Leaving town

The below story is inspired by NPR's Three Minute Fiction contest. I didn't enter, but I did follow the rules: 600 words or fewer; the story must have one person enter town and one person leave it.

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The building blocks collapsed like a sand castle­—slowly, crumbling, as though something behind or underneath were pushing to get out.

“Buh-ee,” the toddler said as she pushed the rabbit through the shell of the toy-block town that she had laboriously constructed just five minutes ago.

“What’s that bunny doing?” her mama asked as she tucked footed pajamas into a dresser. “Is he smashing the town?”

“Ton,” the little girl nodded in agreement. She swung the bunny side to side by his ears, aiming to level any two blocks that remained stacked atop one another. 

The bunny’s arrival in “town” had left a few casualties—a stuffed cotton frog, a raggedy plush dog and a naked plastic baby doll, all toppled from their makeshift beds of handkerchiefs and diapers.

Mama finished putting away clothes and put her hands down atop the oak dresser, letting her head hang down. “Silly bunny,” she said tiredly.

“Buh-ee,” the little girl said sadly. She threw the toy into the wreckage on the floor and stood over it, contemplating. Finally, she turned to her mama. “Uh-oh,” she said. “Buh-ee down.”

Mama stepped over the mess on the floor and told her daughter, “I’m going to go put on some laundry. You stay here. Help bunny put the blocks in the toy box, OK?”

“’Kay,” the girl agreed, and she followed her mama out the door.

The two separated clothes and stuffed them into the washer; mama let the girl scoop the laundry detergent into the automatic dispenser and push the button to start the load.

Mama ignored her ringing phone and insistent daughter as she carried a laundry basket full of dry clothes out to fold them. The girl walked right between her mama’s legs and whined, “Ma-ma, uppy. Mommy, mommy, mommy…”

“No uppy,” Mama returned. “No uppy. You can walk. Here. Come help Mama fold the laundr-eeeeee—” She let go of the basket as her feet slid across the floor on a surfboard of wooden blocks. Her arms flailed to find purchase—or at least to push her daughter out of the way so she wouldn’t fall on her.

No such luck.

Together they landed in a pile of tangled limbs and soft toys and sharp blocks. The back of Mama’s head thudded dully against the wood floor; one jeaned leg came down on the soft sloping bridge of baby’s nose.

The little girl screamed and her mama groaned and rolled off of her. She crawled away from the decimated toy block town on her hands and knees, momentarily stunned by the numbing blow. Though she hadn’t looked at her daughter, she could tell from her gasping cry that she was more scared than hurt.

Her head pounded too much to stand upright, so she let herself lay down on the floor again. She couldn’t seem to say anything just yet to her girl; each breath was jagged and piercing. It was OK as long as she didn’t move.

She heard the answering machine click on and the girl’s skinny-voiced, skinny-chinned, skinny-hipped father start talking.

“Hey, Cheyenne?”

The toddler quieted.

“Yeah, uh, I’m not coming tonight.” He was drunk.

So surprised, Mama thought from the floor. More of the same.

“I know it’s my weekend—“

And you missed last weekend.

“Da-ee?” The girl asked.

“But… I lost my job today.”

Of course you did, she said. She swore under her breath, sending a tear of pain through her side.

“And I just had to get out of town.”