Bounded Strings

Her padded feet made a soft squeaking sound against the ground as she walked. Her little heart thumped loudly as she stared at all the children running around and having fun. She wanted to play too but she didn’t have any friends.

Evannah pouted as her eyes began to sting. She wanted to go back to her mother. She wanted to sit by the fire and eat the cookies she and her mother made together yesterday. But most of all, she wanted to return to her old home.

She had a lot of friends there. She went to the playground every evening to play with them and she used to have a lot of fun with them.

And now, here she was, suddenly moving to a new town even when she didn’t want to, leaving all her friends behind, and to top it all of, her mother barely stayed home with her because of her new job.

She didn’t even like her new home. Her new room was bigger than her old one and but the walls were still white instead of purple, her favorite color. Her new house was also surrounded by a lot of trees. At night, strange noises came from there and it scared her. She didn’t like it at all.

She wanted to make new friends but she felt too shy to talk to anyone. And nobody talked to her either. They looked at her like she was weird and stayed away.

She didn’t like anything in here. She just wished that she could go back to her old town. She wished that she didn’t have to move. And most of all, she wished that she knew why they had to move so suddenly, without even a goodbye to the people they lived beside.

Her blue eyes swept through the playground before she found an empty spot near the seesaw. She quickly moved there and sat down.

Her gaze fixated on all her other classmates playing together, having a lot of fun. They looked like they knew each other for a long while.

“Hello” came a sudden cheerful sound from her left. She turned to see a girl her age standing there. Her long burgundy hair was tied back into pigtails and her rounded face displayed a wide toothy smile. Her brown eyes twinkled with mischief as she regarded Evannah with curiosity. She was wearing a purple top, a color that reminded her of the walls of her previous home.

“Hi” Evannah replied back to the girl, voice low and shy. She wanted to tell the girl she liked her top but didn’t know how to bring it up.

The girl’s smile widened with pride at being able to draw a response from her and she sat down beside Evannah without even asking if she could sit there. Not that, Evannah minded.

“Why are you not playing? Don’t you like to play?” she questioned, still as cheery as before, swinging her legs back and forth.

“I like to play. But, I don’t have any friends to play with,” Evannah responded, blinking owlishly. She hoped the girl would offer to play with her.

The girl frowned but nodded, her pigtails jerking up and down at the sudden movement. “You came here new?” she pestered again.

Evannah nodded, kicking the ground beneath her. The girl seemed nice. She wondered if she would be able to befriend her.

“Oh, so that’s why you don’t have friends!” the girl exclaimed loudly, making Evannah turn to look at her with wide eyes, “Don’t worry, though. I can be your friend.”

Evannah’s eyes widened in happiness at the girl’s offer before a wide smile took over her face too. “Really?”

The girl jerked her head left to right. “Really, really.”

“I am Evannah” she introduced, wanting her new friend to know her name.

The girl grinned. “And I am Sierra. Friends?” she offered her hand for a handshake. Evannah noticed that her nails were bitten.

Evannah took her hand with great enthusiasm and shook it feverishly before exclaiming as loud as she could,

“Friends.”