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Artwork: Running without a Mask by Will Jacques

Flyer
Haley Magrill

The pair sat like proper school kids, legs crossed, hands folded in their laps, and smiled like the lawyers told them to. They wondered how long this was going to take. Officer Kelly took their statement. He had a small pink face and lots of thick, dark hair that stuck to his cheeks when they got hot.

Afterward, they would both agree that he looked like a small gorilla.

They repeated what the lawyers told them to say.

It was an accident.”

“It was only meant to be a bit of fun.”

“No one was supposed to get hurt.”

Jack was thirteen when Jimmy Milburn fell out of the sky. Laura was twelve because her birthday was after Christmas. At night when she couldn’t sleep, Laura would go out to the driveway and lie under the car until her fingers turned blue. Her parents called an ambulance for her five times that year.

***

It rained the day Jack and Laura decided to teach flying lessons to the first grade.

“Please, can we stay inside, Mr. Davis!” Laura said.

“You won’t even notice we’re here,” Jack said.

“I’m wearing new shoes,” another girl whined. She stuck out her foot. “They’ll get all muddy and then I won’t be able to wear them to the dance on Friday.”

There were rumours going around that a real-life professional wedding DJ was going to play.

Just then, Mrs. Stonemore staggered into the room, her hand clamped to the side of her leg, growling about the gym teacher having the flu.

“One of them kicked me!” She said to Mr. Davis, showing him a large purpling bruise. Mr. Davis ran to get her an ice pack from the teacher’s lounge.

“You two,” Mrs. Stonemore said, flicking her fingers at Jack and Laura, “would you mind watching the first graders until the end of lunch? I’ll let Mr. Davis know that you’re excused.”

“Big kids!” The first graders shouted, running at them when they walked in. “Big kids! Big kids! Big kids!”

“Laura!” Jimmy Milburn waved excitedly to his sister. Laura smiled weakly.

Jack led them in games of freeze tag, line tag, ball tag, elbow tag, and jump tag, until Laura got bored and began to make up her own.

“Eyes-closed tag!” Laura called out and the first graders all squeezed their eyes shut. But the game ended shortly after a blond haired boy ran head first into the wall and was sent to the nurse’s office with a wad of toilet paper stuffed up his nose.

“I’m bored!” Jimmy cried. He plopped down under the basketball hoop and crossed his arms. “Do a better game!”

“Better game! Better game! Better game!” The first graders chanted, stamping their feet into the ground.

“Crawling tag!” Jack said. Jimmy stuck out his tongue. “Spin tag?” The first graders booed them.

“Flying tag!” Laura burst out.

“People can't fly,” Jimmy said, although he sounded a bit unsure.

“Absolutely they can,” Jack winked at Laura.

“Prove it, then,” Jimmy said as the bell rang. The first graders begged Jack to teach them as soon as the monkey bars dried.

They were waiting the next day after school wearing bicycle helmets and knee pads.

“We’re ready,” Jimmy said, and the other first graders nodded. They followed Laura in a single file line to the bleachers behind the baseball field.

“Close your eyes,” Laura said. “We have to sprinkle you with magic dust.” She dug her hand into the ground and began to pepper their heads.

“Is this dirt?” One of them asked.

“No,” Jack snapped, “it’s magic dust. Now, close your eyes.”

Laura showed them how to hold their arms out to the side like an airplane, and then they were off.

“I’m doing it!” a small red-headed girl shrieked, before immediately losing her balance and tumbling down to the ground.

Jimmy was by far the best flyer. His arms flapped madly as he zipped past the others. His smile stretched to his dimples.

“Look at me go!” He screeched. The first graders flitted around the baseball field, occasionally catching themselves in the fence, but then taking flight again with greater control than before. Soon, the sun began to dip behind the tall tree.

“What are you kids doing out here?” Mrs. Stonemore squawked as she made her way across the field, cursing as the heels of her shoes stuck in the grass. The children giggled. She cupped her hands around her eyes, ogling at them in disbelief.

“We’re just playing with them, Mrs. Stonemore,” Laura said innocently. Mrs. Stonemore blanched as Jimmy Milburn landed at her feet. He yanked on the cuff of her sleeve.

“Look at me,” he said, pushing off the ground, “I’m going to fly all the way up to the moon!”

“Very well,” she quipped, “be sure to send them home before it gets dark.”

“Ten more minutes,” Jack called out and a collective groan echoed through the field.

“I’m not ready to go home yet,” a short blonde girl wailed.

“Me neither!” another cried.

They linked their pudgy arms through the holes in the fence and refused to let go until Laura promised to teach them new tricks in the morning.

“Like flips and stuff?” Jimmy shouted, his eyes growing to the size of dinner plates.

“Sure.”

Jimmy insisted on flying home. “Hold on to my leg, Laura,” he said. “I’ll pull you along with me!”

At supper that evening, Jimmy floated two feet above the dinner table. The baby clapped and giggled from her high chair. The dog barked and tried to nip at his socks.

“Jimmy,” his mother scolded him, “don’t stand on your chair, you’ll fall and hurt yourself!”

He sat and ate the rest of his peas without saying a word.

“Can I go to the dance after school tomorrow?” Laura asked.

“We need you to babysit?” her father said, shovelling mashed potatoes into his mouth.

“Can’t you get someone else to do it?”

“We’d have to pay them,” her father said.

After dinner, Jimmy watched his mother read a book with a half-naked man, and a lady with long red hair all the way down to her knees on the cover.

“Can’t you read anything else?” Jimmy’s father snarled angrily, glaring at the book. His mother said a rude word and left the room. Jimmy winced as she slammed the door. He would remind her later to put twenty-five cents in the swear jar.

“They’re still not talking to each other,” he whispered to the dog.

***

The children were waiting patiently at the bleachers the next day at lunch. Some of them had removed their helmets and knee pads. Jack showed them how to tuck into a ball and push their feet over their heads.

“Help me, I’m stuck!” A chubby boy screamed, his face growing red. Laura ran over and flipped him right side up again.

“Are you excited for the dance, Laura?” Jack asked.

“I have to babysit my stupid brother,” Laura growled. She kicked a stray rock.

“Why don’t you just ditch him?” Jack said as the pair walked back to class.

“Maybe,” Laura mumbled.

They didn’t notice Jimmy flying nearby.

It was hard to concentrate on Mr. Davis’ incredibly long and especially dreary lesson on isosceles triangles. The class could hear the DJ setting up down the hall and exchanged exciting glances from behind page sixty-four.

“Eyes on your own textbook,” Mr. Davis scolded, turning back to the chalkboard. “I can see out of the back of my head, you know.”

But he didn’t notice the girls in the back row passing around sparkly blue eyeshadow under their desks. The bell rang and Jack and Laura rushed to the gym with everyone else. Mrs. Stonemore lurked uncomfortably near the door, as neon sticks were waved in the air to slow music. The girls stood in the corner sharing one raspberry lip gloss between them, and twirling their hair around their little fingers. They eyed the boys who leaned against the far wall smelling of their father’s cologne. In the middle of the dance floor, smiling awkwardly at each other, Laura and Jack swayed an arm’s length apart from each other.

Jimmy waited outside by the bleachers as the other first graders practiced their tricks. He shivered from the cold.

“I’ve got to find my brother,” Laura said as the last song ended, “he’s probably upset I ditched him.”

Jack and Laura could see the first graders zooming in circles out by the bleachers. The sun was beginning to dip behind the tall tree.

“Big kids!” The first graders shouted as they got closer. “Look, look!” They pointed to the roof.

“Laura! I'm up here!” Jimmy waved to his sister. His toes were inches from the edge, his arms straight out to the side like Jack had shown him.

“Jimmy! How did you get up there?” Laura shrieked. Her heart slid into her stomach.

“I climbed the tree!” Jimmy said proudly, pointing to the tall Evergreen. Its branches bridged across to the roof. “I’m going to fly down, OK?”

“No!” Laura shouted. “Don’t do that Jimmy!” The first graders huddled behind her.

“Get a teacher!” She screamed to Jack. “Get a ladder! Get something!” She began to run.

“What in the devil is going on out here?” Mrs. Stonemore said, stomping outside. “Jimmy Milburn, get down right now!” She shrieked, clutching at her chest.

“Don’t move!” Laura shouted. Her hands shook as she began to climb the tree. Her knees scraped against the bark and dripped blood down into her clean, white socks. And then her fingers touched the edge of the roof.

***

Red and blue lights flashed as parents quietly collected their children from the school.

“He flew away. I saw him do it!” the first graders insisted, kicking their feet as their mothers strapped them into their car seats. Jack wrapped a blanket around Laura’s shoulders. She would not stop shaking.

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