Unspoken Unbroken

Posters of change

A yell wakes me up, and I immediately jolt out of bed. I hear the yelling coming from the kitchen and hurry towards the sound. As soon as the kitchen comes into sight, I see Emma clutching one hand with the other, tears rolling down her cheeks.

"What happened?" I ask, concern filling my tone.

"I burned my hand," she cries out.

I grab her arm and hold her hand under the tap. Before putting it under the water, I first test the temperature to make sure it's cold enough. Small red burns start to form on her left hand.

"Is it not too hot?" I ask her worriedly.

"Noo, but it still hurts," she whines.

"Of course it hurts. What happened?"

"Well... I tried to fry an egg, but it didn't go well," she mumbles, as if she's ashamed that her attempt at cooking failed. I let go of her wrist and move towards the fridge, grabbing a cold pack and handing it to Emma.

Once she's calmed down, I turn on the stove and resume the cooking process Emma started. When the eggs are cooked, we eat them with some toast.

After we're done eating, I do the dishes and grab some paper and pens from the closet. I take a pen, lay the paper on the table, and sit down in front of Emma.

"What's that?" she asks.

"What do you think?" I say.

She just shrugs.

"You suggested that we'd make a plan today about changing things around here. Well, I thought that the best way to change the world and this ridiculous system is by making people think," I explain.

"We can do that by making posters and just hanging them up everywhere," I suggest, pointing to the paper in front of us.

"That's brilliant. We can do that without breaking any laws," she says, sharing my excitement.

I gather some crafting supplies, like crayons, pencils, and paint, and we begin.

I paint in black letters: "Why do I, a woman, need a licence when men don't?"

Once I'm done, I show it to Emma.

"What do you think? Is this enough to make people's minds rattle?" I ask.

"Hell yeah. Let's make a hundred of them," she responds.

And we do. We proceed to make tons of posters over the next few hours. The clock on the fridge tells me that it's two in the afternoon by the time we're done.

I put on a pretty dress, grab our posters and some tape, and leave the house.

"Let's go this way," Emma says. I close the door behind us and stuff the key safely into my pocket. God, I love it when dresses have pockets.

I spot the first lamp post and tape the poster to it.

"It's a lil' bit crooked, but it'll do."

About an hour later, we've already taped fifty posters onto all sorts of objects and surfaces: walls, lamp posts, and I think I even saw Emma taping a poster to someone's mailbox. "We're already halfway through. I like this. It's so much fun," I say, laughing.

"Yess, it feels good to not do something by the book for once," she says.

As we're putting up one of our last posters, a man walks over to us and looks at it.

"What is this?" he asks, frowning at the sight of the paper.

"A poster. Can't you see?" Emma retorts, her voice laced with attitude.