Tea in the Tree House
Tin-Tin poured steaming earl grey tea from the delicate rose painted teapot into its matching teacup. Well that's how she imagined it. In reality she had to content herself with a red plastic tea set with dinky yellow teddy bears filled with muddy water until she was old enough to use the kettle.
She looked out of the tree house window and surveyed the Tracy family's yard and the vast oceans of wheat fields and prairie beyond. Right now she was suitably proud of her new vantage point. John, the middle son of Jeff Tracy, was six and now a fully-fledged elementary school pupil. So like most six year olds in Kansas went to school five days a week, nine till three. Tin- Tin had not missed this opportunity to claim the tree house while he and his older brothers were and school and studiously ignoring John because he was "A stupid first grader" ergo unworthy of the company of 3rd or 5th grade kids, such as themselves.
Sitting on old sofa cushions and playing hostess at a tea party for several stuffed animals was a bit of an anticlimax, something was missing from her cosy amateur domestic scene, but she couldn't quite figure out what it was.
Below the tree house the doors to the conservatory/ playroom were flung open and three-year-old Gordon Tracy stepped out daringly.
"No play out, dada say" his younger brother Alan reminded him.
Gordon carried on regardless. He was too young to go outside without an adult, Jeff had said. Gordon felt he was too young for everything. John was allowed outside without grown ups, Scott could even go out to store and buy candy without Jeff. Gordon had to sit at home or in the stroller while his brothers ran off and did big kid stuff. He got stuck playing with Alan too, and that pretty much defined booby prize.
"How could a Daddy who loved his son be mean enough to make him play with a dumb baby who couldn't say proper sentences or go without diapers?" Gordon thought angrily, as he stomped across the lawn with his stuffed rabbit under his arm.
"Gore, come back!" Alan screeched from the doorway. Gordon decided that if Jeff came along and caught him outside Gordon would strangle Alan with his own stupid baby reins!
Gordon stopped under the towering oak supporting the tree house. He didn't really hate Alan. After all it wasn't Alan's fault he was a dumb baby. John thought that Gordon was a baby sometimes, more so now he was at school and seemed to forget having fun with his little brothers and only remembering hanging out with Scott, Virgil or their friends.
"John just wants to be grown up" Grandma had told him. That didn't make sense to Gordon. Everybody said Scott was grown up when he looked after Alan and read Gordon stories. If John did that sort of thing he could be grown up like Scott, but John didn't want that either. John wanted to do everything different and even Grandma was stumped on that one.
Tin-Tin peered out of the doorway of the tree house.
"Gordon, do you and Alan want to play up here?"
The boys, stood together at the bottom of the rope ladder looked at each other. The tree house was the big kids place to play. Inspiring awe among the younger ones akin Mount Olympus to the ancient Greeks. So what was Tin-Tin doing up there. She clambered down the ladder.
"We could have lunch up there?"
Alan nodded enthusiastically; Tin-Tin was his favourite person on the whole planet. Gordon just said okay, only babies got excited about playing with girls.
Jeff carried several thick folders outside to work on the patio; today was too nice to sit inside. He went though the conservatory to check on the boys, and saw they weren't there. French windows flung back as far as possible, the voile curtains floating like spectres.
"Damn! I knew I should have locked the door" Jeff fumed
Then three small figures appeared, walking towards him.
"Hewwo Dada" Alan said totally innocent (which, in his defence, he was)
"We would like to have lunch in the tree house, is that okay Mr Tracy?" Tin-Tin asked politely.
Jeff smiled; he couldn't really refuse them anything with those sweet little faces.
"Okay then, we could sort that out"
Later, up in the tree house, a spread of potato chips, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (no crusts), cupcakes and grape juice was laid out on the tea chest covered with a plastic table cloth that as a table and the spread was eagerly consumed by the three children sat around it.
"That yummy" Alan announced
"Yes, it was" Gordon agreed. Tin- Tin smiled warmly and felt very proud of her efforts. Just as Alan yawned.
"You need to go to sleep now, lie down in the corner," she instructed.
Alan did this instantly, thinking it was a game and not dreaded naptime. He wriggled into a comfortable position among the cushions under one of Virgil's many paintings on the wall. Gordon covered his brother with a blanket.
"Sleep tight" Tin-Tin told him and lightly kissed his forehead.
She then turned to Gordon, when they had moved back to their seats.
"Would you like some tea?" she asked
"Yes please"
So she poured some grape juice into a clean red teacup.
Gordon smiled and took the cup.
"This is very grown up" he commented
Tin-Tin and Gordon sat on old sofa cushions sipping "tea" from the red plastic cups. The May sunshine flooded though the window and doorway of the tree house glittering on the glossy surfaces around them. They discuss literature and popular culture (picture books and sesame street)
Inside the tree house all was mature and civilised, filled with similes and laughter. For that afternoon and each one after.