Little Girl Blue

((1973, St. Paul, Minnesota) (Sharla and Sheryl))


Let me call this for the present, two lost little kittens although lost might not be the correct word. The two little girls involved, one eight (Sharla) the other five (Sheryl), looked about for the house, my house, not knowing for sure what the correct number was, not even knowing if I was at home—they were taking a chance, but by familiarity they looked for my apartment house, and then stopped in front of it (it was a duplex, I lived upstairs). There was white snow drifting lightly across the road I remember as I had looked out the window prior, slouch on the sidewalks, and alongside of the road, it was a chilled late afternoon. The gale rubbing against their faces, the exposed surface of their flesh was red, near a crush like look.
I jumped from my chair, the hallway door was locked, and no one was downstairs, and I rushed to look out the window to see who was doing the knocking, making the noise. On the white below Sharla and Sheryl stood there like two wooden soldiers. Dropping an awareness in my body, I stared hard—snow seemed to drop off from all over her, she must had been in the cold winter elements for a long spell—so I thought, told myself—curiously looking. Sharla looked like a shot rabbit, and Sheryl, simply cold and confused, she stood a little further back, as Sharla continued knocking at the door, and I rushed down the stairs to greet them.

“What is it,” I said, when I opened the door, knowing her mother Carol lived near a mile up the road. Sharla knocked the snow off her some—went to say something, but couldn’t for the moment, she was if anything—tongue-tied, allowing her body to plunge down to normality.
Shivering as she came in from the outdoors of the crystalline motorized snow, she seemingly floated up the stairs whispering something dramatic, she held to her left and sat down in the apartment on a couch, her little sister to her side.
I looked down at her, knowing now it wasn’t a friendly visit, it was more than that. She held tight in her sitting position, her knees shaking.
“I was afraid I’d never find your house,” she said, and then she started crying, and I hugged her and told her “you’re safe now.” (Not really knowing why I said what I said, just sensing she needed to hear that for some reason…)
“Is it all right we stay here a while until my mother comes home, she’s late, she’s never been so late, and I can’t fine my keys to the house, and she didn’t call us, and it’s been two hours that we waited for her.”
“Sure,” I said, “you can stay here as long as you need to!” She smiled. Little Sheryl, sat knowing very little of the situation except for what her big sister told her, and it seemed she did not tell her the full impact she had been feeling, perhaps a little abandonment, that is to say, knowing you are not really abandoned, yet feeling you have been dropped into empty space—without a clue of what happens next, you’re on your own, it is a complex emotion, she was unsure if her mother was okay, perhaps for those hours she wasn’t sure of anything anymore, although on the other hand, she was sure of one thing, that her uncle lived somewhere down the road, in a big house, on the second floor, and it was a chance, a big chance, she might find it—if indeed she’d decided to go look for it—and he could help. She followed her gut feeling, she was courageous, and she was correct ((if not lucky) (and perhaps it wasn’t luck, perchance it was God sent)).

I stood silent for a minute. Looked at the empty look in Sheryl’s face; it is hell isn’t it, I wanted to say, but I didn’t say that. It reminded me of the time my brother and I were lost in North St. Paul, I was likened to Sheryl then—perhaps a few years older, and Mike my brother my big brother, about eleven at the time, he was similar to Sharla, had to find a way home for us—do something, because I didn’t know what I would have done, I was empty and blank, I wasn’t sure what was going on completely, although my brother’s mind knew, but I had a good idea now what he might have been thinking. In any case, Sharla’s instincts were correct, as my brother’s were, in Mike’s case he begged to get a dime to use for the phone and made a phone call that would end our dilemma; for Sharla and Sheryl, I was home, thank God.
About an hour and a half later, I got hold of Carol, to let her know where her two girls were. I never asked what her situation was, I felt it was none of my business, she was a good mother, that is all I knew, and whatever her reasons were, I’m sure they were more than substantial.


No: 505 (10-28-2009) EAP (Inspired by a real happening in 1973, dedicated to the two sisters Sharla and Sheryl)