42 DAYS

Alyssa Krivak

10th Grade • Riverside Brookfield High School

42 days, Aly thought. It has been 42 days since I’ve been in a car. Since I have been to real school. Since I have seen my teachers, my friends, and studied for a test while walking blindly through the halls to my next period. As much as I miss my friends, it isn’t so bad, though. I don’t go a day without FaceTiming them and I won’t go a day without living my life and staying connected to all of the people I love.

“Rise and Shine!” Aly’s mom says as she flicks the surprisigly bright light on to wake her up. As Aly squeezes her eyes shut thinking maybe it’ll make her fall back to sleep, she slowly regrets telling her mom to wake her up early the night before. “Even if that means dragging me out of bed and onto the floor from under the warm comforter!” she recalls from her request to her mom from last night.

“I’m up…I’m up....” She yawns as she stretches every morsel of herself until she feels satisfied that she is woken up and ready for the day.

After filling out the attendance form for her online classes and flipping the scintillating light back off, Aly crawled under the covers again and into the stream of sunlight projected from the window. As she lay there grasping the sunbeams with her gaze, Aly thought about her life at home. Her mom would be leaving in a few hours to work, for she was an essential worker. For the

469

next eight hours, Aly would work to finish her homework and then dawdle around the house, waiting for her mom to come home from work. She would do this until the day repeats again, but as a Tuesday this time.

“I’m leaving!” her mom shouts from downstairs as she scrambles to get her red jean jacket on over her red vest and red plaid shirt. She was determined to embrace the color red while working at Target as much as she could. Aly tumbled back out of bed and raced down the stairs after her mom with her sister Bri, who bolted out of the opposite room when their mom announced her departure.

“Lunch?...Phone?...Hand sanitizer?” Aly checks with her mom as she is getting ready to leave to ensure that she has everything she needs. She always viewed her mom’s hand sanitizer, that clipped onto her jeans, as her weapon of defense while at work. As other people have pepper spray, her mom had her hand sanitizer as her protection because of all of the crazy customers that don’t stay six feet apart at her work.

“We have to keep our distance from others and make sure we are trying to eliminate any chance of germs that we could have possibly picked up,” Aly recollected from a previous conversation she overheard her mom having with her other sister Elle. While Aly focused on all the positive pieces of this crisis and tried to disregard as much as she could related to COVID-19, Elle researched and shared all her statistics about it with their mom each day. It is tough having to hear about all the people in their country who are going through a rough time, especially those who have lost the ones they love.

As her mom gets into their old Ford Escape, Aly waits by the

470

slightly cracked open door for her to pull away. Her sister Bri and herself both linger while clasping their hands shut, hoping that they will contain the kisses their mom blew from inside her car to them. As the blue car blurs around the corner and away, Aly whispers out the door the words “I love you,” as if those words will carry her love and support all the way to her mom while at work, and maybe create a shield of safety around her, ensuring that she will come home safe and sound again. Just like the last day, and the day before that. All the same, but with a different name.

471

472