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The Marigold

By: Esther I. Kim

By Esther KimPublished 3 years ago 2 min read
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The Marigold
Photo by Jacinto Diego on Unsplash

The Marigold

By: Esther I. Kim

She was tall and lanky, with awkward movements. The glasses she wore were from the local Target Optometrist her family had gone to for years. She wore a pink sweater and shoes from Old Navy. As she sat down to eat lunch with the other girls, she was shaking; with her lunch bag in hand.

“Look. It’s Sally”, one girl whispered.

“Is she wearing that pink sweater again?”, another girl whispered.

“Maybe she doesn’t have any other clothes”, another girl snickered.

Before Sally could sit down, the other girls got up. Sally sat down and opened her lunch bag and took out a book. Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White. She was on page 101. The classroom bell rang and Sally packed up her things.

“Today we are practicing for our annual school performance. I will assign the parts and we will practice tomorrow”, said Ms. Lynn.

“Johnny, you get to be the Zoo Keeper. Helen, you’re the Animal Keeper. I need some people to play the parts of the animals. Any volunteers?”

Some of the boys raised their hands straight up.

“I’ll be the tiger because I’m big and strong!”, said Fred.

“I’ll be the lion!”, said Brian.

“We’ll be the penguins!”, said all the girls. “Penguins are cute and small and they waddle together”.

“Okay. We have one more animal. Who wants to be the giraffe?”

The room was silent. Then you could hear someone snickering and coughing.

“Sally looks like a giraffe”, said one boy.

“Yeah a giraffe with bad eye sight”, said another boy. They both laughed out loud.

Sally felt tears welling up in her eyes. Her glasses were fogging up with her tears. She ran outside into the lawn where there wasn’t anyone watching. She huddled up in a ball and started crying. It was a hot, summer day and the sun was beating down her face. She cried and cried until she couldn’t cry anymore. When she looked up, she saw another girl. She recognized her from Classroom 5B. She was holding a Marigold flower in her hand. It was orange and yellow and had many layers of colors.

“Here. Do you want one? I found this Marigold over there. There’s a bunch of them hidden behind that fence. Let’s go find more!”

Sally and the girl from Classroom 5B went to look for more Marigolds. They picked each of the Marigolds off the ground. They tied the Marigolds together to make flower crowns and put it on each other’s head. They laughed. As the sun was setting, Sally and her new friend promised to come back to where the Marigolds were.

That night Sally took our her journal and put a Marigold inside. She pressed the Marigold down firmly so that it stuck to the pages. The Marigold stuck on the pages like sand sticks to the ocean waves. It shinned like the sun that brings warmth and comfort. It gave light and hope for a lonely soul. It had layers and emotions Sally had never felt before. Today was a good day. Tomorrow will be a better one.

She smiled.

friendship
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About the Creator

Esther Kim

poet, writer, cook, keyboardist

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