Tag: growing up

Butter

When they were small, they used to sneak into the kitchen at night. They never went for the cookie jar. They never went into their parent’s secret stash of whatever it was that they weren’t allowed to have yet. No, they opened the fridge and took a bite out of a cube of butter.

Part of it was because butter was delicious. But another part of it was because they would never get to do that when either of their parents were awake.

Then, of course, they grew up.

“Should I eat this stick of butter?” they asked their elder sibling.

“Do you want to?” was the response.

As they decided they wanted to, they did so. Despite being an adult, not much had changed.

More than growing taller

If there was someone she had looked up to since she was a child, it was her father. That wasn’t to say literally, the moment she realized she was going to be taller than him. He shrugged it off.

“Well, not everyone can pull off the short look like me, kid.”

She should have enjoyed it, growing up. There was something that told her that some of the other people she knew who hadn’t gotten as tall would have enjoyed her height. But all she could do was look down on her father and remember the days he could pick her up. Those memories were becoming more and more vague in her mind.

She didn’t like realizing the things she hadn’t noticed as a child. She didn’t like hearing some of the things her father said to her now, that she knew he never would have told her before.

“I’ve taught you some bad habits. Ah, well. I guess we’ll both have to work on those.”

If there was someone she admired, that time tried to take from her, it was her father.

While the memories of implicit belief became more and more nostalgic, the admiration stayed the same.

Then the admiration grew.

From the Rooftops

The roof was filthy, covered in the debris of weather and time. She dragged herself up on top of it nonetheless, getting to her feet. The shingles weren’t good purchase for these boots. She’d have to remember that.

There was her goal, the other house across the way. She took a breath. It wasn’t that far. She had made this jump when she was younger.

When she was younger, before she had any encounters with mortality, before she understood the risks she was taking. Funny how a simple change in perspective suddenly made this a concern. An action she should have been used to. She steeled her nerves.

Shifting her stance, she readied herself. Then she began to run.

She jumped.

Accepting his lead

The two stood outside the club. He stood beside them, pretending to be as cool as he had tried to make himself look before the both had left the house. They wore the outfit he had chosen for them, but as they remain rather indifferent to it. It clung to them tightly, all in black, covering all skin but not concealing much of it, in its own way.

It was dumb, as far as they were concerned, but he liked it and this entire outing was for him.

“Ready?”

“We won’t be let in,” they said, as if it would change their plans. It didn’t, they were ready to go and he was ready to get them in.

He led them by the arm. They let him do so, because it was his day and he wanted to do this, so they might as well have let him think he had the lead. They were trying to behave, after all.

He was tall enough, wide enough, now to look like an adult. They wondered if he would possibly grown anymore. Like his father, maybe. His father was even taller than that. He could be that tall eventually. He looked like an adult.

They, on the other hand… How could the two of them possibly be the same age?

Somehow, both of them were allowed inside. They had to give him credit for that, when he actually stayed calm, he could make things seem as if they were completely normal.

It could be normal, the two of them being here, they realized. If they let him lead them, it could be.

One of many possibilities.