Terry sat on my shoulders as we made our way to the cliffs, shifting his weight through his little plastic feet, swaying back and forth to counteract my movement as I walked. I did my best to stabilize my upper body. Just like old times. It was certainly a hell of a lot easier to carry him now. Bigger shoulders, heavier clothes, more callused skin, just generally. Back then, his claws would accidentally sink in and draw blood. He would apologize
profusely. I would do my best not to cry. I wouldn’t want him to feel bad. I knew he didn’t mean it.
He hopped down my outstretched arm to settle onto the fractured cement we planned to call a bench. The sun still had 15 degrees of sky to go before it left us. Nice. Timed it just right.
We were silent for a moment as we took in the view.
“Wow,” he squeaked. I smirked. It was good to know at
least he hadn’t changed all that much.
“And you see this every day?” He seemed astonished.
“I guess I can if I want,” I responded. “I don’t though. It’s
kinda hard to find the time these days.”
“Oh,” he said, clearly a little disappointed. I flinched at his indirect condemnation. He continued, “well, if I could, I would always watch the sunset.” He had a point. The sun crept past the haze hanging just a touch over the horizon, finding an opening to our view, and casting a wash of orange onto the canvas of clouds that hung above us. It was undeniably beautiful.
“You always loved sunsets,” he noted. He turned to look at
me. “You always were so excited when you had the chance
to see one.” He turned back to the bleeding horizon. “I’m
sorry. I wish you could see one this pretty always.”
We sat in a comfortable silence for a moment.
Do you remember, I started, “that summer when we went to Grandad Miller’s cabin out in the Blue Ridges?”
“Mhm,” he said. “We’d go on walks for ages and only see
trees. I never saw anything like it.”
“You wandered off one day, do you remember that?
And not just one of your typical walks, I couldn’t find you
anywhere.”
Terry shifted a bit.
“It felt like I searched for hours. I didn’t know what to do. It was
getting dark. Mom was worried and wanted me back inside. I thought I lost you Terry; I really thought I did. When I finally stumbled onto that overlook, I almost couldn’t believe I found
you. I wanted to scream at you and cry at you and call you stupid
in a hundred different ways.”
He looked at me then, “Why didn’t you?”
“I saw what you were looking at. How could I?”
Terry looked up at me, wearing that same old grin below his eyes, “The trees were so green,” he murmured, “it was more green than I had ever imagined possible.”
I couldn’t help but smile at him. He continued, “It was like
the world opened up just for you and me!”
I took a deep breath. “Mom was so mad when we finally
got back.”
We sat in silence then and watched the last of the sun take
its final dip behind the horizon.
Terry looked back at me with his familiar toothy grin. He
shuffled closer, and rested his weight on my leg. I barely
felt any push.
I remembered him being much heavier. ▲
