Childhood tragedy with a happy ending.

Dear friends who love literature.

I am responding to the invitation of @theinkwell of @jayna and @agmoore

[The Ink Well Fiction Prompt #12 - Childhood-summers


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Childhood tragedy with a happy ending.

What a strange feeling suddenly filled me that afternoon in the middle of recess. I leaned against that tree, pensive. My teacher detected the change, came up to me and asked me what was wrong. All I could say was that I was very sad and that I felt that there was something very wrong at home.

It was no longer necessary for my father to take me to school, nor did he pick me up at the end of the day. After my teacher's permission, I walked, a little girl, alone and pensive, the four blocks that separated the school from my house.

Along the way I met people I knew, people from the street who, as they passed me, touched my hair affectionately and greeted me by name. Nothing was alarming on my block. I began to think that nothing was happening until I reached the porch of my house. Through the open door I could see my family gathered around my younger sister. Was something wrong with Marguerite?

My mum looked out and saw me, shocked. She ran to me and hugged me tightly. She didn't ask me why I had come home from school, she was concentrating on comforting me.

Mum never knew how to deliver bad news. When it was necessary to talk about something difficult, she always started by offering juice or coffee. In the middle of her hug, which prevented me from looking at what was going on in the living room, she offered me a pineapple juice.

My heart pounding uncontrollably, I looked into my mother's eyes, wordlessly asking what was going on. Then she quietly took my hand and led me into the living room. I never imagined what I would see.

In the middle of dad's long legs, standing, and under the pained gaze of my two little brothers was Margarita sitting on the floor. Next to her, intact and beautiful, was Jazmin, her blonde doll, and on her back on the floor, headless, that is, with her head on one side of her body, was mine, the brunette, Azucena.

My little heart never again received a stronger shock than that. My breathing stopped short and I couldn't manage to say a word. That day I knew, for the first time, what a duel was.

My whole face filled with tears. Dad pulled me up to his chest and held me there for a long time. I was not the only one crying, my brothers were crying with me. My crying, although copious and uncontrollable, was a silent cry, like that of my siblings, with the exception of Margarita's, who cried pitifully:

"Ay, ay, forgive me, little sister." She repeated, looking at me and clasping her hands together.

I looked at her without understanding how it was possible what I was seeing. My most precious treasure, my doll, the one my older brother had given me and on which I had focused all my pride, was broken.

While dad was carrying me, my mum was now taking care of Margarita. I was quietly asking her to explain how she had broken my doll.

Azucena and Jasmine were two dolls more than half a metre tall; they were the same, but not identical. Jasmine, my sister Margarita's doll, had green eyes and blonde hair, dressed in a pink dress. My Azucena, was a brunette with brown eyes, dressed in emerald green. I still remember her bows, her lace, her buttons, the thin childish stockings and her black shoes.

The day my brother brought them to us, arriving home on holiday from work, he called me from the door and when I was beside him, happy and surprised, he handed me the brunette doll first. She looks just like you, she told me, with a kiss.

From the moment I received Azucena she became the queen of my bed. She didn't want anyone to touch her. I knew, at that age, the danger she was in in a house full of small children.

Margarita began to speak in a halting manner and started to tell me that she wanted to have a party in the corner of the door, that she had invited all the toys but that she hadn't touched Azucena.

"Then I passed by your bed and saw Azucena alone and sad. And I wanted to cheer her up by taking her to the party. I wanted her to sit next to Jasmine at the party and..." Margarita continued speaking while moaning.

"Ay, ay, forgive me, sis!"

Margarita couldn't say, really, how she broke Azucena's head.

My little sister's suffering had mitigated my own. Little by little my pain began to subside, for I could attend to what mother was saying.

"Since Margarita broke her sister's doll, now she will have Jazmín and Margarita will be left with a broken doll"!

Mum's voice came through the room like a bolt of lightning! Margarita doubled the volume of her crying.
"No, mommy, no, I want my doll, I don't want a broken doll!"

I understood her pain perfectly. And then I went over to my broken doll and picked up its parts.

"No mommy, please don't do this! I'm keeping my broken doll!"

After a week, daddy came to pick me up from school. His eyes were sparkling in a cute way. He took my school bag and put Azucena in my arms. She was in one piece!
My eyes told him I couldn't understand what was going on. He, crouching down to my height, said to me:

"There are doctors for dolls".


Thanks for reading

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@gracielaacevedo

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