Blue's Park

It had been fifteen years since Blue had been in Sander’s Park. Back then she thought it was just a playground and a parking lot, but she now knew the trees surrounding the playground, the hills on the other side of the parking lot, and the creek at the bottom of the hills were a part of it too. As a child she thought the trees were a thick forest where children would get lost and wolves would prowl at night. But now she realized she could see through them, and on the other side, barely thirty yards from the edge, was the back of a Walmart. She had plenty of memories from the superstore as well, but when she was young, the town felt big enough that each place was its own little world. Those worlds were clearly much closer than she realized.

Fifteen years ago, Blue moved with her mother and brother, who was a year younger than her, to Chicago, making the town of Mount Gracious, Iowa forever smaller to her. She would often cringe at the thoughts she used to have while living there. The ignorance of her childhood was not cute and that contributed to her lack of nostalgia whenever she had to visit the town of eight thousand. Going there now was like walking around in a dream. The memories were distant or repressed and she felt disassociated from the things that would happen around her in the present because of them. But they were true memories. She had spent the last day in Sander’s Park while her mom was packing up the moving truck. Fifteen years was a long time, but the memories of that day had stayed vivid. Most likely it was because it marked the beginning of a  new, very different chapter in Blue’s life, but she also believed it was because it was the first time she noticed the ugliness that lay beneath the surface of the “Midwest nice” facade of Mount Gracious.

She was old enough to help pack the truck, but Blue’s mother seemed to be obsessed with the concept of preserving childhood. She told her to take her brother, Riley, to Sander’s Park for a few hours and make as many last-minute memories as she could. As an eleven year old she didn’t really understand or empathize with the grownups perception of nostalgia, but if it meant avoiding manual labor, she would go make as memories as time would allow. The walk to Sander’s park from her house was four blocks, with a steep hill on the final block. At the time, it felt like a trek. Until a trip to Pennsylvania a few years later, the hill was the steepest Blue had ever seen or had to walk up. There were houses all along the hill, several with families that had kids that went to Blue’s school. The second to last house, before the road turned into the parks parking lot, was where Riley’s best friend, Brady, lived. Brady’s mother worked with Blue’s, and they had been setting up playdates for their sons’ whole lives. Every time Blue took Riley to the park, they would stop to see if Brady could come play too.

On their last day in Mount Gracious they knocked on Brady’s door to see if he could come to the park one last time. Brady came to the door with a big, and Blue thought, dumb grin on his face. If he knew it was the last day he’d have with these friends, it didn’t show on his face. Blue asked if his mom was home and he nodded without looking at her; he was already putting his shoes on and chatting with Riley about a new video game he had gotten over the weekend. Blue stepped into the house and called hello into the empty hallway entrance. At the end of the hall was the open doorway into the kitchen and, from around that corner, Brady’s mom came with a strange look on her face. Blue thought it was strange because this woman had never directed any emotion other than warmth and welcome toward her for as long as she could remember. The foreign expression was cold, maybe angry or a little condescending. She said that Brady couldn’t go to the park today and that it was rude for her to walk into the house without being invited. Blue said sorry and took a step back out of the door. She started to explain that it was their last day and that they were going to the park one more time, but Brady’s mom interrupted with a stern “I know.” and then told Brady to take his shoes off and go to his room. When Brady started to protest she grabbed his arm and walked him to the end of the hall. She came to close the door in Blue and Riley’s faces and said that their mother was inconsiderate for allowing them to come there.

Blue and Riley stood in shocked silence on the doorstep for a minute. They had not experienced pure nastiness in real life. As they walked away, toward the park, Riley began to cry silent tears. Blue would always feel awful that that was his last interaction with his childhood best friend. When they got to the park, it was empty. They went to the top of the tall tube slide and sat there together. Riley asked why Brady’s mom was so angry. Blue didn’t know for sure but told him it was probably because she didn’t want them to leave. Riley quietly said he didn’t want to leave either. They stayed at the park for another ten minutes and started the walk home. Neither felt like making any more new memories.

Now Blue stood at the top of that same slide, looking down at the empty park. She now knew Brady’s mom wasn’t the only person in Mount Gracious that looked down on them leaving. According to her mother, her own grandparents had said terrible things to them before they left. Their friends had felt betrayed by their move and they only way they knew how to express that was through passive aggression. Knowing what she knew now, Blue hoped she wouldn’t treat anyone the way they had been treated. Family members had died and they hadn’t been told, friends had children they never saw pictures of. The isolation they felt forced them to start a new life. And though Blue thought their new lives were better, she still felt the sadness of leaving a life behind.