Chapter 20: Day 19
"Welcome to being a year older than you thought you'd be," said Kyle as he read inside of a card with the numbers nineteen on the front. "Wrong again," Kyle replied in an unplayful way.
"Ha, what do you mean wrong again?"
Kyle shrugged as he said, "Well, we celebrated every birthday of mine including my eighteenth. I've been all those ages including the age I am now." He held this card in his hand before throwing it at me. "This card, is a lie."
"I didn't lie when I said every day can be a celebration."
"What if I don't want it to be?" asked Kyle.
"Then I'd be really sad, Kyle. Best part about celebrating a birthday a day is that you can stop at any age you want!"
Kyle looked up.at the ceiling before he said, "Then, I'd like to live to a hundred."
"That's the spirit! But, why so old?"
"No age is too old when you've been given a deadline," replied Kyle. "Growing old for real would be the greatest gift I could wish for."
"Even if you won't be able to change yourself and be eating mush for breakfast?"
Kyle looked at me as he said so truthfully, "Disbelieve all you want, Renata. That picture you just painted with your words is a beautiful one. I envy you so much."
"What for?" I asked Kyle with a scoff. "I've experienced less of this world than you have and we're almost the same age!"
The moment I said that it was like I lit a fire in him. Kyle swung his legs to the side of the bed, and they dangled inches from my own. "You get to fall in LOVE, get MARRIED, get DIVORCED, have CHILDREN, have GRANDCHILDREN, and maybe even some GREAT-GRANDCHILDREN!"
Every word Kyle shouted, I leaned further and further away from him. So much so that by the time he yelled the last word, I fell off of my chair on the linoleum floor. "Ow!"
At my small outburst, Kyle immediately looked guilty. He stood near his bed and stuck out his hand. "Let me help you up," he said to me in the softest whisper I ever heard escape his lips. I reached for his hand and with some real effort on his part, he pulled me up.
Well, sort of.
I was halfway away from standing up straight, before Kyle's breath sputtered and he leaned forward. My shoulder hit the wall behind my chair and he leaned next to me. For a moment we just looked at each other. "Renata?"
"Yes?"
"How does it feel to take my breath away?"
"You choose the weirdest times to make a fool out of yourself," I replied. "I'm still going to make you a birthday card each day. That childish outburst of yours doesn't change a thing."
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone