We came home to a muggy evening and a dying hydrangea, and walked to Toby's for pizza. You rode your bike and while we waited for the food you raced back and forth on 6th Avenue, stopping for dogs and planters and the old man on his folding chair who looks like he's 90 but is only 65 and talks to you in a Donald Duck voice, in Spanish. Jay and I took turns chasing you down the block and gulping beer. Every once in a while you rode inside the corner deli only to carefully back out, your hand clenched around some gum or candy pressed flat against the handlebar. The deli man just smiled at us. Everyone smiled at us. The people at Toby's all wanted high fives, the Puerto Ricans up the block all wanted to know where we'd been. "We missed you so much," they said, looking at you. "You look so tired," they said, looking at me. You just smiled and sped up the hill.
Tuesday at 9AM it was already melt your flip flops hot, but we wanted to ride. We took Frankenbike and went to the water park on Atlantic. We passed buses and all kinds of trucks, delivery trucks, garbage trucks, a tow truck, even a big semi. And some of those Access-A-Ride vehicles that you don't really know how to respond to. We even had to pull over for a fire truck that went whipping by, sirens blaring. Pedestrians waved. Other bikers waved. Even the cars seemed less threatening, almost polite. You shook your arm to the beat of the music that slipped out their windows.
It was so hot that after an hour locked up in the sun, Frankenbike was too hot to ride home. I had to take it through the water park before putting you in the seat, and even then I could hardly pump the brakes without scalding my fingers. At home we drank ice water out of bowls and almost fell asleep under the fan.
In the afternoon we took Frankenbike out again. I didn't want to but you had a doctor's appointment and the car is such a pain in the ass to park. On the way home we raced the B63 all the way down 5th Avenue (and won!). We stopped at Black Horse to talk to Phil and Kenny, local bikers who thought it was too hot to ride. They told us it was 102 degrees. 102! You peeled the stickers off your arms and put them on mine. On 6th Avenue we stopped to walk with Gary, coming home from work. On 22nd Street two fire hydrants were part open, spraying water all the way across the street. A man washed his upholstry in one. We rode Frankenbike in big lazy circles through the water, stopping for the occasional car, and you laughed like a maniac. The very first time through we were soaked to the bone. At the top of the hill kids played in yet another hydrant, open all the way, water sloshing out in a lazy burst as thick as my thigh. The Puerto Ricans were just getting started with their grilling and they said, "we have a pool in back. Come swimming." So we went. It was one of those big doughboys with a tall wobbly ladder you had to climb and we went swimming in our clothes. Do you remember, Roan? You cried and cried when we had to go.
Roan, before you, none of my neighbors invited me to go swimming in their pools. I never knew how utterly drenched you could get from running through a fire hydrant, just once. Garbage men didn't wave at me and truckers didn't honk. Deli men didn't offer me free candy and firemen didn't give me tours of their trucks. I never knew the world could be so friendly. Maybe the difference is our neighborhood, which feels downright magical sometimes. Or maybe the difference is you.
I love this. Beautifully told!
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