Isla and the Humming Wall

Isla wanted to ask the new girl to play. That was all. She stood at the edge of the playground, holding her coat, and her mouth would not open.

The new girl sat on the low wall by the gate. She was drawing in the dust with a stick.

"Just say hello," Isla whispered to herself. "Hello. Hello."

She took one step. Her feet felt like two bags of sand. She took another step, and the words crept back down her throat.

So Isla tried something different. She sat on the wall too, a little way off, and looked at her trainers.

Hmmmmm.

A low sound came from somewhere. Isla looked up. The new girl looked up too.

Hmmmmm.

"Was that you?" Isla asked. It came out before she could stop it.

"No," said the new girl. "I thought it was you."

They both listened. Hmmmmm. It was not the girl. It was not Isla. Isla put her ear against the wall, and the stones shivered against her cheek.

"It's in here!" she said.

"I'm Nell," said the new girl, and she put her ear to the wall as well. Their heads were very close together. "It sounds like a big cat purring."

"Or a bee in a jar," said Isla.

They crept along the wall, ears pressed flat, step by step. The humming got louder, then louder still. At the very end, behind a clump of tall grass, they found a gap between two stones.

Out buzzed one fat bumblebee. It wobbled up into the air, circled twice, and landed on Nell's drawing in the dust.

"Oh!" said Nell.

"Oh!" said Isla.

The bee did not care about either of them. It had flowers to find, and off it went, bumbling over the fence.

Nell looked at Isla. Isla looked at Nell. Isla's mouth, which had been so stuck, opened all by itself.

"Do you want to play bees?" she said.

"Yes," said Nell. "You be the hive."

And Isla stood by the wall and hummed, hmmmmm, while Nell buzzed round and round her in the warm morning sun.