Hope Is a Tiny, Flickering Thing

Childhood is so fleeting.

Photo by Derek Sears on Unsplash

The wind whispers a song to Sasha as she sits in the grass of the wildwood just on the edge of her home’s backyard. If her mother were here, there would be the soft whispers of a fairy tale — perhaps one of the Grimm histories or one of Andersen’s somber musings. Her father would shake his head, smiling a little, even though later in the night he would read to her from something a bit more full — like Dickens, perhaps. The house is peppered with books, hidden like treasures to be found at odd intervals. Sasha has never been hungry for words with her parents.

But there have been small sadnesses. Like when Cassia, the cat she’d grown up with, had died. Or the day Papi, dear old Papi, had passed away in his sleep in his favorite rocker in the house. That same morning, just hours prior, Sasha had seen a fox scamper through the backyard — and she swore it winked at her before its tail disappeared past the back fence. When she’s older, she may think it had been a sign that Papi had ended up where he needed to be: in the great wide somewhere with the birds, the trees, and the hope of something brand new on the horizon.

The hope is what keeps Sasha going on the bad days when her heart feels heavy because of the things she hears on the news. She’s only six, but she sees people like her every day on the…