The Girl in the Yellow House Kathryne McCann
At the end of my street there was a yellow house. It had been there ever since I could remember, marking the point in the road where the flat pavement gave way to a small hill. When we were young we used to drag our sleds through the fresh snow until we reached the yellow house. This was where we mounted our plastic chariots and raced down the deserted street to victory. Now we groan and march up the steady incline, our book bags sinking into our shoulders. Relief does not come until we reach the yellow house, where we know comfort is waiting. The house itself was completely ordinary. It had ordinary paint chips here and there, a sturdy black door faded with time, and a roof missing three tiles. I had counted them once as I stood outside, waiting for her. Whenever she emerged the world seemed to become lighter. A trick of the wind, she would say if I ever told her this. In her world, the wind was a troublemaker, always bending the laws of our world. Oh how I wish I could spend a day wrapped in her world, entangled in the weeds of her fantasies until they became so knotted around my limbs I simply could not leave. Though the house was completely ordinary, she was extremely extraordinary. Radiant energy seemed to flow from the curls that toppled from her head and seep into the very air around her. Her old friend, the trickster wind, would then carry it into every corner, making her surroundings extraordinary too. The yellow house
American Literary Magazine | 20
suddenly became bolder and brighter, as if the sun itself had painted it using its very own curated shade of brilliance. The faded black door morphed into a hallowed secret, a passageway reserved only for those who would even dare to imagine what lay beyond. Even though I have traveled beyond its threshold hundreds of times and knew it was just a regular home, I still found it a magical experience. That was a nice way to describe her—magical. She had always been this way, that much I knew. We had all been that way once too, I suppose, but the rest of us had shed our adolescent gleam as we came to know life as it is. Like a coat we had outgrown, we cast aside our playful imaginations, or rather, were encouraged to mature and leave the comfort of our fantasies behind. As we exposed our expanding bodies and minds to the harsh chill of the world we lived in, she merely held on tight to her coat of dreams. It grew with her, modifying itself to fit her shape, size and mood. Her world thrived, watered by her constant attention and unyielding spirit. Sometimes, I wonder what would have happened if I had held on a little tighter, pleading with my own coat to change with me. Perhaps, by some strange miracle, the fabric would have listened. I will never know. For now, I will settle for sharing her coat of imagination during the times we share. Perhaps some day I will sew my own and I will see the world blossom before me like I did years ago.
