One Good Day

There was a time. Somewhere between pigtails and training bras, where I remember kindness. A softness that is only offered to a child, or at least a texture I haven't experienced since. A time when skinned knees and palms were marks of joyful afternoons in the sun and not evidence from nights where dishes were broken, and the driveway was the only escape.

I remember that day so clearly, it feels preserved. My memory somehow sealed it off from everything that came after. The smell of sun-warmed black plastic. The way it radiated heat was like it was alive. The rusty pipes coughing water into the mouth of the slide, spraying unpredictably, splashing legs of the children waiting in line.

I remember the lifeguard was Bobby Kerwin. Megan’s nerdy older brother. Wearing a long-sleeved white shirt with LIFEGUARD stamped across the chest in red block letters, matching red shorts clinging damply to his thighs. A silver whistle rested against his freckled neck, bumping softly against his narrow chest when he moved. A red bucket hat shaded his pale skin. He looked impossibly old to me then. Even though he was maybe 15.

My toes felt squishy beneath my body as I sat on the softened wooden platform. The boards were slick with a mixture of lake water, algae, and layers of sunscreen left behind by a hundred kids before me. Each step in line meant another drip of cold water sliding down my back, another inch closer to the mouth of the slide.

The girls from my soccer team stood in front of me, giggling. Maybe at Bobby. Maybe at something else. I couldn’t tell. The pounding in my ears was too loud, the pressure in my face too intense, like my body was trying to warn me that I was in danger.

I prayed for intervention. That Bobby would glance down and decide maybe that I was too small. Or that the lifeguard at the bottom would blow a whistle... because they spotted lightning, thunder...anything. But the sky was impossibly blue. Too blue. As if the clouds had been tucked away somewhere, sleeping in, unconcerned with my fate.

I had been on water slides before. Living so close to Tomahawk Lake, they were a regular part of summer, birthday parties, camp days, after-game celebrations like this one. But this slide was different. The biggest one in the park, and it was completely pitch black. Notoriously fast. Something older kids bragged about surviving.

It’s hard to explain what took hold of me then. Not fear exactly...something deeper. Something that lived low in my body, pulsing, spreading outward until my fingers trembled and my knees softened. With only a few kids left ahead of me, the feeling overwhelmed everything else, and I started to cry.

I didn’t want anyone to see. But standing there in a Strawberry Shortcake one-piece, exposed and shaking, there was nowhere to hide. I pushed past the kids behind me, mumbling apologies, and bolted down the wooden stairs, my feet slapping hard, tears spilling freely now.

At the bottom, my mother waited. Dark sunglasses hid her eyes completely.

“Molly,” she said. Her voice was sharper. “We've talked about this. You’re too big to be crying over a slide.”

I looked at her, hoping for something...anything. A hug, a towel, a hand on my shoulder. My mother was never one for softness.

“If you’re going to be afraid of everything,” she continued, “we’re going to leave.”

That sentence landed hard. I broke then. Really broke. I was handed my flip-flops and towel, grabbed by the arm, and pulled toward the exit. My mother believed in the follow-through. If I wasn’t going to be brave, we were going home. And home we went.

We drove in silence. My towel soaked through the Nissan’s cushioned seat, leaving a dark and quickly spreading stain. I stared out the window, my chest still tight and my throat sore, burning, from holding everything in.

When we got home, you were there.

I expected my mom to tell you right away. To explain how I hadn’t been brave. But she said nothing. I went upstairs, water droplets trailing behind, and collapsed onto my bed. Still in my suit and still shaking. The tears came warm and steady, and the warmth of them provided some comfort, and that felt good.

I must have fallen asleep like that, because I remember waking to the soft creak of my door opening. Yellow hallway light spilled across the walls.

“You doing okay?” you asked.

Your voice stopped me. There was something in it I would only hear that one time.

“Mom’s mad at me because I wouldn’t go down the slide like the other girls,” I said, sitting up, tears threatening again.

You came in and sat on the edge of my bed.

“Yeah, she told me,” you said gently. “What happened?”

I tried to explain through sobs. How I wanted to be brave. How I tried. How the lake felt too dark, the slide too fast, my body too small.

“But you’re a good swimmer, Molly,” you said.

“I know,” I whispered. “I just… can’t.” I buried my face in my pillow and felt defeated.

“Hey,” you said quietly. “What if we went back tomorrow? And we went down together?”

I lifted my head. Hope rushed in so quickly it startled me. I wanted so badly to be brave. But more than that, I wanted to hear this. Time alone with you, something I'd never had before.

“You’d do that?” I asked, unsure if I was allowed to believe it.

“Yes,” you said. “Tomorrow.”

And tomorrow came. We went back. We climbed the stairs together. You went first. Then again, with me. Then I went alone. I felt brave. You bought me ice cream. Forgot my towel. I sat in the front seat on the way home, sun-dried and smiling, because I had a good day with my dad.

I remember a time when I had one good day with my dad.

One good day.