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The sun was excited to see three of his favourite twelve-year-olds walking to the court. They had tennis racquets slung over their shoulders. They wore matching green skirts. They held their chins high. Upon reaching, all three girls huddled around and dived into a whispering discussion. The sun strained to hear, though he wasn’t proud of it. He shone down some of his most powerful rays over the committee and extracted its core issue. The girls were deciding who should play first.

Each of them put forth compelling arguments but alas the ball was in Amyrica’s court. Quite literally, she owned the ball they were to play with and as innocence would have it, she chose her opponent in an established weaker player, Irhael. The two duelled, wiped their brows, duelled again, fell down and then duelled some more. Surprisingly enough Irhael was in good form that day. It may have been the calcium tablets her mother, Mrs Brighttain, was giving her after dinner. If all went well, the sun decided to wager on her at the next celestial gamble. He was terribly tired of losing his rays to Monsieur Moon.

After a rather close game, Amyrica stood victorious. The two girls shook hands and in came Lolasia with a stride in her step. The sun had never seen anyone with such pearly enjoyment for life. She was new to the neighbourhood; an uncharted territory for Amyrica. That was the very first-time Lolasia had joined in for afternoon games. The sun and the moon didn’t agree on a lot. They did when they witnessed Lolasia walk her dog on the very first night the Blankans had moved into town from the ‘Islands of Freewill’. She had been chatting with the dog, Baliyo. Right then, nobody in the world had been happier than them.

“Ay, Mista Sun, could it be at all possibley zthat zthe little girl is...how you say...ethereal?” Monsieur Moon had asked, squinting down upon the earth. Surprised by the sudden shimmer of silver raining down on them, Lolasia had pointed towards the sky and giggled. Wagging his tail, Baliyo had barked with glee as well before they proceeded to blow kisses to Monsieur Moon.

“Wait, let me just see.” The sun had put on his special glasses, to not flash down during nighttime and tilted his head to the side. “Oh my, you’re right. You might be a miniscule ball of nothing but you never miss a pearl.” He had laughed heartily.

“Oui, she is...I cannot say what...she is...you know zthat zthing...rather rare...she is...”

“She is tranquil. Unearthly, so hmm...I wasn’t aware that was possible on that planet, the seat of universal entropy.”

So it had been decided from that night onwards no one would wager on Lolasia for she was according to nature, a mutation. Like a flower meant to be observed, not plucked.

Down in the field, the wind hummed to dancing blades of grass. At the centre, within the boundary of the court, a match began. Amyrica placed a splendid serve. Lolasia missed it by a breadth of a hair. She squealed up and exclaimed at how good the shot was. Then she went on to miss another, making Amyrica guffaw. Lolasia clutched her belly and joined in on the laughter. The next serve found Lolasia lunged in position like a cheetah on the prowl. She stretched back, took a full swing and smashed the ball. Her racquet was a part of her arm. The sun yelled in glee. Caught in arrogance, Amyrica leapt up to receive the ball only to come crashing down on her knees.

“Are you okay?” The two girls rushed to her aid. Scowling, Amyrica dusted herself off and assured them, a tad bit unconvincingly that she was fine. The wind hushed down to listen in. The grass stopped dancing. The sun held his breath. The match resumed. It went on for a while. They were to play for the best of three games. Both the girls played in brilliant forms. One was with a piercing scowl and sheer determination. The other was laughing, jumping, and feeling the wind.

Amyrica won.

Red-faced and wheezing; she plopped down on the grass by the court. Lolasia sat beside her and offered her a drink of water. She congratulated her on the win and praised her moves. The sun watched with interest as Amyrica’s face morphed into confusion. She muttered a small thank you and stood up, ready for her next opponent.

“Wait, what are you doing?” Lolasia looked up at her.

“What do you mean? I am going to play with Irhael now.” Amyrica shrugged incuriously.

“But you already played two matches. One with each of us. Shouldn’t Irhael and I play one now?” Lolasia asked.

“What?” Amyrica snorted. “But I won, didn’t I? The winner gets to keep playing until she loses.”

“I don’t understand.”

The sun munched wide-eyed.

Amyrica sighed, “How do you not know this? So since I won against Irhael, I got a chance to play you. Now I won against you, so I get to play Irhael again. This goes on till I lose. So suppose Irhael defeats me this time, she gets to play against you. That is if she defeats me.”

Lolasia took a few seconds to let this information sink. Then she nodded at the ground. Looking up with a thought between her brows, she said, “We can play outside for two hours, Mom said. If each of us plays against the other two, one time each, we’d all be playing two games at least. I play with Irhael once, then with you once. The same goes for you both. That way we all get to have fun.”

“But then how do we know who won?” Amyrica was so confused that the sun couldn’t help but laugh.

“What does winning have to do with this? Just like we know you won this game, we’ll know who won the next. We just wouldn’t use the win to decide anything. We each get to play for equal turns. Right now you’ll have played six or seven games, while we’ll barely play three.” Lolasia smiled.

“Oh, yes. I hadn’t thought of it. She is right, Amyrica.” Irhael bobbed her head excitedly.

“No, she’s not!” Amyrica threw her hands in the air. “We’ve never played this way before. If I win, I get rewarded. If you win, you get rewarded. That’s how competitions work. That’s how we become better.”

Both the girls mulled that over. Finally, Lolasia said, “What if I just want to play? Not compete.”

The other two girls looked at Lolasia like she was an alien. Then they burst into laughter. “How can anyone not want to compete?”

“I don’t know. I have never had to before.” Lolasia said, a little nervous suddenly.

“You need to join the coaching, Lolasia. My mother says good players should always make use of their potential. You are a good player. You should have your Mom call mine, she’ll tell her all about Coach Elizabeth.” Amyrica patted her new friend on the shoulder. After a while of thought, Lolasia sighed and nodded her head ever so slightly. The sun was holding his breath now. With the sky reddening, it was almost time for him to retire for the day. He did not want to miss the ending of his daily soap opera under any circumstance.

“Okay, I think I’ll ask my Mom. Thank you.” Lolasia gave her a small unsure smile. “Although, don’t you think if we all got to play for equal durations, we’d all eventually become better than we were the previous day?”

“No, silly. That’s just a fairy tale grannies tell little kids. We have to try to be the best, right? We’re grownups, we know better.” Amyrica said, with a sombre expression. In an event of uncanny synchronization, the other two girls listened intently with fixed, dilated eyes. They nodded in fleeting happiness at the prospect of the best days of their lives and sang a chorus of “We’re grownups, we know better.”

As the three girls strutted back home, the sun pulled a blanket overhead to make way for Monsieur Moon’s ever-Elysian aura and sighed, “Humans.”