So Says The Mouse In My Hair

The Boy Next Door Chapter 1

I lived next door to a young boy once, did you know that? A strange age in my life, I already had crows feet printed next to my eyes. I was beginning to find gray woven into my hair. Too old to work much, to young to retire, nothing was making sense.

I met him on a nippy afternoon raking leaves. In the middle of my thoughts I was admiring the size of my leaf pile and the path of clean that trailed behind it. Ready for a cocoa break I dropped my rake and brushed my hands across my jeans and there he was.

"Hi," he said. Scrawny, smaller than you even, he was missing one of his front teeth. The one on the left. My left anyway. I’d say seven years old. A bright orange sweater and a blue baseball hat. Hot pink sneakers. A lunch box. And quite the stare. It disturbed me that day. I frowned back at him, trying to match the look.

"Good morning," I replied. "I like your shoes."

"Really? I picked them out myself. Mommy wanted me to get the gray ones, but I didn’t like them. Gray isn’t a very happy color is it? None of the other kids like them. But I don’t see them very much, only when I’m at school. And I don’t get there very much…"

So he was a talker, it turned out. We didn’t have many in this neighborhood in those days. But then, the kids all lived closer to the school so I didn’t see them all that much. Not on purpose you have to understand, I was never one to avoid children, we just never happened to be in the same place at the same time.

"…they run off when I get too close though. It’s fun to watch with those big bushy tails. I’m going to name them all this week. I’ve started. Gaston is the darker one and he’s always beating up on the little guys like Melvin and Rover. But they don’t seem to mind too much. Do you have any?"

"Any what?"

"Squirrels. I think everybody around here has them, so I’m asking."

"Yes. They keep eating all my birdseed. I don’t know what to do about it. And what was your name again?"

"Andrew. But don’t worry, I hadn’t told you that yet, so you it’s not one of the things you missed when you weren’t paying attention."

He had noticed. I was a horrible person. "I’m sorry Andrew. My name is Lilly. Would you like to come inside? I was going to make some cocoa."

"Yes, please." And polite. Was that normal? I could never tell in those days. "And don’t worry about listening to me. It happens a lot. I play a game with my mother where I try to time how long it is before she sees that I’m still talking. And I also like to find out how many different things I can talk about and how weird they can be. There are some weird things that you can talk about, aren’t there Mrs. Lilly?"

"Absolutely, young Andrew, and please, you can just call me Lilly."

"Oh, no I can’t. You are so much older than I am. I could never call you by one name. Please let me call you Mrs. Lilly."

We walked into my little cottage, and I sat him down at my kitchen table. His lunchbox plunked onto the floor. Smurfs. How sweet. His legs flung themselves all over the empty space between the seat and the floor, little streaks of flashing pink.

I smiled.

"But I’m not a Mrs. No one ever wanted to marry me. Now I am just an old maid living in a little house with a big yard."

He stretched his neck to see out my window. The little green eyes excited now, concentrated on that pile of leaves. The head went to work, working on a scene that I could not follow.

Then it was there. A picture of him in the middle of the load, with reds and yellows and browns stuck in his hair and shirt. The taste of dirt on his lips and the twig digging at his tummy. Pebbles in the shoe. The grin on his face. He stands up with a bundle of Fall in his arms, throws it up and sinks into the heap as it joins him again. Of course. Maybe he’d like to after his snack.

And back to now he comes.

"Well, I’ll call you Miss Lilly then. And that will make you feel like a little girl again, right? And if you feel like a little girl, maybe you won’t mind playing with a little boy like me. And I can teach you how to talk a lot and you can show me where all the squirrels live. Ok?"
He was twitching in his seat now. I laughed.

"All right Master Andrew. You have a deal. You teach me how to play. I’ve completely forgotten you know, it’s been so long. And I’ll answer all of your questions. Or try at least. You ask a lot of questions, don’t you?"

His head bounced up and down.

"This is going to be fun, Miss Lilly. I promise. And I can too, because I always have fun. All the time. Except sometimes because there are a couple things that I don’t like, but we’re not going to think about those things. They don’t make me happy. Like the color gray, right? So we’ll just avoid those all the way. Right?"

"Right."

I set a mug down in front of him.

He reached with both hands. His eyes stretched wide as he began to slurp it up.

"Can I tell you a secret, Miss Lilly? The cocoa made me think of it."

"Sure."

I sat down across the table from him and sipped from my cocoa as I listened.

"Well, it’s not an it, really. It’s a him. His name is Mr. Milk, and he really likes cocoa, too. But I’m the only one that can see him. I talk to him kind of a lot. In fact, it was his idea for me to come and see you today. I think he likes you. He is about your age. In fact, I think he may like like you. You know? Would you like to meet him sometime?"

Blushing? Me? Over an imaginary man? Maybe it had been longer than I thought.

"Of course, Andrew, you may bring him by any time you like. There’s always extra cocoa in this kitchen."

"Great!" He jumped out of his seat. "Let me see if I can go find him right now."

"But your cocoa. It’s going to be cold by the time you come back."

"No it won’t."

He closed the door behind him And I watched him run down the front walk. I picked up his mug to help him finish it, but I was too late. Already empty.

posted by Sarah Eliza @ 8:45 AM