Sunday

Despondent Puppy Face across the room.  Grey, warm, humid.  The scent of banks and banks of honeysuckle outside.


***


I remember deflowering so many honeysuckle as a kid, stealing the nectar, leaving the beautiful, denuded mounds of the dark green weed without a thought.  Summer smell - like mimosa, like the chlorine at the pool.  Scent of standing poolwater inside the clubhouse.  A different smell - the water under the sun.

"Let's go take a dip" dad would say some evening, after supper.  It would be un-crowded, quiet.  Just long enough to feel cool.  Just long enough to be there together.

Walking in our neighborhood.  Scents everywhere.  Grills, food.  Voices - over the water - over the suburban asphalt streets.

Towels over our shoulders.  Hair solidifying, drying, on the tee shirt, between my shoulder blades.

I'm a kid, my dad will never die.

Neither will my mom.  My brother is just another kid.  It is summer.


***


It is Sunday.