Third grade

Hot sun on my face I look up towards the sky squinting as the heat of the noon day seems to steam my clothing. All around me swirls of children run in every direction and I can hear them laughing and talking as they chase each other around in a carefree blur on the greenest grass I've ever stood on. My shoes are too tight, my hair too messy and I am instantly not one of them so I stand alone in the sun trying to decide what I should do next. Part of me wants to pull a book out of my bag, sit in the shade and transport myself off to far away place where they don't matter. I've seen what happens to the book worms during recess though so instead I wander to the only empty swing. It is empty, I quickly discover because it has been in the hot sun all day and it burns the back of my legs through my jeans but I sit on it anyhow. I pump my legs with rhythm and determination until the swing begins to soar and the breeze in my hair dances across my sweaty face and cools me. I am above them all looking down and I am free.

In the wind I can hear the song that was playing on the radio that morning. I'm not sure if I hear it in my head or perhaps it is gently gliding in from one of the houses near by but I humm it inside my head as I continue to methodically pump my legs in and out. As the lyrics of the song pick up my empty little soul, I begin to play with fate, my arms stretched out to both sides I swing now without hands. Then quickly grabbing back onto the swing chains with my hands and feeling their rusty hot metal indent my skin I lean back with all my body weight and soar almost upside down feet pointed towards the sky.

Somewhere in my flight I hear a whistle, faintly first and then louder and I open my eyes which I hadn't even realized where closed. The color of the playground, the brightness of the sun and the sounds of children running back to line up for class flood into my head again. I jump off the swing before it stops swinging and hang for a second in the air before my ankles clud ungracefully to the earth and run after them.

The new girl. Last in line, last in role call, last to be picked until you make friends at the kick ball field. And so I walk behind them in line to whatever we're doing next as a class and I day dream. I am in a tall tower and I am doing magic. The magic that I do makes people think I am invisible. And that's how I stay... invisible... at the back of the class, at the top of the swings, at the end of the lunch table up against the back wall of the cafeteria.

In my tower the breeze whips through my hair dancing off my sweaty face. In my tower the music of the town whafts up to me in the breeze and I can sing along without anyone hearing me. In my tower I am waiting for the spell to wear off and to become visible again so I can join them in a great feast like the books I read from the library talk about. Books that smell of old paper and abandonment which tell me that I will not be forgotten in my tower, someday, someone... will rescue me.