“Dammit another one?” Chenoa muttered to herself emptying a pocket full of rubber mulch her son brought home from school. Why did he have to store it by the handful?

“Malachi” she caught him by the arm as he sprinted past with a nerf gun, and showed him the handful of black rubber shards. “What did we say about this?”

A nerf bullet shot Malachi in the face and he let out a cry of either pain or joy; it was difficult to tell. He shouted a warriors call then shot back at his cousins down the hall.

“Malachi! Boys enough.”

“It’s for my rock collection.” Malachi said after firing a few well aimed styrofoam bullets. “I know they’re not rocks, mom. But they look like it. Some of them sparkle too!”

Chenoa pulled a face glancing at the dull shards in her hand. They resembled fat black beetles, and a few times that’s exactly what she’d thought when having stepped on them in the hallway.

“No more stealing them from the playground. We can hunt for real rocks by the river this weekend instead. Go on now. And throw these away.” She called after him with a reminder to use the kitchen trash and not the sink! She’d just had it fixed from the last thing he tossed in there.

Returning to the pants she fished another handful out dumping it atop the dryer when it clinked against the metal. Chenoa noticed nothing besides the black rubber beetles and decided to call the district tomorrow morning to complain about their choice in laying rubber mulch.

The hood of the washer slapped shut, water rushing loudly as Chenoa leaned against it, closing her eyes with burdens too heavy to speak of. There was still time left… it’s the same mantra she‘s say each time her anxiety rose in back of her throat. There’s time.

A tear tickled her cheek, and she dashed it away, blinking her eyes rapidly to focus on the rubber shards. Chenoa scooped them into her hand when she heard a heavy scrapping across the dryer top.

Chenoa narrowed her eyes, scrunching her face to better analyze the contents in her palm; and in between the ugly faux rocks, something refracted light; glistening in a brilliant hue.

Chenoa plucked it from the group, forgetting the other pieces to the floor, pulled back the rubber pieces to reveal a brilliant shard of diamond.

“I told you,” Malachi took aim at the mulch littered on the floor, and shot. “Some of the rocks at school sparkle.”