A Ladybird Laura Labno   © Copyright 2018 by Laura Labno

The problem was that I couldn’t.

I wanted to draw, or write, or tear the notebook apart. I just wanted to do with it whatever would allow me to get rid of that horrible cloth in my throat.

And simply, I could not move my hand. I couldn’t even move my finger. I was like frozen on the outside while inside of me there was a storm.

All the people passing by seemed to be so happy pretending that they didn’t see all these things I could see. Or maybe they did not pretend, I wasn’t quite sure. They seemed so satisfied in their little worlds, so focused on their everyday lives. I was jealeous in fact. Everyday I was waking up seeing the huge picture that others apparently could not notice. The pain in my heart was growing and I wanted to cry but I wasn’t able to produce a single tear. And then, there, out of blue, it happened;

I saw her.

It was a woman, a huge and disgusting woman. Oh, she really made me want to vomit. It seemed as if she was a personification of everything that was causing all my suffering. She was fat, no... not fat - porky. She was wearing shorts and a pink t-shirt, which was too small for her. Her belly was shaking like an enormous jelly. She was pushing a pushchair with one hand and in the other she was holding a burger. I could see very clearly her hand moving, as if in a slow motion. The burger reached its destination, her oral cavity opened. She took a heavy bite, a bite which, as I was sure, she did not need. This was her entertainment, short pleasure, self-focused act. I could hear her body begging to stop and I could hear, somewhere afar, thousands of weak voices groaning from hunger.

A drop of ketchup dropped on her t-shirt, she didn’t notice it. I heard her squelching. It was so loud! The earth seemed to tremble from this horrible sound. And, as if somewhere in the background, mooing of a cow which was being mangled in a machine... Oh, I did not want to hear it! I wish I could cover my ears but I was still like frozen.

The burger was wrapped in a piece of paper. It was making a swishing sound as she was squashing it in her puffy fingers. And again, I could hear something else in this swishing too. It was a swishing of leaves growing on trees and then... a loud sound of a saw and the noise of falling woods and squeaks of animals, and oh, suddenly I felt like there was no more air I could breath in...and I got so scared, I thought I'd die. I regret I didn’t die in fact as it was merely a prelodium of the worst part of this grotesque scene.

Her feet were so big and her stamping was so resounding that I could not hear anything else anymore. But sadly I did not lose my sight.

I saw everything so expressively and aquilinity. There was a small ladybird on the path. Lovely little creature, it was red of course, and had four black dots on its' back. It wasn’t moving, it seemed to be resting. It didn’t make any sense to me. This monstrous woman was getting closer and closer and it still didn’t move. My forehead got sweaty from the pressure, and then…it finally made a move.

It started running, moving its' short legs as fast as it only could but unfortunately it was too late. The monsters' leg lifted and fell with a sound of an earthquake on the last beautiful thing in the world that existed for me in this moment. I knew it was gonna happen and I had this horrible feeling that the world would end at this moment. It could not last anymore, how possibly could it?

But then, all of a sudden, everything turned normal again.

The woman passed next to me. Her movements weren’t slow, and her stepping was not loud anymore. And I could finally move.

I could breathe and smell flowers and feel the heat of sun again but I didn’t want to draw nor write anymore. I just wanted to cry.

And I did cry, indeed, for long and empty hours, looking at the dead body of the ladybird,

I was crying so long that finally it turned into an invisible dust,

And flew away into its unmeasured eternity.