Luna was a special little girl. She lived among the ghosts and she herself was a cute little ghost. Her red hair was always completely disheveled, her cheeks were dirty and her clothes seemed to be sewn together from all sorts of brightly colored pieces of clothing. You could tell at a glance that she wasn’t like the other kids. But Luna wanted so much to have friends among normal children, even though her mother was a ghost and her father was a ghost, too. Although she went to school with the other ghosts, she was still longing for the world of ordinary kids who weren’t ghosts.
Mommy would always tell her: “Luna, we don’t belong there. People don’t understand who we are and they might hurt you. Stay away from the human world.” But Luna couldn’t let that happen. Almost every day she hid around the corner of the wall near the playground where the children played and watched them. She enjoyed it and thought no one saw her. She thought she was safe.
One day when she was hiding around the corner like this, watching the children, she heard a voice behind her, “Hi, I’m Lili. Why are you hiding here and not coming to play with us?” Luna was so frightened that she fell to the ground. Behind her there was a little girl, about the same age as her. She was very pretty, with braided pigtails and a pretty flowered dress. Lili stood over Luna, held out her hand to help her up, and told her again to go play with them. But Luna said shyly, “You know, I’m not like the other children. I’m one of the ghosts, I look different, and I have no business here among people.” Lili just smiled, “It’s okay that you’re not like us. Come on, it’ll be fun.”
And so Luna, all excited and nervous at the same time, followed the children to the playground. She had the best afternoon ever. Nobody looked at her strangely, nobody laughed at her. She made some new friends. From then on, Luna went to see the children almost every day.
One afternoon when she came to the playground, all the children were sitting sadly on a bench discussing something. “What happened?” Luna asked the children, because she could tell that something was bothering them. Lili sighed and began to explain, “You know, there’s a big boy coming to see us. He’s very bad. He’s kicking us off the playground, saying that little kids like that have no business being here and that if we’re here he’ll chase us out. And we’re afraid of him. We’re too small. But we love coming here.”
Luna thought about it and then said, “Don’t worry, my friends. We’ll make him leave. After all, I am a ghost.” And she began to explain her plan to the children. When the hour approached for the bad boy to come, the children and Luna were in their places so that he would not see them. In a little while he appeared on the playground. He was tall and definitely older than the other children.
He was looking around the playground when Luna snapped her fingers and basketballs started bouncing by themselves around the tall boy. They bounced off the ground right at the boy. He just covered his head and spun around. When the balls calmed down, Luna snapped her fingers again and all of a sudden, the goals started chasing the bad boy . He started running around the field, away from them. He didn’t understand what was going on. Then the goals surrounded him and threatened him, “You will not chase anyone off the playground and dare the children. Everybody can play here.” The boy just nodded eagerly in agreement.
The children began to jump for joy. And Luna? She was happy to help the children because they took her in and didnt laugh at her for being a ghost.. Ever since then, everyone has been playing on the playground. Even the tall boy became their friend.
