I hate driveways.
Amaryllis, the girl who had not yet mastered the art of falling, lay on the pavement with her hands scraped through the remnants of tiny pebbles that she hadn't bothered to clean up beforehand.
Forcing herself to block out shaking, she stumbled back upright onto her skates, wiped her stinging hands on the thighs of her shorts, and then began to roll across the driveway . . . avoiding the cones lined up down the center, straight to the car in front of her.
Amaryllis leaned up against the back of it, one elbow supporting her while the other lifted its hand in front of her face.
Skinned, bleeding, and with a few of the tiniest pebbles still stuck in the skin, her hand had survived what she thought was going to be the concussion of her life.
No reason to cry.
Amaryllis nodded, sighed in relief that her head was okay, admired her new battle-scars, and then rolled back to the line of cones. The shakiness would go away as she got going again, as would the feeling that she had just been held at gunpoint. Worse falls than that had happened; there was no reason to cry over this one.
No reason to cry.
Amaryllis nodded again, and then put her left foot in front of the other, and began to swerve her feet in between the cones, pivoting on the back wheels of her rollerblades to make for quick and accurate turns. She put her arms out and moved them according to the movements of her feet to keep balance.
She exited the line of cones, went as far as to the gutter between the driveway and the street, and then turned back around and performed the same trick. This pattern was repeated approximately five times before the shakiness left her, and she began to feel more comfortable with attempting other tricks.
New tricks.
New patterns.
New ideas for choreography that was interrupted when another twig squeezed itself in between her wheels and slammed her back down to the pavement.
"You know . . ."
Any indication that she was still physically and mentally okay left when the voice came within earshot.
Her face shifted from its usual pale color to red, which appeared brighter in contrast to her light blonde hair lumped into the bun overtop her head. She hunched over her skates, started shaking, and pretended to pick the pebbles out of the wheels while hot tears started streaming down her cheeks . . . tears which she couldn't wipe away with her hands now that they were re-enveloped in tiny pebbles.
Curse those pebbles.
". . . For someone who resents sports so much, you skate an awful lot," the voice continued.
Amaryllis at least managed to smear the salty liquid off her face with her arm, listening, silently pleading with the person behind her that they would leave and let her practice in peace.
. . . And, rid the street of any other people while they were at it.
The footsteps just continued to approach her.
No reason to cry.
"I don't hate sports," Amaryllis muttered, undoing the clasp at the top of her skates and kicking her feet out of them. It would've helped if she weren't using indoor skates for outdoor purposes . . . I'm considering quitting this, if that makes you happy. "I hate sporting hypes."
YOU ARE READING
The Pioneers
Science FictionBalance is key; discovery lies in mistakes; and pebble covered pavement . . . well, that just leads to broken bones. Amaryllis is trying to find a loophole in each of these little sayings. Maybe the fact that she lacks balance both literally and met...
