The War Game by Crystal Black

Author:Crystal Black [Black, Crystal]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: C429, Extratorrents, Kat
Publisher: Marvel Enterprises, Inc.
Published: 2010-06-16T00:00:00+00:00

~~~

I was looking through my anatomy book when Ricky wandered over, trailed by his mom. Before I had a chance to close my book, he was already pointing to different organs, laughing at the “naked” people.

Then, to my surprise, Luann started to talk about the different body systems and what they did, simplified for a seven-year-old’s brain.

Then I got a great idea. I borrowed Luann’s pocket knife (she keeps it in the ripped tongue of her shoe) and very carefully, I cut out the bodies showing the different systems. Circulatory, digestive, muscular, all of them.

I explained to him that they were paper dolls. Jim, back from several camps ago, made me some dolls before. He made me a Pearl doll that looked much better than I do in real life. Then he drew some clothes and accessories. Everything was done in a black marker but Jim could draw clothes better than any I had ever seen. He made the paper Pearl a really glamorous gown, the kind movie stars would wear to receive awards when movies were still being made. He also made a ton of funny hats too. Big ones with feathers and stuff sticking out of them. He made the paper doll a pearl necklace, even though I asked him not to. He insisted and then I had to let him. Said that pearls were exquisite and that I’m lucky to be named after them.

“My name’s Jim. Just boring old Jim.” And from then on, I always referred to him as “Boring Old Jim.”

I needed to stop this. One damn thought only leads to another. One tear added to another.

I didn’t need to explain much about the concept of paper dolls to Ricky. He got excited and proceeded to grab them all out of my hands.

It was weird how throughout history, people had always made little figures of people. Dolls. Jim told me that. Often times I felt like a doll. My throat was suffocating with that stuff pillows are made out of. People pulled a string this way and I went this way. Pull the string that way and I went that way.

I needed to not think about this stuff. Memories were nothing but ghosts that haunted you. And there was no way to kill a ghost. You had to learn to ignore them. See through them.

I closed my book. There were more paper dolls I could make but Ricky had more than enough. “Luann, do you know anything about the cards people talk about? Or the numbers?”

“I think people try and fill in the gaps of what they don’t know. Don’t pay much attention to them, they’re just fools. But I do know something about numbers—at least, what they mean in my parents’ culture. There are lucky and unlucky numbers. For example, eight is a very lucky number. When people were allowed to fly on the airplanes to my country, the flight numbers would often begin with the number eight. In China, the word eight sounds a lot like the word for wealth.

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