Normund
and I shuffled toward the edge of the flat roof of the shed and
froze. He towered above me with the confidence of a seven-year-old
who rode a two-wheeler and knew everything. Me? A scarecrow made of
sticks with a straw bundle of hair. I felt my blue shirt flopping in
the wind and tucked it into my shorts.
With one foot back, I
leaned forward and craned my neck at the plants below. They invited
me with their swaying outstretched stems. “You can do it,
you’re turning four,” they whispered.
My
heart punched my ribs. The sun-heated bitumen grew warm and sticky
under my worn-out sandals.
“Let’s
jump together!” Normund’s poise blocked any chance of
retreating.
“One,
two, threeeee!” His curls parachuted above his head as he flew
down.
“Four,
five..” I counted louder.
If
I keep on counting, I’ll stay here until one million.
I
took a step forward. The world around me shifted into a slow motion.
Falling
shouldn’t take that long. Why am I not on the ground yet?
Still
soft from the night rain, the soil accepted me. My sandals filled
with warm sand, and so did my fingernails. When I got up, I saw
Normund’s head bobbing above the green thicket toward the road.
I tried to follow, but my ankle locked in pain.
As
I dragged my leg in the direction of Normund, the plants attacked.
Every leaf poked me with poisonous blades. When I crawled out of the
head-high jungle, my skinny legs swelled with constellations of
hives, connected with red dwarfs of blood droplets.
Normund,
who wore pants, stopped examining his hands and stared at me.
Neither
one of us expected my out-of-control laughter.
Shara,
the guard dog, sleeping under the cover of her long ears, sensed
unnatural notes in my chuckle and barked with worry.
Her
alarmed woofing brought my dad.
“Most
of these plants are stinging nettle, they hurt you fast, but not for
long,” he explained, as he unrolled a hose and aimed a stream
at my legs. Little needles of pain coated my skin, but the flowing
water was soothing.
Dad
believed that cold water is a remedy for everything, from mosquito
bites to excessive laughter. When I pointed at my swelling ankle, he
stated his usual, “It will heal before your wedding day.”
“Come
on boys. We’ll have a birthday dinner. Irenka is already
there.” Dad ushered us into the house.
A
three-year-old blonde doll with blue eyes, Irenka was a city kid like
me. We caught bees and grasshoppers with matchboxes and listened to
their songs. We stuffed forest blueberries into our mouths until our
lips turned vampire-purple. Her parents and mine rented tiny rooms in
a house surrounded by pine trees near Melluzhi, Latvia. Normund was a
local I met last summer, a grandson of the old woman who ran the
house. Everyone’s parents worked in Riga, the capital, a sweaty
half-hour train ride away.
The
cream of wheat steaming from the plates had brown gems in it. Raisins
for a birthday.
Our
spoons searched for those treasures in the warm mess.
The
best birthday gift appeared by the door. My mom in her white city
blouse dropped a black bag on a table and pulled me in for a kiss on
the cheek, smelling like her lilac shampoo.
“Oleg
was brave today,” Normund reported while slapping my bony
shoulder.
Dad
pulled two large fruits out of the bag.
“I
like peaches.” Irenka’s eyes glowed with anticipation.
Dad
always peeled every round fruit in a continuous spiral from the south
pole to north, and peaches were no exception.
“Skin
has pesticides,” he’d exclaim, dangling another twisted
scalp from the blade for all to see.
Every
kid got a sweet-and-sour slice for dessert. Dad sucked on the juicy
flesh around the seed.
*****
I
don’t remember falling asleep, but when I opened my eyes, the
moon illuminated the gauze curtain that looked like a full sail
filled with the breeze through the window. What appeared next was the
strangest thing I’ve seen in my life.
A
toad the size of a teapot sat still in the middle of the table. I
closed and reopened my eyes. I looked at the nearby bed where Dad
snored, his one arm wrapped around Mom, then focused back on the
table. The green creature remained in place, next to a stain from the
cream of wheat.
Since
it is not here to harm us, maybe I can ask the mysterious visitor to
grant me a wish.
Should
I ask for world peace or for a bicycle?
My
thoughts swirled in a disarray, but I knew I had to act fast.
“I
would like..,” I started in a loud whisper.
My
dad stopped snoring. I glanced at him; he was still asleep.
When
I looked back at the table the toad was gone. I climbed out of my bed
and searched under the table and on the chairs in vain. I pulled
aside the fragile curtain only to see a sly smile of the full moon.
Not a track on a windowsill, not a croak in the garden.
Nobody
would ever believe me. I twirled in bed for a while before
dozing
off.
A
knock on the door woke everyone up in the morning. Normund’s
hairy head poked through the doorway.
“I
have a pet hedgehog I found in the forest. He is drinking milk. Do
you want to see?”
I
got up and looked at my legs. The swelling on my ankle was almost
gone and so were the hives.
Do
I have to get married soon?
“I
want to see!” I exclaimed. “Let me find my pants.”
