Tea, Party of One

How am I just realizing how annoying my alarm clock is? Did my mom turn the sound up? I reach over to snooze it but it had already stopped. It takes me moment but it makes me realize today is the day! I have a secret that I have yet to reveal to anyone apart from my pet Raven who I call my pet on account of her recent frequent visits to my window at my parents’ house in the mornings. But I don’t think she believes me. I used to get frequent visits from my best friend and we would go on all sorts of adventures. You know the kind that 16 year olds are expected to get into. But after a while, the visits stopped. I wondered had I done something wrong, said something I should not have? No answers came until one day, I opened my bedroom door and there they were! My friend was back and I could not be more elated. I had just gotten over a little cold so my mom had loads of tea in the house. My friend had made some for us. When they asked me how I was feeling, I was confused. I was more worried about them and why they had disappeared so suddenly. I’m feeling much better can’t you tell? My friend looked really nervous so I reassured them that I was ok. No more coughing or sneezing for me and I didn’t feel weak any longer! They apologized for not being there and I said, "Don’t be because you would have gotten sick too!" He smiled a strange smile. We drank our tea and played video games like we always do. When it was time to trade comic books, mine was placed on the nightstand by my bed instead of reading them on the floor immediately like always. When I asked him why he changed the routine, he said, “Its better this way. We set up a certain time, then read them all at once right before we have to grow up." We'd continue to do this and everything was back to normal. Each time though, something was different. I could see the changes happening and I knew soon, it’d be time to grow up. To face the world, good or bad. For worse times, hard times, beautiful moments, crushing blows, pleasant surprises or shock and horror. Healing times and revealing times through ugly cries and snotty whispers with hoarse voices. To the growth in growing up and those moments all making this moment. We can understand now, this moment and how it always will come. My stack was pretty high now after 6 years, I mean you'd expect it to be right?  

Today was the day. Like it always was for a while now. But today was THE day. We had all agree it was for the best. Three tea bags left. We were all getting better. From the kitchen, I watched the raven flutter float from the tree it's always perched on at this time, to the window above. We would help him today, together. I walk to the living room to peer out the window. Once his friend came back around, things got better. We would all get back to how it always was eventually. Before I walked up the stairs to turn off is alarm, thinking he was sleeping through it… His friend always wanted to pour the tea. It will help him get better faster watch! His best friend said. It'll be over soon enough! Best balance I had ever seen a 16 year old muster upstairs but I never once had to clean up broken pieces. Once they started the video games, I knew it was time to start lunch. Tuna on wheat is my son's favorite but his best friend liked turkey on rye. Both preferred their chips with dip, "Room temperature please mom! Thanks, love you." Always shouted from upstairs. I'd deliver the lunches in additional to my "No Mess No Stress" rule. Only upon their acceptance of the proposal do I exit the room. Comic books are next. I remember the first time I heard no shouting after the game was turned off. "This superhero is way better than that one." "Are you crazy?" "Well the premise of such and forth could never even happen even in fantasy!" They'd go on and on and after I started to learn character names and things-- I could actually hold brief conversations with teenagers’ about something they were actually interested in. Imagine that! Today, his friend walks in. Carrying a crate of comic books because, today really is the day. And everyone knows it. We would all grow up today. We will face the world and beyond it at the same time. Today we would all accept the growth in growing up no matter what age stage you are. Sometimes you will grow and then bloom. Grow and then thin at your stem. Grow and then break out and fly. Sometimes you will experience the world from high up and away. The world will inevitably grow up and around you until you say, “Hey! Take me with you, I want to evolve too. I want to revolve too and I want to move any way but still." After 6 years, today is the day we revolve around growth.

I pull my car to the curb. To a house around the corner from mine that I've been to a million times it seems. I stare at the house for a second. My friend's mom peeks out the same window like always to see who has come though she know it's me. She knows it’s me because it's the same time as always. My friend didn’t feel well and had been out of school for a week. She bought my friend home from the hospital and I heard her tell my mom there was nothing that could be done. I didn’t know what that meant until my mother spoke with me that night and even then I wasn’t clear or ready to give up. I didn’t feel well either now, my stomach hurt. She said she knew and fixed me some tea. She said I would feel better in the morning when I woke up. I did feel better. My mom said that my not feeling well was different than my friends. But I went to my friend's house determined for things to be back to normal. I was ready to walk to my friend's room door until he opened it first, excited to see me. I sat our tea down and we talked about going outside once he got better and that the tea will help. I always liked to fix it. He said, “Don’t tell my mom, but I kind of like this stuff." referring to the tea. I said to him, "I told your mom I drink it so you won’t have to drink it alone but I like it too! Our secret!" We clinked mugs and fired up the game. Comic books were next but I had an idea that day. We would wait until we grew up so he had no choice but to get better. I took the crate out of the trunk and place them by the stairs. I greeted my friend's mom on the day with a heavy sigh and knowing look complete with a hug of desperation. Other than myself only she knew about it. Today. The tea was made, she took hers to the dining room sitting down in the chair across from the window, waiting for the raven to fly away. I took ours upstairs to my friend, who had not been there to greet me at the door the last 6 years. I drank my tea whilst his got room temperature, just the way we liked our dip as all cool kids should. The video game took forever to load today but once it does, I'm still the reigning champ for the last... 6 years. Hyper from the video game nostalgia still, I run down the stairs to grab the crate because the comic books are next. I get a menacing glace as I hit the bottom stair. I know better now than to run indoors but especially on stairs. Back in the room I sit uncomfortably on the floor in my same spot as always though my legs are cramped now and I had to slide the desk just a bit. He laughs at me which makes him cough a bit. "Take it easy" I tell him. We got a long ways to go and you're going to want to read your stack for quality content! "It must be opposite day today too!" he retorted. "For the last time, settle down boys!" his mom called up to me with only a chuckle sob to follow. I hadn’t heard her yell that way for a long time but my turkey on rye earlier was delicious like always. We finished our last pages. I told him that I had to disappear again but this time I couldn’t come back. I had to make him understand it was never anything he did. But I told him that another future awaits him. That I couldn’t hold him here drinking tea forever because it takes more than that to get better sometimes. My friend knew I was right. Watching the stillness of the tea mug, I slowly shut the door to his room. His room that the movers would pack up shortly after I had left. The room his mom couldn't visit after that day. The room his mom agreed to let be my friend until we could both accept it. Accept that it would never be like always. 

-Melcina S. Martin