i was digging around in my computer files and i found this essay which i wrote almost a year ago. fast eh? how time flies? scary, i say. anyway, read it if you want to. i was amused. haha goodnight :) today was a happy happy day :D

"Look mummy! Watch me! Watch me as I fly!" The chirrupy voice of her three year old son yanked her back into reality. Shelly smiled as she faded out of her daydream, and she waved as he ran around. That day, Shelly’s son, was a bright red pterodactyl made of cheap muslin cloth dyed to perfection, held to his arms with silver duct tape. Michael has always been attracted to things of the air. Birds, planes, helicopters, you name it, and he loved it.

Michael’s first words were “mama, plane”. These precious words were murmured from his mouth when he was almost two years and four months old. As late a bloomer as he was, Michael turned out to be a brilliant child.

Hardly ever was Michael seen not running around, buzzing like an airplane or a busy bumble bee. Shelly often wondered where his fascination with the air came from. Could it be human’s natural desire to break free and fly? Since the start of time, liberation has been associated with flying, flight, leaving the nest. This thought often left Shelly fearful. She could not imagine life without Michael; she could not imagine an empty nest, especially an empty nest which she would have to sit in alone. Knowing full well that someday Michael would grow up and get hitched and move out, she treasured every moment with her son. Her fiancé upped and left her, right after her pregnancy was announced, so Michael was all she had now. Yet, Michael loved to fly, and she loved him too much to clip his wings to keep him home.

Shelly sat on the porch and watched her beloved son knock over the potted peonies and trample on the green lawn of carpet grass, shaded with a lush canopy of rain trees. Watching him enjoy his youth this way, it didn’t even occur to her how tiring it would be to re-pot the peonies. She would do anything for Michael, absolutely anything. Her flesh and blood hurtled his little body against the ground and he picked himself up, flashed his silly grin, and then carried on in his little fantasy of the Jurassic Park. The phone rang from inside the house and reluctantly, Shelly heaved herself off the steps and marched indoors to answer the phone.

As she lifted the phone off its cradle, Shelly could not help but wonder if Michael would be alright alone. He had always been an independent child, however…“BOOM!” Just then, a loud sound compelled Shelly to drop the phone back to its cradle and dash out the door. All she saw was red, red and even more red. Red muslin cloth, red blood, the red insides of Michael’s mouth as it opened wide with loud scream splashed with agony.

“Michael! Baby, are you alright? Oh goodness, what was I thinking?” Shelly blabbered, unsure of what to do. Her eyes ran to and fro the garden, searching for the cause of his injury. That was when she noticed the wooden ladder perched against the shed behind her, placed the for the sole reason of allowing ivy to grow.

“Oh no. Heavens, no.” Thoughts ran through her mind at the speed of a bullet train. “Did he break a bone? Can he walk again? What was I thinking? How could I have been that stupid? What kind of a mother am I? Where’s the phone when I need it?” She was in a dilemma of having to leave Michael on his own again or calling for the ambulance. Practicality forced her to tear herself away from her injured pterodactyl and to make a mad dash inside the house to dial 995. Miraculously, she managed to give clear and precise instructions to the operator on the other line.

Returning to her son’s side, Shelly could not shake off the feeling of immense guilt and self-reprimand. Michael’s screams had, by now, been reduced to occasional sobs and sniffles, the pain’s intensity causing him to drift in and out of consciousness. His leg was twisted at and awkward angle and Shelly’s heart broke along with it. “My poor, poor baby...” she crooned as she held his head to her bosom, slowly rocking him, perpetually aware of the pain she might cause if she even so much as moved his leg.

The ambulance came by, its arrival announced by the heralding of its sirens and flashing red lights. Shelly felt useless as she watched the paramedics lift her son onto a stretcher and she felt stupid as they carried him off in the ambulance. Sitting in the backseat of the ambulance, Shelly clasped the tiny three year old hand as she looked out the window. A commercialized blimp promoting Macdonald’s flew by and Shelly could not stop herself from thinking, “boy, would Michael have loved to see that.”

Before she knew what was happening, Shelly found herself sitting on the plastic green chairs in the corridors of a pristine white hospital which smelled of disinfectant. Staring into space, Shelly felt as helpless as a mother hen was when her young is attacked by a weasel. The images of empty nests seemed to be ubiquitous in her mind, and passer bys could only see her insipid eyes. “Michelle Turnstone” her head whipped at the sound of her name, and hope swelled in her heart.

“Doctor? How’s my son?”

“I’m afraid, Ms. Turnstone, that Michael will not be able to walk for a few months. His fall, although not great, has broken his left leg and would require four to five months of complete rest.” He doctor blabbered on about Michael’s medication and medical fees but all that was peripheral in comparison to the great news that her son was alright. She bounced with ebullience into Michael’s ward and held her son in tight embrace.

“I flew, mummy! I flew! I really did. Did you see me?”

“Well, no dear. I’m sorry. Mummy was on the phone. Are you feeling better now?”

“Yes, mummy. You didn’t see me? But mummy, I told you to watch me. I told you to watch me fly! I flew, mummy, I flew.”

Michael faded off into feverish slumber, and Shelly felt almost somnolent herself. Now that her worries had faded, she too fell off the brink of consciousness and into the realm of the surreal. In her dreams, Shelly saw her Michael flying away, further and further with paper thin wings painted a horrific shade of red. Michael’s laughter penetrated the air and left a resounding tingle in her ears. A sharp rip left her jaw hanging as she saw her son’s left wing being snagged by a broken branch which hung in midair and she heard her own voice hurling invectives at no one as she rushed to catch her falling son. Her arms became twigs and the twigs became a nest as Michael plopped to safety. Her nest was empty, no more. Michael flew no more.

Michael loved to fly, and she loved Michael too much to clip his wings and keep him home. Or did she?