When Was The Last Time You Dreamt You Could Fly?

When was the last time you dreamt you could fly? Or swim? This summer I held a young boy with an invisible hand and he believed he could swim. “I can swim!” No you can’t, I’m holding you. But you can fly. With my free hand I dragged a boy to the surface and propelled him spluttering forward on his command for another try. The pretty little girl whose brother’s pants I hung in the tree to dry because he’d forgotten his swimwear the week before, looked at me and laughed her adult laugh at my childish humor. Not childish actually. She just nailed it, and me, in that moment to her personality. Her brother cried, not understanding the game of splashing each other that was taking hold of the paddling pool in the park, and mistaking it for attacking. I tried to coach him to splash back, and he tried. But he did it with trepidation and fear of reprisal. His splashing turned into retribution. He splashed then turned and held a hand of fear in his attackers’ direction. “well, I don’t know what to do my boy. You don’t have goggles. You need goggles.” He turned away in failure. “I suppose you could wear my sungl..” He beamed with joy, so I had no choice but to let him look like the coolest splasher in the pool. I turned his sister’s chair to face me and told her to copy every movement I made. I lifted my hand, she lifted hers. I pretended to fall asleep, she mirrored. I winced a smile into a frown and she followed. I started to fly and she did too.

Is there a story in this? Two weeks of joy and tears and piggy backs, although I only got the joy. Sadaq hobbled up to me, beside me, and tried to slice a cucumber. His deformed hand was hidden in his sleeve so I wasn’t sure why every slice was an almighty effort. “Just hold it with your right hand like this and left hand does this”. Slice. Slip. “Like this”. Slip. “I can’t”. slip. “Oh, ok, maybe this is not for you”. His arced hand hidden in his red jumper probably had been telling him that all along and now had a reason to be smug. Later his smug leg would be telling him he should never have tried to go on that long walk in the hot sun with the others. But he did, and he didn’t leave my side. Sadaq, my faithful wounded boy with his smug limbs. But no, I was the faithful one with shameful limbs who wrapped his fajita, tied his jumper around his waist, held his biscuit; walked at his pace and sheltered in his shadow. 

The bus flew through the streets and the kids lifted their arms to the ceiling. “Drop those arms and you’re out!” “But why are we keeping them up?” “To be the best! Stop resting your arms on the headrest!” “I’m not!” “He was!” “Was he?” YEEEEEESSS!” Fwump, the bus went over a hump and the boy from Guinea landed with both feet firmly planted, rooted and growing.  They spread through the bottom of the bus and his branches bent up and crowded the inside. He pulled his collar down, and the rivulets of kindness that came out of those scars lapped at us who came close. But now it’s getting sentimental. “Hey, leave him alone!” “He was touching me!” “It doesn’t matter just let it go!” “Ishmael…” Came the call. “I’m on my way to your house now; do I have to talk to your mum about your behavior?” “No… but he was… get off meeee” The grumbles and the moans and the engine revved the bus forward. In another bus, on another day, air came in tight into sleeping mouths that couldn’t have breathed the high altitude freezing air that in another lifetime, they or their parents sailed in on. Now, the hands sailed down one by one except for the one with the quiet smile in the middle row effortlessly remaining, and I thought of Olympiads crossing the line, the white ribbon wrapping around them, “ok, you’re the best”.

-Daniel Wolfson, London, England.