Ladybird
Sarah Royston
“Rain, rain, come today,
Rain, rain, come and stay.”
Tilly chews a fluffy antenna. She loves her ladybird and its electro-burble song. Were the words of that rhyme different when I was young? It’s funny what you remember and what you forget. Having my own child seems to stir long-buried things.
Mum used to bring me here every summer to visit my grandparents. We’d eat bread with honey from their hive. Then climb the white track till we found the butterflies—shivering clouds of them, flirting with the knapweed. Luminous as scraps of sky. What were they called? I can’t remember. We’d picnic on the ridge where larks sang, white dust on our shoes.
* * *
Now it’s my turn. The village looks different. After ten years away, I shouldn’t be surprised. There’s a housing estate where the Common used to be. My grandparents’ cottage has new owners now. The garden is withered from the drought, the dry stalks stand like skeletons. Something feels strange—the silence. The birds must be hiding in the shade.
“Here is the beehive, where are the bees?”
Mum used to sing that. What was the answer? The eerie quiet is broken by a low-flying plane.
I wrangle Tilly into the front-loading sling, determined that we’ll make it to the ridge by noon. The rucksack is heavy with baby supplies; it balances her weight. Her hair is silky under my chin. Sometimes I wish she could stay forever, hearing my heartbeat, safe from harm.
“You are my sunshine!”
The ladybird bleeps cheerily. Wasn’t there a line about not taking the sunshine away? Pleading, almost. The toy’s version goes: “With you, my sun shines every day.” Perhaps the old words made people think of things they’d lost.
It’s getting hot. Tilly grizzles and I take her cardi off. Mum knitted it for me when I was a baby. A design of red squirrels, owls, and hares. I saw an owl once, in a zoo. I thought it was a stuffed toy, it sat so still. Tilly wriggles as I smooth suncream over her arms. I wish Mum could have held her.
“Here is the beehive, where are the bees?”
Mum used to sing that. What was the answer? The eerie quiet is broken by a low-flying plane.
I wrangle Tilly into the front-loading sling, determined that we’ll make it to the ridge by noon. The rucksack is heavy with baby supplies; it balances her weight. Her hair is silky under my chin. Sometimes I wish she could stay forever, hearing my heartbeat, safe from harm.
“You are my sunshine!”
The ladybird bleeps cheerily. Wasn’t there a line about not taking the sunshine away? Pleading, almost. The toy’s version goes: “With you, my sun shines every day.” Perhaps the old words made people think of things they’d lost.
It’s getting hot. Tilly grizzles and I take her cardi off. Mum knitted it for me when I was a baby. A design of red squirrels, owls, and hares. I saw an owl once, in a zoo. I thought it was a stuffed toy, it sat so still. Tilly wriggles as I smooth suncream over her arms. I wish Mum could have held her.
* * *
The path rises steeply. Tilly’s dropped her hat; I try to shield her from the glare. My back aches and I drip with sweat under the nylon sling. We should have seen the butterflies by now.
The ladybird runs out of power. Tilly shakes it and cries. Sodding plastic insect with its sodding plastic songs. I try to sing, but I’m out of practice. My voice is rough and dry.
“Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home,
Your house is on fire and your children are gone.”
The words rustle a memory. Kids outside school-gates. Felt-tip posters: OUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE. The teachers must have stopped it; they don’t stand there anymore.
How does the rest of the rhyme go?
“The roots they all wither, the branches all die,
If I am forsaken, I know not for why.”
Or is that another song Mum sang—one about a cuckoo? Was that even a real bird, or just something from a story? Words melt and slip away. I can’t think in this heat.
The ladybird runs out of power. Tilly shakes it and cries. Sodding plastic insect with its sodding plastic songs. I try to sing, but I’m out of practice. My voice is rough and dry.
“Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home,
Your house is on fire and your children are gone.”
The words rustle a memory. Kids outside school-gates. Felt-tip posters: OUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE. The teachers must have stopped it; they don’t stand there anymore.
How does the rest of the rhyme go?
“The roots they all wither, the branches all die,
If I am forsaken, I know not for why.”
Or is that another song Mum sang—one about a cuckoo? Was that even a real bird, or just something from a story? Words melt and slip away. I can’t think in this heat.
* * *
A flutter of blue. My heart soars. But it’s just a crisp packet, snagged on a thorn. Tilly kicks and screams. I stumble on a flint and nearly fall. My breath is ragged, my throat closes, choked on silence and dust. I can’t go on. I sink to my knees beside a hedge, a thin strip of shade. Shed the bag, unwrap Tilly, open my shirt. She feeds greedily, her cheek hot on my skin.
In the stillness my breathing slows. The grass smells like picnics and rolling down hills. Something distracts Tilly; she raises her head. It’s a ladybird climbing a stem. She stares open-mouthed. Looks up at me as if to say: Are you seeing this? Then laughs, her whole body shaking with delight.
She suckles again, then sleeps. I kick off my chalk-stained shoes. Nestled in the long grass, I watch the shadows grow, the colours deepen in the fields. A tiny train runs on sun-silvered rails. Far-off turbines glint, drawing circles on the blue. Something hums in the hedge, waking the answer to the rhyme of the bees:
“They are hiding away where nobody sees.”
Above the ridge, a lark calls—so high it’s out of sight. As if the sky were singing a half-remembered song.
In the stillness my breathing slows. The grass smells like picnics and rolling down hills. Something distracts Tilly; she raises her head. It’s a ladybird climbing a stem. She stares open-mouthed. Looks up at me as if to say: Are you seeing this? Then laughs, her whole body shaking with delight.
She suckles again, then sleeps. I kick off my chalk-stained shoes. Nestled in the long grass, I watch the shadows grow, the colours deepen in the fields. A tiny train runs on sun-silvered rails. Far-off turbines glint, drawing circles on the blue. Something hums in the hedge, waking the answer to the rhyme of the bees:
“They are hiding away where nobody sees.”
Above the ridge, a lark calls—so high it’s out of sight. As if the sky were singing a half-remembered song.
Sarah Royston’s writing draws inspiration from queer ecologies, plant-lore and the landscapes of southern England. She embraces the Hookland motto: Re-enchantment is resistance. Her work is published in Dark Mountain, The Rumpus, and Crow & Cross Keys, among others. She lives in Hertfordshire and works at Anglia Ruskin University. Her first book, Fernseed: A Collection of Tales, was published by The Braag in 2024.
Website: https://hedgeways.wordpress.com/
X/Twitter: @sarahroyston
Website: https://hedgeways.wordpress.com/
X/Twitter: @sarahroyston