The Dark
By Maryann Macdonald
I tell Madame Marie about those soldiers
and how afraid I am of them.
"I was afraid of things too,
when I was a little girl, " she says.
"What were you afraid of?" I ask her.
She closes her eyes and sits for a while in thought,
her sewing in her lap.
Then she opens them again and licks her thread
to sharpen it for her needle.
"The dark," she says, "and big dogs."
"Oh, I am afraid of the dark and big dogs too," I say,
"but I am more afraid of the soldiers!"
Madame Marie's eyes meet mine.
Slowly she nods her head.
She understands everything.
Copyright Credit: Maryann Macdonald, "The Dark" from Odette’s Secrets. Copyright © 2013 by Maryann Macdonald. Reprinted by permission of Maryann Macdonald.
Source: Odette's Secrets (Bloomsbury USA, 2013)