It was a cool autumn day. The leaves made a crinkling noise when the wind blew through them, and my long jacket billowed a bit behind me. I didn't have tears. It didn't seem quite right. Yet, I was sad when I looked down at the stone marker that said "Daisy Williams" and indicated she had been 18 years old when she died.
I met Daisy when I was seven. My mother introduced us. The first thing I remember thinking was how cute she was. She looked up at my with hopeful green eyes. Even though she didn't say anything, I could tell from that look that she wanted to be my friend. From that moment, we were practically inseparable. She couldn't go to school with me, as much as she wanted to, but every day when I got home we would play together and then I would make sure she had enough food and water and she would curl up on my lap while I watched TV.
Right. I'm sure you've figured it out by now, but Daisy was my cat. My mom got her for me as a kitten, five months old I think, to help me learn responsibility. I had wanted a puppy, but mom decided a cat would be easier for a start. I don't know why I thought I would be a dog person. Kids don't really know who they are yet, I suppose. I never asked for a dog again. Daisy was all I needed.
She came from the city pound and my mom made sure to tell me this. She said Daisy needed a home and that I had to take good care of her. The pound was a sad place, my mom told me, and Daisy was surely happy to be away from it and have a home with me. The first time Daisy looked up at me with those big green eyes, I knew my mom was telling the truth.
My mom supplied a few toys for Daisy and all the food and water and litter she needed. I got an allowance and mom said that if I wanted to get Daisy any extras, a bed or treats or more toys, that was up to me. I quickly decided there was no need for any bed. Daisy would curl up on my chest every night and purr her little heart out. I wanted to get some treats and some more toys. I wanted the best for Daisy, but I realized I didn't get enough money in my allowance to afford the best, so I got her some cat treats first and then paid close attention to which of the toys she already had that she seemed to enjoy the most. Then I got her a similar kind of toy. She didn't seem to like it quite as much as the toy I had modeled it after, but she would still play with it, so I was happy. Daisy certainly was happy, too.
The thing Daisy really hated, just as much as I did, was going to the doctor. I totally understood her complaints and her desire to just stay in the carrier. The doctor seemed like a nice man, just like my doctor, but he was always poking and prodding and sticking Daisy with things, just like my doctor. She would shake a little during the whole ordeal and I felt so bad for her. "It's for her own good," my mother told me when I whined that we should make the doctor stop. "You don't want her to get sick, do you?"
I didn't want Daisy to get sick, so I bore with it, even though I didn't like it, and I made sure to give her lots of treats (well as many as my mother would let me) and love (my mother set no limit on this) afterwards.
Daisy's growth amazed me, too. She had been such a tiny thing when I got her, but it seemed like she got three times as big in less than a year. I asked my mom why I didn't grow that fast. She laughed and said, "You used to."
I wasn't sure what that was supposed to mean, but I was proud of Daisy for figuring out whatever secret I had apparently missed. The only sad part was that Daisy wasn't quite as cute as before, but I found myself regretting even thinking that and every time I did think it, I would rush to Daisy and hug her and tell her I was sorry. She would let out a confused meow, which was totally appropriate for a cat who had no idea what I said, yet alone what I thought.
For my eighth birthday, my mother made me a cake in the shape of a cat. It looked just like Daisy! My mother was pretty good at things like that. She made cakes for weddings and things sometimes in addition to her regular job and the hotel restaurant. I was so happy. My friends from school laughed a little at how much I loved that cat cake. They could be jerks sometimes, but then a few of them gave me presents that were really for Daisy so I forgave them. I wonder now if maybe they were still making fun of me, but I like to think they were being nice. I never talk to any of them so it doesn't matter much anyway.
I wanted to give Daisy some of the cake on my birthday, but my mom said it wouldn't be good for her, so I had to settle for giving her some of those boring cat treats instead.
Daisy did seem to love the cat treats, so much so that I wondered what they must taste like. I tried one once when my mom wasn't looking and it was disgusting. I'm sure I made a face and I know I made a sound because my mom turned around and asked me what I was doing. I felt a little ashamed as I told her, but she didn't seem angry, she just seemed alarmed. She made a quick phone call, which I think must have been to poison control, and then she calmed down and laughed about what I had done. "It wasn't very good was it?" she asked.
I shook my head and made a pouty face and she hugged me. "I love you sweetie," she said.
My mom was always telling me how much she loved me, but for some reason I found it hard to say it back to her. I had no trouble telling Daisy how cute and special she was and how much I loved her. Later, I felt bad for my mom, seeing all that love and affection I showed a cat and missing out on it herself. But I'm pretty sure she knew I loved her. I may not have said it, but, well, I was kind-of like Daisy. Daisy never told me she loved me, since she was a cat and couldn't talk, but I knew that she did. I spent years not saying, "I love you" to my mom, but when I finally told her, she smiled at me like she had known all along. I think she had known all along, just like I knew Daisy loved me.
It was that summer after my eighth birthday when Daisy got a little bit of competition for my attention. A new family moved in down the street and I was intrigued by them. I was an only child, but this family had six children and an uncle who lived with them as well. Their house wasn't even that much bigger than the one my mom and I lived in, but it did have a room above the garage where their uncle lived. With six kids in the family, there were two of them who were somewhat close to my age. Chelsea was 6 and Roger was 9. Roger was the one who came over to our house with a plate of cookies. He explained that our parents had been talking and their mothers had decided the two of us might make good friends.
I wasn't sure about Roger at first, but he certainly was interesting. He was a few inches taller than me even though he was only one year older and he liked to play soccer. It worked out well since I was goalie for my soccer team. I wasn't as interested in soccer as Roger was but as soon as he learned I was a goalie, he wanted to go to the park and practice against me. I was a little nervous about that. The whole reason I liked being goalie was so I could just stand there and not really have to talk to anyone, but Roger seemed to like to talk, even though he was a little grumpy when he was talking about anything other than soccer.
My mom agreed to take us to the park later than week even though I told he she didn't have to. She told me it would be good for me. My pouty face still didn't work.
Roger and Chelsea both came along. Chelsea said she wanted to play soccer, too, but Roger told her to go play on the swings. She looked sad and I almost told her she could play with us after all, but Roger gave me a glare and I decided against it. Chelsea reminded me of Daisy when she was a kitten: sad and lonely and not quite knowing what to do at times.
Anyway, Roger and I played soccer for about half an hour. During that time he scored what seemed like 100 goals on me, but was probably more like 15. I think he started to feel sorry for me, or maybe he was just taunting me, because towards the end he would say, "Nice block!" whenever I managed to stop one. I told him afterwards that I wasn't a very good goalie, but he said I did just fine, especially since he was a whole grade older than me. But then when Chelsea came over he seemed to get a little frustrated even though she hadn't done anything. I didn't really understand it. I figured if I had a sister like Chelsea, I would be nice to her, not angry all the time. This was when I got interested in Roger. I didn't understand his behavior, even in the short time I had known him so far, and my little eight year old brain didn't like that.
I turned to my mom and asked if Roger and Chelsea could stay over for dinner. She smiled and said that was a great idea, as long as it was okay with their parents. Chelsea cheered and Roger grumbled. I wanted to tell him to be nicer, but I would never say that to anybody. I didn't like talking to people all that much, which was why I didn't really have close friends at school. Maybe Roger could be my friend, but I felt like I'd rather be friends with Daisy and Chelsea.
I started to feel this way even more when we went home for dinner, after stopping by Roger and Chelsea's house and getting permission from their parents, and these neighbor kids say Daisy. Chelsea's eyes lit up and she exclaimed, "Kitty!"
Daisy's eyes got big, too, and I told Chelsea she was going to scare the kitty. Chelsea frowned and looked like she might cry, so I coaxed Daisy over and let Chelsea pet her. It might have been the most adorable thing I'd ever seen. Roger just stood there with his arms crossed and a bit of a grimace on his face. I noticed, and I glanced at my mother to see if she noticed, too, but she was just looking at Chelsea and smiling. Why did my mom think this Roger kid and I could be friends? I didn't really know, but I wasn't sure I wanted to be friends with a kid who just cared about soccer and didn't even want to pet my cat. Chelsea, however, was seeming nicer and nicer all the time.
She was nice at dinner, too. She was very polite and told my mother how yummy everything was. I guess Roger was okay, too, but it seemed like he only said please and thank-you because his parents always told him he had to. After dinner, I let Chelsea give Daisy a treat. I decided to ask Roger if he wanted to, but he told me what I already figured out: that he didn't really like cats. And then he told Chelsea they should go home so she smiled and me and waved good-bye and then her big brother dragged her off.
As I lay in bed that night with Daisy purring away on my chest, I thought about how different Chelsea and Roger seemed to be. Chelsea was pretty cool. I'd be okay with being her friend. But Roger just seemed lame. I pet Daisy as she continued to purr and drifted off to sleep wondering what my mother was thinking.
Roger was a fascinating mystery to me and Chelsea was a lot of fun to play with. This was more than enough to lead me to spend most of my summer hanging out with the two of them. Roger mostly just wanted to play soccer so I would allow him to kick the ball at me in our backyard for an hour or so while Chelsea would alternate between watching, swinging on the swing my mom had hung from a tree several years ago, and hunting for four leaf clovers in a yard in which I had never seen a clover of any variety grow. She was an amusing girl, with a fun imagination.
Her brother seemed focused on only one thing: being the best soccer player in the world. I'm not sure how close he was to achieving that goal. In fact, as the summer went on, it seemed to me like he was getting worse because I was able to block more and more of his shots. It annoyed me that all he wanted to do was play soccer, so I was glad when he seemed to deflate a little as he realized what was happening. That took most of the summer though.
Up until that point, it was difficult to get Roger to even want to come into the house. My mom seemed glad that we were spending so much time outside, but Daisy was an indoor cat and I couldn't be outside and play with her at the same time. This was why I limited the outdoor time as much as possible. I wanted to make sure there was plenty of Daisy time.
I had sometimes seen Daisy looking out the window at us. It's hard to read a cat's emotions, but she certainly looked sad to me. This broke my heart and whenever I noticed it, I would push to go back inside as soon as possible. Daisy always seemed so happy when Chelsea and I came in the house. She was rather indifferent towards Roger. She wasn't mean to him or anything, I don't think Daisy could be mean, but she just didn't seem to care one way or the other about him. She was a smart cat.
Chelsea and I would play with Daisy for hours. To some, it might seem like playing soccer was way more exciting than playing with a cat, but to me, it was the other way around. Daisy was so funny the way she would chase her toys. And then sometimes she would give up on playing and would just come over to me and rub against my legs. That was the best. That was when we knew Daisy was ready for cuddling time. So we would sit on the couch, maybe watch a movie or something (Chelsea loved to watch Fraggle Rock) and let Daisy cuddle and purr as we pet her. Roger would sit in a chair away from the couch, but he would watch the movie and not complain much. He always thanked my mom when she made popcorn and brought two bowls: one for me and Chelsea and one for him. This thankfulness seemed sincere and he even smiled at my mom. She smiled back as if the two of them knew something that I didn't. At the time, I was intrigued, but didn't care enough about it to ask my mom, and I certainly wasn't going to ask Roger.
It was about halfway through the summer that I first got upset at Chelsea. She and I were playing with Daisy while Roger was sitting on the couch reading some boy scout magazine or something and glancing at us with a smirk every so often. My mom brought us a plate of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. Chelsea smiled and thanked her and Roger mumbled his thanks too as he reached for one. Then, as we paused to eat the cookies, after my mother had left the room, Chelsea looked over at me and asked, "Why is your dad never here?"
I was totally surprised by this question. Chelsea and I had been playing together for weeks and she had never commented on my dad before. I just stared at her as I managed to swallow the bite of cookie that had been in my mouth. It felt like a rock falling slowly down my throat and into my stomach. I set the rest of the cookie down and said, "He has to be somewhere else."
Chelsea looked at me with widening eyes. I think I knew deep inside that she wasn't trying to be mean, but I hadn't thought about my dad in so long that her question really hurt me. And then she went on and asked, "Where is he?"
"I don't know," I said quietly. I looked down a felt something nudging me. There was Daisy, pushing against my hand. I smiled a little as I pet her. Daisy always made me feel a little better. And if Chelsea had just let it go at that, everything would have been okay. But she didn't.
"When is he coming back?" she asked.
I looked back at her and frowned. I stopped petting Daisy. "I don't know," I said again.
Chelsea looked confused. "You don't know?" she asked.
"I don't know!" I shouted.
I felt the hair on Daisy's back bristle for a split second before the cat tore away in fear. I glanced behind me and felt awful as I saw the little fur ball cowering in the corner. I turned back to look at Chelsea, my anger boiling. "Now look what you did!" I shouted
"I..." Chelsea stammered. There were tears welling in her eyes, but I didn't yet feel bad for her. I was still feeling bad for Daisy and for myself. I also hadn't yet realized that I was angry at myself for scaring Daisy and that it wasn't Chelsea's fault at all. These thoughts would all come soon enough. Part of what helped bring them on was the hand I felt on my shoulder just then.
I looked over and was surprised to see Roger kneeling there with one hand on my shoulder and the other on Chelsea's. He frowned at me, the same disappointed look I had occasionally seen on my mother's face, and then he looked at Chelsea. "You shouldn't ask questions like that, Chel," he said. "They hurt people's feelings."
And then he looked back at me. "You shouldn't respond like that," he told me. "She's just a kid."
I wanted to shout back that I was a kid, too. I was just a kid, and so was he, and so was Chelsea. I felt briefly angry at Roger for making it sound like I was supposed to be all grown up, but then I looked over at Chelsea and saw her trying to wipe tears away. I was still angry at her, but I felt a little bad for making her cry and even worse that Roger was the one who had to come over and calm us down. "Sorry," I mumbled at her.
She just gave a little nod, and I thought I heard her say, "Me, too."
She must have said something like that because Roger seemed satisfied. He gave a loud sigh and went back to reading his magazine. By the time my mom came in 30 minutes later to clear the cookies away, things seemed to be back to normal. I'm not sure how she managed to not hear me yell at Chelsea. I think she must have been taking on the trash or something. I never told her about it, and apparently Chelsea never said anything more about it either.
We pretended like it never happened, but it still had me a little rattled. It was such an honest, sensible question to ask. Chelsea never thought I would react like I did. I shouldn't have reacted like I did, but the truth was, even though I couldn't remember my father at all, I was angry at him. I was angry at him for going away and never coming back, but I was even more angry that my mom had told me that he might one day come back. I would be years before I would ask her for more information about him, but the questions I would ask then may have started to brew that first day I ever got angry at Chelsea.
That first day I ever got angry at Chelsea was also the first day I felt a twinge of respect for Roger. He was a strange kid, but at least he had kind-of protected his sister. I thought later about how he could have done more and done it sooner, but at least he did something. "She's just a kid," he said. That seemed to sum up the way he thought about her. He wasn't interested in doing much to play with his "just a kid" sister, but he still cared about her and didn't like to see her upset. That was something.
I also started to realize that playing soccer with Roger wasn't all that bad. I had thought at first that he had actually been getting worse, but when he started to grumble less about my blocked shots and tell me, "Good job" more often, I started to realize that it was more that I was getting better. At one point he asked if he could try being goalie. I told him I wasn't very good at kicking the ball and he shrugged and said, "I'm probably not very good at blocking it either."
We were both right, but we actually managed to have a good time. I couldn't help but laugh when Roger fell on his face trying to block a shot that had completely missed the goal anyway. He got up and spit some grass out of his mouth and smiled at me with a blade still stuck between his teeth and I cracked up. He pulled the blade of grass out and started laughing, too.
A few days after that, he showed me the magazine he was always reading. It wasn't the exact same issue, but it was the same title of magazine he always had. It was about sports and recreation. He liked the articles on soccer the best, of course, but there were articles on camping and hiking and fishing, too. Roger told me his dad was taking him fishing the next week and asked if I wanted to come. I was surprised, but I managed to stammer, "I.. I guess. If it's okay with my mom."
"Do you have a fishing rod?" he asked.
I frowned and shook my head.
He smiled. "It's okay," he said. "I'm sure my dad has extras."
When I asked my mom about the fishing trip, she seemed absolutely thrilled. I wasn't sure how much fun fishing was really going to be, but I decided it was worth it to make my mom happy. I asked if I could share whatever I caught with Daisy. My mom laughed and said that of course I could, but I would have to eat most of it.
It was that summer after my eighth birthday when Daisy got a little bit of competition for my attention. A new family moved in down the street and I was intrigued by them. I was an only child, but this family had six children and an uncle who lived with them as well. Their house wasn't even that much bigger than the one my mom and I lived in, but it did have a room above the garage where their uncle lived. With six kids in the family, there were two of them who were somewhat close to my age. Chelsea was 6 and Roger was 9. Roger was the one who came over to our house with a plate of cookies. He explained that our parents had been talking and their mothers had decided the two of us might make good friends.
I wasn't sure about Roger at first, but he certainly was interesting. He was a few inches taller than me even though he was only one year older and he liked to play soccer. It worked out well since I was goalie for my soccer team. I wasn't as interested in soccer as Roger was but as soon as he learned I was a goalie, he wanted to go to the park and practice against me. I was a little nervous about that. The whole reason I liked being goalie was so I could just stand there and not really have to talk to anyone, but Roger seemed to like to talk, even though he was a little grumpy when he was talking about anything other than soccer.
My mom agreed to take us to the park later than week even though I told he she didn't have to. She told me it would be good for me. My pouty face still didn't work.
Roger and Chelsea both came along. Chelsea said she wanted to play soccer, too, but Roger told her to go play on the swings. She looked sad and I almost told her she could play with us after all, but Roger gave me a glare and I decided against it. Chelsea reminded me of Daisy when she was a kitten: sad and lonely and not quite knowing what to do at times.
Anyway, Roger and I played soccer for about half an hour. During that time he scored what seemed like 100 goals on me, but was probably more like 15. I think he started to feel sorry for me, or maybe he was just taunting me, because towards the end he would say, "Nice block!" whenever I managed to stop one. I told him afterwards that I wasn't a very good goalie, but he said I did just fine, especially since he was a whole grade older than me. But then when Chelsea came over he seemed to get a little frustrated even though she hadn't done anything. I didn't really understand it. I figured if I had a sister like Chelsea, I would be nice to her, not angry all the time. This was when I got interested in Roger. I didn't understand his behavior, even in the short time I had known him so far, and my little eight year old brain didn't like that.
I turned to my mom and asked if Roger and Chelsea could stay over for dinner. She smiled and said that was a great idea, as long as it was okay with their parents. Chelsea cheered and Roger grumbled. I wanted to tell him to be nicer, but I would never say that to anybody. I didn't like talking to people all that much, which was why I didn't really have close friends at school. Maybe Roger could be my friend, but I felt like I'd rather be friends with Daisy and Chelsea.
I started to feel this way even more when we went home for dinner, after stopping by Roger and Chelsea's house and getting permission from their parents, and these neighbor kids say Daisy. Chelsea's eyes lit up and she exclaimed, "Kitty!"
Daisy's eyes got big, too, and I told Chelsea she was going to scare the kitty. Chelsea frowned and looked like she might cry, so I coaxed Daisy over and let Chelsea pet her. It might have been the most adorable thing I'd ever seen. Roger just stood there with his arms crossed and a bit of a grimace on his face. I noticed, and I glanced at my mother to see if she noticed, too, but she was just looking at Chelsea and smiling. Why did my mom think this Roger kid and I could be friends? I didn't really know, but I wasn't sure I wanted to be friends with a kid who just cared about soccer and didn't even want to pet my cat. Chelsea, however, was seeming nicer and nicer all the time.
She was nice at dinner, too. She was very polite and told my mother how yummy everything was. I guess Roger was okay, too, but it seemed like he only said please and thank-you because his parents always told him he had to. After dinner, I let Chelsea give Daisy a treat. I decided to ask Roger if he wanted to, but he told me what I already figured out: that he didn't really like cats. And then he told Chelsea they should go home so she smiled and me and waved good-bye and then her big brother dragged her off.
As I lay in bed that night with Daisy purring away on my chest, I thought about how different Chelsea and Roger seemed to be. Chelsea was pretty cool. I'd be okay with being her friend. But Roger just seemed lame. I pet Daisy as she continued to purr and drifted off to sleep wondering what my mother was thinking.
Roger was a fascinating mystery to me and Chelsea was a lot of fun to play with. This was more than enough to lead me to spend most of my summer hanging out with the two of them. Roger mostly just wanted to play soccer so I would allow him to kick the ball at me in our backyard for an hour or so while Chelsea would alternate between watching, swinging on the swing my mom had hung from a tree several years ago, and hunting for four leaf clovers in a yard in which I had never seen a clover of any variety grow. She was an amusing girl, with a fun imagination.
Her brother seemed focused on only one thing: being the best soccer player in the world. I'm not sure how close he was to achieving that goal. In fact, as the summer went on, it seemed to me like he was getting worse because I was able to block more and more of his shots. It annoyed me that all he wanted to do was play soccer, so I was glad when he seemed to deflate a little as he realized what was happening. That took most of the summer though.
Up until that point, it was difficult to get Roger to even want to come into the house. My mom seemed glad that we were spending so much time outside, but Daisy was an indoor cat and I couldn't be outside and play with her at the same time. This was why I limited the outdoor time as much as possible. I wanted to make sure there was plenty of Daisy time.
I had sometimes seen Daisy looking out the window at us. It's hard to read a cat's emotions, but she certainly looked sad to me. This broke my heart and whenever I noticed it, I would push to go back inside as soon as possible. Daisy always seemed so happy when Chelsea and I came in the house. She was rather indifferent towards Roger. She wasn't mean to him or anything, I don't think Daisy could be mean, but she just didn't seem to care one way or the other about him. She was a smart cat.
Chelsea and I would play with Daisy for hours. To some, it might seem like playing soccer was way more exciting than playing with a cat, but to me, it was the other way around. Daisy was so funny the way she would chase her toys. And then sometimes she would give up on playing and would just come over to me and rub against my legs. That was the best. That was when we knew Daisy was ready for cuddling time. So we would sit on the couch, maybe watch a movie or something (Chelsea loved to watch Fraggle Rock) and let Daisy cuddle and purr as we pet her. Roger would sit in a chair away from the couch, but he would watch the movie and not complain much. He always thanked my mom when she made popcorn and brought two bowls: one for me and Chelsea and one for him. This thankfulness seemed sincere and he even smiled at my mom. She smiled back as if the two of them knew something that I didn't. At the time, I was intrigued, but didn't care enough about it to ask my mom, and I certainly wasn't going to ask Roger.
It was about halfway through the summer that I first got upset at Chelsea. She and I were playing with Daisy while Roger was sitting on the couch reading some boy scout magazine or something and glancing at us with a smirk every so often. My mom brought us a plate of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. Chelsea smiled and thanked her and Roger mumbled his thanks too as he reached for one. Then, as we paused to eat the cookies, after my mother had left the room, Chelsea looked over at me and asked, "Why is your dad never here?"
I was totally surprised by this question. Chelsea and I had been playing together for weeks and she had never commented on my dad before. I just stared at her as I managed to swallow the bite of cookie that had been in my mouth. It felt like a rock falling slowly down my throat and into my stomach. I set the rest of the cookie down and said, "He has to be somewhere else."
Chelsea looked at me with widening eyes. I think I knew deep inside that she wasn't trying to be mean, but I hadn't thought about my dad in so long that her question really hurt me. And then she went on and asked, "Where is he?"
"I don't know," I said quietly. I looked down a felt something nudging me. There was Daisy, pushing against my hand. I smiled a little as I pet her. Daisy always made me feel a little better. And if Chelsea had just let it go at that, everything would have been okay. But she didn't.
"When is he coming back?" she asked.
I looked back at her and frowned. I stopped petting Daisy. "I don't know," I said again.
Chelsea looked confused. "You don't know?" she asked.
"I don't know!" I shouted.
I felt the hair on Daisy's back bristle for a split second before the cat tore away in fear. I glanced behind me and felt awful as I saw the little fur ball cowering in the corner. I turned back to look at Chelsea, my anger boiling. "Now look what you did!" I shouted
"I..." Chelsea stammered. There were tears welling in her eyes, but I didn't yet feel bad for her. I was still feeling bad for Daisy and for myself. I also hadn't yet realized that I was angry at myself for scaring Daisy and that it wasn't Chelsea's fault at all. These thoughts would all come soon enough. Part of what helped bring them on was the hand I felt on my shoulder just then.
I looked over and was surprised to see Roger kneeling there with one hand on my shoulder and the other on Chelsea's. He frowned at me, the same disappointed look I had occasionally seen on my mother's face, and then he looked at Chelsea. "You shouldn't ask questions like that, Chel," he said. "They hurt people's feelings."
And then he looked back at me. "You shouldn't respond like that," he told me. "She's just a kid."
I wanted to shout back that I was a kid, too. I was just a kid, and so was he, and so was Chelsea. I felt briefly angry at Roger for making it sound like I was supposed to be all grown up, but then I looked over at Chelsea and saw her trying to wipe tears away. I was still angry at her, but I felt a little bad for making her cry and even worse that Roger was the one who had to come over and calm us down. "Sorry," I mumbled at her.
She just gave a little nod, and I thought I heard her say, "Me, too."
She must have said something like that because Roger seemed satisfied. He gave a loud sigh and went back to reading his magazine. By the time my mom came in 30 minutes later to clear the cookies away, things seemed to be back to normal. I'm not sure how she managed to not hear me yell at Chelsea. I think she must have been taking on the trash or something. I never told her about it, and apparently Chelsea never said anything more about it either.
We pretended like it never happened, but it still had me a little rattled. It was such an honest, sensible question to ask. Chelsea never thought I would react like I did. I shouldn't have reacted like I did, but the truth was, even though I couldn't remember my father at all, I was angry at him. I was angry at him for going away and never coming back, but I was even more angry that my mom had told me that he might one day come back. I would be years before I would ask her for more information about him, but the questions I would ask then may have started to brew that first day I ever got angry at Chelsea.
That first day I ever got angry at Chelsea was also the first day I felt a twinge of respect for Roger. He was a strange kid, but at least he had kind-of protected his sister. I thought later about how he could have done more and done it sooner, but at least he did something. "She's just a kid," he said. That seemed to sum up the way he thought about her. He wasn't interested in doing much to play with his "just a kid" sister, but he still cared about her and didn't like to see her upset. That was something.
I also started to realize that playing soccer with Roger wasn't all that bad. I had thought at first that he had actually been getting worse, but when he started to grumble less about my blocked shots and tell me, "Good job" more often, I started to realize that it was more that I was getting better. At one point he asked if he could try being goalie. I told him I wasn't very good at kicking the ball and he shrugged and said, "I'm probably not very good at blocking it either."
We were both right, but we actually managed to have a good time. I couldn't help but laugh when Roger fell on his face trying to block a shot that had completely missed the goal anyway. He got up and spit some grass out of his mouth and smiled at me with a blade still stuck between his teeth and I cracked up. He pulled the blade of grass out and started laughing, too.
A few days after that, he showed me the magazine he was always reading. It wasn't the exact same issue, but it was the same title of magazine he always had. It was about sports and recreation. He liked the articles on soccer the best, of course, but there were articles on camping and hiking and fishing, too. Roger told me his dad was taking him fishing the next week and asked if I wanted to come. I was surprised, but I managed to stammer, "I.. I guess. If it's okay with my mom."
"Do you have a fishing rod?" he asked.
I frowned and shook my head.
He smiled. "It's okay," he said. "I'm sure my dad has extras."
When I asked my mom about the fishing trip, she seemed absolutely thrilled. I wasn't sure how much fun fishing was really going to be, but I decided it was worth it to make my mom happy. I asked if I could share whatever I caught with Daisy. My mom laughed and said that of course I could, but I would have to eat most of it.
The first thing I noticed on our fishing trip was how big and beautiful the world can be in the early morning dawn. I was yawning as we first pulled up to the lake, but my mouth remained open in amazement as we grew closer. I had never seen so much water before. I knew Daisy would hate it. My mom and I had given her a bath one time and she had clawed me for the first and only time. I nearly yelled at her, but I restrained myself because I knew cats didn't like water.
When I saw that gorgeous lake with the pink sun sparkling off of it like a million diamonds, I decided that dislike of water was one thing I definitely did not have in common with my feline friend. With the sunrise and the lake and a gentle hill framed by trees, it was all an artist could hope for and more, and it filled my young heart with joy. I couldn't wait to go see it all up close.
My excitement was short lived, however. The second thing I discovered on our fishing trip was that fishing was really, really boring. At first I didn't mind. I marveled in the beauty of the lake. And then there was temporary excitement when Roger hooked something, but it was too small and his dad told him, despite protests from Roger, that it had to go back into the lake. "It's just a baby," Roger's dad said. I thought about when Daisy had been "a baby" and how cute she had been. This fish certainly was not cute. I wished I could take it home and let Daisy play with it as a toy. I was sure I would love it. But Roger's dad had told Roger it had to go back and I figured my pleas wouldn't make any difference.
The thrill level went down from there. The sun rose higher and the subtle beauty of the early morning was overtaken by a boldness that seemed to say, "Wake up everyone!" It reminded me that I was tired and probably should have fallen asleep sooner last night. But I couldn't help it. I had been wondering what this trip would be like and now I knew. It was a short moment of beauty, a brief blip of temporary excitement, and then utter boredom.
After what seemed like hours, but was probably only about 40 minutes, I let out a deep sigh and sat down with a plop on the upside down bucket that I had for a chair. Roger quickly turned to me. "Shhh," he commanded. "You'll scare away all the fish."
I frowned and sighed more quietly as I leaned my face on the hand that wasn't holding my pole. There were a few moments of silence and then I heard a humming noise. I looked up to see it was coming from Roger's father. He was smiling and bobbing his head back and forth and merrily humming a tune that I slowly started to recognize as "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star."
Roger turned at his father. He looked frustrated, but he fought to remain relatively calm as he whined, "Daaad! You'll scare away all the fish!"
His father grinned at him, turned briefly to wink at me, and then looked back at Roger and said, "Of course I won't, son. Fish love it when you sing! Here, I'll show you!" And then he took a comically deep breath and then burst out in an embarassingly loud voice: "Come here, come here little fish! You will make a tasty dish! Come and bite upon the hook! Don't give it a second look! Come here, come here little fish! You will make a tasty dish!"
"Daaad!" Roger whined, but at the same time, he was trying to keep from laughing. His father gave him perhaps the goofiest look I'd ever seen and Roger couldn't help it any more. "That's so dumb!" he exclaimed as he started snorting in amusement. The look on Roger's dad's face and the half-laugh that Roger couldn't hold in any longer combined with that ridiculous song were too much for me and I burst out laughing myself. And then, I nearly feel off my stool as I felt a sudden jerk on my line.
I jumped up and the bucket went tumbling away beneath me as I shouted, "It worked! It worked!"
At first, Roger and his dad both seemed rather confused, but then Roger's dad saw my line growing tight and rushed over to help me. Roger was excited, too. "Reel it in! Reel it in!" he shouted, clutching his own pole tightly, perhaps hoping he could catch something next.
I fought and struggled against that pesky fish. I wasn't sure I was strong enough to reel it in, but Roger's dad was helping me and he remained so calm and reassuring that I remained dedicated to the task at hand. Finally, after several heart-pounding minutes, I had my prize! It looked like a whopper to me, though I learned later that it really wasn't that big.
"Wow!" said Roger. "Nice job!"
"Nicely done," said Roger's dad with a smile. "I'm sure that will make a great dinner tonight."
"I'm going to share some with Daisy, too," I said proudly.
"That's his silly little cat," Roger piped in, sounding slightly annoyed. His dad must have shot him a glance I missed or something, though, because in the next breath he said, sounding fairly sincere, "I'm sure she'll love it."
The third thing I had learned was that even though fishing is usually really, really boring, it can be pretty exciting, too. Nothing else that day topped that level of excitement, but it was still a nice morning the rest of the time. We sang some silly songs when things got slow, and Roger managed to catch one fish that was a tiny bit bigger than mine and his dad caught two smaller ones. All in all, it was declared quite a successful trip, and Roger's dad said he wished he could take us to Fish King on the way home, but we would have to settle for Burger King instead.
Roger and I got the goofy crowns they hand out at that place and argued, in a good-natured manner, about whose fish really was bigger. I knew it was his, but I tried to convince him it was mine. I was perhaps a little mean in the pleasure I took in seeing Roger get a little annoyed with me, but eventually he just sighed and rolled his eyes and said, "Whatever, Davy!" and then chomped away on his burger. Towards the end of the meal, he said, "I'm glad you came with us."
His dad smiled at him and at me. I was glad I had come with, too. And it felt nice that Roger was being nicer than he often was. It wasn't like he was mean normally or anything, he just often didn't really seem to care that much about me one way or the other. Today, it seemed like he really meant it when he had said, "I'm glad you came with us."
I was so proud to show my mom my fish when I got home. I don't think she really liked fish all that much because she made a bit of a face while she was telling me how great it looked. She also told me I would have to help her prepare the fish... get rid of all the scales and bones and all that. It sounded pretty gross, but then Daisy came up to us and I'm sure I saw her lick her lips when she looked at the fish so I told me my mom that I would do it, for Daisy's sake!
Preparing the fish was just as gross as I had expected it to be, and it turned out there wasn't nearly as much meat on the thing as I had expected, but there was still enough for me and my mom and a little for Daisy. Honestly, I thought the fish was just okay, but Daisy loved it, so I sneaked a little extra to her while my mom went to get a salad she had forgotten in all the fishy excitement.
All in all, it was a pretty good day. I realized Roger wasn't such a bad kid and his dad was great. Even though I had spent the whole morning away from Daisy, it was still pretty fun, especially because I got to come home to her that evening and share some fish with her. As she lay on my chest that night and I pet her as she fell asleep while purring, I wondering what I might get to do with Roger and his dad next.
The answer to that question was: go to a baseball game.
I wasn't sure why Roger and his dad seemed to enjoy so many activities that just involved lots of sitting around with brief moments of excitement, but I decided to play along. It was nice to be included. And really, watching a baseball game wasn't so bad. There will silly little events between inning and the mascots were fun. Plus, I was amazed whenever a player sent a ball flying deep into the outfield.
"Why don't you play baseball?" I asked Roger near the end of the game.
Roger shrugged. "It's more fun to watch than to play," he said.
I thought he must be crazy. I would much rather be the one sending that ball soaring than the one watching it happen.
When we got home from the game, my mom was at work so Roger and his dad hung out with me for a bit until Roger starting yawning and his dad took him home. My mom got back just as they were leaving.
"How as the game, sweetie?" she asked.
"It was good," I said, the sleepiness I was feeling stealing some of the excitement from my voice. I waited a second to make it seem like I wasn't too anxious and then asked, "Can I play baseball next summer?"
My mom seemed a little sad and I didn't understand why, but then she smiled and said, "Of course, honey."
She did let me play that next summer and for many summers after that. Even though I wasn't particularly good, I still got to send the ball flying into the outfield or even over the fence every so often. It was a great feeling. My mom was always there to cheer me on and I never saw that twinge of sadness again. It was several years before the random thought came to me that my mother usually worked nights and hardly got to see me during the school year, so summer was the time we got to be together the most, but baseball cut into some of that.
Really, though, mom shouldn't have worried too much about losing me. After all, I loved her, even though I never said it, and I loved Daisy. No matter how much time I would spend playing elsewhere, I would always come home to the two of them. Even though my mom was sad about seeing me a little less, I think she was glad that I was wanting to expand my circles of friends further beyond her and an adorable little cat.
There was one more event of note that summer. It was Chelsea's birthday party. I was happy to be invited and told my mom my idea for the perfect gift for Chelsea. My mom agreed Chelsea would love it and we went to three different stores before we found it. I initially wrapped it myself and then my mom kindly asked if maybe she'd like me to help a little. I reluctantly agreed and I have to admit it looked quite a bit better after that.
When I got to Chelsea's birthday party, I was a little sad to see there weren't many kids there, but then I remembered that Chelsea and her family had just moved her this summer and she hadn't had a chance to meet many other kids yet. Most of the ones who were there were from her rather small Sunday school class, it turned out. I was somewhat flattered to find that Chelsea seemed to gravitate towards me the most.
The part started out with some party games and snacks and then it was time to open presents. I hoped that she would like my gift. I felt myself getting a little nervous when she picked it up, but as soon as she opened it and her eyes lit up, I realized I had nothing to worry about. She glowed as she picked up the stuffed cat and held it in her hands. "It looks just like Daisy!" she exclaimed.
I smiled. "I know!" I said.
The rest of the kids seemed slightly confused, but Chelsea was happy and that was what seemed to matter most. There were a few more presents after that, but Chelsea kept the Daisy toy on her lap the rest of the time and it made me happy. Then it was time to sing happy birthday and eat cake and then the party drew to a close. The other kids slowly departed and then it was just me and Chelsea and her family. She walked up to me still holding the new cat toy. "Thank you so much!" she said with a smile.
I smiled back. "What are you going to name her?" I asked.
"Daisy!" Chelsea exclaimed as if there was never any question. Then she did something most unexpected. She leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek.
I was so surprised, my first reaction was to reach my hand up and rub the spot where she had kissed me. Chelsea just giggled and I must have turned beet red. "I should probably get home before my mom has to leave for work," I said.
"Okay," Chelsea said, still grinning and swaying back and forth a little as she clutched her new toy. "See ya later!"
That was my first kiss from someone outside of my family. I suppose it doesn't really count as a first kiss, but it does to me. Chelsea had just turned seven and I was nearly eight and a half.
Chelsea's birthday was very close to the end of the summer, but for those last two weeks or so before school started, she brought her Daisy toy over to visit the real Daisy almost every day. She loved to have them play together. The real Daisy sniffed at the fake Daisy at first and then batted at it a little, but never used her claws. She seemed to know it looked like her or that it was Chelsea's precious toy or something because Daisy would certainly use her claws on things that she knew were cat toys. Chelsea just giggled whenever Daisy would play with the fake Daisy. I felt so much older than her when I heard that childish giggle, but I thought to myself that we were only one year apart. When school started, I would be in third grade and she would be in second. Roger would be in fourth.
I wondered if when school started we would see less of each other even though we were all going to the same school, just because we were in different grades. Though it was true that we didn't see each other a whole lot during the school day, we still saw each other after school quite a bit. Chelsea and Roger's oldest sister Amanda would pick us up after school (she was almost 17 and a junior in high school) and take us all back to Roger and Chelsea's house. In addition to Amanda, I also rode home with Bryan (who was 14 and a freshman in high school) and Hannah (who was 12 and in seventh grade). Natalie was the youngest, but she was only in preschool and didn't go every day so I think their Uncle took care of picking her up or something. I hadn't really seen much of Chelsea and Roger's other siblings during the summer, but riding home from school with them every day, I got to know them a little better. Amanda was usually nice, but she would get angry and yell at us to shut up sometimes. Bryan seemed the most nerdy. He liked science and was always talking about new ideas for experiments he wanted to try. Hannah was quiet. The first time I sat by her, I noticed her drawing in a sketch book. "That's pretty," I told her, but she just blushed and tilted the book away so I couldn't see what she was drawing anymore. I decided that Chelsea and Roger were my favorites in the family. And I did mean both of them.
I guess if I'd had to choose only one of them to be friends with, it would have been Chelsea, but Roger had started to grow on me quite a bit. I enjoyed those outings I'd had with him and his dad over the summer and when the school year started, we seemed to get along even better. We'd work on homework together and he was usually pretty nice about helping me out if I had questions and, since he'd come from a different school the year before, sometimes he even had questions that I could help answer. Chelsea sometimes asked for help, too, particularly with reading, and I saw that Roger was very patient with her. It made me happy to see again that he cared about her more than I had originally thought. I wondered if I would be a good big brother if I had a younger sister, but Chelsea was the closest thing I would ever have to that younger sister. I wondered if that was why I liked her so much, and if maybe I was a little jealous of Roger since he really did have her as a younger sister. Well, I would think to myself, at least I have Daisy to care for.
It wasn't long into the school year before we started thinking about Halloween. Chelsea wanted to be a cat, mostly because she loved Daisy so much, and I thought that was great so I decided I was going to be a cat, too. Roger sneered a little, in what I had come to know as a good-natured way, and said that if we were going to be cats then he was going to be a dog and chase us all around the neighborhood. "Well good," Chelsea said. "While you're busy chasing us, we'll be getting all the candy."
Roger stuck his tongue out at her and gave her a playful little push which caused her to squeal and then stick her tongue out right back at him. We were over at Chelsea and Roger's house at the time and Amanda was doing her homework nearby. "You two are such brats," she said. When I first looked over at her, she rolled her eyes at me, but then she went back to her work and I saw her smile.
I was done with my work, so while Roger and Chelsea continued to poke at each other, I decided to go see what Natalie was doing sitting at her little mini table. "I'm drawin'," she told me proudly. I looked down at the scribbles on her page and wondered if I had ever considered that "drawin'". Then she added, "It's a cat!"
When I looked at the loops and scribbles with this in mind, I could vaguely make out four paws and a tail. I smiled and said, "That's very good!"
I didn't really know how to act around little kids like Natalie, but she didn't seem to know that. She just kept scribbling and humming to herself.
I think that might have been the night that Roger and Chelsea's mom made mac'n'cheese and I stayed over to dinner. I had never before had a meal at their house that was better than my mom's, but this mac'n'cheese was the best I'd ever had. It was mostly cheese with just a few noodles hidden inside and some crispy bread crumbs on top to give it a nice crunch. It was amazing. I wanted to take some home for Daisy, but Mrs. Humter (that was Roger and Chelsea's mom) said she wasn't sure if cheese was all that good for cats.
"It's probably fine," their uncle said. He was pretty laid back.
But Mrs. Humter frowned. "I wouldn't want that sweet dear getting sick," she said.
Mrs. Humter talked like that a lot, saying things like "sweet dear". It was a little strange, but I think it was because she watched a lot of old television.
"It's okay," I mumbled with my mouth full. "I'll just give her one of her treats when I get home."
That was one new tradition I had started with my Daisy. I often hung out at the Humter household after school since my mom was almost always working in the evenings, so when I did go home for bed, I would give Daisy a treat, or sometimes two or three. One time I accidentally spilled about ten of them, but she was a fairly delicate eater and I managed to pick them up before she got to all of them. I was glad I got them picked up because I wouldn't have wanted her to get a tummy ache.
I didn't worry about Daisy a lot, but I did worry sometimes about making her sick. I didn't want to feed her too much and I made sure to scoop her litter ever other day because I figured all that mess could make her sick. I knew I wouldn't want to have to stand in my own poo when I went to the bathroom so I figured Daisy wouldn't want to either.
My mom always told me that since Daisy was an indoor cat, she would be safer and happier than if we let her roam free all the time. Considering how long Daisy lived, mom was probably right. But I do remember how I often wondered if Daisy would actually be happier outside. She never scratched at the door or tried to escape or anything, but I did often see her looking out the window like she was longing to know just what adventures were out there. Many of the times I noticed her looking out the window were when I was coming home.
It was about a week before Halloween when Roger and Chelsea were over at my house and I voiced my idea that Daisy would like to go outside.
"Why doesn't she?" Chelsea piped up, beaming excitedly. "Wouldn't it be fun! She could follow us around and for Halloween we could dress her up and she could go trick-or-treating with us!"
"I'd dress her up like a dog," Roger said without looking up from the magazine he was reading while curled up on the couch. "That would be funny. There would be a cat dressed like a dog and me dressed like a dog and the two of you dressed like cats."
"That would be funny," I agreed, either ignoring or unaware if Roger was making fun of us, "but my mom always said it would be better for Daisy to stay inside."
"But whyyyy?" Chelsea whined.
"Mommies always know best, Chell," Roger said. I'm still not sure if he was being serious or sarcastic.
"I guess I could always ask her about it," I said. After all, I was the one who had brought it up. The least I could do was ask my mom if maybe Daisy could go outside for just a little bit.
Chelsea smiled and clapped her hands, "Yay!" she exclaimed.
I think what Roger mumbled was, "Oh, boy," but I like to think he was smiling behind that magazine of his.
So I asked my mom about Daisy going outside. She seemed worried, but said that maybe if we could keep Daisy on a leash or something it would be okay.
"Like a dog?" I asked.
"Yeah, similar," my mom said.
I laughed and told her about Roger's idea to dress Daisy up like a dog and take her trick-or-treating. My mom seemed more concerned at that thought. "I don't think Halloween is a good time to take her out, sweetheart," she said. When I asked why not, she talked about how all the children and noise would scare her and I decided she was probably right. "But we can buy a harness for her and get her used to it and maybe before it gets too cold out we can see what she thinks of the outdoors."
I was excited and nervous from that day on. I still had a lot of fun on Halloween dressed up like a cat, going around with Chelsea the cat and Roger the dog and collecting all sorts of candy. But I was still thinking about how much fun it would be to have Daisy out here with us, dressed up like a cute little dog or not.
It was that very next day, November 1, that we first tried to put the harness on Daisy. My mom had the whole evening off so we started out right after school. We'd bought the harness a few days before and had it around the house just to get Daisy used to it. She'd batted at it and chewed on it a little. My mom thought that was fine. Now that we tried to get it on her, she seemed to like it a lot less. We tried for a minute or two and my mom said that was good enough. We would try again later.
It took four separate attempts, but we finally go the harness on her. I praised her like crazy and gave her three treats. She seemed pretty happy. And then with the harness still on her, she jumped up on my lap and started purring. I pet her while my mom finished cleaning up the kitchen after dinner.
We took the harness off her before we went to bed and my mom said we would try putting it on her again in a day or two.
It was almost two weeks later when we finally took Daisy outside. It was a brisk but not too cold fall day. My mom was off from work again. It was a Saturday. Chelsea was there, too, but Roger was off doing something else. He said he didn't mind missing it so we did it without him. Chelsea was so excited. She wanted to be the one to walk Daisy, but my mom said I got to do it. My mom had warned me not to get too excited. We had tried putting Daisy on the leash and walking with her around the house, but if she didn't want to go somewhere, she didn't want to go.
My mom wasn't so sure it was a good idea to have Daisy walk outside on her own. She didn't want the cat thinking it was okay to walk outside. So instead, we put the harness on and then I picked her up and carried her into the middle of the backyard. She was shaking a little bit when I put her down, like she was cold or nervous. I was going to say maybe we should take her back in, but then she calmed down and started sniffing around.
Chelsea squealed with delight at that point, which startled Daisy a little, so I knelt down beside her and started to stroke her coat gently. She purred and rubbed up against me, and the sniffed a little at a leaf. She spent about fifteen minutes outside and then the wind started to pick up and my mom suggested we bring her back in. Chelsea said, "Noooo!"
My mom said, "But it's cold, sweetie."
Chelsea made a little pouty face and crossed her arms, but with a sigh she said, "Okay."
That was Daisy's first outdoor adventure. We didn't walk around much, but that was okay because she seemed fine with just staying in one spot. She sniffed around and seemed to like it well enough. I had hoped she might be a little more excited about being outside, but maybe it was good she wasn't totally in love with the outdoors. My Daisy tolerated our shenanegans with introducing her to the outside world, but she was perfectly happy to remain and indoor cat. Inside the warmth of our home, curled up on my lap, eating a crunchy meal of cat food, or playing with her favorite toys, that seemed to be where she belonged.
A year or two later, after several more trips outside, I commented to my mom that Daisy's attitudes hadn't seemed to change much, towards the outdoors or towards anything, really. She told me that sometimes cats are like that, consistent. It's usually their people who change more than they do.
I'm not sure I changed much over that next year. The biggest change had been getting to know Chelsea and Roger, but it seemed like we were well ingrained as friends now. It seemed like Roger opened up and got a little more social and nice over the next year, but I felt like I mostly stayed the same. Like Daisy, I was willing to try some new things, like the Pistachio ice cream my mom brought home from work one time, or the Boy's Life magazine that Roger convinced me to start reading, but mostly I stayed the same person.
Oh, I should mention thought, that one thing that did seem pretty different when soccer season rolled around was my skill as a goalie. It turned out all that forced practice with Roger had helped quite a bit. The other teams scored about half as many goals on me as they had the year before and some of my teammates even started saying I was a pretty good goalie. I hadn't thought I cared a whole ton about soccer, but hearing them say that did make me happy. I decided I liked soccer a little more after that and the second summer of hanging out with Roger, I was much more willing to play soccer for like an hour in the backyard or at the park. My mom even made my tenth birthday cake with a design of me as a goalie making an awesome block. She even had frosted it to resemble a photo she had taken during a game! It was a really good cake, too, with layers of strawberry and vanilla and chocolate. My family, my soccer team from school, and the Humters all loved it.
I suppose it might seem like skipping ahead to my 10th birthday is going a bit far, but since my 9th birthday wasn't long after the first outdoor Daisy incident, I'm really only skipping over that year during which I contend I didn't change all that much. I think I've hit all the highlights. You'll not missing much else, other than the fact that for that next Halloween, Roger dressed up like a lion, which I made sure to point out to him numerous times, was a type of cat.
The summer after my 10th birthday was more interesting, because that was when Roger and Chelsea got a dog. Chelsea was eight at this point, the same age I had been when I first met her, and she was getting clever. She insisted on naming their new puppy Lily so that both their dog and my cat could be named after flowers. She was not quiet about her hope that Lily and Daisy could become friends. Roger, now 11, made sure to point out to her that cats and dogs aren't usually friends, but Chelsea just said, "But they can be!"
The first few days they had the puppy, Chelsea and Roger were very busy playing with her and trying to teach her how to pee outside. They got a doggy door installed so that Lily could come and go as she pleased. I don't know exactly what kind of dog Lily was, but she was a medium sized, brown, short haired dog with a long, flappy tail. She was certainly a lot bigger than Daisy, but many dogs and even some cats were. It certainly was exciting at the Humter household that summer, but I realized from being around their dog that it had definitely been good that my mom got me a cat instead. I was always happy to see Lily, and sometimes acted even more excited than I was for Chelsea's sake, but my heart fully belonged to Daisy, the best cat a boy could ask for.
The worst thing about Lily was that she seemed to shift Chelsea from being a dedicated cat person to being more of a dog person. I have nothing against dogs and their people, but I found even from that young age that there is quite a difference between dog people and cat people. I realize that both Chelsea and Roger were better as dog people than cat people, but it made me a little sad to realize this, particularly for Chelsea, of whom I was so fond. A cat person, like me, is usually more quiet and laid back. A dog person is often more energetic, perhaps spastic is a word for it, though they can also be reserved or perhaps quietly brooding. Chelsea was the energetic kind of dog person. Roger was the more brooding kind of dog person. It took both of them to raise Lily.
Chelsea would get all excited and then Lily would get all excited and it was amazingly adorable, but sometimes it would make Lily pee in the house. Then Chelsea's dad would get upset and tell Chelsea to calm down and Chelsea would seem a little sad and Lily would come and lick her hand which made it better. Roger would also tell Lily it was okay, but it was mostly okay because he and Bryan, who was now 16 and the one who would pick us up from school in the fall when Amanda was away at college, were the ones training the dog. Bryan may have actually been the one in that family who was the most dedicated to making Lily into a good dog, but Roger was definitely on board with it, too. They started by teaching her simple commands like "sit" and "stay" and "come" and then moved onto more advanced commands like "paw" and "roll over". Chelsea loved the tricks, and teaching her how to give the commands properly was an ordeal in itself, but she was plenty smart and could do just fine when she calmed down enough to work with Lily.
I admit, training Daisy was not really something that ever seemed possible to the extent that Lily could be trained. She did often run to the door to meet me, and never tried to jump up and claw at me (which was something Lily would do). I also, when I got older, heard about how you could teach a cat "paw" with some treats and hard work. I tried with Daisy and she learned what I wanted, but being the good cat that she was, wouldn't always do it. That was what I loved about cats: they don't just blindly follow you. They have a mind of their own. Yet anyone who would say that dogs have the monopoly on loyalty and cats aren't loyal never knew my Daisy. She loved me to the end. That love and loyalty was what most broke my heart when I had to let her go.
But lets not talk about that yet. There are plenty of good memories and happy times to share before we get to the tragic end of this tale.
Lots of the happy memories had to do with Daisy herself. She continued to be an amazing cat. She would often be at the door to greet me when I came home from school. It amused me, though, how indifferent she continued to seem about going outside. Whenever I took her out on her little leash, she wouldn't move very far. She would sniff around at the grass and then, if I was sitting beside her on the ground, she would walk over, rub against my leg, and curl up in my lap. When she did that, those were the times we spent the most time outside because she would just fall asleep there and then I would be stuck for an hour or more because I didn't want to disturb her. My mom suggested I bring a book outside and read it while this happened. I thought books were just okay before then, but after my mom's advice, I came to love them a lot more. I started reading them more inside, too, with Daisy curled up on my lap. My mom seemed pretty happy about that. I never had watched much TV, and we didn't even own a video game console, but now I was spending even less time in front of a screen, which now I know is what parents aim for with their children.
I saw less of Chelsea and Roger during those first several months of them having a dog, but it was okay because I got to spend more time with my mom and with Daisy. My mom started working a less consistent schedule, but it was so she could have more evenings free to be with me, which was nice. She started to seem a little more tired, but she seemed happier, too. I remember we would play games some nights. She taught me how to play checkers, and then I'm pretty sure she gradually started letting me win. She waited until I saw how good she was, and then she slowly started getting worse. I think she was letting me win, but I guess it could have been a bit like my soccer practice with Roger where I was actually the one getting better. I doubt it though.
Sometimes Daisy would want to know what we were doing when we played, but we wouldn't let her get up on the table. Instead, she would just curl up on my lap while we played. Sometimes, though, she didn't want to just sit still and our checkers game would end early and we would end up playing with Daisy, each shaking a different cat teaser at her, taking fake bets on which one she would go after (we each always declared it would be whichever one we were holding). In reality, Daisy usually split her attention between both of them. She would dart of my mom's and bat at it a bit and then I would gently tap her on the bottom with mine and she would spin around and start attacking mine and then when my mom did what I had just done, she would be right back to the first teaser. It was the closest thing I had ever seen to a cat chasing her own tail. I remember asking Roger one time if Lily ever chased her tail and he said, "No, Lily is too smart for that." While it was true that Lily was very well behaved, eventually, it was hard for me to believe that she never did anything silly, especially since I often witnessed the dopey look on her face as she wagged her tail, so happy to see me.
We had a nice time with Daisy all though the fall and the first part of winter, and then my mom said we were going to our grandparents house for Christmas, instead of them coming here like they had done the last few years. They only lived an hour away, and we would only be gone for two days, but I had never spent an overnight away from Daisy. I fretted and worried about it, but my mom assured me that the cat would be fine for one night on her own. "But where will she sleep?" I asked, thinking of how she always curled up and purred herself to sleep on my chest.
My mom smiled and stroked my hair, kind-of like she was petting me. "Wherever she wants," was the answer.
I was still worried as we left, but I had made sure Daisy had plenty of food and water and that the liter box was nice and clean and my mom told me everything would be fine. I worried for the whole car ride, but when we got to my grandparents house and my grandma hugged me and my cousins were all running around being noisy and silly, I relaxed and had a really good time.
I got some Legos for Christmas that year, which was something I hadn't had before. I thought of Daisy right away and eyed the Legos carefully, hoping they weren't too small, but it didn't seem to me like they would be a choking hazard for her. Besides, I would make sure to keep them away from her just in case. I got socks and a sweater from my grandma, because that's the kind of typical thing a grandma gives you, and then the rest of the presents specifically for me were books. My mom got me some and so did some other family members. Apparently the word had spread that I had developed an interest in reading, but it might have been overstated. I figured the books I got would last me through the end of the school year, and I still had my birthday coming up in about a month and wondered if I would get even more books then. The rest of gifts I unwrapped were for Daisy, and included a couple new teasers and a bag of treats. It reminded me of how much I missed her and when I looked at my mother, she smiled and assured me we would see her again soon.
It was about eight hours later, just after Christmas day dinner, that my mother and I headed home. Mom had to work the next day and I was anxious to see Daisy again, so we hugged all our relatives and headed out. I remember how anxious I was the whole way home to see my cat. I kept asking my mom how close we were to home, and when we finally got there, I rushed to the door. I remember feeling a jolt of fear when Daisy wasn't there to meet me, but I quickly found her curled up on the couch asleep. When I walked up to her, she lifted up her little head, and I imagined she smiled. I was happy, she was happy, my mom was happy, and I had gotten to see my family. I showed Daisy her new toys and she seemed even happier. It was a wonderful Christmas, in stark contrast to what would happen the next year. But that's jumping ahead again. There are still more happy times to talk about first.
Though sadly, I can't remember a lot of details of the happy times that happened over than next year. I turned 11 and I did get another book from my mother, but it was about chess and came with a chess set. She said that since I liked Checkers so much, she thought this would be the next game for me to try. "It's similar," she claimed, "but its a lot harder."
A lot harder sure was right! It took me a little while just to understand all the rules, and the strategy eluded me for years, but now, I'm pretty decent at chess and I owe it all to that gift my mother gave me when I turned 11. I'm not sure I was really as smart as she thought I was. I don't think I was quite ready for that set by age 11. But still, she got me thinking about it early. She wanted to shape my mind, maybe make me smarter. I like to think that it worked.
Besides the chess set and the reading, I played soccer again that year. I was getting pretty good as goalie. I should mention that they started combining grades that year and so Roger and I ended up on the same team. It was a little weird at first, but in the end I liked it. The combination also meant I only got to be goalie about half the time, but it was strange to see that the goalie who was a year older than me wasn't actually as good as me. Again, Roger probably had something to do with that. It was one of those little things that made me like my neighbor more than I otherwise would have. I'm not sure he even realized what he had done, and, being only 11, I still didn't make the full connection right away, but I did notice that I like playing soccer with Roger now more than I had like playing it without him.
The other weird and unexpected thing that came from the soccer combo and Roger having already been somewhat of my friend was that Roger started introducing me to his other friends on the team. This had the potential, I now realize, to be disastrous: older kids making fun of the younger kid and all that. But that wasn't at all what happened. They saw I was a pretty decent goalie, better than their own goalie, and they liked having me around. We would go out for pizza sometimes, and one of the pizza places we went to had a video game arcade in the back. That was where I first discovered video games. I had never played them before. After several trips to the arcade, I decided that they were interesting, but much too hard. I never really played them much, but at least I can say that I'm familiar with some classics like PacMan and Space Invaders.
The soccer stuff was a good wrap-up to the school year, and then, it seemed like before I knew it, it was summer time again. Lily was a year older, now a calmer adult dog instead of a constantly playful puppy, and Daisy too was a year older, though Daisy didn't change all that much from year to year. Lily and Daisy still had not met, and I remember just about the first day of summer break, Chelsea begging again to introduce them to one another. Roger and I exchanged a look (we had started to do that now since the additional soccer bonding), and both told her we didn't think that was a good idea. "You could come over right now and visit Daisy, though," I said. I was anxious to get Chelsea to come over to my house more often. We seemed to spend a lot of time over at her place lately. Reluctantly, Chelsea agreed, and we spent the rest of that day over at my place, watching some movie I no longer remember, reading some books, playing with Daisy, and consuming milk and cookies courtesy of my mom. I think I might have said this already, but my mom made the best cookies. I still hadn't had any better anywhere.
That summer passed by much too quickly. It seemed like the older I got, the faster the summer seemed to go. Before I knew it, it was already the new school year again. I was in sixth grade this year. Sixth grade! I couldn't believe it. Just one more year, and I would be in middle school. It also meant that Roger was already in middle school and in a different school building than me. I knew that he wouldn't be on my soccer team any more, since now I as a sixth grader would be playing with the fifth graders and sixth graders, and that made me a little sad, but it was still nice to kind-of feel like royalty in the school, with all the younger kids looking up to me. We got paired up with kindergarteners, too. I think we were supposed to encourage and protect them or something, but its all a little fuzzy now. I just remember that mine was a rambunctious and fairly obnoxious little boy. When I complained about him to my mom, she said that helping him out would grow character and make me more patient. I'm not sure that really happened, but he did seem a little sad when I got annoyed with him and eventually he apologized for upsetting me and I felt so bad I told him that he never upset me and that I was jealous of how excited he was all the time. It wasn't entirely true, but it both made him happy and seemed to make him like me more. That was months later though, after Christmas and my next birthday, after the incident I'm trying to avoid talking about happened. Unfortunately, I can't think of much more to say unless I skip over it entirely and that wouldn't be right, so here it goes...
It was the last day before Christmas break. We had a half day at school and got out early. My mom was working in the evening that day and she would still be at home when I got home. I was so excited for Christmas break, I rushed right in the door and started calling for my mom and for Daisy, but no one came. The house was very dark, which had me instantly worried. I saw a single light coming from the dining room and I followed it to find my mom facing away from me with her head in one hand and the other hand stroking Daisy. I was already worried, but I knew something was wrong when I noticed that Daisy was on the table. That was something my mom never would have allowed. I inched forward and queried timidly, "Mom?"
She stopped absently stroking Daisy and looked back at me, her eyes red and puffy and tears streaming down her face. I noticed there was a formal looking sheet of paper sitting on the table in front of her with wet tear stains all over it. She looked up at me and started crying all over again. She jumped up and rushed to me and gave me a big hug. "I'm so sorry, David," she gasped between sobs. "I'm so sorry. I gave you... I gave you hope. I gave me hope. I always thought they would find him alive."
It turned out that my father, the man I had never really knew, had finally been officially declared dead instead of just "missing in action." My mom didn't tell me much, but I knew he was gone and I would never see him. I remember feeling like there was a hole inside of me, but I couldn't cry. How could I cry for a man I barely remembered. He had left the winter I turned 5 and never come back. My mom still remembered and loved him, but to me, he was just an empty place in my heart.
I know I just kind-of threw all this at you: the official death of my father. This was part of the reason I wasn't looking forward to talking about it. I knew I wouldn't give him the honor and respect and remembrance that he was due. I know, on paper, that he was a great man, but I never felt it personally. I wish I could have my mom tell you all about him. I wish she had told me more about him. Maybe then I would have cried for him more. I cried much more when Daisy died than when I learned he was never coming home. I was used to not having a dad around. I wasn't used to living without my cat. I feel guilty to admit that my grief was greater for a cat than for my own father, but maybe as I tell you more of my story, you won't hate me too much for that. Maybe already you've seen how important Daisy was to me, and realized just how little I knew or remembered my father. Maybe.
I wish I could linger more, for the sake of the great man who was my father, but I have nothing more to say right now, and if I tried to make things up, I'm afraid it would just be awkward and feel forced and that would be worse, in my mind, than not remembering my father at all.
So let me mention that my mom was very, very sad for weeks if not months after that letter came. We had a ceremony of remembrance for my father where I heard others talk about how he was brave and loyal and true. They told me that he would have loved to meet me. That was what made me cry the most, the realization that my father would have wanted to meet me and now he never would. After that remembrance ceremony, my mom and I were able to cry together. I'm thankful for that, at least.
But I couldn't keep the feelings of grief for very long. They lingered on in my mother's behavior for both of us. She took a sabbatical from work, and we skipped out of Christmas that year. Even for New Years, a holiday she usually loved, she still seemed sad. But I bore with her, and encouraged Daisy to comfort her, too. It took a while, but she seemed to remember that we were here and that we loved and needed her. Eventually, shortly after my birthday, she apologized for being so absent and for missing out on everything over the past several weeks. I told her I was sorry for not being more sad with her. That made her cry all over again, but after that, she seemed better. Not completely better, but better enough to give me hope. She even started playing Checkers with me again (which I currently still preferred to Chess).
So that and I hope I don't have to bring it all up again, though thinking ahead, I probably will have to mention it at least once more.
Things seemed to return to normal around our household. I started to hang out with Chelsea more again. Roger was usually off at some other friend's house. He was really good at making friends at school, which I was not so good at. I was glad I had Chelsea to hang out with. She loved to show me Lily's tricks. I showed her the trick I had kind-of taught Daisy, with giving me her paw for food. I remember she giggled and thought that was great. Chelsea's giggle was not quite as high-pitched as it had been two years ago. I guess she was growing up just like all of us, but she would always be younger than me and so I always viewed her as one might view a cute little sister.
I have to admit, even though I am firmly in the "cat person" camp, I did enjoy seeing the tricks that Lily knew. I thought it was pretty neat that they had trained her to do all these things, and I said so, though secretly I did also think my Daisy was better off having a mind of her own, and I didn't say so. Still, the tricks were fun and they made Lily happy. The latest one, which their uncle had helped teach the dog, was to "play dead". Lily would roll over onto her back and just lay there with her tongue hanging out until Chelsea laughed and said, "Okay!" "Okay" was the command that told Lily that she was done with the trick and it was time for a treat!
The next interesting thing that happened that year was try-outs for the school play. Every year, the sixth graders put on a show. If there were extra parts needed, sometimes fifth graders could join in, too, but usually it was just sixth grade. I have no idea what Roger's play had been the year before. I know I went to it, but I just don't remember. My year, we did some version of "The Princess and the Pea."
I wasn't much for acting, so when tryouts came around in late March, I tried to skip out of them, but our teacher said that everyone needed to do something for tryouts. I decided to mostly do my best, since I had to anyway, but I knew I wasn't going to get a major role. They ended up giving me the role of "palace guard 1". It ended up being pretty fun. I got to go to rehearsals and hang out with my classmates outside of the classroom. I would play kickball and stuff with them during recess, but I didn't really talk to many of them very much. I remember wishing I had talked to some of them more before sixth grade.
Now, some of my classmates I saw I wasn't missing out on much, but it was nice that "palace guard 2", Henry Adams, got along with me pretty well. We spent lots of the play just standing around trying to look important and foreboding and not saying anything to the audience, so during rehearsal, we talked about what we liked to do. Henry wasn't into sports, which was somewhat of a welcome change from Roger, but he did like animals. He was more into the creepy, crawling kind, but his mom had three cats and he thought they were pretty alright. He had a turtle, and iguana, and a snake. I was most interested in the turtle, and Henry seemed to be, too. He really liked talking about his pets and I liked listening to him. I think I heard somewhere that Henry grew up to be a science teacher, which makes total sense to me.
Anyway, practices for the play went on for several weeks and then we had two performances, just in case your parents couldn't make it to one of them. My mom took off work so that she could be at both. She was so proud of me that it was somewhat embarrassing. I only had a handful of lines: I said, "Halt, who goes there?" two or three times and something like "In the name of the king" once or twice, but my mom hugged me after both performances and told me how great I looked. She loved the fake guard uniform and thought I delivered my few lines perfectly. I looked over at Henry, whose parents were not smothering him, and he just shrugged, but there was a hint of a smile on his face. Now that I've grown older and I cherish those silly love moments that my mother showed me so much more than I did then, I wonder if Henry was trying to keep from laughing or if he was actually a little bit jealous of me and my mom.
That play marked the conclusion of our sixth grade year. The next week, we had a small little graduation ceremony, and then it was time for everyone to move on to middle school. I remember feeling a little anxious about going on to middle school. I would meet new kids from other schools, but I would also get to see Roger again more often, which was nice. I wasn't really sure if Roger and I were still really good friends, but I would hang out with him sometimes, especially that next summer.
Chelsea was not looking forward to me going to a new school. I barely even saw her during the school day as it was, but apparently it was often enough that she cried when she thought about me not being there anymore. "You'll forget all about me!" she said several times that summer.
"That's ridiculous," I said. "Our houses are almost right next to each other. I'll see you all the time."
I didn't understand why she was so upset. I asked my mom about it and she turned a little red but didn't really say anything.
I asked Roger about it, asked if she was this upset when he had changed schools and I just didn't realize it. He laughed and informed me, "She has a crush on you."
I was shocked. I didn't even really know what that meant, "She has a crush on you." I mean, I had seen some TV and movies, enough to know that meant she liked me in some way that was more than just a friend, but I didn't really understand what that meant. I mean, I myself thought Chelsea was cute, but I didn't think that meant I had a crush on her. I didn't really get what "a crush" even was until I started middle school. Sadly for Chelsea, the crush I had was not on her.
It was the very first day of school that I met the girl I would develop a crush on. Her name was Emily. She was from a different school and I had never met her before, but we had Math class and English class together. In middle school, you had different teachers for each subject, as you probably know, which was new for me. The Math class was first that day and Emily ended up sitting two rows up from me and just to the right. She was not so close that I could easily talk to her during class, but she was close enough that I happened to glance at what she was drawing in her notebook. I was amazed to see that it was a cat that looked an awful lot like Daisy.
After class, I did something I don't think I had ever done before: I walked up to another classmate (Emily) all by myself and talked to her without any prompting. I said, "The cat you were drawing looks just like my cat, Daisy."
Emily, though I didn't know her name yet, blushed and hugged her notebook a little tighter.
"It was really good!" I added quickly, feeling it was necessary to clarify this point.
Emily smiled and timidly held out her hand. "Thanks," she said. "I'm Emily."
"I'm David," I said, shaking her hand. My palm felt really sweaty but hers was nice and dry. Fortunately, she didn't seem to notice.
"Do you like art, too?" she asked hopefully.
"Sort-of," I said. "I really liked cats."
She laughed a little, but it was a happy, fun laugh. It didn't seem like she was laughing at me as a person. "I have to go to my next class now," she said. "It's science."
I glanced at my schedule and scrunched up my face. "I have P.E," I said.
She laughed again. "You don't like PE?" she asked.
"I like soccer," I admitted. "But it's better with people who know what they are doing."
"Well, maybe I'll see you later," she said.
When she saw me later, it was for the English class we both had in the afternoon. I had gotten there first and chosen a seat. My stomach seemed to do a flip when Emily walked in, looked right at me, and, with a smile, sat down beside me. I realized later that this was the moment when the crush I had on her became real.
It took several weeks of me hanging out with Emily just at school and talking about her at home until my mom finally had a much needed talk with me about boys and girls and how they interact. Some of it I did already know, but lots of it was pretty new. My mom seemed to get embarrassed at times, but she managed through it. She ended by suggesting that I invite Emily over for dinner sometime so that she could meet her. I thought that was a great idea! It was a Saturday when we had our talk and I couldn't wait for Monday to come around so I could ask Emily out.
I did make the mistake of mentioning my plan to Roger on Sunday and he ran around his house shouting that "David's got a girlfriend!" When Chelsea heard him, she just stopped and stared at me. She looked so hurt. I realized now what having a crush meant. I tried to imagine if Emily didn't seem to like me back and it hit me how Chelsea must feel.
I just stared at her. I meant to apologize to her, but all I got out was, "Chelsea..." before she ran off to her room and slammed the door.
Roger came up behind me and slapped her on the back. "I'll talk to her," he said. "Don't worry about it."
I kind-of wanted to punch him in the face since it was his fault that Chelsea even knew about my potential "girlfriend" who wasn't her. When I looked at him angrily, he frowned and looked away. I figured that ashamed look was the closest thing to an apology I could expect.
Chelsea's reaction kind-of ruined my excitement about having Emily over. Fortunately, my mom noticed my shift in mood that evening and we had a talk about how we should be honest about how we feel and sometimes that means people get hurt a little. My mom told me that some day I might get hurt a little, too, but I should remember that people can still be friends. "You and Chelsea can still be friends, too," my mom told me. "I'm sure of it."
I felt a lot better about Chelsea as I ended my conversation with my mom with a hug, but now I was nervous about talking to Emily the next day. I had been really sure she did have a crush on me, too, but the talk I had with my mom made me realize it was possible she just wanted to be friends in the same way I just wanted to be friends with Chelsea.
When I woke up the next morning, the first thing I thought of was that today was the day. I was nervous and my palms were sweaty. My mom told me, "Relax, sweetie, it will be fine." I didn't understand how she could be so calm as she just stood there smiling at me.
It should have been just like any other day, but I could barely look at Emily during math class, yet alone ask her out. After class, she came up to me. "Are you okay?" she asked. She looked really worried.
I felt my hands shaking as I replied, "Yeah... I'm fine. I'll tell you about it later."
Later could have come in the form of lunch period. I saw Emily sitting with her friends, and she looked up and smiled at me. I very nearly walked over and asked her over to dinner right then and there. I was trying to find of a way to tie the fact that we were at lunch together with my invitation to dine again with me at dinner when Roger called out to me, "Hey, David, over here!"
I frowned as I walked over. Roger was smiling. He patted the seat right beside him and when I sat down, he whispered, "Dude, did you ask her out yet?"
"No," I grumbled. "I was just about to when you called me over here."
Roger frowned. "Aw, man. I'm sorry," he said. At first I thought he was messing with me and had surely noticed I had been looking at Emily. But then again, he was facing away from her and I wasn't even entirely sure he knew who she was.
I gave a little smile. "It's okay," I said.
"Well, at least now I can tell you," he went on, "that girls like it when you're honest. It's hard sometimes, but if you lie to them, they'll eventually find out and get angry. Take it from me, whatever you do, just be yourself."
This took me completely off guard. It might be the most heartfelt thing Roger ever said to me. "Yeah, uh, thanks man," I managed, and then I also manged, somehow despite the butterflies still flying around in my stomach, to take a bite of my sandwich. I decided to just try to be normal the rest of the day and ask her over to dinner after school. That would make it easiest just in case she did say no.
So I made it, somehow, through English class without acting all weird like I had in Math. After school, Emily was the one who came up to me. "You seem to be feeling better," she said. "I'm glad."
I smiled at her. She was so pretty, I remember thinking. "Well, I'm still a little nervous," I admitted.
She wrinkled her brow a bit in confusion. "Why is that?" she asked.
I thought about what Roger and my mom had told me and took a deep breath. "Because I wanted to ask you over for dinner at my house," I said. "And I was afraid you'd say no."
"Why would I say no?" she questioned.
I took another deep breath. "Because it's kind-of... it would be kind-of like a date," I blurted out, looking down at the ground.
The first thing I heard was her laughter and my heart sank, but when I looked up at her, feeling the pain of her rejection, she was smiling, and it didn't look malicious at all. "I'd love to go on a dinner date with you," she said. I noticed she was turning a little red. Maybe she was nervous, too. "It will be fun."
My face must have lit up in joy at that. At least, it certainly felt like it did. "Great!" I said. "How about tomorrow night."
"Works for me," she said. "I'll check with my mom and tell you tomorrow."
"Okay, cool," I replied with a nod. "Well, see you tomorrow!" As soon as I walked away, I realized my ride wasn't actually ready yet, but fortunately for my ego, I only had to wait a few more seconds until Bryan sauntered out of the building and I could follow him to the car ride home.
I was super excited to tell my mom about how Emily accepted my invite. I burst in the door gushing with excitement and asking her what she was going to make tomorrow and suddenly realized I hadn't asked Emily what she would most like. My mom laughed good-naturedly. "I'm sure we can figure something out," she said. "I can call Emily's mom and ask her what Emily likes if you like."
"Isn't that a little weird?" I asked, wrinkling my face up. "And how would you know her number anyway."
My mom laughed again and gave me a mischevious wink. "I have my ways," she said. "Emily's mom and I are kind-of like friends."
"What does that mean, kind-of like friends?" I asked feeling a bit uneasy.
Apparently my mom couldn't hold in her secret any longer at that point. Just like I blurted out my invitation to Emily, she blurted out, "Oh, I've been talking to Emily's mom for nearly two weeks now, sweetheart. She's really nice and I'm sure Emily is too. I'm so excited to meet her."
I just stared at my mom in dumb silent for a moment, jaw slightly agape, and then inquired, "Did you tell Emily's mom about this dinner already?"
"Not entirely." My mom managed to remain non-commital. "But I had heard from her that Emily seemed to like you as much as you liked her."
"Mom!" I exclaimed throwing my hands up in the air. "You knew she liked me and you didn't tell me?!"
She just kept on smiling like the annoying but caring mother that she was. "Oh sweetie," she said. "That would have spoiled all the fun." Then she got a little more serious as she added, "I wouldn't have encouraged you as much as I did if I didn't know a little something, though."
I sighed and rolled my eyes, but in the end, I gave my mom a big hug and then ran off to tell Daisy that she was going to meet my most awesome classmate tomorrow.
"I hope you like her," I said to Daisy as I sat on the couch petting her while she purred away. "She's really nice and sweet, just like you! I'm sure she'll like you, too! She even drew a picture that looked like you without even realizing it was you!"
The next day at school, I was much more relaxed than the day before, though I was still a little timid when asking Emily if her mom had talked to her about the dinner. Emily confirmed she had, and revealed that her mom seemed to have already known about the dinner. "I knew it!" I exclaimed, and proceeded to explain to Emily how our parents had already been conspiring about us.
Emily rolled her eyes, but smiled. "Parents are weird," she said.
I nodded. "Yeah," I agreed. "But my mom is a great cook. I think you'll really like dinner. Do you know what we're having?"
Emily shrugged. "I really like pasta, so I told my mom she could suggest that. I'm not sure other than that."
"I'm sure it will be good," I told her.
When it came time for dinner, I was as right as I thought I would be. My mother made linguine with Alfredo sauce, garlic bread, and Ceasar salad. Emily had never had Ceasar salad before, but she said it was now her favorite kind of salad.
As good as the dinner itself was, the best part was before and after the meal. Before the meal, Emily met Daisy and gushed over how sweet and cute and nice she was. Emily and Daisy really hit it off. Emily and I sat on the couch while my mom finished up dinner and Daisy went right to Emily's lap without any encouragement. When dinner was ready, Emily was sad to move Daisy off, but I told her it was okay and that Daisy would understand.
After dinner, Emily asked if we could play with Daisy some more. I was thrilled. I showed her some of Daisy's favorite toys and we laughed and played for about another hour before Emily's mom came to pick her up. Before Emily left, she told me, "Your cat is even cooler than you said." And she also added, "It's so cool that you like cats. Other boys like stupid stuff like snakes." I smiled and thought of Henry. I didn't really think snakes were all that stupid, but I certainly agreed that cats were a lot better. When my mom had just opened the door for Emily's mom, Emily looked back at my mom and said, "Dinner was great!" The she looked at her own mom and said, "Do you think David could come over to our house for dinner on Thursday?"
Our mothers exchanged some sort of look, but then they both agreed that dinner on Thursday would be fine. I think they thought our little romance was cute. I don't think any of us were thinking yet about how it would likely one day end. Very rarely is a romance that starts that young the one that lasts. But then again, sometimes it is...
Anyway, it turned out that over the next few weeks, Emily and I saw quite a lot of each other. I tried not to forget about Chelsea too much, but I really was leaving her out of my life more than I intended to. I asked Roger about it a few times and he assured me she would be fine. I knew he cared about her, so I took his word for it and tried not to worry about it too much.
It was really hard not want to spend all my time with Emily because she was so cool. I was a relatively shy kid most of the time, but Emily was a lot easier to talk to than other kids in my class and a lot of fun to be around. She taught me how to draw better and I even convinced her to try soccer. She ended up slipping on a slightly damp patch of grass and falling down, and I was worried she was hurt but she just started laughing.
That was not too long before Halloween, and might have even been the same day that Emily asked me if I wanted to go trick-or-treating with her. I told her that I'd love to, but I usually went around with my neighbors Chelsea and Roger. She shrugged and said, "Well, they can come, too."
I blurted out my acceptance before thinking about what a bad idea this could be if Chelsea still had her crush on me, but it was too late to take it back, and even though I still remembered what Roger said about being honest, I didn't think it was a good idea to tell Emily the whole story about Chelsea. So instead, I asked my mom about it after Emily left. "I'm sure it will be fine," my mom assured me, "but you probably want to talk to Chelsea about it if you aren't sure how she's feeling."
I didn't like the idea of talking to Chelsea, but I figured my mom was probably right. I wasn't quite to that age when I didn't believe her about things anymore.
I dreaded talking to Chelsea even more than I had dreaded first asking Emily out. Emily would have been friendly towards me even if she had declined my offer. Chelsea could very well be hostile towards me. I tried to prepare myself if the worst should happen, but what I wasn't prepared for was what actually happened.
I went over to Chelsea's house a week and a half before Halloween, just a couple days after Emily had suggested the trick-or-treating together. Roger was there, too, and he had a weird little smirk on his face when he told me that Chelsea was in the kitchen. As soon as I set foot in that room, I stopped immediately. There was Chelsea, sitting at the table, eating a peanut butter sandwich without the crust, and sitting right there beside her was a boy I had never met before nibbling on some grapes. As soon as she saw me, her eyes lit up with a smile. "Oh good, Davy!" she exclaimed, setting down her sandwich and jumping up from her chair. She wiped her hands on her jeans and walked over to me as the mystery boys eyes followed her uncertainly. He remained silent.
"I was hoping you would come around!" Chelsea said as she walked over to me. Her voice seemed a bit lower than normal, like she was trying to sound sophisticated or something.
"Yeah," I said, glancing at the boy and smiling uneasily. "I was just wanting to check about the plans for trick-or-treating on Halloween."
Chelsea looked up at me (she was still a few inches shorter than I was) and smiled. "I'd love to go trick-or-treating with you." Her voice lilted a little, like I had heard in the voices of some "ladies" in old time TV shows and movies that Chelsea and I had watched together. "However," she went on, "I must insist upon having Ben join us." She gestured towards the boy at the table who nervously gulped down a grape and then waved shakily at me.
"Oh, of course," I quickly put in, figuring this would make it easier to mention what I needed to say. "In fact, I was hoping that it would be okay if Emily came along, too."
Chelsea let out a little gasp of glee and clasped her hands together. "That would be perfect," she exclaimed, her voice rising slightly, seemingly in excitement. "It can be like a double date!"
"A double date?" I dared, dumbfounded.
Chelsea nodded happily. "Um-hum! Ben is my boyfriend now!" She gestured towards him just as he was swallowing another grape and he waved nervously again.
I admit, the whole exchange may not have been quite as comical as I remember it now. I remember being confused and uncertain and wanting to ask Chelsea if this was a joke, but she certainly seemed genuine at the time and she was angry or yelling, and surely wouldn't do so in front of her "boyfriend", so I decided to take it as a victory.
"Well, I'll let you too continue your hanging out then," I said.
Chelsea leaned towards me and, blocking her mouth with her hand so Ben couldn't see, whispered, "It's a date." There was a sparkle in her eye. I couldn't decide if she was excited or just being mischevious. Trying to make me jealous maybe? Again, I decided not to push my luck and just smiled.
"Okay," I said, trying to sound kind, "I'll just go see what Roger is up to."
As soon as I walked back into the living room, Roger looked up from his magazine and burst out laughing. "I'm sorry, dude," he said. "I wanted to tell you, but you know, I figured it was better for her to tell you herself."
"What's so funny?" I asked as I sat down on the couch next to him.
"You. Her. Both of you," he said. "It's so cute how you have your little dates for the Halloween outing."
I gave a little sneer as I crossed my arms, propped my feet up on the coffee table, and looked over at him. "Oh yeah, who are you taking?" I asked.
He shrugged, but then said, "I guess I'll take Lily."
I couldn't help but smile at that. That was one nice thing about having a dog, I suppose. It was much more feasible to take a dog with you trick-or-treating than it was to take a cat.
So the days inched closer to Halloween and I still wasn't sure what was going to happen, but, rather surprisingly, the answer turned out to be: nothing much. Chelsea was a perfect little angle, which was what she was dressed as, and her "date" went as a devil. Their parents thought it was super cute. Chelsea and I hadn't really coordinated our costumes at all. She was a crayola crayon and I was some sort of safari adventure guy with the round hat and everything. I guess it was kinda good that all the attention was on Chelsea and her cute little mini couples costuming. I was just happy to be out with Chelsea and Emily together without a cat fight breaking out.
Emily seemed happy to meet Chelsea and told me, out of Chelsea's earshot, that she thought it was cute how I seemed to talk to her like a little sister. I was glad Emily saw my relationship with Chelsea for what I wanted it to be. I figured that as long as Chelsea kept being this sweet angle, everything would be fine.
And it was fine, for Halloween at least. We got lots of candy and sorted and traded it and then we went our separate ways and Emily smiled at me as she left and smiled at me again when we saw each other at school the next day. Everything seemed to be going great.
And then, seemingly out of nowhere, the break-up happened. It wasn't me and Emily, not yet anyway, it was Chelsea and that devil, Ben. Ben never said much, and it turned out that this was because he just kind-of went along with whatever the latest kid in his life said. Chelsea had said they were dating and he shrugged and went along with it. But between Thanksgiving and Christmas, another girl told him that the two of them were dating and he shrugged and went along with that. Chelsea was devastated, though it was almost Christmas time before I heard about it, and I found out about it through Roger.
"So how are Chelsea and Ben doing?" I asked one day when I sat with him at lunch due to my girl Emily being sick and not at school that day.
He gave a slight smirk and shook his head at me. "If you ever talked to us anymore, you'd know that they broke up like two weeks ago," he said. "And she was really sad. Some friend you are."
And he scooted his tray and his seat a few inches away from me.
I was crushed, not just because something bad had happened to Chelsea, but because I hadn't known about it and because Roger was right. I had been so wrapped up in my world with Emily ever since Halloween, when I saw that everything was fine with Chelsea, that everything had not remained fine with Chelsea. I may have only been twelve years old, but I realized that friendships were even more important than potentially fleeting relationships. I knew that no matter what happened, I wanted to keep on being friends with Chelsea and Emily both.
So that day after school, I went over to Roger and Chelsea's house to talk to Chelsea. She was playing with Lily and seemed content, though not her usual happy bubbly self. I walked up to Lily and started petting the dog as she gnawed on a bone. Chelsea looked up. "I'm sorry, Chell," I said. "I'm sorry for not hanging out and I'm sorry about Ben. I really want us to still be friends."
Chelsea smiled at me. "Yeah, me, too," she said. "Boys are dumb anyway."
I laughed. "Yes, we certainly are," I agreed. We played with Lily for another two hours before I had to go home for dinner.
I should have realized, with all of this preteen drama going on, that my relationship with Emily was unlikely to last forever, but even though my head knew this, my heart refused to accept it.
Now that I've got you expecting the worst, I can tell you that though it didn't last forever, my relationship with Emily did last all through Junior High. We continued to hang out and play with Daisy. We started hanging out and playing with Chelsea, too. To me, it was perfect: my girlfriend and my neighborhood friend hanging out together, with me, all of us getting along. It was almost too good to be true.
It was late spring before Emily said to me, "I like Chelsea a lot, but I think she might have a little crush on you."
My eyes immediately and instinctively darted away. I had never lied to Emily about Chelsea. I had just failed to tell her the whole story. I felt now, with such a direct confrontation, though I could just say something like, "maybe," it was probably best to come clean and tell her the truth.
I sighed and looked back at her. "Well, I guess she kinda did a while ago," I admitted. "It was before we started dating that I found out and I told her I just wanted to be friends and I thought it would be okay, but then I met you and I guess she still liked me then and was a little jealous."
Emily frowned. She opened her mouth to speak and then closed it again. I was about to break the silence myself when she asked, "Why didn't you tell me?"
"I don't know," I truthfully replied. "I guess I should have, but there didn't seem to be a reason to, and then she had her own boyfriend and she seemed happy so I figured it was all over."
Emily just laughed and shook her head. She was smiling and didn't seem upset. "Boys," she said.
I felt a little hurt. Emily had never lumped me in with other boys before. She had always made me feel special. "What is that supposed to mean?" I asked.
She must have sensed she had upset me because she frowned and rubbed my arm, trying to comfort me. "It's not bad," she said. "I just mean that I don't think you really knew how Chelsea was feeling and why she got herself a boyfriend."
"Well you don't know either!" I was feeling a bit defensive.
"I guess not," Emily admitted, "but my guess would be was that she was trying to be a grown-up like you."
I opened my mouth to protest, but closed it when I thought Emily might be right.
"Maybe I was wrong," she said, much to my surprise. "Maybe Chelsea doesn't even realize it, but maybe she really does view you as more of a big brother than a love interest."
I wrinkled up my nose. "A love interest?" I questioned.
Emily laughed. "That's just something I heard on TV," she said. "And do you know what love interests do?" she asked.
I shook my head, but my heart was beating a little faster and I imagined Emily's green eyes were flashing at me from behind fluttering eyelashes.
"This is what they do," she said, and she leaned forward and kissed me right on the lips!
It was a quick, surprising kiss, and really not all that passionate. Emily had kissed me before, but on the cheek and never on the lips. I decided immediately that I liked it better on the lips, but I'm sure the only emotion that showed on my face when Emily pulled away and looked at me was shock.
She blushed and scooted away a little. "I'm sorry," she said. "That was probably inappropriate."
"No!" I said quickly. "My mom told me that kissing like that is totally fine!" I immediately regretted mentioning my mom. I suspected that wasn't very romantic. Fortunately, Emily didn't seem to mind.
"Good," she said, and she leaned forward and kissed me again.
You might think after that story, after hearing about how awesome Emily was, that I've been tricking you about us breaking up, but I'm not. It really happened. It was over a year after that first on the lips kiss, but it happened.
We made it through that first summer together just fine. We played and kissed and tickled. We even tried to take Daisy for a walk, but she stuck to her usual outdoor persona and just kind-of sat there, so we ended up tying her leash to a tree in the front yard and chasing each other up and down the street. We hung out with Chelsea and Roger some and ate lots of meals together and had time for just the two of us, too.
Eighth grade was great, too, at least the first half of it. We had gym class together, which embarrassed me a little at first, but it turned out to be a lot of fun to run around and play with Emily. We also had math together again, and science as well. We talked and worked on homework together and got closer to one another's friends. Emily's other friends weren't as cool as her, but they were okay. She only had a couple of them, but that was okay since I didn't have a ton of other friends either.
It was after Christmas break that things started to change. We still hung out, but we only had one class together and so we didn't see each other as much during the day at school. Emily tried out for the soccer team that year, too. She got in as a third-stringer and barely got to play. She said it was okay, but it seemed to me that she would have been happier either playing more or not at all. Still, she came to my games and cheered me on, and I came to most of hers, too, even though she didn't play much. We were still having fun together, but I was finding I didn't get as excited when she kissed me. We were great as friends, but the romance was getting a little boring.
I wasn't entirely sure if it was us or if we needed to do more than just kiss or what, but doing more than just kiss wasn't really an option for me, so I convinced myself that Emily and I just weren't meant to be. I was nervous about bringing up with her, this idea of just being friends after being boyfriend and girlfriend for so long. I was surprised to find myself being the one wanting to end it, too. Emily was so awesome. I still felt that way. I just didn't care that much about having her as my girlfriend anymore. I thought maybe something was wrong with me, but when I talked to my mom about it, she said there was nothing wrong with me at all.
"Feelings change," she said.
I was nervous about my next question, but I felt I had to ask it. "Did you feelings for dad ever change?" I asked.
"Not like yours for Emily," she said. "I never got less in love with him, but with other guys before him I certainly did. This is why we date before we get married. This is why I encouraged you to date, so that you could see what it was like and you could know when something is going to last."
I nodded. I felt better about my feelings, but I didn't feel better about talking to Emily about it. Somewhat fortunately, Emily brought it up first, and it wasn't much later.
I remember the day well. It was just a couple weeks before the end of the school year. It was a warm day, but not too hot. School had just got out and we were walking to the parking lot together. I was blocking the sun with my hand and not really looking at Emily when she asked, "Do you still like me?"
I immediately stopped walking and looked over at her. My heart beat faster, but not in the same way it used to around her. "Yes, of course I do..." I trailed off.
"But?" she prompted.
I wanted to talk it all back, standing there looking at her. Her long brown hair, beautiful green eyes, sun sparkling off her face. She was clutching her books to her and looked sad. It didn't seem like she was going to flat out cry, but I was still afraid she might. I felt awful, but I had to say it. I had to be honest with Emily. "But I don't think... I don't think I still have a crush on you... or whatever." I looked down and kicked at a rock I noticed on the concrete.
"You don't love me," she said.
It wasn't a question, but I still felt it needed an answer. "I guess not," I said. "I'm sorry."
"It's okay," Emily said in a choked up voice that told me it really wasn't okay.
I looked up, trying to convey on my face the pain I was feeling, even though it wasn't quite like the pain she was feeling. "Emily, I'm sorry," I said again.
She shook her head. I saw her eyes get teary, but she still wasn't flat out crying. "No, it's better this way," she said. "Then in high school we can be free if we want to date other people or whatever." She took a deep breath and rubbed her eyes a little, wiping away the tears before they fell. "We can still be friends though, right?" she asked.
I nodded immediately. "Of course!" I said.
Her smile seemed a bit forced. "And Chelsea?" she asked.
At first I thought she was questioning if I had a thing for Chelsea now. "I'm not..." I began.
She interrupted me to clarify: "Can I still be friends with Chelsea, too?"
"Oh," I said, rubbing the back of my head nervously. "Well, of course. That's between you two."
She smiled more genuinely. She seemed more concerned about remaining friends with Chelsea than with me. She gave a nod. "Well good," she said. She looked across the parking lot and said, "I think my ride is here. I guess I'll see you tomorrow."
"Yeah, I guess so," I said.
It was weird, going through my first break-up. I reflected I had broken the hearts of two girls now and it didn't exactly feel good. I told my mom about it when I got home and told her how sorry I was. "Don't be," she said. "You want to be the boyfriend of someone you love. It's fine to have lots of friends, but you can only have one love."
"Well if that's true, then my only love is Daisy!" I exclaimed.
My mom laughed. "You can only have one human love," she clarified. Before I could declare that that human love was her, she also added, "One human love of the kind that you marry."
It was a little awkward talking to my mom about all this, but since we had already had the really awkward talk two years ago, this wasn't so bad in comparison.
It was weird continuing to be friends with my first girlfriend as well. Some things stayed the same: Emily would still come over for dinner now and then, we still did some homework together, and we still played with Daisy, but we spent a lot less time completely alone, and there was no more kissing. By the end of the summer, I did miss the kissing, which confused me since I had been bored of it before. I didn't really understand what was going on with me, but I decided that when the new school year started, I would need to find a new girlfriend who was at least as awesome as Emily had been.
But my first concern, I found, was surviving as a high school freshman at all. Fortunately, Roger was once again at my same school and a year older than me, but I found sophomores weren't all that higher up on the totem pole than the poor freshman were. I hadn't expected to be both teased and ignored in such a manner. Elementary school kids hadn't been mature enough to be this immature, and in junior high, it was just the two grades so we were pretty much all equal. Not so in high school. This was also the time when I started to doubt my mom when she would tell me, "Everything will be okay." I found more comfort in Daisy's purrs than in my mothers words.
I wasn't a super tiny kid, but I wasn't huge either. I was small enough to be picked on and made fun of by older kids. They teased me for being a math nerd for one thing. Even though I wasn't all that good at math, I found it interesting enough to join math club and that was bad enough to get teased about. I thought about quitting math club, but I decided not to let them win. They teased me for sitting with girls at lunch. I was still friends with Emily and her friends and I had found I liked them more than most of the boys in my class so I ate lunch with them. This got me teased and called a girly boy and much worse. But Emily was my friend and I didn't want to give that up. The worst was that they teased me about being so obsessed with Daisy. I'm not entirely sure how this older kids found out. They must have overheard me talking to someone who was actually nice. I wasn't about to apologize for liking Daisy, though. This was the one subject about which I sometimes got angry and yelled back at them. For this, I got teased about being a little hot head.
All of this went on for a couple of months. Really, it was all very stupid, and I recognized that and tried to ignore it, but I was still a long way off from believing "Everything will be okay." It was frustrating. The kids teasing me were so dumb. The reasons they were teasing me were so dumb. I knew this. But when I did protest, they just laughed and poked fun at me more. For those couple of months, it all stayed with words, but then, about a week after Thanksgiving, one kid started making remarks about my mom and that was it.
I don't even remember what he said or who it was that said it. Some stupid senior trying out some "your mamma" jokes. It was so ridiculous I shouldn't have responded at all. He had clearly never met my mamma because, despite being an excellent cook, she maintained a pretty stellar figure (though of course I didn't think about it that way as a teenage boy), but anyway, his joke was clearly not even remotely true and I shouldn't have reacted, but instead I responded by shouting something like, "And you're so dumb you don't even know what you're talking about."
The guy just laughed and was like "oooh tough guy." He was laughing and his friends were laughing and he was doing that dumb thing where he held his hands up like he was surrendering, so I did what I thought at the time was appropriate and I punched on of his hands. I'm sure it didn't hurt him at all, but his friends stopped laughing and he acted like he was hurt and then he took a swing at me. I easily ducked out of the way, then kicked him in the leg, spun around, and ran away. He grabbed at me, but I had caught him off guard. I remember running for the stairs and taking them two at a time as he was thundering after me. He was definitely faster than me, but a couple of his friends had tried to hold him back and so he got a slow start. Just as I was getting to the top of the stairs, he was reaching the bottom. He must have tried to take them three at a time or something, but all I know is that I heard a thump and looked back and he was sitting at the bottom of the stairs with a bloody noise and shouting something unintelligible at me. Some older girls (juniors) had gathered nearby and were giggling. One of them caught my eye and winked. It turned out her name was Hannah and she was going to be my next girlfriend.
But that's getting ahead of things just a little. First there was a trip to the principals office and an after school detention in my future, but I thought it was totally worth it.
My mom was pretty upset when she found out. She told me I should have just let it be and "Everything would have been okay", but it seemed to me like things were pretty okay as it was. I still got teased a little after that, but not by as many people and not as often. The boy I had hurt still made remarks from time to time, but when I glared at him he backed off.
Chelsea thought it was funny and giggled about it. Roger told me I had done a nice job and I told him it was mostly due to all that soccer practice we had done years ago. Emily frowned and said she was disappointed. But I guess that's why Emily wasn't my girlfriend anymore.
Speaking of which, I rather do want to talk about my next relationship now, the one with that Hannah girl. Well, but "want to", I mean I'd like to brag a little about the fact that, after Christmas break, a girl two years older than me showed an interest in me. That's the kind-of thing guys are supposed to brag about right?
Yeah, well, Hannah was progressive and asked me out. She could drive, so we went to a couple fast food places on these "dates" and then I asked if she wanted to come meet my cat. She wrinkled up her nose a little and said she was allergic to cats. "But it's sweet that you like your cat so much," she said. I wasn't really sure after that how long things were going to last, but I figured I couldn't dump an older girl over her being allergic to my cat. Fortunately, she got bored before Valentine's Day (fortunately because then I didn't have to figure out what do give an older girl for Valentine's Day), and dumped me. It was the first time I had been dumped, but I didn't mind. I realized that having to break up with Emily had hurt a lot more than Hannah breaking up with me. I briefly considered asking Emily out again after Hannah had dumped me and I realized this, but she was dating someone else at the time, so I didn't.
So that's my brief and, I think, humorous story about standing up to bullies and my second ever girlfriend.
The last part of Freshman year was the best by far because that was when I got to play soccer. Well, by "got to play", I mean I was second string on the JV team, but the first string JV goalie was super nice and taught me some great tricks and the coach had some great drills I hadn't learned before. Plus, Roger and I were on the same team again, so that was pretty sweet. (All of the Freshman and most of the Sophomores were JV at our school. I kinda think Roger could have been Varsity, but if he phoned it in a little at tryouts so that he could be on the team with me, I'm super flattered about that.) I reconnected with some of the other guys I had played with all the way back in fifth grade, too. I realized that I did have at least as many male friends as female friends and started hanging out with the soccer guys more, which was really what I wanted to do, but helped cut down on what little teasing I had to endure even more. All in all, soccer season was my favorite time of the school year and I found that soccer season was probably my favorite soccer season of the entire time I played, just because it made me feel part of something again. Plus, our record was 8-2, so that was pretty good. I was more than content, especially when Daisy didn't mind that I came home from games smelling like dirt and grass. If anything, I think she liked that even more than my usual smell.
When you're having fun, things always seem to go faster, though, and before I knew it, Freshman year was over and it was summer time again. I could hardly believe I had made it through the first year of high school. The older I got, the faster time seemed to go. When I told my mom this, she just laughed and said, "Wait until your my age!" I still wasn't quite as much in awe of my mother as I had been a few years earlier, but I still liked her well enough. I both smiled and rolled my eyes at the "Wait until your my age!" comment.
No comments:
Post a Comment