Eliana and The Weeping Willow
Julia Lathrop
Eliana wiped the salty tears from her blurry eyes. Her long
brown pigtails fell over her shoulders, dangling next to her petite
purple backpack. She raced from the schoolyard, speed walking
away from the taunting and the teasing that was her fifth grade
year.
As she treaded down the heated sidewalk toward home,
dainty Eliana pondered her dreadful day under the autumn sun.
Oh that rude girl, Sadie! She made Eliana miserable, yanking her
hair and humiliating her in front of her friends. Absolutely horrific.
Eliana jogged down the sidewalk and across the narrow
bridge. She clutched her math workbook as cars whizzed by her.
At the other side of the small bridge, Eliana suddenly tripped
and tumbled to the concrete, her workbook sliding off into the
nearby bushes.
She moaned in temporary pain, placing her dirty hands
down to lift herself up. Sitting on her butt, she eyed her pale extremities. Thin streaks of neon blood patterned her palms, but
the throbbing pain that resounded in her wrists didn’t hinder
her. Eliana then crawled over to retrieve her workbook, stretching her hand beneath the bushes, fingering around in the fallen
leaves for it. But she could not feel it.
That’s odd, Eliana thought.
She placed the side of her face to the concrete, gazing at the
underside of the bushes with her left eye, her butt jutting into the
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