Inner Child - Revised

As I watch a television program with a cup of soup in hand, I hear the rustling of leaves outside my little house. I push myself up from the couch and stand slowly to check on the noise. There better not be any hoodlums out there. I hobble to my large kitchen window and peek out to the yard below.

I see tree branches stretching and swaying to the wind as if dancing for the moon. And, there is a dark-haired girl with a porcelain like face illuminated in the moonlight staring back at me. Even from a distance, I recognize something familiar about her.

I look around the yard and hope that I’m just imagining things-not unusual a woman of my age. But as I turn back, I have the little one in my sight again. She looks as if she’s waiting for something or someone when suddenly she points in my direction and motions me with the wave of her hand as if to say, “come to me.”

I squint to see her wave more insistently as I take a step out the side door. What am I doing? I think as I walk out onto my old wooden deck and swing open the squeaky door to steps leading me to her.

Breathing hard, I approach the little girl. My heart races like I’m seeing the birth of my first-born. Yet, I know this isn’t my child. As I stand only a few feet away, she sets her eyes upon me, and tears stream down her rosy cheeks.

Cool breezes blow through my thin, gray hair, and for some reason, I sense we are long lost friends who have been out of contact for a long time.

“What do you want little one? Are you lost? I ask as I push strands of hair out of my wrinkled face.“It is you who is lost.”

“No, honey, I’m home. How did you get here?”

“You know.”
“I don’t know. Do you know where you live? Where do you belong?”

“You know,” the little girl replied.

I wrap my hands tight across my chest for warmth and to stop the goose bumps from spreading. She walks toward me-this little one who is only four or five years old. And she reaches for my hand with her tiny warm hand, soft like a baby’s bottom. And her young, smooth hand intertwines with mine, which is now old and hardened.

She and I walk across the yard and smirk at each other like we can read each other’s mind. We see the playground at the school about fifty yards away, and this little friend of mine leads me down the sidewalk to the swings there.

In the still of the night and with leaves falling all around us, we each hop on a swing pumping our legs back and forth reaching higher and higher like we’re trying to reach the moon. While in mid air, we glance at each other and giggle. And as I smell the crisp smell of dried leaves, I figure it out.

She stops swinging for she knows that I know who she is. She jumps off the swing, runs and jumps on me, hugging me. And not one of those polite hugs you give your Aunt, but the kind that takes your breath away. And as I gaze into her little hazel eyes that are just like mine, I say,“You are me, and I am you.”

“I am you,” the little one whispered."

“I needed to see you again, didn’t I? I had forgotten about your pureness and your free spirit. We parted ways many years ago.”

She takes my hand and leads me this time to the slide, and we climb up. She slides down first, and I go next feeling the wind rush over me as slide down. I smile. My heart leaps for joy as I plow into myself. We became one.

And as I skip little steps back up the hill to my house, I breathe in the cool damp air reminding me that fall is here. I walk through the dewy grasses of my yard, and remember everything about her. Suddenly, I am young at heart once again.

###Flash fiction Written by Lisa Braendle