fiction

start with a map.

like this. she hands me a single strand, the daisy heads lying flat against her palm, she's chained them together with milky fresh stems. they lie together on her brown skin like they are a gift.
i make to reach out for them, but she pulls back quickly.
they're not for you. they're for this.
her fingers drop the flowers before my left chubby thumb has left its pocket. the flowers splash into the warm shallow water,
a million insects swim for cover then return quickly to their spot in the sun.
the water is slow here in the shallow part of the creek, and we scramble back to our special place on the overhanging branch, almost two bodies thick
. i look up at the sun, we never wear watches, and neither of us has learned to measure day by light.
she'll be mad if we're late i mumble and although she has heard me, her eyes haven't left the water.
they follow her craft until it is lost beyond the waist high weeds at the bend.

goodbye i shout, my hand fanning the air sideways, we'll miss you.
the chain is gone, and like this my sister snaps her neck back into place
she'll be mad anyways, and i bob my head in silent agreement
we remove our once white shoes, our dark toes squishing through insects, through the softest 3 inches of mud and we're already on the other side. the creek only 4 bodies wide, and we run our feet dry in the short crabgrass.

i carry my shoes, erica slipping hers on over her still damp ankles and we are wandering at a hurried speed back up the path. with these legs, i imagine it is a mile to the house, but their open hands have reminded us on repeat
it is only a quarter.
i can walk it in 4 minutes, we've been told, we can wander it in ten. there are 8 fields on each side as we wind back towards the pond and that house.
a brown one, then a green one, higher than our heads, then an empty one where soy was until last week, then another green one.
we lose ourselves in blank stares, and i stop every now and then to scoop up a handful of onion grass, rubbing the scent on my wrists like a
store bought perfume.