My mom took me to the indoor park for my friend’s birthday. I’ve been there a bunch of times now, and I know every twist and turn, every hiding place, the most common place to find someone’s forgotten toy and the secret passageways. My favourite part of the entire place has to be the big blue slide that leads into the ball pit. It smells like piss every now and then, but when they clean it, it smells like a pool.
We entered and all my friends ran up to me in excitement. I took a quick look a my mom and she smiled at me. I smiled back and took my shoes off in a hurry. My friends and I all climbed the vibrant padded slope. It feels a little sticky, which is gross, but also normal. The fat red punching bags swayed slowly as we approached them. My friend said that one of the punching bags looked at him funny, so he punched it so hard his hand hurt. He told us to stop laughing, but it was too funny not to. We crawled and climbed through a saturated padded maze. My heart felt like it was going to burst, but we eventually made it to the best part of the structure.
The big blue slide.
It was at the second highest point in the entire structure, so I was able to see all the families watching their kids and the place where you could trade in tickets for prizes. Standing before the slide made me feel like a king. I pretended to fix my crown as I turned my back to the slide and told all my friends to bow down to me because I was the king. They all went along with it and called me their majesty as they knelt down onto one knee. Suddenly there was a small pressure on my chest, pushing me back. I had taken a step back, but there was nothing beneath me besides a steep drop. I panicked and tried to grab onto something. A split second before I banged my temple on the slide was a small voice that whined, “No! I’m the queen here”.
I tumbled down the slide, every part of me getting a piece of that slide. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. Plop. This reminds me of that one time when that stupid bully kicked the shit out of me and left me with a bunch of purple marks on my arms and legs because I told him his hat looked stupid.
It felt as though the ball pit was absorbing my entire being in it. Some of the balls held tight on my arm and others held even tighter. I was too weak to move and all I could feel was the smooth plastic against my skin.
It felt warm.