Some Pieces #1: Hide and Seek (English Version)

Once, I had a dream about a kindergarten teacher whose name was Evelyn. She was a full-packaged, passionate, inspiring teacher who was devoted to her work more than anyone did. One day, she and her pupils had an activity outdoor: playing hide-and-seek in the field not far from the school building.

The day was so gloomy, and the sky was covered in grey. Its vibe was so different from Evelyn's pupils' moods: the kids acted as if they had an activity at the beach during summer; the damp weather did not seem to bother smiles on their faces. Evelyn enjoyed her pupils' giggles for a moment. It would have been perfect to have a picnic if the sun had beamed as bright as the other days. 

It's nice. She tried to focus on positive things instead of minding the muddy ground dirtying her pair of white shoes. And quite strange. 

Because as far as Evelyn remembered, yesterday, neither she was a kindergarten teacher who was passionate or whatever was the rest, nor she had pupils. What was Evelyn yesterday? Had she ever became something, even? 

I don't know. Only Evelyn knew to whom the answer was addressed. For Evelyn, seeing her white shoes was full of chocolate dots was better than trying to recall what kind of failure she was yesterday and the other days before. Even if I don't know where it is or why I am here, today is definitely more okay because It's not like I can hear those happy laughs every day. 

"Why don't we start the game?" asked one of the kids. Evelyn blinked. Right, she thought, an inspiring teacher won't allow oneself spacing out in the middle of the class. 

The same kid asked again, "Are we waiting for someone, Ms. Evelyn?" 

Evelyn smiled. "No, let's just start the game." She began to talk to her pupils. "First, I will be the seeker and all of you must hide somewhere." 

"Are we allowed to hide far?" 

"No, please. You can hide anywhere, but not too far from the way I stand AND please don't hide in dangerous places." The kids seemed to pay her full attention. "Do you understand what I said?" 

"YES!" 

As the students answered, Evelyn clapped. The kids seemed so strangely ecstatic that she could feel their excitement as well. "Okay, let's have some fun!" 

One, two, three, four, five .... 

Evelyn's surrounding soon became mute as she counted to eight: the kids' laughs had disappeared. The only thing Evelyn could hear was just the sound of summer breeze, although she could not feel one. The field strangely went silent as if the kids had not been there laughing and playing happily before: the grey became greyer as Evelyn counted to ten. 

Evelyn opened her eyes just to find nobody, to face silence. 

Of course. She said to herself. They're hiding. What did you expect? That they would surprise you in front of your eyes? 

Perhaps. She said that, still to herself. It's a little bit scary realizing they just disappear as if they are not real. 

The absence of the kids made Evelyn a bit anxious. It should have been easy for her to find the kids' hiding place in an open area like this, but, even so, she failed just to find a clue. There were no sounds, their voices were completely gone, there were no clues about a presence of a child around Evelyn. 

Not even a single hiding place here. Where do they possibly go? The school building? 

No, I don't think so. 

Or so, Evelyn thought, but there was nowhere to hide and go for them except the school building. 

Soon, Evelyn went to the school building that suddenly had a touch of gloomy. As she walked, she wondered why today's weather was so damp dan humid that she had to go through annoying reeds and rushes and muddy ground. 

Today was so odd. Evelyn mumbled. It almost felt like she was wandering around in someone's daydream. Or maybe she's not, because if Evelyn were wandering around in someone's fantasy right now, the school building should have been a ghost nest or some other nonsense things. 

Evelyn made her way passing the reeds and muddy ground that made half of her white shoes covered in chocolate. The alleyway on the ground floor of the school building was full of paintings that were hung facing the wall. Evelyn had no idea about what was immortalized in those canvases, so she turned one of the paintings to feed her curiosity. Slowly, Evelyn touched one of the paintings' frames. She turned the nearest from her standing place. Quite heavy. 

Evelyn held her breath for a moment. In front of her, the painting showed a kid who was grinning until his mouth met his eyes. He, then, ran and left Evelyn puzzled with his laugh. The laugh cascaded down laughs from other paintings like dominos. Evelyn had to make her legs struck down by the painting first to realize that she was still alive, and she needed to breath. 

Run, Run! Evelyn flinched. She was freezing, failed to give a quick reaction. There were no one in the world who wanted to whip Evelyn using a cane as much as herself. Evelyn wished she were a cheetah, a horse, an ostrich, even, but she was no way faster than a sloth or a koala. 

The situation was completely different outside. It was so quiet that Evelyn thought she would be able to hear the sound of a strand of eyelashes if it fell to her cheeks. For a second, Evelyn assumed that what happened to her earlier was not real. She was imagining things; she was too frustrated to look for her pupils. A second later, Evelyn heard a scream that was too real to be something she only had in her head beneath the ground she stepped on. 

Evelyn looked down. Not far from her standing place, there was a hole that was quite far under the ground. For a moment, Evelyn thought that her pupils hid in that hole, even though she was not really sure that a kid as tall and big as her pupils would be able to enter a hole that seemingly could be entered only by rabbits.  

Forcing herself, Evelyn came towards the hole. From the hole, Evelyn was separated by a high alley. Its way down to the hole was so protruded in and narrow that Evelyn struggled just to breath and move her hands. Evelyn was only half the way when she realized that the closer she was to the hole, the soil above her slowly falling. It made Evelyn contemplate that, most likely, when she had reached the hole, the exit would be completely closed, and she would be buried with the hole that could be entered only by adult cats. 

Evelyn heard her pupils' laughs again, but now, they were not from the hole. That happy laughs came from the world above Evelyn. She was puzzled. It took blood, sweat, and tears (literally) for her to see her pupils laughing at her. 

"She's fooled!" one of them shouted. After a while, Evelyn had made her way out. She survived thanks to the help of her pupils pulling her hands with all their might and main. 

"She went underground!" exclaimed the others. 

"You ... hid under the ground?" 

"Of course, we didn't, Ms. Evelyn. We didn't even hide?" 

"Ah, I see," Evelyn almost exhaled a relieved sigh. Almost. She forced herself to face the kids' gazes: their eyes were completely white when she looked at them. Evelyn gulped. "Then, if you didn't hide ... whose laughs were there underground ...? The paintings ...?" 

At first, it was only one pupil who chuckled. Not even a second after, the number of kids who chuckled increased. Evelyn was so sure that she heard her pupils laughed all together. 

Or no? Because as the day became darker, Evelyn's pupils' voices sounded more like a bunch of crows perched on a branch cawing, like a bad omen. 

"We didn't hide?" They grinned. "We can choose if we don't want to be seen by you. We just want to play and see how you will look for us even when we are not going anywhere." 

At that very moment, I woke up. 

© dailydoseofkafein | Published on November 12th 2022