Unfurled

10/22/18

Daniel was standing on his toes to see over his classmates’ heads as his sister pulled up into the school parking lot. She had promised to pick him up during recess to go home early and go get ice cream. She always took him out for ice cream on his birthday. Ice cream with Alyssa was always the highlight of every birthday. Although, when he thought about it, any time with his sister was bettter than any time without her. His classmates yelled and giggled around him, enjoying their recess. But Daniel just waited on his tiptoes, tracking his big sister across the parking lot. When she finally got close enough, he waved his arms around and called to get her attention, but she just laughed and told him to wait just a few minutes so she could sign him out at the front office. About 347.5 seconds later (yes, he counted), she finally came into the playground area to come collect him. This was the part that was better than the ice cream: being able to run at Alyssa and feel her arms around him like she would never let him go. He never liked being alone. It scared him.

Since it was his ninth birthday, and he was almost in his double digits, and, therefore almost a big kid, he was allowed to sit in the front seat. For today, anyways. So on the way to Daniel’s favorite ice cream shop, he sat up front with his sister, smiling the entire way, because it was just another birthday spent with his sister.

When they pulled up, it took a power of will for Daniel not to just jump out of the car and rush inside. Sure, his birthday was at the beginning of December, but the ice cream shop was always warm in the colder months, and, well, ice cream was ice cream. Not to mention that during the winter, there was a special where the customers could get their ice cream in hot chocolate, like a rootbeer float, but hot cocoa. Alyssa met him at the front of the car and held her hand out for him. He loved the way she took his hand so easily, like it had always been there for him, waiting for his little fingers to intertwine with hers, all along.

Daniel ordered his usual— two scoops of mint chocolate chip in a large mug of dark chocolate hot cocoa, with exactly one and a half scoops of crumbled brownie on top— and waited patiently for Alyssa to get her ice cream, too. After that, she promised him they would go home and watch a movie in their pj’s with some delivery pizza. Their mom was more than willing to make him a special dinner and dessert and take him out to do whatever he wanted, but, honestly, that was all so overrated. Daniel didn’t want to make a big deal out of his birthday. He didn’t want a birthday party or presents, or his parents to make a big deal out of it. Honestly, when he was with Alyssa, he didn’t want her to think about his birthday, either. He just wanted to spend the day with his sister. So he did. He sat with her, laughing, at the table. Alyssa teased him and laughed and talked to him about all the things you would expect to talk to a nine year old about. Everything was splendid.

Daniel grabbed Alyssa’s hand as she got up to leave. Snow had started to fall while they had been sitting inside, and he watched it, excitedly, fall past the glass door. This really was shaping up to be a perfect day. Alyssa started heading to the door, with Daniel at her side, when a woman in her late twenties opened the front door ahead of them. She was holding the hand of a litttle, brunette toddler as she ushered her out of the cold. Something about her face— it seemed familiar. Something about those dark eyes and that long, swinging curtain of hair across the woman’s back as she bent down to talk to the little girl. Something nagged at Daniel’s memories. Something was… off? The same? Familiar? All of the above? Not right? But he didn’t know for sure. After all, Daniel told himself, dark hair and dark eyes are common. He had dark hair and eyes, too. But her dark eyes were the same shade and shape as his. They turned up at the corners and lit up the same way his did when he looked at Alyssa, the way that woman was looking at that child. He remembered how the ends of that hair tickled when it brushed across his face when she bent down to him like she was doing to the kid. But he didn’t know. Dark hair and dark eyes are common. He had dark hair and dark eyes, too. She looked up at him. Those eyes… Did she know him? Had he known her before? Truly? Because that glance was more than a cursory glance. But her eyes flit away from his so quickly, it was impossible for him to know for sure. He didn’t know. So many people had dark hair and dark eyes. He had dark hair and dark eyes”for, too. And then she asked the little girl what she wanted from the counter. And that was it.

Daniel flashed back to five years ago, to the day. It was snowing, like it was that day in the present, too. But it was night, and it was cold. It was his fourth birthday, not his ninth. Daniel always loved the swings, and all he wanted to do was go to the park with his mom and swing for a little bit and play in the snow. So they did, “for a little bit of birthday fun,” Vivian told him. They stayed at the park for a little while before Daniel started to get cold. He had forgotten his jacket in the car, which was across the park and the parking lot. Vivian, his mom, said she would go get it for him, but he had to wait exactly where he was and not move a muscle. Daniel had never liked being alone, though. He wanted to go with, but Vivian told him to wait right there. She’d be right back. She said she’d be right back.

“Wait here and close your eyes. I’ll be back before you know I’m gone,” she had told him.

“But I don’t want to be alone, Mommy,” that little voice sounded afraid. He didn’t like to be alone. He didn’t like the dark. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t go, too.

“Close your eyes, sweetheart. I’ll be back so soon, I promise you won’t even know I left.” And then she turned away, and never did come back.

He was there alone for the rest of the night, cold. Alyssa and her parents found him the next morning when they were walking through the park with their dog. He was curled up under the stairs on the playground, trying to stay warm.

Daniel stared at Vivian with a whole new level of recognition. Those words played over and over again in his ears. “I’ll be back before you even know I’m gone.” But you didn’t come back. “I promise.” But you lied. You didn’t come back for me.

Alyssa pulled on his hand, yanking Daniels attention back into the present. His ears were ringing and the world was spinning, yet still, around him. The only thing he saw was VVivian bending over that little girl. Was that his sister? Did he have a sister? Other than Alyssa, he had no family. His parents, yes, but Alyssa was his forever. Alyssa was apologizing to Vivian for her brother staring. She rushed him along outside, apologizing one last time before the door closed between them. And Vivian’s eyes turned away from Daniel again. And she let him go for the second time. And he knew it would be the last.