What I Can't Recall

After storming out of Ellie's house, I just start walking. I'm not sure where I am going, I just know I have to get as far away from her as possible; if I don‘t I‘ll probably end up doing something drastic.

After a while I get tired, and just decide to retire to a random play set in someone‘s backyard. Since it's dark out no one is here, I walk straight to the swings and sit down with a sigh. It’s kind of eerie out, and something tells me that this swing set has long ago been abandoned, along with the house. After closer inspection, I notice that there is in fact a For Sale sign in the yard. I sigh.

Though I'm plenty mad at Ellie for being so inconsiderate, I'm mostly mad at myself for getting angry so easily. And letting it bother me so much that she knows I like Bryler, when she probably has the right to know in the first place. She’s one of my best friends.

I find myself beginning to push my legs back and forth, making the swing climb higher in the air. As I go back and forth, the wind hits my face and scatters my hair about. It feels good. I close my eyes and let it run all over me. I feel myself climber higher and higher until it's as if I'm flying.

Flying..

"Mommy! Look at me!" I shouted to Mom, who was sitting on the porch next to Sarah, taking sips of lemonade and reading a book. It was either a summer or spring afternoon; I can’t remember correctly because it was back in the day before I went to school; nothing helped me keep track of things. We’d just bought a new play set a week ago, and so far Bryler and I had spent every day outside playing on it.

"That's good honey! You're really flying!" She told me encouragingly, though I could tell she was having a hard time tearing her eyes away from the book. My little mind wondered for just a moment what she was reading about, but it quickly didn’t matter. Even back then I was curious, but my attention to such questions could not be held long, because I’d soon have another question.

"Flying?" I asked, stopping in my tracks and looking at my mother with curious eyes. I was only four and did not yet understand the concept, and wanted to know exactly what it was I was really doing.

"Like birds," she told me, smiling a little bit as she looked pointed up to the sky, as if I‘d see a bird zooming past right at that exact moment. “Or angels."

"Oh,“ I said, satisfied with her answer and glad I knew what it meant. I began pumping my legs back and forth once more, but continued talking to her. “Well I like flying. I hope someday I'm an angel."

"Only an angel? Why not a bird?" She wanted to know, somehow finding all of it amusing. Sarah looked a little annoyed; she was very absorbed into her book and I could see that the distraction was not making her happy.

"Angels are prettier," I told her easily, shrugging my little shoulders and almost causing myself to flip out of the swing by doing so. "Plus birds eat icky worms, that‘d be gross."

She only laughed at me in response.
"Why don't you got over to the sand box and play with Bryler?" She suggested, for some reason not seeing it fit for me to swing any longer.

"Ok," I said with a sigh, dragging my feet across the dirt to get myself to stop so I could hop off the swing. Once that was accomplished, I made my way over to the little sandbox that was set up a little bit closer to the porch.

"I'm gonna be an angel when I grow up," I informed Bryler right away as I set down in the sand next to him, instantly demolishing whatever he’d been trying to build. He frowned.

"You can't be an angel when you grow up, you have to be dead to be an angel," he told me, looking worried by this .

"You do not," I argued, stubbornly. “You only have to beautiful and nice to be an angel. And dead people aren’t even beautiful or nice.”

"Yes, you do. Mama told me so," he said, getting a little upset himself that I didn’t believe him. “’Cause she said that since Grandma died when Mama was a kid, she’s an angel now. So, see? You gotta be dead to be an angel.”

I started to cry, somehow finding that fact extremely devastating. It ruined all my plans, it meant that I could not be an angel when I grew up, which seemed like that most important thing in the world to me in that moment.

"What's the matter September?" Mom asked, panic on her face, as she set down her open book on the table and got up, quickly making her way over to the scene.

"Bryler said that I have to be dead to be an angel," I said, sniffling and wiping at the tears on my face.

"It's okay, Honey. Its just another fact of life," Mom said, placing her hand on my shoulder, "you've got to be dead before you can really fly."

Thinking back on it does nothing but bring even more tears to my eyes. Mom can fly now.
Thinking that makes me feel connect to her. As if for the smallest moment we're experiencing the same moment; the same feeling. We're both flying. I imagine her on the swing next to mine, chatting away to me, just your run-of-the-mill angel. Her hair is a complete mess, all tangled up in her halo. Her gown is dirty, and put on wrong. She has a huge smile on her face, in spite of everything.

"You've got to be dead before you can really fly."

I close my eyes, and allow the words to haunt me.