken clavicle later, Henry felt fortunate the car had been going no more than 3mph when it hit him. Logan required stitches on his forehead where he had hit the pavement after Henry pushed him.
“You know I’m trying to keep you safe,” Henry explained to him, padding over to Logan’s room next door while he waited for the nurse to bring his discharge papers.
“I don’t care about being safe,” Logan grumbled.
“Really?” Henry raised his eyebrows. “The yelling I heard coming out of this room when the doctor stitched your forehead suggests otherwise.”
Logan flushed. He looked at the floor. “What do you care anyway?”
“Well for one, it’s my job to care. And two, why wouldn’t I?”
“No one else cares.”
“No one? Your parents don’t care?”
Logan looked up at him, anger flashing across his face. “My mom says she’s coming but she’s not here yet. They think she’s held up at work, that’s what she told them, but she’s not. She’s too drunk to drive here. She’s been drinking all weekend. Ever since my little brother died, she just drinks and my dad left because he couldn’t handle it, but I’m supposed to handle it alone.”
Henry’s heart broke for the boy, and guilt filled him as he thought about the times he’d disliked Logan and lamented the state of parenthood these days. “You’re not alone, Logan. There are still plenty of people who care about you. You go to school where I know your teachers care. And I care.”
Henry hesitated, wondering whether he should say more. “I don’t know you very well, but many people feel better when they believe God cares about them.”
“If my own dad doesn’t care about me, why would God?”
“Oh Logan. People make mistakes and do bad things. But God doesn’t.”
“Where is He then?”
“Wherever you need Him to be.”
A woman with unkempt blonde hair and disheveled clothing marched in the room as if ready to fight. She stopped when she saw Henry. “Who are you?”
“Mom, this is Mr. Henry. He’s the crossing guard.”
“You’re the one who pushed my son? I hope you are ready to pay the hospital bill.”
Logan rolled his eyes. “Mom, he saved me. He...” realization flooded across his face as if he hadn’t realized until this moment the full ramifications of what had almost happened. “If he hadn’t pushed me, the car would have hit me.”
“That’s right!” A nurse appeared in the doorway with some papers in hand. “Mr. Henry is a true hero. I can tell you from working trauma for eight years that while the car wasn’t going very fast, Logan is shorter than Mr. Henry and it would have hit Logan in the shoulder instead of the waist like Mr. Henry. That kind of hit could easily have caused Logan to hit his head on the pavement. I’ve seen some pretty bad outcomes when kids are hit like that. You are very lucky Mr. Henry was there.”
Logan’s mother softened. “Why would you do that?”
“It’s my job,” Henry said.
The nurse tapped the papers in the palm of her hand. “I’ve got your discharge papers. Ready to go?”
Henry nodded. He started walking through the door, then turned back toward Logan. “It’s a new school year. A new beginning with a new teacher who doesn’t know you. It’s not too late to turn things around.”
For the first time Henry had ever seen, Logan smiled.
Julie Lewis inhaled the aroma of the steaming grits in her bowl. Her mother had made them just like she always did, with plenty of butter and salt, always the long-cook kind, because Mama wouldn’t be caught dead with instant grits in her kitchen. Just as they were almost done, she’d pour in a splash of heavy cream; it was the secret ingredient that took her grits over the top. She’d pile a little mountain of them into a bowl, and just like the cherry on top of a sundae gives it a finishing touch, Mama would crown the steaming grits with a generous pat of butter.
Those grits, made by loving hands, had always been the very essence of all that was comforting in the world, no matter how upside-down things got. But not today. Today, even her mama’s grits weren’t enough to bolster Julie’s courage. Her stomach in knots, she now sat dragging her spoon through the creamy concoction, making troughs and trails that ran with rivulets of the butter as it melted. She wished she could float away on one of those little streams, somewhere where she wouldn’t have to face this day… and the worst part was knowing she had signed up for this. What had she been thinking?
“You going to play with those grits all day?” Julie’s mom asked, drying her hands and taking the chair beside Julie. “I can practically smell the dread on you.”
“Actually…I think… I’ve decided… I’m not going.” Julie replied, making the decision as she heard herself speaking it.
“Not going?” her mom raised one eyebrow. “Of course you’re going. Otherwise you’re failing before you even begin. You wanted this!”
“So what if I wanted it?” Her confidence was growing… this felt right, she felt relieved at the idea of just backing out. “I have a whole graveyard of bad life decisions; I might as well bury this one too. And I know I wanted it. I know I signed up for it. But that was some other version of me. Extroverted me. Hopeful me. Now, in the bright light of day, introverted me is pretty ticked off about it. I just can’t.”
“Oh Jules… you’re 50 years old and—”
“I’m not 50!” Julie objected.
“OK, fine… you’re almost 50. It’s time to put on your big girl pants and move forward with your life. Your whole life, you’ve always accomplished whatever you set out to do –”
“I’m not that girl anymore, Mama!” Julie interrupted again. “I’m not her! She got lost somewhere along the way and all that’s left is this frumpy, outdated… 50-year-old…” she rolled her eyes at her mother’s wry smile, “… almost 50-year-old… who is practically a fossil.” She paused and let her shoulders slump and the two of them sat there in silence for a moment, her mom for once having the wisdom to sit quietly.
“If my own dad doesn’t care about me, why would God?”
“Oh Logan. People make mistakes and do bad things. But God doesn’t.”
“Where is He then?”
“Wherever you need Him to be.”
A woman with unkempt blonde hair and disheveled clothing marched in the room as if ready to fight. She stopped when she saw Henry. “Who are you?”
“Mom, this is Mr. Henry. He’s the crossing guard.”
“You’re the one who pushed my son? I hope you are ready to pay the hospital bill.”
Logan rolled his eyes. “Mom, he saved me. He...” realization flooded across his face as if he hadn’t realized until this moment the full ramifications of what had almost happened. “If he hadn’t pushed me, the car would have hit me.”
“That’s right!” A nurse appeared in the doorway with some papers in hand. “Mr. Henry is a true hero. I can tell you from working trauma for eight years that while the car wasn’t going very fast, Logan is shorter than Mr. Henry and it would have hit Logan in the shoulder instead of the waist like Mr. Henry. That kind of hit could easily have caused Logan to hit his head on the pavement. I’ve seen some pretty bad outcomes when kids are hit like that. You are very lucky Mr. Henry was there.”
Logan’s mother softened. “Why would you do that?”
“It’s my job,” Henry said.
The nurse tapped the papers in the palm of her hand. “I’ve got your discharge papers. Ready to go?”
Henry nodded. He started walking through the door, then turned back toward Logan. “It’s a new school year. A new beginning with a new teacher who doesn’t know you. It’s not too late to turn things around.”
For the first time Henry had ever seen, Logan smiled.
"A Degree of Second Chances"
by Aimee Graham
Julie Lewis inhaled the aroma of the steaming grits in her bowl. Her mother had made them just like she always did, with plenty of butter and salt, always the long-cook kind, because Mama wouldn’t be caught dead with instant grits in her kitchen. Just as they were almost done, she’d pour in a splash of heavy cream; it was the secret ingredient that took her grits over the top. She’d pile a little mountain of them into a bowl, and just like the cherry on top of a sundae gives it a finishing touch, Mama would crown the steaming grits with a generous pat of butter.
Those grits, made by loving hands, had always been the very essence of all that was comforting in the world, no matter how upside-down things got. But not today. Today, even her mama’s grits weren’t enough to bolster Julie’s courage. Her stomach in knots, she now sat dragging her spoon through the creamy concoction, making troughs and trails that ran with rivulets of the butter as it melted. She wished she could float away on one of those little streams, somewhere where she wouldn’t have to face this day… and the worst part was knowing she had signed up for this. What had she been thinking?
“You going to play with those grits all day?” Julie’s mom asked, drying her hands and taking the chair beside Julie. “I can practically smell the dread on you.”
“Actually…I think… I’ve decided… I’m not going.” Julie replied, making the decision as she heard herself speaking it.
“Not going?” her mom raised one eyebrow. “Of course you’re going. Otherwise you’re failing before you even begin. You wanted this!”
“So what if I wanted it?” Her confidence was growing… this felt right, she felt relieved at the idea of just backing out. “I have a whole graveyard of bad life decisions; I might as well bury this one too. And I know I wanted it. I know I signed up for it. But that was some other version of me. Extroverted me. Hopeful me. Now, in the bright light of day, introverted me is pretty ticked off about it. I just can’t.”
“Oh Jules… you’re 50 years old and—”
“I’m not 50!” Julie objected.
“OK, fine… you’re almost 50. It’s time to put on your big girl pants and move forward with your life. Your whole life, you’ve always accomplished whatever you set out to do –”
“I’m not that girl anymore, Mama!” Julie interrupted again. “I’m not her! She got lost somewhere along the way and all that’s left is this frumpy, outdated… 50-year-old…” she rolled her eyes at her mother’s wry smile, “… almost 50-year-old… who is practically a fossil.” She paused and let her shoulders slump and the two of them sat there in silence for a moment, her mom for once having the wisdom to sit quietly.
“What if the ‘other kids’ don’t like me?” Julie asked, sarcasm dripping from her voice in a vain attempt to mask the insecurity that she loathed in herself.
“The thing is, Jules, you are that girl. Still, after everything. You are her! She may be buried deep inside… she may be sleeping… but she is there! You chose this because you knew deep down that you can do this! Starting over isn’t for sissies, but this is the path your life took, and you have to own that. Raise your fist to life and go be that girl who knows what she wants and just goes and gets it and doesn’t give a fig what anybody thinks! The Lord knew your life was going to crash around you… he never expected you to sit defeated in the ruins. He has more for you. You still have so much life ahead if you just go after it."
“It’ just feels… too late,” Julie said. “Who goes back for an undergraduate degree when they’re this… old?” She spoke as though the word left a bitter taste on her tongue.
Both women heard the clatter of keys falling to the floor and being retrieved, and the staccato tap of heeled boots hitting the hardwood as Julie’s daughter, Emma, raced into the kitchen. “Just in time for mom’s pity party and another pep talk from Grandma, I see! Hate I have to miss this one, but I’m late! I guess I’ll see you later today on campus, Mom?”
“The thing is, Jules, you are that girl. Still, after everything. You are her! She may be buried deep inside… she may be sleeping… but she is there! You chose this because you knew deep down that you can do this! Starting over isn’t for sissies, but this is the path your life took, and you have to own that. Raise your fist to life and go be that girl who knows what she wants and just goes and gets it and doesn’t give a fig what anybody thinks! The Lord knew your life was going to crash around you… he never expected you to sit defeated in the ruins. He has more for you. You still have so much life ahead if you just go after it."
“It’ just feels… too late,” Julie said. “Who goes back for an undergraduate degree when they’re this… old?” She spoke as though the word left a bitter taste on her tongue.
Both women heard the clatter of keys falling to the floor and being retrieved, and the staccato tap of heeled boots hitting the hardwood as Julie’s daughter, Emma, raced into the kitchen. “Just in time for mom’s pity party and another pep talk from Grandma, I see! Hate I have to miss this one, but I’m late! I guess I’ll see you later today on campus, Mom?”
Emma didn’t wait for an answer, dashing out the door in the same whirlwind she’d blown in on. Emma was a perpetual force field of chaos and hurry, always late… but she always knew where she was headed.
Julie remembered when she used to always know where she was headed.
Emma’s casual words pierced Julie to the core this morning, though. Pity Party? Is that really how she sees me? Is that really who I am now? An object of my own pity and everyone else’s? The truth was, although Julie might deserve a pity party – or at least a modest reception- after all she’d been through, she really didn’t want to be an object of pity.
It had been over a year since the divorce. She’d felt so abandoned and yes, even pitiable. But deep down, Julie realized that even though Scott was the one who cheated, the one who betrayed her, and the one who left, she’d really been checked out of her marriage almost as much as he had been. She was so busy with raising children, a job she took on with all the gusto of a personal cruise director, that the years flew by in a flash and there were the two of them, husband and wife, but practically strangers.
Emma’s casual words pierced Julie to the core this morning, though. Pity Party? Is that really how she sees me? Is that really who I am now? An object of my own pity and everyone else’s? The truth was, although Julie might deserve a pity party – or at least a modest reception- after all she’d been through, she really didn’t want to be an object of pity.
It had been over a year since the divorce. She’d felt so abandoned and yes, even pitiable. But deep down, Julie realized that even though Scott was the one who cheated, the one who betrayed her, and the one who left, she’d really been checked out of her marriage almost as much as he had been. She was so busy with raising children, a job she took on with all the gusto of a personal cruise director, that the years flew by in a flash and there were the two of them, husband and wife, but practically strangers.
She recalled all that old advice about nurturing your marriage… she had meant to do that. And now here she was, needing to redefine an entire life.
In a burst of enthusiasm a few months ago, she had decided to go back to college to finish her degree. She envisioned walking across that stage at graduation, a moment she had planned to share with Scott almost 30 years ago and had promised her parents that she would when they gave their blessing for Julie and Scott to get married before their junior year. But a surprise pregnancy had waylaid those plans, and Julie had decided to pause her education for “just a few years.” How quickly a few years became three decades. And now, on the first day of her first “back to school,” it seemed all the enthusiasm and empowerment had vanished, and all she felt was old and worn out.
Julie looked over at her mom, still sitting quietly and looking at Julie with eyes of… what was that? Not judgment. Not criticism, as Julie might have expected since her mom had never been one to suffer complainers gladly. It was… compassion. Love. Encouragement. What had Mama done when she heard the news about Scott leaving? Dropped everything to come and offer her support. And here she was now, serving breakfast with a side of first-day encouragement. Emma was right. Mama was right. Where was Julie’s old sparkle? Her determination? Her resilience?
Julie looked over at her mom, still sitting quietly and looking at Julie with eyes of… what was that? Not judgment. Not criticism, as Julie might have expected since her mom had never been one to suffer complainers gladly. It was… compassion. Love. Encouragement. What had Mama done when she heard the news about Scott leaving? Dropped everything to come and offer her support. And here she was now, serving breakfast with a side of first-day encouragement. Emma was right. Mama was right. Where was Julie’s old sparkle? Her determination? Her resilience?
She leaned over, gave her mom a kiss on the cheek, and stood with new resolve, “Mama, you’re absolutely right. That intrepid girl I used to be is still in there. I’m letting her loose! And now… I’m off to be the ‘new kid’ at school. Thanks for the grits… and the grit.” She laughed at her own play on words. “You know I got that from you!”
* * *
Late that afternoon, Julie pulled into her driveway, exhausted but triumphant. Her mom was waiting to hear how everything went, and Emma was already home too. The three women gathered in the kitchen over coffee. “Some days,” Julie told them, just surviving should count as a win. Today was one of those days.”
“Oh no, what happened?” Mama asked, bracing herself to hear Julie’s adventures.
“Well, let’s see…. What happened? I was 15 minutes into my first class before I realized it was, in fact, not my class at all. I read the campus map wrong and I was supposed to be halfway across campus.”
“So what did you do?” Emma asked.
“I didn’t want to create a scene packing up and leaving in the middle of the class… oh and by packing up, I mean my paper notebook and my assortment of pens and pencils, because I was the only one without a laptop open and ready… so I just sat through that class till the end.”
“No, you didn’t!” Mama said, trying not to laugh.
“You didn’t have your laptop?” Emma asked, bemused.
“No.” Julie replied sardonically. “I did not. I felt like Wilma Flintstone pulling up with an actual dinosaur.”
“Wilma Who?” Emma asked.
“You don’t know who Wilma Flintstone is? I am a dinosaur!” Julie cried, laughing now herself.
“Well,” Mama said, offering comfort, “at least you got started with a bang and got that awkwardness out of the way.”
“Oh, Mama. If only!” Julie shook her head. “You know that no good sentence ever starts with the words ‘at least.’ Noooo. That was not even close to being the worst part of my day. I’m not sure if the real low point was when I tripped and would have fallen if I hadn’t landed in a total stranger’s lap, or when I walked into the men’s room. Or maybe it was when I accidentally shot my gum out of my mouth like a guided missile, and it landed on my professor’s chest.”
Julie bit her lip and shook her head.
Emma’s eyes widened in disbelief, her hands clapping over her mouth to hide her gasp,
“That was YOU?”
Julie’s shoulders slumped, “You heard about that?”
“Everybody heard about it! It’s a small school, Mom. I didn’t know it was you; I just heard it was a boom..."
“Emma!” her grandmother attempted to drown out her granddaughter’s words, but it was too late.
“I am NOT a Boomer!” Julie spouted.
“So anyway,” Julie’s mom asked, “what did you do?”
What did I do?”
“Yes,” her mother continued, “What did you do when the gum landed on him?”
Julie hung her head in shame, too embarrassed to answer. “You do not want to know, Mama.”
“Yes, we do!” Emma and Mama shouted in unison. Mama said, “it can’t be worse than spitting it out in the first place!”
“Ahhh, but you underestimate me, Mother. I peeled the gum off his shirt. And…. I…. I put it back into my mouth. And I just kept right on chewing.” Julie collapsed in laughter at her own words. She had been so mortified, but in hindsight, there was really nothing to do but laugh at the absurdity. “I bet that professor never forgets me!” she choked out.
* * *
Late that afternoon, Julie pulled into her driveway, exhausted but triumphant. Her mom was waiting to hear how everything went, and Emma was already home too. The three women gathered in the kitchen over coffee. “Some days,” Julie told them, just surviving should count as a win. Today was one of those days.”
“Oh no, what happened?” Mama asked, bracing herself to hear Julie’s adventures.
“Well, let’s see…. What happened? I was 15 minutes into my first class before I realized it was, in fact, not my class at all. I read the campus map wrong and I was supposed to be halfway across campus.”
“So what did you do?” Emma asked.
“I didn’t want to create a scene packing up and leaving in the middle of the class… oh and by packing up, I mean my paper notebook and my assortment of pens and pencils, because I was the only one without a laptop open and ready… so I just sat through that class till the end.”
“No, you didn’t!” Mama said, trying not to laugh.
“You didn’t have your laptop?” Emma asked, bemused.
“No.” Julie replied sardonically. “I did not. I felt like Wilma Flintstone pulling up with an actual dinosaur.”
“Wilma Who?” Emma asked.
“You don’t know who Wilma Flintstone is? I am a dinosaur!” Julie cried, laughing now herself.
“Well,” Mama said, offering comfort, “at least you got started with a bang and got that awkwardness out of the way.”
“Oh, Mama. If only!” Julie shook her head. “You know that no good sentence ever starts with the words ‘at least.’ Noooo. That was not even close to being the worst part of my day. I’m not sure if the real low point was when I tripped and would have fallen if I hadn’t landed in a total stranger’s lap, or when I walked into the men’s room. Or maybe it was when I accidentally shot my gum out of my mouth like a guided missile, and it landed on my professor’s chest.”
Julie bit her lip and shook her head.
Emma’s eyes widened in disbelief, her hands clapping over her mouth to hide her gasp,
“That was YOU?”
Julie’s shoulders slumped, “You heard about that?”
“Everybody heard about it! It’s a small school, Mom. I didn’t know it was you; I just heard it was a boom..."
“Emma!” her grandmother attempted to drown out her granddaughter’s words, but it was too late.
“I am NOT a Boomer!” Julie spouted.
“So anyway,” Julie’s mom asked, “what did you do?”
What did I do?”
“Yes,” her mother continued, “What did you do when the gum landed on him?”
Julie hung her head in shame, too embarrassed to answer. “You do not want to know, Mama.”
“Yes, we do!” Emma and Mama shouted in unison. Mama said, “it can’t be worse than spitting it out in the first place!”
“Ahhh, but you underestimate me, Mother. I peeled the gum off his shirt. And…. I…. I put it back into my mouth. And I just kept right on chewing.” Julie collapsed in laughter at her own words. She had been so mortified, but in hindsight, there was really nothing to do but laugh at the absurdity. “I bet that professor never forgets me!” she choked out.
All three women were clutching their bellies, gasping for air, and at least two of them were trying not to wet their pants.
Julie realized it was the first time in a year that she had really laughed. She had nearly forgotten how to laugh at herself, how to not take life so seriously, and it felt good to be back, like a part of her was waking up after a long hibernation. She didn’t know what turns her life would take in the future. She might be out of her comfort zone with this crazy idea of starting a whole new career at her age. But she was not the first person to go back to college and she was nowhere near the oldest. And getting out of her comfort zone wouldn’t kill her. She still had living to do! God was still good, and He still had good plans for her future. She was going to be OK.
Julie realized it was the first time in a year that she had really laughed. She had nearly forgotten how to laugh at herself, how to not take life so seriously, and it felt good to be back, like a part of her was waking up after a long hibernation. She didn’t know what turns her life would take in the future. She might be out of her comfort zone with this crazy idea of starting a whole new career at her age. But she was not the first person to go back to college and she was nowhere near the oldest. And getting out of her comfort zone wouldn’t kill her. She still had living to do! God was still good, and He still had good plans for her future. She was going to be OK.
"Little Jesus"
by Marla Price
"And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also." (John 14:3 ESV)
“I’ll be right back,” said Jon, Amber’s new student.
Amber flushed, the words striking her like a stone. She watched Jon maneuver his electric wheelchair down the concrete ramp, back to his aunt’s van. Amber was thankful for a moment of composure, turning toward the front doors of the school and hoping that none of the middle school students entering the building had noticed the tears in her eyes.
Amber’s son, Malachi, had uttered the same words on a freezing night in January as he had dashed out to the garage and slid behind the wheel of his truck. It was just a sack of tacos, warm tortilla chips, and fresh salsa. A quick trip.
“I’ll be right back, Mom!”
Those words had been echoing through the empty places in Amber’s mind ever since.
After all, she had been reasoning for the last months, hadn’t they all had cabin fever after spending so much time in the house after the snowstorm? Didn’t Malachi enjoy his alone time, which he didn’t get while they were all shut in together? True, family time is a blessing, but Amber’s oldest child needed his solitude. Little sisters Marli and Makenzie, aged 12 and nine, were friendly chatterboxes when they weren’t fighting over the iPad, or their dolls, or who was breathing on who. Baby brother Matty tagged along in their schemes, but at six, he couldn’t understand why his sisters didn’t want dinosaurs in their dollhouse.
Malachi, at 17, had been the oldest of the crew and the leader in all ways, from being named a captain on the football team during his junior year to refereeing his siblings’ skirmishes.
It was a miracle that none of them had been in the truck with Malachi, but even if one of his siblings had tagged along, chances are they would have been fine, the state trooper had said.
The primary impact from the light pole had landed directly on the driver’s side.
They all blamed themselves: the kids, for wanting the tacos because they were tired of soups, oatmeal, and sloppy joes. Amber, for giving her permission for Malachi to make the trip to the restaurant. Couldn’t she have had it delivered? And Jay, Malachi’s father, for reporting that the roads were indeed clear, and so they were as he had traveled the familiar path to get to his night shift job at the Black Creek No. 3 Mine.
Jay had picked up extra shifts in the mines since his son’s death, a man’s way of coping.
Jay had picked up extra shifts in the mines since his son’s death, a man’s way of coping.
These thoughts flashed through Amber’s mind like a riptide of grief on this, the first day of school, threatening to pull her under.
There would be no senior year memories except for those in honor of Malachi. Amber was bracing herself for those plans, for she knew, after the years of working at a school, that the students and teachers needed to mourn. She had already tacked up a wall-sized piece of red bulletin board paper, signed by Malachi’s friends and schoolmates, in his room. It was a thousand wonders she had not torn it down in one of her angry moments.
There were dents and stains and scuffs on the door leading to the garage now, for Amber had thrown her set of keys, a stapler, a cheese grater, and trinkets well-meaning friends had given to her. Even a devotion book gifted to her by her Sunday School teacher now had bent edges and torn pages. No gift would bring Malachi back, and seeing them was just another reminder that he was gone forever.
The first night she had cooked spaghetti, Malachi’s favorite, she had hurled an entire pot filled with pasta sauce against the door, and she was shocked at her lack of remorse. She just mopped it up, and that felt good—taking action in some small way was a good thing, for there was nothing she could do to change anything else that had happened.
Trade places with me, Malachi, she had thought, especially when she visited his grave, which was covered with a few mementos. A tiny football. A pack of his favorite grape-flavored chewing gum. A pebble from the driveway, placed by Matty. When the family went on vacation to the beach, Amber brought back a bobblehead shark from the souvenir shop, and it now rested among the other offerings.
Malachi would have liked it.
Still, Amber prayed, simply and with few words, like a child.
Thank you, God, for the sunshine.
Thank you, God, for the flowers.
Thank you, God, for the grass.
Thank you, God, for the flowers.
Thank you, God, for the grass.
But sunshine, flowers, and grass reminded her of a cemetery, so she most often thanked God for anger, for it meant that she could feel. She thanked God for the curtains she kept closed during the summer days when she was at home and away from her job as a paraprofessional at Arcadia Middle School. She thanked God for the blanket with which she covered herself and wept into whenever a memory would pop up on her social media feed. Malachi’s first day of kindergarten. His first little league baseball game. His twelfth birthday party at the laser tag and gaming center. His last day of middle school and first day of high school. His first truck.
Amber looked out to the road that passed in front of the middle school, and she saw a steady line of cars and trucks making their way to the high school. Amber could spot the seniors’ vehicles, decorated with streamers and balloons, and sayings like “Time Flies,” “Last Ride,” “Last First Day,” and “Senior 2026.”
“No, Amber,” she told herself aloud, “save it for later.” Her therapist said using your own name when talking to yourself is a good thing. It’s like your own personal pep talk, she had told Amber, along with a little more of a clinical explanation, which Amber had forgotten.
The whirr of the motor of Jon’s wheelchair also grounded her, reminding her she had a job to do.
Amber had met Jon at the end of the last school year, as all students with special needs had transition plans in place when moving from one school to another. Amber had added Jon’s aunt, Sandy, along with Jon, to her list of people and things to be thankful for, something she had started on the recommendation of her pastor.
Jon would never play football, but he was the Arcadia High School Wildcats’ biggest fan. At the spring meeting, Aunt Sandy had said, “Jon might as well have a school uniform. He doesn’t leave the house unless he’s in some kind of red wildcat T-shirt. We can’t always make it to the games. I don’t like to drive at night.”
Yes, thought Amber, and the cost of parking and tickets probably doesn’t help much either.
At the spring meeting, it was Jon who had said, his words uttered with difficulty due to muscular dystrophy, “I’m sorry . . . Mrs. Amber . . . about Malachi.”
It had been the first time since Malachi’s death that Amber did not feel hot anger rising inside her after someone offered condolences. Even as a fifth grader, there was something about Jon that went deeper than merely saying the words because they were what was expected.
Despite his physical fragility, there was a strength in Jon’s character that Amber had not seen in
many adults.
many adults.
Jon was returning up the ramp now, his small frame illuminated by the morning sun. A small cellophane bag lay in his lap. Aunt Sandy waved to them both, saying, “I’ll see you this afternoon!” but she did not come up the ramp with him. Jon needed to learn to be more independent, Sandy had also said at that spring meeting, and she trusted Amber with helping him.
Jon wheeled right up to her, explaining, “I’m sorry, Mrs. Amber. I just had to go back for it.”
The bag was filled with little figures, and through the cellophane, Amber could not tell what they were.
The bag was filled with little figures, and through the cellophane, Amber could not tell what they were.
She asked Jon, “What is it?”
Jon struggled with the words, but Amber could make them out: “Oh, you’re gonna love it. But I need you to help me with it because you know my hands don’t work so well.”
Amber reached down and picked up the bag from Jon’s lap. A hole had been torn in one corner, so Amber reached inside. She pulled out a tiny Jesus doll, just over an inch tall. There were at least one hundred of them in the bag.
Jon continued. “I need you to help me give them out today. Everyone needs a little Jesus. It’s my welcome back to school present.”
Amber smiled despite the fog in her mind, and she agreed. “Absolutely, Jon, I am happy to help you.”
He began to roll beside her, heading to his first period class. “Mrs. Amber,” Jon said, “I want you to pick out the first one, for yourself. And then get one for everyone in your family.”
Amber could feel a warmth come over her, one that she hadn’t experienced in some time, at least, not before losing Malachi. That day, Amber’s hands did the work for Jon, but it was his spirit that carried them through what was supposed to have been a hard day, at least for Amber.
Together they shared Jesus with the teachers, cafeteria ladies, and office staff. The janitor got his very own tiny Jesus, one with a blue sash. Jon spotted students that he thought needed one, and he high-fived them, in his own way with his good hand, as Amber let them look through the bag for the one that they wanted.
By the end of the day, the bag was empty.
That afternoon, Amber gathered her children for the trip to the cemetery. They had already decided that they would visit on the first day of school, because no one wanted to leave out Malachi, but after she told the children of her plan, they had an even greater purpose.
Matty crouched low at Malachi’s headstone, tucking a little Jesus with a red sash against the gray granite, alongside the other treasures at the grave.
“It’s his favorite color,” he said simply. “It looks just like Jesus in my Bible storybook.”
Amber’s throat tightened. For the first time in a long while, her tears weren’t only for sorrow but for something gentler—gratitude, even. For Jon’s quiet strength. For her family. For the kids and the husband who needed her. For the reminder that Malachi wasn’t really gone.
She touched the little Jesus with the red sash and whispered, I’ll be right back.
She touched the little Jesus with the red sash and whispered, I’ll be right back.
Hadn’t Jesus promised the same before leaving this world? To return, to gather His people, to make things whole again?
Amber let the thought steady her. She would order a bag of the figures that night. She would not wait for the football team or the senior class’s remembrances. Instead, she would go to them first, for they were mourning too.
She would share hope the way Jon had shown her how.
Because everyone needed a little Jesus. And Amber needed to believe that Malachi, too, was
only waiting, just out of sight, until they could all be together again.
only waiting, just out of sight, until they could all be together again.
~~~~~~
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