Yellow Flowers

• Annaliese English, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2021

“I know today will be different. The sun is brighter, and the grass is greener. The birds are chirping their lovely songs and the crickets are clicking, like they are applauding them. Mum started her job at the bank yesterday. Now I am seeing her less and less. And dad? Well, I miss him. 6 months now he has been gone for. I hope eventually he will decide that his job is not worth losing family to. Besides that, everything has been pretty good so far. But something still doesn’t feel right.”
At that McKenzie looked up and shut her eyes, letting the warm sun heat up her already rosy cheeks. She stretched out her crossed legs and placed her journal onto the grass besides her tanned thigh. With her bare feet, she felt the softness of the fresh cut green grass and watched as the bees flew to and from her mother’s Dahlias.
“Kenzie!” Yelled her mother Grace. “Get out of the sun now!”
With a huge sigh, McKenzie got up, stretched, and started walking slowly towards the yellow painted house. Each dragging step she took; a different flower gets caught between her dark pink toenails.
McKenzie felt the sudden coolness of shade as soon as she walked inside the cool house. Grace was burning something on the stove and continuously swearing each time something would alight. As she walked past the kitchen and into her room, she noticed a single yellow flower holding on to her toes, as if it feared falling off. She picked it up and held the squished yellow petals against her ruff cheek. The carpet was welcoming as she passed the door into her room. The setting sun was shining onto the blue, starry sheets on her small bed, making it looks like the Milky Way.
That night, McKenzie went to bed on a full stomach of roast potatoes and burnt chicken. Hours passed and it was nearly midnight when she started talking. It was the same sentence repeatedly. “Don’t go. Please.” Again, and again and again. “Don’t go. Please.” Until eventually it stopped. And she slept soundlessly.
“Get up! Or you’ll be late for school!” yelled her mother from down the hall. Grudgingly, McKenzie got out of bed, got dressed into her uniform and made her way down the creaky floorboards into the kitchen, where she made a bowl of cereal. She looked out the window only to see her mother watering her pretty yellow Dahlias and humming an old song to herself. When she was finished, McKenzie put her bowl in the sink and made her way out into the garden to leave for school. “By the way Kenzie.” Said Grace. “I’ll be at work when you arrive home this afternoon.” McKenzie looked at her and nodded slowly. “Love you.” She whispered. Grace didn’t reply.
Half a day went through at school. McKenzie and her friends were sitting around at lunch. Kenzie and her best friend Ella talking about funny things like how Ella’s two brothers got into a fight over a video game, and they broke the controller in half or how Kenzie accidentally fell off the bed a week ago. The other 4 were sitting on their phones scrolling through social media. Just then, McKenzie’s phone rung. No name. On the third ring she picked it up. “Hello?” She whispered slowly. After a second or two there was a reply. “Is this McKenzie Harper?” She glanced at Ella with a worried look on her face. Ella nodded. Still looking at Ella she answered the question. “Yes.” Another moment passed and once again a voice passed through the phone. Her phone dropped out of her hand with the 2 single sentences spoken through the phone ringing in her ears.
“This is the police. Your mother was hurt in the bank robbery this morning.”
The End