It was the middle of a May afternoon when a 10-year-old Maddie was playing outside with a nearly two-year-old Evan in their backyard with chalk while their parents were inside. While Maddie was drawing hopscotch trails, hearts, and her name, Evan just scribbled everywhere and was smearing chalk dust on not only his hands, but also his entire face, limbs, and clothes. He looked like he had taken a colorful clay bath.
"Wow, Evan! Look at you!" Maddie expressed as she let out all of her laughter. "You are definitely going to need a nice, good bath after all of this."
Evan just giggled and cackled as he continued to doodle scribbles and swirls with a green piece of chalk on the patio.
Maddie pulled out a blue piece of chalk and then decided to write both her and Evan's names in cursive. She learned how to do that in second grade and now she was a whiz at cursive. Ms. Rogers even praised her for her neat handwriting, telling her that it was even better than her own cursive handwriting.
Meanwhile, Evan was standing right behind Maddie and watching her. He eyed the extremely wet dirt that surrounded the garden bed of his mom's beloved Petunias. There was a mini picket fence around it because she didn't like him and Maddie messing around in it and destroying her precious flowers because those have been really important to her. They've meant a lot to her since they moved into this house.
While looking at the dark brown mushy wet stuff on the ground, he thought up a great idea. So, he used his tiny hands and fingers to scoop up the mud in his hands and make a mud ball; rolling it around into a ball just like Maddie taught him how to do when they played with play-doh. However, he had some difficulty rolling it up into the most perfect ball compared to when he used play-doh, so instead, he just grabbed a fist full.
Just as Maddie was about to finish the second D in her name, she felt a hard punch of something wet and heavy hit her back followed by an excited laugh from Evan right behind her.
"What the..." She immediately zipped her head around and saw that Evan's hands and knees were covered in mud. It had rained yesterday, which was why the soil was still pretty wet. "Evan that was not funny! You could have got it in my eyes and now I'm all muddy!" She yelled.
Startled by his sister's stern and loud voice, Evan just started crying, not understanding why Maddie was so upset with him now. He just wanted to play in the mud with her.
Maddie immediately regretted her words once she saw Evan's tears, so she leveled down to him and looked him in the eyes to reason with him, holding his hands in hers as she spoke. "Look, Evan. I'm sorry. I really didn't want to yell at you. It's just...it's not nice to throw mud at others. If you threw it in their face, it could have gotten in their eyes, up their nose, in their ears, or in their mouth. And when that happens, it doesn't feel good. Also, mud tastes yucky."
She was pretty much scolding him like a parent, and speaking of parents, she really wished that her parents would make more fun time for her and Evan. They've changed way too much since Daniel died. For example, Friday night movies and family game nights turned from weekly to monthly and they hardly ever made plans to take Evan to museums or parks or movie theaters or the zoo. In fact, plans for Evan's first trip to the zoo were made by Heather's dad when Heather invited Maddie to come with her, and then she asked if Evan could come too. Since Kyle was also tagging along, Evan was allowed to come.
"Mud? Yucky?"
"Yep, mud is yucky to eat and is something you should never eat," asserted Maddie. "However, it is very fun to play with, so maybe I can play in the mud with you instead without throwing it? Would that be fun?"
Evan nodded a yes.
"Alright, but let's get our shoes and socks off first," recommended Maddie.
Once the siblings got their shoes and socks off and set them aside, Maddie turned on the garden hose to where the mud got a bit muddier. They stepped into the muddy area and then started to play in it, smearing mud all over each other and making mudpies.
Evan grinned as he held up his creation of brown goop to show Maddie. "I made chocolate pie!"
"Mm, delicious," pretended Maddie as she used her hand to take an imaginary bite out of the mudpie. She then made her own with a couple of leaves on top. "And I made a chocolate pie with um...spinach...on top."
"Ew!" Evan cringed, scrunching up his face and making overly dramatic, fake gagging noises.
"But spinach is your favorite? You love spinach!"
"Spinach pie, yucky! Blech!" Evan retched.
"My guess is that you like spinach and you like pie, but not together?" Maddie guessed, remembering that she could still like two things and hate them together. For example, chocolate and bacon.
"Uh-huh," Evan nodded excitedly.
"Okay then," Maddie said as she took the leaves off the mudpie. "Here is a chocolate pie and a side of spinach. You can eat them apart."
"Yay!" Evan cheered as he pretended to eat the mudpie and the leaves.
They continued to play in the mud for the next half hour, getting it all over themselves as they had their mudpie competition and covered each other in the mud until they finally decided that they were done.
When they got out of the mud, it was everywhere and they were super dirty - in their hair, under their nails, all over their clothes, and sticking to their skin like glue.
Before walking inside, they hosed themselves down with the garden hose so their parents wouldn't get mad at them for getting mud everywhere. One time when Maddie and Evan both splashed around and jumped in mud puddles after a rainy day, they got water and muddy shoe prints all over the floor, which caused Margaret to flip out and scare them both. Maddie didn't want a repeat of that incident.
"Come on, Evan. Let's get ourselves cleaned up," she announced. "Let's get the rest of the mud off with a bath."
Although Maddie sometimes gave Evan baths, she never really bathed with him until now as they were showering together to get the rest of the mud off of them. In addition, the mud was also starting to itch, which made her desperate to get the both of them cleaned up quickly.
While Evan was sitting on the bath mat playing with a rubber duck and Maddie's old Ariel figurine (that had now become a bath toy for Evan) on one end of the tub (pretending that Ariel was riding the duck), Maddie was standing underneath the showerhead on the other end running her fingers through her hair to get all the grime out before she would help Evan get scrubbed clean from the chalk and mud.
Once Maddie was finished getting herself clean, she moved on to help Evan. She turned off the shower and then switched the faucet to bath mode yet still leaving the drain unplugged so they wouldn't be bathing in a tub of their own filth. As soon as she lathered Evan's blonde hair up with shampoo, she filled up a cup with water from the running faucet.
"Okay, Evan. Tilt your head back and close your eyes," she instructed and Evan did as he was told. She placed the edge of her hand over his forehead and then slowly poured the water over his hair to wash all the soap out. Then she moved on to conditioner and body wash to finish everything up.
"All clean!" Evan shouted with excitement.
"Yep, all clean!" Maddie agreed, helping him step out of the tub before grabbing the towels to dry each other off. "It feels nice, doesn't it?"
Evan nodded enthusiastically.
"Okay, now let's go get dressed."
AN: I hope you all enjoyed. Please review :)