Moving to Albion

         The people here smell funny.  And they look diseased.  I can tell already that I'm not going to have much fun here.
         The lady at the counter of the Pamida store has a head that's too small for her body.  She looks as if some brutish pigmi tribe and its shaman had had a grudge against her.  But maybe it's just collapsing for lack of support.
         I buy my shoes and run.
         It's fall now.  The old oaks that shade all the broken sidewalks and hide the faces of the houses are slowly decaying in color.  Their leaves mold over from a sickly olive green to a spotted poisonous orange, and ease into a dog-shit brown death.  If we had moved somewhere else this would have been a beautiful season.  Somewhere with lots of trees and no corn fields.  Why dad had to chose Albion to come and teach, I'll never know.  Just walk.
         But I suppose we had to move, didn't we?  How weird would it have been to have stayed where we were!  What with what dad did.
         It's a bad idea to think about that.  It reminds you of your friends, of the fact that it could have been them.  It could have been you, the lawyers said.  Of course, dad had more money, of course he would win.  It's all the same to me.
         Two pieces of the sidewalk have come off, where a root grew up underneath and broke two halves of the corner away.  Separated them.  I kick the bigger piece.  Watching where it lands, my eyes are drawn upwards, and I realize that I'm about to cross a bridge.  The river it spans is murky and brown.  It runs through a large park, and is fenced in by a stone retaining wall.  Straggling old people are running on the bike trail, about to have heart attacks.  Little devils are galloping through the fields after frisbees.  What a nuisance.
         I sat down against the cold, rough cement railing of the bridge and tried to hide the hot tears.


Word Count: 344