Red Plastic Moving Day

by Luka Neal

 

A small, crumpled up face frowned back at me as my mother carried me to the courtyard in front of our house, the same one I live in today. My first memory of my sister, tugging at my father’s pants while glaring me down with unsure brown eyes.

I had a toy wagon, thick-wheeled plastic that would just rattle and rattle when my mother and father took turns dragging it around with me inside until inevitably one of our neighbors would come out and ask politely or not so politely that they stop. When they did, my parents would pause the dragging only until whichever neighbor it was headed back into their home, at which point they would start again. I loved that wagon.

I’ve seen pictures of me in photo albums when I was two or three, only as tall as the wagon itself. I can see myself huddled up next to it with a big, childish grin splayed across my face, but what really solidifies it into my mind is the way it reminds me of the first memory I have of my sister. She’s frowning at me, talking loudly and asking my mother and father what they were doing with me. We’re just going to help him ride in the wagon right now, that’s all, they replied patiently. That’s another thing I remember. My parents’ patience. My mother began one of the only rituals I could comprehend, wheeling out the wagon and lifting up the hollow handle before picking me up and setting me down right in the middle. I don’t think anything made me happier at the time than going in slow circles within that beautifully flimsy toy.

My sister broke her grasp on my father’s cargo shorts, standing with clenched fists before running over to my mother, out of breath from the effort it took her short legs to cover the few yards that stood between her and her destination. I can do it! Let me pull him around! she said, looking me in the eyes curiously. My parents exchanged concerned glances, but after some deliberation my mother relinquished and stepped back while my sister seized the handle. She too was only about as tall as the wagon, so she had to trudge to even cover the smallest distance. My mother felt out of reach, like she had left and wasn’t coming back, the familiarity of the ritual being broken right before my eyes. I did the only thing I knew to do when I felt that way, I cried.

I didn’t cry because it was my sister dragging me around, I cried because it was someone other than my mother, someone that surely I recognized, but not in this context. I can remember seeing the look she had displayed earlier being recreated, a look filled with disdain and disgust that struck such a fearful chord in me. My mother rushed over, my father staying in the same place within the bounds of our garage, a beer in his hand.

What happened? Is he okay?
She sounded worried, her tone coated with urgency.
He just started crying, I don’t know.

My sister sounds unsure, but quickly reconciles with herself and decides to walk back to my father while my mother picks me up and sways me back and forth. I stop crying.
—————————————————————————————————
My eyes are watering, the ceiling fan of my room staring back down at me curiously as I rise from my bed, lifting up my comforter. I have to forcefully shove my door open as I trudge through it because of the boxes huddled throughout the hallway. Each one has a scrawny label on it, each unfitting for the memories they’re trying to contain. Figures, blankets, cds, shirts, each one is written with varying levels of care, packed with varying levels of caution. The cascade of boxes tumbling over themselves and the stressed reassurances under the breath of my sister to herself that I can hear as I exit make me realize I’d better traverse the cardboard maze downstairs, where I don’t have a chance of aggravating her.

A couple moments pass as I groggily get some bread in the toaster, gazing out my kitchen window daydreaming about how long it’s been since I rode in the red wagon. I hear a sound, a loud thud emanating from the second floor. I make my way back up, seeing a few blankets splayed about the carpeted floor, my sister staring on in dismay.

You ok?
Fine, thanks.

I help her stuff them back into the box labeled bed stuff. I take it and stack it amongst its brethren in the hallway, each pile a looming figure cloaking the ground in shadow. I head back downstairs, leaving my sister as she double-triple-quadruple checks that all her sheets are in order and all the pots and kitchenware she was gifted for graduation are compressed into their new temporary homes. This has been the routine for the last two days, and occasionally I slither through the mess to ask if she needs any help, to which she usually replies with an unsure No.

BBBBBBBBBBVVVVVVVVVVVVVV: the sound of my rickety garage opening as it swallows up the moving van my father just rented. It feels like it’s entrenching the whole house in an earthquake, louder today than most days. My mother comes up the staircase, clenching the railing.

You ready?
I guess.
Okay, then let’s get moving, your dad’s gonna be up in a second but let’s get a head start.

My sister, mother and I begin to grab any of the boxes we can carry, cradling towering stacks in our arms until we have to peer around the side just to see where we’re walking. We each jumble down the stairs like marbles laid as a booby trap, and eventually we find ourselves in front of the entrance, the door to the courtyard where the rear of the moving van resides. We set down our respective boxes, rivulets of sweat eroding our foreheads. I open the door, setting down one of the heftier boxes to lodge it open and for a split moment something changes. I can see myself and the red wagon in the courtyard. I’m not crying, I’m just standing there with the handle in my hand, staring at myself with no expression. I observe my young, shifty blonde hair and white collared shirt. I can see the shoes I’m wearing: turquoise crocs. I loved the word turquoise, it was one of those words you learn as a kid and just can’t stop repeating until it loses all meaning. And within that split moment I can see my sister too, but she disappears before I can observe anything else about her.
—————————————————————————————————-
The road rumbles underneath the frame of the blue Mazda SUV I’m sitting in with my mother, leftover boxes snoring in the trunk. My sister opted to ride in the moving van with my father, where the bulk of her things were stored. I would be lying if I said it was only me and my mother in the car, however. I have something to admit. After seeing myself in the courtyard I couldn’t help but ask him why he was all alone. He didn’t know how to respond, simply raising his eyebrows and providing me with a shrug. I took his hand and led him to the car where my mother and I would be spending the next few hours on the way to San Antonio. He’s in the back seat now, and I can hear his mousy voice ask Are we there yet? I remember learning that phrase and the tone of how it should be recited from an infomercial about little plush animals you could wrap around a seatbelt and rest your head on, marketed to parents who took their kids with them on long drives. The commercial featured two kids, brother and sister, in the back seat of a sedan as their parents annoyedly tell them that they haven’t arrived at their destination yet. With the addition of the product, the pair just rest their heads on the cushion and fall asleep instantly. No, not quite, almost though. Just about half an hour left.

How long is half an hour?
Thirty minutes.
That sounds long.
Don’t worry, it’ll go by fast.
Okay.

We arrive at the dorms, my father and sister already unpacking the big items like chairs and shelves while my mother and I haul the less important things: my sister’s playstation and monitor, her figures and posters, her bags of snacks that she prepped for the first week. Once we’re done unloading the car I pop over to the backseat, undoing the seat belt that my young counterpart has on and picking him up by the sides before setting him down on the gravel beneath us. He looks lost.

Hey, you ok?
Where are we?
This is your sister’s college.
College is for grown-ups, my sisters not a grown-up! She’s…

My younger self takes a moment to count on his hands. I know he doesn’t really have the hang of it yet but to see him try makes me smile a little.

I actually don’t know how old she is…but she’s not a grown-up.
Well, yeah I know it feels like that but you gotta realize some time has passed. But you don’t really look all that different. You’re like me but taller.
Yeah. I guess so.

I take him by the hand and lead him to follow my mother, boxes balancing in my other hand. We enter the sleek glass building and find ourselves surrounded by eager new residents. My younger self yanks his hand away from mine to cover his ears.

It’s loud.
It is.

We follow our mother up a stairwell occupied by many movers. Stressed mothers reassure their children as they reassure themselves, fathers struggle to muscle chairs and mini-fridges up the stairs while sweating through their shirts. The day sweeps through itself and before I realize it, I’m standing in the middle of my sisters’ dorm, everything moved in and set up. The space is small-ish, with only enough room for a bed and a small desk, on which rests figurines and a small, shitty monitor who’s resolution makes you think you have bad eyesight.

Yeah, but she must like it because it’s all hers. You like having things to yourself, right? I do.

The kid makes a good point. The monitor may be shitty but it is all hers. I think about how we used to fight over things like who used to get to play on the family computer, or who got to watch their show before bed. Why did we waste time on those things?

It wasn’t wasteful. It was important.
Was it? Was it really, truly important?
Yes.

He sounds so sure of himself, so confident in the way he carries himself. Maybe he knows a little more than I give him credit for. I’m still standing awkwardly in the room, my sister unrolling and pinning up Cyberpunk 2077 and Cowboy Bebop posters along the bumpy drywall. It feels like I’ve missed a chance, wasted all the years. We were friends, but could I have done more? Could I have asked those extra questions, or held that conversation a little longer, or… I feel a stubby hand grab mine.

Can we go home now?
Hold on.
I’m tired.
He’s right. I’m tired. In the end, there’s nothing I can change.
Are you going to say goodbye?
I think about it. I miss being him.
No.
Why not?
I know I’ll see her again, or maybe I won’t.
The definitive nature of a goodbye doesn’t sit right with me.
What does definitive mean?
I wave goodbye to my sister, weakly mustering up a “see you later.”

The drive home was quiet and stiff. The car felt like it was full of crumpled up tissue paper, the pressure pulverizing and dry. It was night by the time I was walking up the stairs to the kitchen. I looked out the window at the streetlights coating the roads, and in the middle of the traffic-abandoned street lies a small, dented, red plastic wagon.

 

Luka Neal is a sixteen-year-old creative writing student at Kinder HSPVA. He loves his friends, his computer, and his piano. His favorite forms of literature are short-form fiction and poetry, and he loves surreal art, movies, and music.