1The Most Perfect Day

I remember the perfect day - the most perfect day that I ever had.

Sunlight lazily drifted through the room, dust floating like tiny clouds on the air. It shone in rays that diagonaled through the large, old window. The sounds of summertime clung to the air like molasses; running water, barking dogs, construction, cooing birds, wailing cicadas, ice cream trucks, and slow, warm music playing softly. I did not understand the music, but I loved it for its soothing tones and rhythmic beat. It, above all other things, hung on the air like smoke, sticking to it and bringing with it its own sense of carefree. Summertime smells waft in through the opened door and windows - smells of humidity, flowers, incense, and heat - they all came together in an intoxicating aroma. I laid on the old couch, short, toned legs propped up on its collapsing arm. The temperature was over one-hundred degrees, and it was too hot to move and too hot to think... too hot to play and too hot to explore. But it wasn’t to hot to listen, and look, and feel. I gazed up to our faux-brick mantel to a statue, in black marble, of a mother holding her child in her arms. I thought that it was a statue of Us - me, and my mother.

When enough time had been spent lounging before the open window, I heaved my small body from the couch and stood. My hair, which was blonde and far from neat, reached the small of my back, easily half the length of my entire body. My bangs hung in to my eyes and tickled my eyelashes. I stretched toward the ceiling and moaned loudly, then slowly began to walk in to my kitchen. Outside, the hose was being turned on by our nearby neighbors, and the entire house squeaked as the water system was activated. I walked down the cool, dark hallway that led to the kitchen, tiptoeing in only my underwear. The door to the backyard stood in the kitchen, and from that hall, it was a beacon of lazy golden light, with its reflection bouncing to me from the red-brown kitchen floor.

I entered the kitchen, and immediately, the aroma of old lilacs filled the air. They sat to my left, on a hand-made mantel above the sink. They wilted miserably in the hot noontime sun, their petals falling in to the wet soil in which they grew. Dishes were piled high in the sink, and their putrid aroma mixed with the soothing one of the lilacs, but it was not unpleasant. I stood and looked at the sky through the high window, up high on my tiptoes once again, and then slapped my way to the fridge. I opened up the freezer and found a box of Popsicles, and I quickly plucked a purple one from the bunch. I stood in the open freezer door for a few seconds, but I didn’t like the cold very much, so I closed the door and went to eat my popsicle. I needed someone to open it for me, so I set out for my one source of help - my mom.

I called out her name several times, standing in the kitchen alone. When I realized that she couldn’t hear me, I again made the journey from the kitchen to the living room. When I entered the room, which was the warmest room of the house, I looked in to the open door on my left. That was her room, and the room in which I slept almost every night. She was there, and just as I had been, she was lazily sprawled across her bare futon. The only difference was that she wore a pair of cut-off shorts and a tank top. Unlike the living room, her room was dark. The light above her was off, but the fan turned slowly. Incense burned on her bedside table, and the smoke seemed to disappear as quickly as it snaked its way off of the stick from which it burned. She wasn’t asleep, but she hadn’t seen me yet.

I walked in to her room and past her old mirror. I loved the old mirror, because she had decorated it with various stickers and pictures. There was a sticker of a panda, a ASPCA sticker, and, among other things, a picture of me grinning widely as someone handed me my fourth birthday cake. That was a year ago. Finally, I said her name again, only softly. She looked up at me and smiled, then slowly moved herself up so she was sitting on her knees.

“What is it, Baby?” she cooed softly. “Come over here, Sweetpea.”

I grinned, just like I did in the picture on her mirror, and lazily walked over to her. I handed the popsicle to her sheepishly.

“I can’t open it,” I mumbled. She quickly opened it with her teeth, and I giggled at her as she pretended to eat it. I began to try to take it back. “That’s my popsicle!” I laughed. “Give it back! Give it back!”

“I can’t!” she said as she let me tumbled backwards from the futon. “I have to make sure it’s not poisoned.” I fell silent and let her examine my popsicle, which only took a few bites. She quickly assured me that it was not poisoned, and that I could eat as much as I want. I thanked her and crunched it up with my teeth and slowly slurped it as she watched me with half-open eyes. A small smile was on her face, because, as she had told me every day of my life, I made her the happiest person in the world. I laid my head across her lap as I ate it, and my hair cascaded over her knees. She looked down on me, smiling.

“I remember the day that you were born,” she said. “The very first thing that I ever said to you was ‘I’m going to love you forever’.” She slowly stroked my hair and picked out the tangles.

“Will you, though, even when I’m your age?” I asked. I thought it was silly for her to love me when I was an adult, because, for some reason, I never thought that adults loved each other.

“Of course I will,” she said softly. “Now, do you want to go play in the sprinkler?” I jumped up, yelling, and eagerly agreeing. I ran from the room and out the front door. Standing in the front yard, I waited for her to come outside and attach the sprinkler to the hose. She slowly walked out of the front door, still leaving it open, and turned on the hose. The sprinkler, which was bright yellow and black, sat in the middle of the yard. It was already beginning to work. I grinned widely as the sun beat upon my face, then began to run over to the sprinkler, which now was creating a rainbow as it rose higher and higher in to the sunny sky.

“Not so fast!” my mom said, and she quickly grabbed my arm. I wailed as she slathered thick, warm sun screen on to my face and shoulders, but allowed her to do so anyways. When she finally finished, I sprinted to the shower of water before me, and leapt through the cold droplets, laughing and screaming. My mom soon joined in, playing in the cool water and preserving the rainbow it created.

We played in the sprinkler until dusk fell, and the sky was a lazy purple out across the railroad tracks.