Memory

My memory is hazy. But what is clear is that his facial features through my nine year old eyes could not have been arranged in a less appealing way. He handed us moldy, bruised peaches from the ground; rotting, skin separating from the flesh without effort. One, two, three rotten fruits in the hands of children, and we watched as he plunged his thumb deeply into the flesh of the fruit. The juices oozed down his palm and wrist before he lobbed it over the fence between his house and the neighbor's. "I bet you can't make it over." He challenged, his freckled face contorting as he spoke. We looked at each other for silent confirmation then arced our gooey peaches over the fence to hear a muddy plop on the other side. Marco Polo We played in a tepid pool never once skimmed for fallen leaves. We floated in the water chest deep, calling and answering. Fish out of water. kicking up the layer of dirt that coated the pool floor, no one daring to submerge their heads beneath the surface of the water which then resembles herbal tea before adding milk. watch out for the leeches, they warned. We played tag around the sunk-in living room with no couch, taking breaks to perfect our pitch and harmonies against the repeating Sing-Along-Songs video playing from the twelve inch screen tucked into a folded armoire. We ran free in the house smelling faintly of whisky and decay to the beat of Zip-a-dee-do-dah and held a competition for who made the better Jasmine in A Whole New World. I stood in the doorway of the back bedroom, they sat on the bed. The smell of stale shit and overdue death smacking me in the face. I cursed my mom and dad for leaving me with family friends for the week while this man slowly passed in a red tinted room covered floor to ceiling with Betty Boop knick knacks and memorabilia. I was out of place and forced deeper into the room brimmed with death and sexy figurines. I sometimes wonder what became of the boy and girl I spent a week with at nine years old. Maybe she teaches history and he makes scale models of high rises. Or he got arrested for assault and she smokes crack next to her baby boy's crib. My memory is hazy. But what is clear are his twisted features that sometimes haunt my ambient thought, and the smell of peaches makes me sick.