“Define ‘normal’, please, Miss Black,” the principal, Mr Thomas, asked, peering over his thick glasses from the dictionary set out in front of him.

“‘Conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected or people free from disabilities,’ the definition is from Oxford,” Sarah replied, and stepped back in the line of nervous students waiting for their turn to define a word.

“Correct, Miss Black,” Mr Thomas gave a glare, and then turned to the other student. Looking to the crowd, Sarah saw her mom’s disapproving look aimed right at her, her brother sitting in the wheelchair next to her mom. Continually her mom would hound her about there not being a definition for such an absurd word.

The only reason why her mom said that was because she had two disabled brothers. One had Down Syndrome, the other one had Autism. The number of times Sarah had asked for a normal family was countless; her mom just gave a fed-up sigh and said that it was a normal family.


“You did it again!” Sarah’s mom exclaimed, strapping in Nicolas, her Autistic brother, to his car seat. Andrew, the older one, was ready, his wheelchair strapped in, and he was playing with his favourite stuffed dog – unusual for a 12-year-old, but necessary for Andrew to survive the ride home.

“Sorry, Mom!” Sarah exclaimed, opening the passenger side of the car, and hopping in. “I didn’t want to blow it this time! I was so close!” she hugged the third place ribbon close to her chest. “So close.”

“Sarah, I’m aware of that,” her mom said in a tired voice, getting into the driver’s side and backing out of the school driveway. “Nicolas is starting to realize his…difficulties.”

“How?”

“When we got our report cards last, he asked why it said he was struggling.” They stopped at a red light now. “He’s starting to realize he’s… different. Normal is a word that can be twisted around so much, that the definition is too extensive.” She hit the gas as soon as the car in front of her started to roll forward.

“Mom!” Sarah whined. “Do you want me to get to provincials or not?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Then let me define according to Oxford, not to you!”

“End of conversation, Sarah.” Her mom’s voice sounded tired, distraught and angry.


The sound of Nicolas making the sound of a plane disturbed Sarah, once again, from her assignment that was due the next day. She had worked so hard on it, and now she was rushing, like usual. It was a huge chunk of her term mark, and she knew that her parents would kill her if she failed the term. The noise of Nicolas was driving her crazy! Getting up from the computer desk, she opened the door and yelled at Nicolas to be quiet. He just dumbly looked at her for a moment and ran out of the hallway crying.

Satisfied, Sarah went back into the study to continue her homework. Less than two minutes later her mom came storming into the room.

“Sarah!” she yelled. “Why is Nicolas crying now?”

“He was loud, so I asked him to quiet down,” Sarah innocently replied.

“Sarah Black! Don’t you dare lie to me, young lady!” her mom yelled. “I heard you yell at Nicolas! Now, if you want peace and quiet, go to your room!”

“I can’t, I don’t have a computer in my room.”

“Then you will have to put up with Nicolas for a little while longer.” With that, Sarah’s mom stormed out of the room.

“All I’m asking is for a normal brother!” Sarah whispered hotly as soon as the door shut.

“I heard that!” The voice from behind the door countered.

Sighing, Sarah ignored the imaginary voice in her mind saying that she should say sorry, but she ignored it and continued working on the essay.


The weather was extremely warm, every possible window was open and every fan was on. Sarah found herself wearing shorts and a tank-top. She ventured outside, and sat underneath a tree giving plenty of shade. She had a box of beads in front of her, and a bunch of string.

“Can I help?” Rachel, her best friend since birth, asked, coming up to Sarah.

“Sure.” Sarah shoved over so Rachel could come. They beaded for what seemed like hours, and in the end they both held up beautiful necklaces, the beads glinting in the sun.

“We should go inside now,” Rachel observed, seeing her red shoulders and back.

“Yeah,” Sarah agreed, touching her shoulders, she winced. She got up and headed to the safety of the house. Trying to find the sun-burn lotion she climbed up onto the counter and searched the cupboard, shifting things around. “Where is that stuff?” Sarah mumbled to herself, and then turned around. “Okay. How is your summer coming along anyway? You’re going on vacation soon, right?”

“Yeah, we’re going to the mountains, there’s this cool camping ground at the base of one of those mountains, it’s like a huge valley. It will be so much fun!” Rachel leaned against the kitchen counter and threw her head back, letting her dark hair fly.

“Fun,” Sarah replied not very enthusiastically. “Found it!” she triumphantly lifted up a bottle of green goop. “I’ll do your burn first.”


Sarah had no idea what happened. All she knew is that the phone rang; her mom answered it and started bawling, she then went up to Sarah and said that there was an accident and now Rachel was in the hospital. She had gone in the pool, and dove into the middle of the pool, thinking that it would be deep enough, but it wasn’t.

Now, half an hour later, she was entering her best friend’s hospital room. Rachel’s parents were in the room, and so was her brother. Slowly, Sarah went up to the hospital bed. Rachel was lying awake, since this whole incident had happened the other day.

“Rachel, are you okay?” Sarah whispered, kneeling down beside the bed and holding her friends hand softly.

“I’m paralysed.” The words slapped Sarah on the cheek. All of Rachel’s family had exited the room at this point. It was only the two of them.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah replied, fighting the tears that came to her eyes.

“Will you still treat me like I’m normal?” Rachel asked a few moments later, a tear falling down her cheek.

“What do you mean?” Sarah reached forward and wiped away the tear that dared to roll down Rachel’s cheek.

“Paralysed people aren’t normal! I’ll have to be in a wheelchair, learn to do everything again! It’s from the waist-down; I’ll never be able to walk again!”

Sarah paused for a moment, wiped away a tear of her own and then nodded. “Sometimes the word ‘normal’ has to be twisted around for everyone to fit under that category. There is no definition for normal, Rachel. None.”

“Thanks, I’ll always be there for you.”

“I’ll always stick up for.” The two girls then did their best to complete their secret handshake.


Four months later Sarah stood up in front of the large crowd in the gym where the contest was held. It was another school event, Sarah knew she had a good chance in winning. She had studied so hard for this one chance, just one chance of winning.

“Sarah Black, please step forward,” Mr Thomas asked, the dictionary in front of him. Sarah smoothed out her red dress before coming forward. “Please define normal.”


Sarah paused, and looked out to the crowd. Her mom gave one of her hopeful faces. Rachel was smiling broadly at her friend, showing all her confidence.

“Sarah?”

“I’m sorry, sir,” Sarah blurted out. “I couldn’t find a definition.”

“What do you mean?” Mr Thomas looked in the dictionary, confused. His brows were furrowed.

“I mean that the word has to be twisted to fit its definition. Everyone is different; no two people are the same. There is no definition, sir. It’s just a word someone made up for people to be tricked into thinking that there was some special group and that anyone who didn’t fit into that category is bad,” Sarah explained, stopping for a breath. “It’s just wrong. Normal isn’t in my dictionary, sir. I scribbled it out when everyone important in my life weren’t the so-called norm anymore.” She looked to see where her family and Rachel sat. Her mom was wiping away a tear from her eyes and Rachel clapped her hands, shouting:

“Whoot! Whoot!” Another person started clapping, then another, and then another until the whole gym was filled with clapping.

“Sarah… I don’t know what to say,” Mr Thomas stammered.

“You don’t have to,” Sarah replied, looking at the older man in the eye, everyone around her was clapping, it was almost deafening. “I was only telling the truth: there is no proper definition for the word ‘normal’.”