Magpie Tales: Better that way (a children's story)

clouds sprinkled the sky like dust, the day the elephant came to live at our house. it was rich and blue, not like the grey storm you would come to expect, or lightning flashing strobe lights through the pane. no it was blue, and the elephant small.

i kept him under my bed, better that way, as no one felt the need to talk about him. not that you would, even if he walked passed the kitchen table while you were eating dinner, or tried to slip him a lima bean to avoid their nasty texture squishing between your teeth. no, no one every really talked about him, even though he was there.

while he did not eat lima beans, and i would not blame him, he must have eaten something as he began to grow bigger and bigger. pretty soon, he would not fit under my bed, and though i tried to squish him into the closet, he found a comfortable place in the corner, where i piled my dirty clothes. i think it made him feel closer to me, it was probably better that way.

i could not tell anyone about him, who would believe any way that there was an elephant in my room. once it almost slipped out, but a hush, hush and off you go, kids you know, left him sitting squarely in the middle of the room again. it was hard to miss him, he was as big as the station wagon at this point, but visitors just walked around him politely, and quietly. better that way, as he just might stampede.

i figured my family would ask him to move out eventually, as he was taking up so much space, but they just left him, even when he put his foot through the window one day trying to turn around. duct tape came to the rescue and we just stopped going into the living room, by then he was too big to get out. we painted him to match the wall paper, it was better that way.

one day, sitting in my wooden desk at school, scarred with the initials of previous inhabitants, i was astounded to see the elephant walking through the school yard, on his way to the playground. his trunk held high, he was blowing a mighty tune, finally getting his overdue attention. all the kids ran to the window, cheering and giggling, to the teachers dismay. me, i just smiled from my desk, thinking its better this way.

elephants are meant to live free.

This was written for the prompt at Magpie Tales. It is not my childhood, I just tell it for the kids that live with elephants.