The Wet Floor Sign

Ages 12-15

Zivi walks round the wet-floor sign, and then goes back for it.

It is in the middle of the corridor outside the lunchroom, a yellow triangle on its feet, with a sign on both sides. The floor behind it is shining. She steps wide, along the wall, on the dry part. She walks on.

She is at the stairs when she hears the sound. It is a skid, and a small thump, and someone's lunch box sliding across the tiles.

She turns. A girl from the lower grade is sitting on the floor, ten steps down the corridor, past where the sign is. She is in the wet. Her lunch box has gone under the radiator. She is not hurt. She is looking at her knee.

Zivi goes back. She does not say anything. She helps the girl up by the elbow, and the girl walks off with her wet skirt, the other way.

Zivi picks up the lunch box and sets it on the sill. Then she goes to the sign.

She looks at where it stands. It is at the edge of the shine, where people pass it, and not on the shine. She picks it up by the top, and carries it three long steps down the corridor. She puts it in the middle of the wet floor.

She leaves it standing there, with the yellow facing both ways, and goes on to her stairs.