Excerpt from the short story “Centrifugal Force”Written for a First Year writing seminar
The assignment was to write a memoir The day is hot, and I can feel the plastic seat of the disc swing getting slimy underneath my thighs. I look up at the looming tree branch above me, wondering if it can really hold my weight. The size four navy blue sketchers on my feet dangle above the dusty pebble studded ground, worn brown from all of the spinnies executed in this spot. There is a disc swing in my back yard too, but the ground beneath it is woven with thick roots, making spinnies impossible. I dangle there for a minute, my heavy pony tail swinging back and forth as I jolt my legs up and down, making the tree branch bounce threateningly. Flirting with danger. I yell for Carrie to give me a spin, and she hops off of the elephant sized boulder they dubbed “Pride Rock” and trots over to me. Carrie always does what I ask. She reaches up from beneath me, her shoulders hitting my knees, and grabs the yellow, waxy rope of the disc swing. She leans her seventy pound body backwards away from the swing, making it move slightly under my body. She shifts her weight to the left, bringing me with her, and running in circles around the swing, the rope bending at her hands. I tuck in my legs and stare at my knees as my peripheral vision goes blurry. I can feel the centrifugal force pulling my head backwards, so I flex my neck muscles and pull in tighter. Suddenly, the rope goes loose as Carrie lets go and runs away, almost tripping over her twisted up feet as she escapes the spinning swing. The inside of my lids look orange from the intense daylight. The sound of chirping chickadees and buzzing lawn mowers is spinning around me. From my left ear, to the right. Left right, left right. My eyes are closed, but I can feel my body swirling in circles the same way Carrie will feel hers swirling after emptying the orange bottle of turquoise pills into her mouth. She won’t worry about what the kids at school will think, or what her mother will say, or anything. In her mind she won’t exist, and all of the spinning will stop. |