Tinkling of cartridges and bolts covered the soft rustle of tree foliage, leaving a strong, hot smell of gunpowder. The fruits were all torn apart by gunfire — the shudders of the shots deafened the birdsong.
"Just one more shot and we'll have lunch, okay?"
"But I still want to show Mom and Dad!"
Charles bent down and detached the rifle's magazine.
"Then let's stop for now, otherwise there ain't be anything left for us to shoot later," he advised, showing her the last two remaining shells.
But she didn't have to wait until lunch, no.
Steps sounded behind her ears, coming along the path her parents had left and, apparently, also returned. Her mother held her brother by the hand and her father touched his shoulder.
They came back all smiles. Picturing a happy and beautiful family. But a beauty and happiness so fragile that when they saw their daughter out of her chair, their smile started to wither with a sudden, antinomic displeasure.
"Natalia, can you tell me who it was that said you could get out?" asked the mother, concealing her cynicism under a pretentious complacence.
The girl didn't say a word: she just lifted her finger and lashed out at her grandfather with all the innocence in the world.
"He said I'm really good!"
"Dad, if you keep going over my orders, that girl will grow ever naughtier than she is," her mother fumed.
The little girl retracted her smile. Her joy withered with a sudden shame.
"Natasha, the girl is on summer holidays" her grandfather defended her. "And even when you come to visit, which is already a novelty by itself, I can't even have a little fun with my granddaughter?"
Her father seemed to agree with his wife; but he knew, too, that one shouldn't poke one's nose into family arguments.
He only gave her a reproachful look, hidden under the discussion.
"What's the problem?" replied the grandfather. "It was just a few shots. Nothing to worry 'bout."
"Shots?" asked Natasha. "And is a rifle something you should put in a child's hand, Dad?"
"It's a low-caliber sporting carbine, this ain't good even for hunting," he defended both himself and his granddaughter. "Furthermore, I warned her of the risks and that she should never point this out to anyone."
"And why does it matter?" she insisted. "If she was more interested in school, she could have fun like her brother!"
The girl's smile crumbled, as did the hope of receiving a compliment from her parents. That was the final straw: she pulled the bolt and cleaned the chamber one last time, dropping the rifle her arms could barely lift over the frame of that porch.
"Just stop fighting", she muttered.
Natalia walked across the battlefield of those discussions, almost as nonchalant as a war veteran's equanimity. She knew that terrain: the relief and topography of contempt.
And she knew which mines she shouldn't step on, and that raising her own weapons was even worse — even if she could've even won a battle; but she would have lost the war anyway. The entire trip had been like this. A pressure settled on her chest, like a fear that she wouldn't be able to prove what she was capable of.
That was going to happen again. Two hours in the car, not even saying a word. A silence filled with utter shame and contempt.
"If I cry, they will yell at me. If I say what I think, I won't be right. It's best to just let it go, isn't it?" she pondered.
And she sat down in the rocking chair again; but this time, she didn't even dare enjoy the swinging. The girl just kept her silence as a quiet, obedient child — the ones her parents should like — by drowning in her own leniency.
"There, I'm here again," the girl said, crossing her arms and slouching in her chair. "Now you don't have to fight anymore, do you?"
The argument was on the verge of rekindling; both Charles, her grandfather, and Natasha, her mother, however, chose to end there. But her parents' eyes had that creepy look like it "wasn't over yet" — a look that meant "they'd talk about it later at home".
"They didn't even want to see me! And they keep comparing me to him. Like I'm worse at everything", she thought.
The words of those two dispersed, leaving only that dead-spirited silence. The pain in her knee no longer bothered her; not because it'd healed, but because didn't she care anymore.
"I used to draw and paint better than he did; but nobody ever cared. I was always faster in races. And I must be much better at shooting."
"But they never care!"
"Because it..."
"Because... I..."
"I... just wanted you to praise me a little!"
"I... just wanted you to know that I... try hard."
Her mother, father and brother left her there. And she should think about what she'd done of so bad, even if she'd never wanted to commit that mistake. And just when she thought that nothing was going to reach what she felt, a gentle hand laid on her shoulder, stroking all her misunderstood grief.
"Grandpa?", she thought.
And that moment, she would never forget. And that warm touch would mark all her decisions. And he let her know what she wanted to do so much: it was to prove that she could meet her cherished future by doing what she did best.
"The best shooter there is."