Sunday, November 15, 2020

Lilith and the little boy


On our afternoon walk to the cemetery, Lilith and I ran into a woman we met yesterday. Very blonde, wearing pink leggings, she'd paid close attention to Lilith and leaned over to smell a flowering tree. As she walked away, I was pretty sure I heard her speaking Russian into her phone. Today, she came toward us, this time with a little boy beside her, a box and a coffee from the McDonald's across the highway. He was not blonde, but a tow-head with brown hair and darker skin than hers. "May I pet your dog?" he asked, and I said of course. He and she leaned down to pet Lilith. "May I kiss the dog?" he asked, and I said yes, so he leaned over and kissed Lilith on the crown of her head, where the black and white fur cedes to brown. "How old is she?" asked the boy. "I think she's almost five," I said. "I'm five!" he said happily, and then referring to the woman by her given name, told me that she is 37. I understood the next question before it was uttered, so I said, "I'm 62." The boy responded that I was even older than his father.

 

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