Tangy Tomato #6

I hate birthdays. Not really birthdays themselves, but the consequences.

It had happened again.

I dreaded being invited to birthday parties because I always knew what was to come at the end.

I told them, “no, no, it’s fine. She’ll be here any minute. Please go. It’s just how my mom is.” Her perpetual lateness hurt and embarrassed me time after time. I frequently sat with the birthday girl and her parents while she opened her gifts, packed up leftover cake and while they waited for me to be picked up. But this time it was different. It was not a close friend and our supervisor was not her parents, but instead her nanny and so, though I was only in third grade, my constant insistence that they leave finally convinced them. So now, I was alone. Who leaves a 9-year-old alone in Central Park? In the snow?

I sat down on a bench and my tears froze on my eyelashes as I wondered if my mom was just late again, as she always was, or if this time something had happened to her. I heard sirens. My mom had been hit by a car. I was sure of it. The ambulance was going to pick her up right now. How would I find her? How would anyone know where to find me? I cried harder.

I tried to calm myself down. I pulled out my party favor. It was a yellow disposable camera with my name written in black sharpie on top. My freezing, tiny fingers could barely press the camera’s little grey button, but I snapped a picture of the beautiful, fresh snowfall and tried to enjoy the scene. Unfortunately, I would never look back on that picture or the beauty within it with anything but bitterness and hatred, remembering how cold and alone I was in that moment.

It had been almost a half hour since the birthday girl with her heaping pile of presents and her nanny had left me, alone. I knew it had been a half an hour because I had watched almost every second tick by on my hot pink Swatch watch. Where was my mom? How could she do this to me? She must be dead. No, she better be dead. Or have a very good reason to be so late! I began to sob out loud. I was so alone and the sky was already darker than usual at this time because of all the snow. It was getting colder and my nose and cheeks were stinging. I had my arms pulled into the body of my coat and in between sobs I would huff warm air into my coat to warm up my body and arms. The ambulance was probably scraping up my bleeding mother from the pavement at this very moment. I was completely hysterical.

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I see a familiar face flying around the corner, Zabar’s bags in hand. “Oh, sweetie!” She reached out to hug me. I pushed her away. I had been so scared that something terrible had happened, yet somehow I hated her for being fine. “There was such a long line, and I was already there with my cart full of food. I’m so sorry.” Her apologies were never good enough; her lateness never acceptable. I hated her so much but I still loved her.

I hate birthday parties.