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The best Valentine’s Day of my life was the one when I was 6 and in kindergarten. I excitedly made a mailbox for my soon to be received valentines with the rest of my classmates, fashioning mine out of pink and red construction paper and using two small heart stickers to form the diaeresis over the i in my name. I went to the store with my mom and picked out perfect valentines, Batman ones, and I wrote each classmate’s name and a “heart, anaïs” in a 6-year-old scrawl on each one. I was ready for my first serious Valentine’s day celebration that Friday; my mom was even going to bring cupcakes for my class.
Then my stomach woke me up on Thursday morning. It felt twisted and crampy, and I walked slowly to my parents’ bedroom. My dad had already left that morning but my mom was still in bed, waking up slowly and watching the morning news. She saw me in the doorway and smiled. I threw up all over the carpet. I heard her inner “AHHH VOMIT” radar go off but she put me in a bath and cleaned me off and put me in clean pajamas and plopped me in her big bed with a tiny trashcan next to me in case I threw up again. She took my temperature and called my uncle the doctor to see what she should do; she came back from the kitchen with juice and medicine for my tummy and I looked up at her with my pale green face.
“I can go to school tomorrow though, right?” I asked, feeling my stomach rumble dangerously again.
My mom sighed and climbed into bed with me. We spent the day napping and watching tv. I threw up a few more times and she held my hair. I have to note that this is also how I spent my first year of college with my roommate. I fell asleep crossing my fingers that Friday would bring good health and valentines. I tried to get out of bed Friday morning but my mom was having none of it.
“Get back in bed now,” she said. She got this certain wrinkle in her forehead and I knew that meant business.
I wasn’t feeling any better on Friday and my occasional crying about not being able to go to school didn’t help me any. My mom dragged me out of bed only to take me to see my uncle who confirmed that it was just a short stomach bug and that I should be fine soon. I was still in my pajamas and I pouted in the car. I could feel my mom grow irritated.
“What’s wrong?” She looked at me for a second as she kept an eye on the road.
“Nothing,” I sniffled.
“Then why do you look like a soggy french fry?” She was trying not to smile.
“I DO NOT LOOK LIKE A SOGGY FRENCH FRY.” Getting upset tired me and I leaned my head against the car door. “I hate Valentine’s Day.”
“I never thought you’d say that this early,” she laughed. I pursed my lips at her.
“It’s not funny.”
“No, of course not.” She tried not to smile. “Do you want to go to Toys R’ Us?”
“Maybe.” I didn’t want to sound too excited. Even at 6, I knew that this was how to play this game.
“Okay.” She drove in whatever direction Toys R’ Us was; when you’re a child, you just seem to arrive places by magic, the code of street names and numbers seeming like a puzzle beyond your mind’s grasp.
She parked outside of the familiar large building with the giraffe on the front and picked me up out of my seat. She carried me inside and put me in a cart. We walked up and down every aisle, even the ones I wasn’t really interested in; today we would inspect every inch of the place. Eventually we made it up the Barbie aisle. I wasn’t a big fan of Barbies. My parents bought me the Dream House and also that weird mansion that folds in to a suitcase but it concerned me that Barbie dolls could only stand as if they were in ballet class. I mostly experimented with giving my dolls haircuts since those hairbrushes shaped like seashells didn’t do very well at getting knots out. There was nothing I wanted until I saw IT. The one thing my mom would never buy me because it was too expensive for a little girl who was just going to cut the hair off and accidentally feed the Barbie accessories to the family dog: the Midge Gets Married set.
I always liked Midge. Barbie was too popular and Skipper tried too hard and the one I looked the most like, Teresa, never got cool jobs. But Midge, I could get behind that. She looked like the Little Mermaid after all. She just seemed like she didn’t try too hard. I waved my little hands in front of me to stop my mom. She looked from the set to me and narrowed her eyes.
“No.”
“I can’t even go to school today! Everyone is having a good day without me and I don’t get any valentines and they’re all making heart shaped Jello jigglers and I don’t get anything and I don’t know why Midge can’t get married at our house!” I said this in one rapid breath and felt nauseated. I must have swayed a bit because my mom reached out to grab my shoulder.
She looked sort of guilty as she stared at me for a while. She reached out and grabbed the box from the shelf and handed it to me. I wanted to hug the shit out of it but I restrained myself since I was supposed to be a sick child. I hid my mouth behind the box and grinned like a fool. I gave it to the cashier to scan when we got to the register; she gave it directly back to me, instantly realizing that I did not need a bag. My mom paid and we left. In the car, she turned to me at a red light.
“If Daddy asks, that was ON SALE, okay? ON SALE.”
“Yep.” I couldn’t wait to tear into the box and put Midge’s lavender honeymoon jacket on her. Could. Not. Wait.
We got home and I ran excitedly into the house as we pulled into the garage. I wasn’t even trying to act extra sick anymore. My mom walked into the kitchen and I climbed back into her bed and tore that box apart. You know how rappers talk about tearing up certain genitalia areas of ladies? That’s the kind of attitude I had at opening this packaging. There was Midge and her husband and Barbie and some other dude and the little girl who was the flower girl and the ring bearer boy. Midge’s skirt came right off and revealed a tighter honeymoon skirt. See, Midge was resourceful, combining the two outfits so she could leave her wedding faster. Barbie wasn’t as smart.
My heart swelled with that joy that you got as a kid when you had something new, a kind of high that comes from figuring out something new. I got that way about books then as well; I still do. Even though I felt better, I was still not 100% and so I fell asleep amidst the sea of packaging and bouquets and cumberbunds (I don’t know why I undressed the guy dolls, there was never anything to find). I woke up to my mom’s hand on my forehead. She had cleaned up the remnants of the box and placed all the dolls at the foot of the bed. There was a plate on the nightstand next to me and it had Jello jigglers, not red and shaped like hearts but orange and shaped like Christmas trees.
“We only have Christmas cookie cutters,” she said in explanation. “And orange Jello.”
I reached out for one and my mom brought the plate around and got into bed with me. She turned on the tv and we ate orange Jello Christmas trees while watching something that I can’t even recall. I escaped that first year of school valentines and the awkwardness of getting a card or not getting a card and what it meant if someone got you candy but what if it was candy that wasn’t as good as what someone else got and even at 6 wondering what it meant when the boy who slept on the mat next to you during naptime gave you a valentine with the word “love” on it because, I mean, your mom and dad said that to each other and in movies people said that and then they kissed so did you have to kiss? I had no clue and I wouldn’t have to prematurely worry about that till the next year. For then there was just Jello, the certainty that Barbie would be the only one to catch Midge’s bouquet, and that my mom liked hanging out with me even when I puked in her bed.
A few days later though, I DID get my mailbox full of valentines and began the analysis of what each Michael Keaton Batman Returns valentine meant. “You make my heart race to the Batmobile, Valentine!” I know, Bradley G.
