To Be Young Again

To Be Young Again

It would not be balancing there for long. I watched the colorful young child teeter atop the wooden playground. This was the moment. A tiny television version of myself tumbled to the wood chips, and we all smiled at my childish fumbles. Inside the luminescent box, little Maisie began to wail.  The camera wobbled with a woman's cry of, "Maisie!" and a more youthful replica of my father dashed towards me, scooping me into his arms and hushing my cries. He wiped the tears away, kissed the tiny scrape on my left knee, and it was done. The screen went static.

Mom smiled, "Oh Maisie, you used to be so cute."

Paul, who was hunched over his sticker-adorned laptop, snickered. "Yeah, what happened?"

I threw the remote at his head, my attention still fixed on the flickering screen. Mom shot me a disapproving look as my brother ducked, and the remote went flying into the wall.

"Maisie!"

I rolled my eyes, and then stood up slowly.  I bent to eject the old VHS tape from the player, and looked outside to assess the dreary sky. Placing the tape back in a worn box of memories, I announced, "I'm going for a bike ride."

Mom glanced up and nodded briefly, her attention quickly back to the squabble she was now having with Paul. I meandered to the mudroom, slipped on my old sneakers, and tugged a grey woolen hat over my frizzy hair.

The small blue bike was hidden in the back of the garage, tucked in behind dusty boxes and trash cans. I lifted it out, and my fingers were instantly covered in a layer of the grime that had collected upon it in years of neglect. An image crossed my mind of a glittering new bicycle emerging from a car in my father's strong hands. With a wipe of a tattered brown rag and a gust of air into the tires, the bike sprung to life again.

At first, it felt awkward beneath my feet, like an old friend that you can't quite seem to make conversation with any more. After a minute or so, though, I grew accustomed to the rise and fall of the pedals, and everything was instantly simple again. The trees whizzed by and the fog chilled my face into a bright, rosy hue. I was young again -  I was invincible. Houses rushed by me in a rainbow of color. The wind played with my hair and whistled through my ears, and the smell of fresh rain brought my senses back to life. A sound of joy escaped from the depths of my throat as if my heart had sprung forth and played a melody upon my vocal chords. Water splashed up from puddles around the bike and drenched my feet. I felt so whole again, like everything I had ever left behind had come back for me.

I was in town before I knew it, and swooped from road to road, maneuvering the maze of streets. The map was engraved in my mind, and I knew just where I was going.

The playground looked so small. The green swings hung wearily, swaying in the wind of the oncoming storm. A cry of thunder rang through the sky as the last mother and child dashed for a car before the first drops fell. There was no one here but me. I walked through the gate, dropping my bike by the entrance, and walked to stand in front of the wooden structure. Its inconsequentiality struck me: how could something that was once so magical look so weary and old? My sneakers squished in the trampled grass as I inched forward. Laying one hand upon the frigid metal ladder, I shuddered, and looked up to the wooden platform that was now only a few inches above my head. I gripped the metal bar, and began climbing my way to the top. My foot hit the platform just as the clouds began to let a few irregularly scattered drops fall to the earth. I rose to a standing position, and stared out at the playground. I took a step. My right foot was now at the edge. I took another step. Now my left foot. My soggy shoes peeked over the wooden edge, as I stared down at the ground in front of me. The shadows of children and parents swirled around me, running through the rain with youthful cries. A woman stood before me, a camera in her hands.

"Mom! Look at me!" I cried, wiping the water from my eyes. A voice echoed through the thunder, yelling my name, telling me to get away from the edge. Childish laughter split through my ears as the sky gave way to a roaring downpour. My mother's worried eyes cut through the streams of rain and hit me in the chest. I stumbled.

My shoe slipped and my heart caught in my throat as my arms flailed, reaching out blindly in the rain. A cry cut through me and echoed into the empty sky as I began to fall. I shut my eyes, locking myself away from the world. I was never going to be young again.

My feet landed firmly in the soggy wood chips, and I stood tall, drenched in memories.