Short Story Month #2~Dandelions and Dinosaur Earrings

Dandelions and Dinosaur Earrings

   Cara felt like digging a hole and crawling down into it, letting the earth swallow her up. Nothing bothers you in a hole. You can't hear anything in a hole.
   Unfortunately, Cara wasn't in a hole at the moment. So she forced herself to take the sticky yellow mess of weeds from her sister's hand, wishing her friends would stop staring, with small, amused smiles on their faces. Finally, her job done, her sister skipped off, singing under her breath and swinging her stuffed dog, Wolfie, like a baton twirler.
   It wasn't that Cara didn't like her little sister, Becca; but Becca was eight years younger than Cara, making their ages five to thirteen. The only thing they had in common was their favorite color. Also, being five and having no shame, Becca was prone to embarrassing Cara, most often when in front of Cara's friends. Not only did she carry Wolfie everywhere, but Becca loved to sing, either under her breath like she was insane, or out loud and painfully off key.
   Also, there was no family resemblance. While Cara remembered feeling like a pretzel rod among carrot sticks as a five-year-old, Becca could be better compared as a whale among dolphins. If people saw Becca and compared her to Cara, people would say "That's how Cara looked when she was that age," hoping that Becca would slim out as she got older, supposedly like Cara.

   Their mother didn't see how any of this should embarrass Cara, though, when they were driving to the mall an hour later.
   "Hon, she's five," Mrs. Lennox said, exasperated, as Cara groaned while Becca launched into yet another verse of "Frosty the Snowman", not caring that it was July. "You did that stuff when you were five. Everybody's like that when they're five!"
   This wasn't reassuring, as Cara watched Becca play with other kids in the mall's playground while her mom made returns. While Becca got along with everyone, she still carried Wolfie around, sang, and kept running back to Cara every few minutes, complaining she had lost a dinosaur stick-on earring and needed a new pair from the sheet Mrs. Lennox had stuffed into Cara's hands.
   Cara was getting more and more annoyed with her sister. Finally, after Becca had lost her fifth dinosaur earring, she lost it.
   "Here! Take it!" she yelled, throwing down the sheet of stick-ons. "Go and do what you want! I don't care! Just stay away from me!"
   Becca looked confused, but took the hint and ran off with the earrings. Cara slouched in the mall bench, angrily trying to rub off the yellow dandelion stain on her hand.

   Fifteen minutes later, Cara looked up to see that Becca had done what she asked; she couldn't find her sister or Wolfie anywhere in the playground. Or in the nearby stores. Or in the food court. Or in the bathroom. Another ten minutes later, Cara couldn't find Becca anywhere.
   She was starting to really worry. Her mother would be coming back to the playground, expecting both of them to be there.
   Cara started to check everywhere a Becca-sized five-year-old could fit: in trash-cans, behind clothes racks, under sinks. All the time she screamed at herself for letting Becca run off, for not looking after her. She's only five, Cara thought over and over, Anything can happen to her, and I should have been a better sister.

   Finally, after checking the jewelry store for the fifth time, losing hope that Becca had wandered in and asked for diamond dinosaur earrings, Cara trudged back to the playground to face her mother. She tried to take deep breaths and struggled with how to explain to her mother how Becca had gone missing. Luckily, her mother hadn't come back yet, so Cara sat on her bench, struggling not to cry. She felt terrible; what if that was the last thing she ever said to Becca? What if that was the last time she would see her skip with Wolfie, or hear her off-key and off-season singing? Not that it was hard; Cara could practically hear Becca singing in her head. In fact, it almost sounded like Becca was right there, singing herself.
   Well, that's because Becca was right there, singing herself. Cara leapt off the bench and ran to the source of the sound. There was Becca, Wolfie by her side, decorating the underside of the slide with dinosaur stick-on earrings.
   "Hey, girls!" Cara turned around to see Mrs. Lennox, minus the shopping bags and looking satisfied that her returns had gone well. "What have you been up to?"
   Cara shrugged and gave a small smile.
   "Just sister stuff," she said, and when Becca came out from under the slide, she held her hand all the way back to the car. Becca was only five, after all.