Wings, Complete Story

“Go outside and find something to do.”
“But…”
“NOW!!!”

Lulu and her little brother, Hugo, went out the kitchen door that led to the garage and from there to the back yard. There in the garage was the great wonder — a refrigerator box that their parents had left out for trash day. They dragged it out the back door and looked at the slight rise at the back of their yard. Then they looked at the refrigerator box. They felt the November wind push their cheeks back toward their ears, and looked again at the refrigerator box. Yep. Wings. They set to breaking the box apart. Before long it was one flat piece of corrugated cardboard.

“We have to get some scissors,” said Lulu, thoughtfully.

Hugo got up from the cardboard and ran into the house. He came out with scissors. Mom’s sewing scissors. “Not those scissors, Hugo. Mom’ll kill you.”

“It’s just this one time.”
Lulu shrugged. Hugo would get away with it if anyone would.
“I’m not touching them, and YOU tell her YOU took them.”
“I will.”
Soon they’d fashioned two sets of wings from the refrigerator box.
“Go put them back,” said Lulu, seeing the scissors on the grass.
“You do it.”

There were no buttons in existence that Hugo wouldn’t push. Lulu picked up the scissors and tried to sneak into the house with them, but as fate would have it, Mom was in the kitchen peeling potatoes.

“We told you…what’s in your hand? Are those my sewing scissors?”

“They are, mom.” Lulu hung her head.
“Don’t you KNOW better than that?”
“I do.” Lulu didn’t DARE look up.
“Can you explain this to me? Look at me when I’m talking to you!”
“We’re making airplanes so we could fly. We needed to cut the refrigerator box so we could both have wings.”
“Look at me.” Mom was mad. “What have I told you about my sewing scissors.”
“Never to touch them.”
“And?”
“We touched them.”
“YOU CUT CARDBOARD WITH THEM!!! Did you take them outside?”
“No. Hugo came in and got them.”
“Well that is neither here nor there.” Mom sighed. “Go to your room.”
Lulu thought it WAS “here AND there.” She’d brought them back in and faced this music while Hugo, the one who’d taken them, was getting off scot free. Lulu knew SHE would not have taken them. “But Mom. I didn’t take them. Hugo took them.”
“Nobody likes a snitch. I told you to go to your room.”

Lulu felt like she got off easy.

It wasn’t long until she heard her mother calling Hugo into the house. “And put that cardboard in the garage where you found it!”

The kitchen door to the garage opened and Hugo came in.
“Hi Mom.”
“Hugo, honey, did you take my sewing scissors out of the drawer?”
Hugo hung his head. Mom wasn’t completely blinded by her golden child, and she recognized guilt.
“Don’t ever, ever, ever, ever do that,” she said sternly. “I need those scissors for sewing. They were expensive and money doesn’t grow on trees.”
“Where’s Lulu?”
“I sent her to her room.”
“We were building airplanes. We were going to fly.”
“Go get your sister,” said Mom who’d never been all THAT angry.

She looked out the window over the sink. She closed her eyes and saw another blond-haired little boy and a dark-haired little girl in braids. They stood on the lip of the small hill in a different back yard. With only one big piece of cardboard between them they had to take turns.

The little boy was smaller than his sister. A moment came when he took off running down the slope, and caught a gust at exactly the right time, exactly the right angle. His sneakered feet lifted two or three inches off the ground. It was only a matter of seconds but long enough.

He flew.

Mom wiped a tear from her eye.

“Mom?”
“OK, kids. Take THESE scissors and go build your planes. Next time, ASK. I hate kids sneaking around behind my back. And NEVER EVER EVER take my sewing scissors for ANY purpose at all EVER.”