Island of Misfit Toys - OPEN to anyone who is sick of being an adult

Louise hated apparition she decided, it felt awful and she felt sick until they appeared near a children's park. Her Daddy was taking her out for the day, which she had looked forward to since she didn't see him much. She looked up at him from where her face had been hidden in his jacket and he smiled back down at her before placing her on the ground. "Go and have fun, Daddy will be right over here alright?"

She pouted, she thought he'd be playing with her not letting her go off on her own. She looked around and spotted another girl by the swings holding a green thing. Since everyone else seemed to be fighting over the slide she ran up to the girl on the swings and climbed into the second seat and smiled. "Hello." She beamed trying to see what the girl was holding as she began to kick her legs making the swing rock back and forth.

Visiting Aunt Emma for the weekend seemed so exciting until she got there. There weren't any toys and Mary soon read all the books she brought with her. She wanted to play with legos, but her Mom forgot to pack them and Aunt Emma didn't have them.

After getting some ice cream, Aunt Emma proposed going to the park. She said there'll be other children there to play with and even though Mary preferred to play alone, she was very bored and so they set out to the park.

Mary was still eating her ice cream when they reached the playground and she was being very careful not to drip any ice cream on her new dress. It was a gift from Aunt Emma's friend and the girl didn't want it to get dirty. She didn't want to approach the group of screaming kids, one of them was bound to bump into her and she was still holding the cone. Instead, the little girl walked over to a girl standing next to the swings.

"Hello! I like you cactus." she said, smiling. There was another girl on the swings and Mary waved to her.

"I'm Louise. Mister cacti looks cute." She smiled brightly showing she was missing one of her upper front teeth as she pumped her little legs harder, swinging higher and higher on her swing and getting her hair all caught up in her face.
She smiled at the other girl too after trying to sweep her hair off her face and waved back. She was quite happy now that her daddy brought her here, she looked around and spotted him smoking a pipe and reading a newspaper by the gates, she waved over to him and he gave a nod and smile to her before reading the papers again.

"Nice to meet you Azalea and Louise. I'm Mary." The five year old introduced herself with a broad smile, just like she was taught to do when she met somebody new. It was very important to make a first impression, her Dad always said.

She nodded seriously when Azalea said Mr. Cacti talks only to her. "He must love you very much." Mary knew how things like that worked, she had a pretty doll at home that made her happy when she was sad. Ice cream made her happy as well, and chocolate. And books. Books were very nice and comforting even when she wasn't sad.

A boy came near them, but he didn't speak. Maybe he was shy. Mary smiled at him and walked over to him. She wanted to make as much friends as possible, because she wanted to visit Aunt Emma again. Having friends in the city where her Aunt lived would certainly be nice.

"I like your suit. My cousin wore something like that on my Mom's and Dad's wedding." the little girl said, trying to compliment him. "Are you coming from a wedding?"

It was noisy and full of other kids and Idella loved it, she loved making noise, chasing the big kids away from the slide so the little ones could take turns on it. She was giggling madly chasing Big Bully Benson around the spider wall till he jumped onto the ropes and climbed out of her reach thinking she wouldn't follow him. What he didn't know is she lived in this park day and night so she could do anything and everything in it. She followed him till he gave up and ran to his parents on the other side of the park and jumped down onto the sand, dusting off her hands on her already scruffy looking top.

She went back to the slide to make sure the small kids were alright, she'd taken it upon herself to be the park watcher, it worked well and the adults avoided her like the plague so that suited her just fine.

The Mary girl looked distracted and Louise followed her gaze to a blond boy in a suit, she looked at him oddly, you didn't play in your smart clothes, he looked very out of place here. A crash brought her attention back and she saw Azalea and another boy on the floor. She squeaked and jumped off the swing to run up to them, seeing if they were alright. She lifted the boy off Azalea and offered her hand tot he girl with the cuddly cactus. "You alright? Please don't cry." She hated when other kids cried, she'd start crying too seeing them upset or hurt.

Mary was looking at the nicely dressed boy with interest. She wanted to know everything about him, but mostly why he was wearing a suit to the playground. Before she could ask him anything else, however, she heard a crash behind her. Azalea and a boy were lying on the floor and the boy was chattering on excitedly.

Mary hurried to Azalea and was glad to see that Louise had already got there. Even though they weren't friends yet, the girl was trying to help and that was a very nice thing to do.

"Do you want some of my ice cream? I promise I don't have cooties." She held out her cone, trying to comfort the girl. She knew what it was like to be accidentally pushed on the floor and it was not nice. The last time it had happened, it was in play school and a potted plant blew up, sending pieces of clay and plant everywhere. Mary didn't know why, but she had a feeling her surprise and hurt was connected with the plant incident, but she didn't want to mention this to anyone. And she was sure that if she had had ice cream, the plant wouldn't have exploded. So, it was crucial that Azalea had ice cream right now.

Louise smiled seeing her new friend was alright and the boy didn't look like he was going to push anyone over so she just watched for a moment. When the boy in smart clothes walked over she got a confused look on her face, he had been quiet up to now and suddenly telling the clumsy boy with the ball he wasn't welcome. "Hey that's not very nice. It was a accident." She glared at the boy and poked him in the shoulder. "You can't tell him what to do."

Idella looked away from the slide and smiled as a smaller girl came up to her and took her hand to shake it. "That's ok, I'm Idella. Did you want to go on the slide? I can get you to the front of the line if you like?" She asked and waved up to the kids on the slide, some waved back as they came down in lines of twos and threes all laughing as they skidded off the end into the sand pit.

As per usual, Joe was sat in the sand on his own. He was making pretty little shapes, grinning to himself as he built them up gradually higher and higher. The kid had never really been a social butterfly, instead choosing to sit in peace and quiet. Well, mostly quiet anyway. Every so often, he would look around at all the other kids getting on like there was nothing to stop them being best friends in an instant. Well, to them there probably wasn't, but Joe somehow always managed to get teased for keeping his teddy in his hands at all times.

There was a star in front of him at the moment, though to be honest it wasn't exactly very good. Joe was proud of it, though, because he'd done it all by himself. "Mummy will be proud of me," he murmured to himself with a shy giggle, dusting his hands off on his shirt as he stood up. He grimaced a little, trying to get the stuff off him. He hated having sand on him.

It was all itchy

"I'll have a little bit, but can you hold Mr. Cacti for me please?"

Mary smiled and took the stuffed cactus from Azalea. When the other girl was holding her ice cream, she cradled Mr. Cacti carefully, making him as comfortable as possible. It was of the utmost importance that he was alright. After such a fall, he needed to be treated gently and with care.

She nodded to Azalea, giving her permission to pass the ice cream on to Louise. She liked both girls and was sure neither of them had cooties. And even if they would have them, she decided they would be very nice cooties.

The little girl looked at Azalea, impressed that she knew such big words. Even though Mary had no idea what 'traumatized' meant, it sounded important, like one of the words adults used when they had their 'grown-up talks'.

The boy with the ball apologized to Mr. Cacti and Mary smiled at him, happy that he wasn't mean. Saying sorry was very polite and mature, Mommy said so. She was glad that the boy didn't push Azalea on purpose, that would have been wrong.

She turned around to see the blond boy who said he dressed like that all the time come up to them. He talked very boldly to the boy with the ball and she didn't understand why. He said he was sorry and all. Maybe the younger boy didn't hear him say sorry. Yes, that would make sense. Mary wanted to tell him so, but she concluded that the boy with the ball could speak for himself and so she remained quiet.

Azalea moved closer to her and Mary held out her free hand, while still holding Mr. Cactus gently with the other. She wanted the other girl to feel safe and Mary found that holding someone's hand made you feel pretty safe.

Daddy had just dropped her off and left for work. She saw lots of other kids playing, wondering where she should go. The swings were always fun, but she saw that they were already friends standing there and she didn't want to disturb them. Slides were not something she liked, so that was not something she would do.

Standing there, her hair began to change colour. She still had not learnt how to manage her abilities to change her hair, although everything else was under control. Squeezing her eye shut really tight, she pictured her hair the way she wanted it, long and black. She waited and waited and waited but she did not feel anything happen. She opened her eyes and saw that it was still at her shoulders, bright green and ugly. Sighing, she started to walk around, looking for someone to talk to. Meeting new people was something she liked but she never knew how to start talking to someone.