Summer Night Stories

Today my thoughts are turning back to you. Back into those ethereal summer nights when we would lounge back in comfort, separated by the length of a room and yet never were we closer then in that twilight. You were to me both mentor and muse, friend and guide. my parents paid you to keep watch over our youthful arrogance but it was the clock hummed goodnight to the children that you came awake. I remember standing at the bottom of the stairs, watching cheerfully the receding backs of my playfellows. I would turn and smile to you, then the fun would begin. With hot chocolate and cookies resting neatly on the table between us we would grin.

 

I remember how i begged you for you story, begged to see again the faces of your friends. laughingly you would concede, "only for a little" you'd say "then its off to bed" we knew it was a lie, but so comfortable a one we could not help but repeat it.

 

Your voice captured the night, even the bird in his cage would cease to flutter at your sound. movies rolled in my head; songs drifted through the room as stormy breezes and all was quietness. You taught my heart to wonder, my mind to wander, off and away in the fantastical landscape of your dreams. It was you who led a bitter child to the dawn, and you whose softness taught gentleness to a savage, angry creature, all innocence.

 

Still i hold the day to heart, when I first brought you my tamperings in your art. You did not shun like the children, or tear down like the teachers. You saw it for what it was, a tribute to your kindness, a unfinished thought, a growing tale. You let me speak and listen as no one had before. Those sad characters you gave me, how i wish to show them to you. You would barely recognize them now. they have grown so much, and seen so many things. If their lives have grown more tragic or their personalities darker i suppose it was because i was growing up too. the world is not so colorful as it was then.

 

I miss you. of late there have been many times when i wished you were sitting across from me so i could share a little of my burden and gather your advice. I haven't seen you in so long it seems a lifetime, it almost is. I never even told you how much your life touched mine, how i never would have tried to write or draw without you. I hope i didn't miss my chance.

Author's Note

To my old babysitter, best friend and older sister.