Day 1: Clouds
"Whew! That was a fun ride, huh?" 8 year old Kendall Knight looked up at his father, grinning and shaking the sweaty bangs out of his forehead.
"Yep, it was awesome! What are we doing here?" Kendall asked curiously. His father smiled, motioning for Kendall to sit down beside him.
"Daddy is showing you something. Look, up there." He pointed up towards the blue sky, and Kendall looked.
Kendall furrowed his bushy eyebrows together. "There's nothing there but the sky and the clouds."
His father chuckled. "I want you to look at the clouds, buddy. It's called cloud watching. Try seeing what those big clouds up there look like." He pointed up to the sky. "Like that one. Doesn't that one over there look like an elephant?"
Kendall squinted hard to see, but he couldn't see how the cloud looked like an elephant. "It looks like a... it looks like a tree, not an elephant!" He argued, being the stubborn boy he is.
His father shook his head. "No way, Kendall! That definitely looks like an elephant. See the trunk and the big body?"
Kendall still couldn't see. "No! I only see the leaves and the trunk of the tree, not the elephant!"
They argued like that for some time, until moving on to the next cloud and arguing all over again. They lay in the green grass, talking and arguing and laughing for hours. Finally, the sky was dark and it was getting cold outside.
"Kendall, buddy, it's time to head home." His father told him, standing up.
Kendall groaned. "Aw, daddy!"
"Aren't you hungry, Kendall?"
Kendall thought for a second." I guess. Alright, let's go!"
"I'll race you back, buddy!"
"You're on!"
It was a sunny day. The sky was blue and full of clouds. It was the five-year anniversary of Kevin Knight's death.
His son, Kendall Knight, lay on the grass, staring up at the clouds. He turned around and grinned at his father. Well, his father's grave.
"Hey, dad. It's Kendall. I'm cloud watching, just like you taught me to." He told him, knowing no one could hear him but still talking anyway. His dad could somehow be listening... it was a nice thought, wasn't it?
Kendall pointed up at the sky, grinning when he saw a cloud shaped like a tree. "Hey, look! It's a cloud that looks like a tree! And it doesn't look like an elephant, dad." He pointed out.
But no one responded.
Kendall sighed, getting up and placing the red roses he had bought onto the dirt in front of the headstone where his father lay. "I wish you could be here, dad, and argue with me about the clouds like you used to." He sighed. "I love you, daddy. I really miss you."
He walked away, getting onto his bike and pedaling away from the cemetery. He was almost late for dinner, and his mother would be wondering where he was. He didn't want to tell anyone he had visited his father at his grave. It was his own private moment, one he shared only with his father, wherever he was.
He loved his father, and even though he missed him, it was time to move on. His father would have wanted him to move on, do other things. Now he had his three best friends; James, Logan, and Carlos, and his mom and his baby sister Katie. He loved hockey and he had developed a strange passion for singing.
But even though Kendall knew it was time to let his father go, it still pierced him in the heart when he realized that there would be no one racing him home on his bike this time.
A/N- So, this was written for the 31 Day Challenge. So I'll be posting every day (or trying to) and every day it'll be a different theme! So please review and tell me what you guys thought of the first one! These will be pretty short since I have to write 31 of them in 31 days haha.
Peace, Love, and Giraffes
Anonymous Skrtle
