I’m drifting around in my head. I didn’t put the mattress up against the wall and it is now afternoon. The only sounds are the babies breathing softly as they nap on “Mom’s bed.” We played hard today. We colored and we sang and they brushed my hair. I have long red blonde hair and there is no greater fun than to give Mom a bunch of funny hairdos. Sometimes they laugh hysterically at the mess they’ve created or they tell me how nice I look. I thank them and pay them for their services in animal crackers. It is well worth the untangling I will have to do later.
I lie beside them and watch their little faces. They sleep close to each other like puppies. Sam Cooke is singing “Change is Gonna Come” on my little radio. I wish change would come somehow. Good change.
“It’s been too hard living but I’m afraid to die…” Sammy sings and my heart tightens but the tears don’t come. I’m too tired. It has been too hard living like this. And I’m very afraid to die. In one of his rages that goes too far. How did I get here…?
I’m drifting around in my head…I think of people in high school and how cruel they were to me. So when my path crossed with that of a gorgeous boy named Jonathan, from a rival high school who sought me out, I did not hesitate. It felt awkward. But why did those people have to be so cruel… Some I didn’t know but most of them I’d known my whole life. Since kindergarten…That makes me smile. I, Neoma Nayrah, with my white blonde ringlets that my mother set everyday until I was 10, had a lovely boyfriend in kindergarten. Except I didn’t know it then. He was one half of beautiful twins…his name was Peter. I should have known he liked me. He tried to share his chocolate milk with me when I already had my own. He always put his blankie near mine at nap time. That sounds so funny now…if I ever see him again I will have to remind him how he tried to sleep with me in kindergarten…
A heavy sigh leaves my worn body…why couldn’t others be as kind as he was…instead they called me names or shunned me. They played terrible tricks to humiliate me to the point I wanted to kill myself. Only that would hurt my family and my best friend Anda…my Andalee… I could never do that to her. We shared too many adventures and secrets and it would not be right. I wonder where she is now…what is Peter’s life like…
I don’t want to think any more. Let the music take you…Three Dog Night sings “Pieces of April…”
“I have pieces of April, in a memory bouquet…”My memory bouquet is filled with childhood and sunlight. And it’s a cold morning in November…
Drift with the babies…drift where there is no pain…drift…
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Tags: animal crackers, change is gonna come, pieces of April, Sam Cooke, Three Dog Night