There's this kid I live with.
He's three. He's my younger cousin and I barely have time to see him these days. He's always asleep when I come home from work, or taking a nap, or probably screaming his lungs out in the yard.
He's three, and he's at that age where everything and anything is a boundary if he can make it one, so something is always breaking in the house and it is always his fault.
Even though he's no responsibility of mine, I've taken to become another person of authority in his little world (I know, ANOTHER, poor kid but what can I do). He misbehaves, he runs around, he screams, he spits, he smashes things, he rolls on the floor, he walks with his socks off, he licks the dog. So I have to go and say "no, you do not do this" with a ridiculously fragile stern look on my face, even though sometimes I want to roll on the floor with him, or take my socks off, or scream and draw on the walls. Because he needs consistency, like most kids do. He's too young to be dealing with people who say one thing and do another. Not now, not yet. Even if sometimes I do want to scream my lungs out as well and cry for no reason and have someone make me some toast with jam which I will eat comfortably in between sobs.
He's three and I can just see him so curious about everything. Everything is new and wonderful and funny and gross. He sees windows with bars and they are not bars, but places to stick your head in. I see windows with bars and it reminds me of how likely it is for someone to break in and are these bars really strong and oh man these break so easily, I am going to die tomorrow.
Today I was standing on the stairs looking at nowhere like I sometimes do when my mind is slower than my body and it is not through with thinking everything it needs to think, and three year old him comes into the room silently, and doesn't see me. I look at him intently, and he starts calling for Mom and eyeing the couch with that look only kids get when things click inside their heads. He walks carefully, climbs on the couch, and quietly jumps, laughing to himself. I muted my mind from going "oh my god, he is by the window, he is going to crack his head, he is going to fall onto the floor, he is he is", for a few seconds. How could I interrupt him? He was just honestly loving the bouncy motion of his body, so much. But I did, I did interrupt him. I say "your mom is in her room, now get down from the couch, you can hurt yourself like that", from my little invisible space on the stairs. He does not see where I am. He just hears my commanding voice and his little hungry eyes look all over for me. "Get down", I say again. He does. Now, call me cruel, but I didn't show myself until he left the room. I still like him thinking that I am a Bigger person, that I can see what he does, that I do not have doubts, that I know better.
Because he is the only one who does.