Stop, please stop

The garden was quiet with anticipation. Balls, big and small; a mini trampoline; a sand-pit full of superheroes, various monsters and dinosaurs buried head first, lay, strewn here and there: ignored.

Billy was playing hula-hoop as his younger brother watched, hopping from foot to foot. The sound and smell of frying onions floated throughout.

‘Can I do it now?’ His brother asked, excited.
‘Not yet.’
‘But it’s my turn Billy.’
Billy carried on spinning the hula-hoop round his waist – he was becoming very good at it. His younger brother wasn’t.

Their mother was indoors, with the onions, she could hear everything being said and eventually shouted out, ‘Billy, let your brother have a go too, don’t be selfish.’

Billy continued to spin the hoop, faster now. ‘Hey,’ his brother squealed, ‘mum, he hasn’t stopped yet. It’s my turn Billy.’

‘Billy', she shouted again.

But Billy really had it now, he had a rhythm, could have kept going all day; he would keep going all day and all night and on and on, in fact. Billy kept going, shifting forward onto his toes, feeling the press against his stomach, and then rocking back onto his heels, as the hoop looped its way round his hips and back.

‘Billy’, his brother began crying quietly.

‘Billy, don’t make me come out, play fair now.’

‘But mum he’s no good,’ Billy managed to blurt out concentrating hard so as not to break the rhythm.

‘Billy if you don’t let him have a go…’ His mother didn’t finish, and Billy didn’t stop. By now he couldn’t stop anyway, this movement, this rhythm had taken over, the hoop span on, how could it stop anyway?

From the corner of his eye he could see his brother sitting on the step, head in hands, as he sobbed gently.

‘You can play with the football,’ Billy told him, trying to comfort.

‘I don’t want to play with the football,’ his brother blurted out, face all red, covered in tears and snot, ‘footballs not fun when you don’t play as well.’

‘Billy,' his mother shouted again, ‘this is the last time, and I’m coming out and then I’ll take it away and you won’t get it back for a week and neither of you will play with the damn thing.’

‘Billy’ his brother screamed, ‘please Billy, I just want a little go. Stop Billy, please stop.’

But it was too late, the hoop was moving, Billy was in it; it wouldn’t just stop, surely they all knew that, things like that never just stop.