Puddles

Taking an old blanket, I pushed aside the carpet of dust formed on top of the heavy wood chest. My once trove of secrets and obsessions that morphed as I grew. At the age of seven it held Matchbox cars, wrestling action figures (and anything else I did not want my little brother to touch). Age twelve it held football memorabilia, at sixteen it held band shirt with dirty magazines folded neatly with them. Its final charge was to hold things I could not bear to part with after college and ready to take on the world. The lid squealed with surprise when I eased it open to reveal its hidden treasures. It had been abandoned in my parent’s attic for seventeen years.

The attic existed over the house my father built and lost in the divorce, that my mother remodeled and lived with her new husband, Mark. My father never got his drinking under control and passed away from liver failure only six years after the divorce. I remember being conflicted on how to feel, alcohol always seemed more important than me, and Mark had never forgotten to pick me up from school or one of my science fairs.

The attic was not as forgotten as my chest would mislead, Mark liked things orderly, some would say too orderly. There were shelves with labels, totes with labels, filing cabinets with—you guessed it—labels. Only my corner of childhood memories and random items from different moves or projects were left untouched and dust ridden. Mark’s motto has always been, if you care about something—take care of it. But it was not his job to care about my somethings.

My argument remained, out of sight, out of mind.

Well in sight and no longer out of mind, the chest lay bared open, patiently waiting as it had done all these years. As if not to disturb some waking creature, I plucked off the top quilt with gentle consideration and smoothed out the top, running my fingers along the different fabrics.

My grandmother had made it for me. It was a gift for my college graduation. Made up of all my old band shirts, flannels, and jeans. At first, I had been upset because no one had talked to me about taking them (sure they had holes or were too small, but they were mine), after a couple weeks with it on my bed, all had been forgiven. It had been three years since my grandmother passed and I would still tear up if I thought long enough about it. That quilt and I had been through a lot. In college it proved a loyal cocoon while I ate my ice cream or boxed mac and cheese and binge watched a new series or the latest horror flick. It was there when I lost my virginity. When I moved out of state and back home. There until I met Hannah and she bought a new set. For a couple of years, it sat on my recliner in the living room, until Hannah’s interior design ideas covered the house. The quilt had made its way up here, when we got married and well, out of sight out, out of mind.

I sat it aside. I will take that home.

My fingers found the next item and at first my mind struggled for realization. I pulled them closer and felt a smile spread across my lips. Garbage Pail Kids trading cards. An entire binder of them. I laugh to myself as I open the cover and reveal the grotesque illustrations with clever names like Barfin’ Bart, Leaky Lindsay, and Slobby Robbie. That’s right, I even had an Adam Bomb. I used to save all my nickels and dimes just to run down to the corner store and purchase as many packs as I could. Over the years many friends tried to buy them from me, but no price compared to the shit eating grin inspired by Large Marge.

I place the binder on the opposite side of the quilt, to put back in the chest. No way they would pass Hannah’s inquiring eye. The quilt I could lean on sentiment.  

“Daddy?” I hear from downstairs.

“Yes, love?”

“Did you find it?”

I wait to respond because I can already hear small feet making their way up the steps and I want to make sure there are no slips. The stairs are kind of steep. When I see the blond pig tails bob around the corner, I smile and open my arms to receive our daughter Abigail, or as I called her Abs. Drove Hannah nuts. Even after five years, it still amazed me that Hannah and I created a tiny human and a damn cute one. Before I can shift Abs onto my knee, her neck is craning to peek into the chest, her brown eyes wide and searching.

“What’s dat?” T with H’s were still a little tough.

“Well, let’s see.”

My hands reach back into the chest and pull out the next item.

A shoe box.

In it is old photographs, letters, lighters, cards, and other small mementos from high school and a little beyond. The span of time Hannah referred to as my idiotic years. Sifting through it, with a deep sigh, I agree with her and set the box in another pile to get rid of.

Abs’s small hands sought the next item with eagerness, her fingers grasping onto another small box, about the same size as the shoe box, only metal and with a push lock. Its face is covered in bumper stickers saying things like, Thou shall not steal. The government hates competition. And Why does freedom cost so much? Memories of my college years flooded back, and the meetings held in the small cramped room that used to serve as a dark room, discussing different actions and political views. All nine of our members had a box like the one Abs held, not all made of metal, but containing, what we considered, essential items for a revolution. I did not have to open the box to know what I would find. A copy of Howard Zinn’s, A People’s History of the United States. A copy of Let Me Speak, by Domitila Chungara. A handwritten list of ten lessons from the Great Depression and how the people can survive it. A hunting knife. A magnesium fire starter. Newspaper articles and other obscure articles, and pocket notebooks filled with scrawling from our meetings different ideas, diagrams and statistics. We were gonna change the world and we called ourselves, The Working People’s Union. We were gonna change the world.

“What’s dat?”

“Love, this is dreams in a box.” An unexpected feeling of guilt washed over me as Abs traced the letters on one of the red colored stickers with a rose on it. I wanted to change the future for children everywhere so they would not have to struggle. All that ambition was shoved into a single metal box and forgotten when the system won and had me working over forty hours a week, making just enough to be comfortable. I had been comfortable. Out of sight, out of mind. I take the box from her hands and place it with the quilt. “One day, Daddy will go through the box with you. Know how I always tell you your gonna save the world?” A nod. “Well consider this a starter kit for when you are older.”

“But I wanna save da world now!”

So do I, I thought. “I can show you where to begin for someone strong, but pint sized.”

“Okay!”

I chuckle to myself and kiss the top of her head, breathing in the smell of Dove soap, the only Hannah approved soap for Abs’s sensitive scalp. “Okay.”

My hand delved once again into the chest, this time rediscovering my old Philadelphia Eagles, DeSean Jackson jersey wrapped around my signed football. I put it to the side with the binder of cards and reach in again. Abs is squirming with impatience.

My old Walkman came next and when I pushed the eject button to find a cassette of Bob Dylan. With a smile I hand the player to my daughter. “That will be your first lesson on saving the world. All we need are batteries.”

“Bat-trees...” She repeated in a mesmerized whisper, taking the player and beginning to push buttons. I fondled around a bit until my fingers found the headphones, which I laid with the quilt.

“John!” I hear Hannah call from downstairs.

“Yes?”

“Is she up there with you?”

“I hold my finger to my lips to signal Abs to remain quiet. “Did you lose our daughter?”

“John! I am serious. She begged your mother for this piece of cake, and she only took two bites!”

“Only two bites of Mem’s chocolate cake?” I whispered with an exaggerated shock at Abs, who began giggling into her fists.

With a glance at the steps, she whispers back. “I want to help you.”

I nod and place another kiss on her head.

“She is up here with me! I found the chest! We will be down in a minute or two!”

“Abigail Maureen you are finishing this cake when you come down here!” Hannah called back with authority and I heard the door close.

“I guess we better speed this up.”

Abs nodded.

I picked her up and sat her on the floor next to me. Pushing myself unto my knees, I gripped the edge of the chest and hoisted myself into better view. There were comics, my college sweatshirt, a few year books, An Airforce for Math and science award, my diploma (opened once on the day I received it), a few surviving band shirts, and books I considered necessary in case of power failure, Lord of the Rings: Trilogy, The Dark Tower Series (all seven books, plus The Wind Through the Keyhole, and a copy of Charlie the Choo-Choo), and finally Lamb by Christopher Moore (because it makes me laugh out loud).

Nestled into the one corner is my desired object. My fingers feel a familiar fabric and I look at Abs, who senses my excitement. Her small fist smash into the sides of her cheeks, her lips pursing out like a fish. It took all my control not to laugh hysterically. I wanted to keep her teetering between suspense and excitement.

“Did you find it?” She bounced up and down with expectation.

“Maybe…” I said.

“Can I have it?”

“Depends…” I removed my hand from the chest and grasped within is my old friend.

Puddles.

Puddles was a stuffed dog. The simplest design, with floppy ears and rounded snout. I imagine at some point he had a nose, but never in any of my recollections and whatever length of fur he had was pilled tight to his worn body. His black and white eyes stared back at me through half lids looking as if I woke him from a peaceful slumber. My favorite thing had always been the beans weighted in his bottom. Given to me by my mother at birth, Puddles and I became inseparable around the age of two. I took him everywhere. The sandbox. The park. School. Sleepovers. The grocery store. My Mem’s. Everywhere. At sixteen, he watched as guardian over my room and through college he was our dorm mascot. Puddles was there the night my parents fought the big one, and when I scraped my knee something fierce trying to impress a cute girl down the street when I was eleven. Puddles watched me cry without judgement over lost friends, lovers, family. Proved a decent pillow on plane rides. A good listener for practicing speeches. He even helped me meet Hannah.

A few of my buddies and I were tossing Puddles back and forth, a studying technique we used. Catch the dog. Answer the question. Our door was open, and I went to toss it to my friend Brian who had rolled his chair in front of the door, but I overshot it. It just so happened this cute blond from down the hall was walking by and it caught her in the hip. Lucky for me, she took it with a laugh and the rest is history.

After college I retired him to the chest. I felt he needed safe keeping, while I collected my life and put in order. Years past and well, out of sight, out of mind.

A week prior Abs was asking for a puppy. Not that I am against dogs, however Hannah and I both worked full-time, and a five-year old’s promise to take care of a living animal is not something to be trusted. So, I thought of Puddles. Maybe it was me wanting to take a trip down memory lane, or maybe it was the guilt I felt when I thought of the old dog stuffed in a chest for years after being number one. I know it is a stuffed animal, but he was more than that to me. He had been my partner in crime. My confidant. My best friend.

Abs reached for Puddles, her little fingers opening and closing. I hold onto him a bit longer, but with some reservation manage to bestow the old dog into her awaiting hands.

“What happened to his nose?”

“I don’t know, love. I’ve had him for a long time.”

“I like his fur.”

“Me too. He doesn’t shed.”

“Sed?” S and H’s were also a little tough.

“No matter. You see he has beans in his butt, just like I said.”

“Yeah…dat’s funny. How did get beans in dare?”

“I don’t know. He came that way I guess.”

Turning the dog around in her hands, she inspected him, and I felt my heart stop. What if she did not like him? What if she tosses him back in the chest and cries for a real puppy? She extended both of Puddles’s ears and swung him back and forth, a small smile playing on her lips.

“Daddy?”

“Yes, Love?”

“Why is he named Puttles?”

“It’s Puddles. Pud-dulls. And from what Mem told me, it was the first thing I did with him. Jump in mud puddles.”

“Oh.” Puddles stopped swinging, and Abs head cocked sideways as she considered his dangling form. A deep breath filled her and then released with what seemed to be disappointment and my heart dropped. I never imagined she wouldn’t love him the way I did.

“What’s wrong? You don’t like him?”

“I do. He looks kind. I just…”

“What, love? Just tell me.”

“I wish it were raining. Den we could splash in mud puddles.” She then stood up and embraced Puddles as I had so many times and decided. “Come Puddles, maybe you can help me eat my cake!”