Sitting

    Are you ever afraid of certain time of day? Or maybe you just have one of those random days where you can't help, but feel detached from everything? You know those day's where you can just sit down and stare into space for hours on end? I have those sometimes. It can happen twice a week or once a month depending on my emotional stability. It is fairly random, but whenever it does happen I'm perfectly fine with just laying/ sitting and staring off into space. When it happens on a weekend then I just play a youtube playlist and sit at my window with a cuppa in my hand and just watch. At first I'm taking sips from my cup of tea and observing the world outside my window. 

    The neighbors new young cat is trying and failing miserably at hunting. The tiny brown birds are just too quick for him. After a while he gives up and just seems to stare at them in longing. The birds are fun to watch, but they never seem to be able to relax when your observing them. At least the older ones can't. I guess they just know when they are being observed, it's a safety mechanism inside them that helps them survive. Only birds of prey seem to be indifferent to your gaze. 

    Eventually my eyes stop seeing the world around me and I get lost inside my mind. Since it's daytime it's easier to stay out of the darker parts of my thoughts. The monsters that keep me up at night, but that isn't always the case. Today though I just lose myself to my random little made up stories. I allow myself to fully emerge into them, forgetting for a while that that is not my life. Usually I keep myself from doing this, it's hard to leave a created world like that, but when I'm in this type of state of mind it's a lot easier to just not care. 

    So I enter. 

    I'm walking in my neighborhoods small square, right next to the children's park. With a small bag of groceries in one hand, humming a small tune. The weather is very calm and it's quite warm, so I'm only wearing jeans and a t-shirt with sneakers. I stop though when I hear my name being yelled, well it's actually my nickname- "Zoey!" I turn to the noise curiosity peaked, because there is a very few number of people that call me that and none of them live in the area. Turning I see my parkour trainer Czapla running after his son in the kiddy park. Perplexed I walk up to the fence that surrounds the play place and give a wave. The young father catches his son and walk up to me with a smile. 

    "Hey Zoey, what are you doing here?"

    I only raise my eyebrow in question, "I should be the one asking you that since I live in the area and last I checked you lived farther west." 

    He only rolls his eyes, used to my blunt like way of speaking and sass/ sarcasm all rolled into one. We rarely ever spoke one and one and when we did I wasn't exactly the nicest person on the planet. "Well, I just recently bought an apartment in the area. It was starting to become annoying getting to and fro from the arena."

    "You still lasted pretty long," I replied with that I gave a small smile, "anyway welcome to the neighborhood." And made my way back home. 

    That situation was the beginning of a strange friendship, because a few days later I get a call from a frustrated Czapla. "Hello?" I answer my phone highly confused as to why my trainer is calling me on a thursday.

    "Hey Zoey, you wouldn't happen to be home at the moment would you?" 

    "I am," I reply still confused and wondering what exactly Czapla wants from me. The only time he ever used my number was when he was looking for someone to hand out leaflets for the club, but he sounded a bit to frustrated for it to be about flyers. 

    He seemed to let out a giant sigh when I replied, "Could you do me a huge favor?" 

    "Depends," I answer still wondering what is going on.

    "I have to go to the arena to teach and I have Damian with me, but I can't bring him to the arena as well, because there is a birthday party going on there today. So there isn't anyone that can watch him and I can't call and ask Annie to get him, cause she's out of town and..." 

    He seemed to be on a tirade and I cut him off, before the young adult got even more unnecessarily stressed. "You need me to babysit him for a couple of hours?" 

    "Yes, could you please?" his voice is filled with hope and as much as small kids sort of scare me, Damian was a toddler, so he wasn't as scary. Besides Czapla sounded like he really needed the help. I sighed answered positively and Czapla seemed over joyed. "I'll send you my address. How fast can you get here?"

    "I'll be there in ten minutes. Write out a list of things that I need to know about caring for Damian while you wait." With that I hung up and let out a resigned sigh, why did I agree? Oh ya, that's right it's cause I like to help people. So I packed a small bag of things and made my way to my trainers house. He lived on a side street not too far from my family home and it only took about three minutes to get there. I typed in the number to his place -12- and he immediately buzzed me up. Swiftly making my way to the third floor I found the door to apartment 12 wide open so decided to just walk in. 

    There I was greeted with Czapla trying to calm his son. The kid wasn't crying, but he seemed to be fussing over something. I coughed lightly unsure of what to do, but as soon as Czapla saw me he brighten, "Oh thank god you're here. I walked over to me and handed me a list of things. Everything you need to know is written down there." He gave me a quick tour of his place, pointing out the bathroom, kitchen and his bedroom. Finally he handed me Damian, who looked up at me in confusion. "Damian this is Zoey," He patted my head to emphasize his point, "She's going to be watching you while I go to work. I will be back around 22:30, so be good till then ok." The kid seemed to nod as if in understanding and started to grab at my hair. 

    "Great," Czapla seemed to smile at his gesture, "that mean's he's comfortable with you." He pat both of our heads again, making sure to make my hair extra messy, before saying goodbye and rushing out the door. 

    The both of us just stared at the now locked door then looked at the other, "So now what do we do?" I ask, of course the tyke doesn't answer, but he giggles, which is a good sign in my book. I put him down and he wobbles his way to the main room where his toys are. He seems to get comfortable on his blanket and starts playing with a dinosaur and car. Seeing that he's occupied I take a look at the list Czapla wrote. It just had a few major pointers, what time he eats, what he eats, when he should go to bed. That he wasn't allowed to use the computer for more then two hours and never alone. Well, it's already 19, so he's been feed and I just need to watch him and get him to sleep around 21. 

    Seeing that Damian was still occupied I pulled out a few math books and started studying. Ugh, so much math. Why did I go to college again, oh ya cause I want a job that doesn't involve me standing behind a counter. I admit I got sort of lost myself in my homework and never noticed Damian getting bored and leaving the room. I didn't notice until I heard a crash, which caused me to jump and run towards the noise as soon as I realized the toddler was gone. 

    I ran into the kitchen, only to find Damian inside the fridge. The door was leaning open against the cupboards and there were food products on the floor. Damian was nestled inside the fridge laying on the bottom self. I couldn't help it I laughed at the little tyke. "What are you doing kid?" I asked him giggling and kneeling down in front of the fridge. The toddler just looked at me and gurgled, laughing with me. "Well why don't you get out of there and we'll change you into pj's, maybe do something before bed?" 

    Amazingly he seemed to understand me, because he scooted towards me and I grabbed for him. Picking him up and starting to swing him around, he let out a laugh, before I put him down and started hiding away all the food that was on the floor. Luckily he hadn't made that much of a mess, but I was surprised that he stayed and tried to help me. 

    "Alright, the mess has been cleaned, so your daddy won't get mad. Let's get you into some sleepwear," with that we went to Czapla's room where Damian had his bag of things. It was a bit of a struggle to get the little guy into clothes, since he seemed to find great amusement in making me struggle. I of course got back at him, by tickling his stomach. 

    Time passed quickly after that with me trying and failing to get Damian into bed, eventually I gave in and let him color next to me while i did more homework. He fell asleep in that time, so i brought him to his cot and laid him to bed. He slept soundly and before I knew it I heard Czapla making his way inside. I packed me stuff, before meeting him in the hall. As soon as he came in he went to check on Damian, so I had time to put on my shoes and light coat. 

    "Hey," he finally spoke, "he wasn't any trouble was he?" 

    "Nope, he was really well behaved for a toddler. The only time he made a fuss was when I tried to get him to bed." 

    "Nothing unusual then," he smiled and I started to make my way out the door. "Thanks again for this."

    "No problem," I reply "If you ever need a sitter again I'll be glad to help, Damian's a pretty fun kid. Night." With that I left the apartment and headed back home ready to hit the sack. This would not be the last time I would babysit Damian.

    I blink a few times, before I start to take in the world around me, the real world. The cup in my hands helps center and ground me. I take a sip of the now cold tea and finally get off my window sill. My body is a bit stiff from sitting in a single position for so long, so I crack my back with a sigh and enjoy hearing all the pops. I look at the time and see that only half an hour has passed. It's still bright out and warm outside. Maybe I'll go for a bike ride. With my mind made up I leave the house and let that small random dream/story world slip through the cracks. 

Maybe I'll see you around?