15.
By Genesis Juarez
As long as the memories keep flowing, the doors appearing are never ending. A long hallway full of dreams finally appears within them. 6408 days, since the last time I counted, worth of memories. I am in the middle of it all. So, I stop to look and gaze at the countless scribbles of color on the walls of my halls. Photographs hang in the hallway. Portraits of people and other small details to connect with memories. Frames flashing filing with pictures from my phone camera. Why so many? Why does my mind conjure more than it can handle? When I know that all I am is a speck of insignificant matter, floating in a galaxy, light years away. Yet, gravity pulls me in my sleep to force me to walk back to the foot of my memories, doors labeled. My 2nd and My 3rd and my 7th and My 9th birthdays. A door opening up to the first time I ever read a book, or the first time I met some of my earliest teachers, and everything leading up to now. Until I reached the door that was labeled, “15th Birthday!”.
I grabbed the door knob and turned it, the door flying open and pulling me in, allowing me to step into my memory.
It starts with me sitting on the floor of my bedroom, I sit and watch the clock turn 12:00 AM. I’m officially 15 and I’m too excited to go to sleep. Still I apprehensively crawl into bed and tuck myself into my sheets. Even if I know that I’ll fling them off, because why did I have to be born in August? The AC blasted on 64, so the cool chill fills my room and has me curling even more into the blanket. I’ll allow it, because I know I’ll thank myself in the morning for sleeping in the cold. So my eyes flutter shut and for the many times I’ve fallen asleep, I dream of nothing.
When I wake up it’s early. I can tell because of the coolness in my room, not just from the AC, but t. Those chilly dewey mornings we’re so used to. I sluggishly get out of bed and get ready, because I have a plan. Actually, we have a plan, my family and I. We need to get on over to Philadelphia to catch the bus that’ll take us to New York.
I check the weather and make sure the day’s nice and warm, which it always is in the summer. As my family and I pile into the car and drive to Philadelphia and as we stand outside where the buses are supposed to be. We realize we have to pay for parking. The most annoying thing about traveling, paying for stuff. So as we’re running across the city and trying to figure out where that big traveling bus managed to park, we take in the scenery. At least I do, the brisk air blowing as we walk down the streets of Philly. The sun is shining, nice and bright to illuminate our path to find the bus. Once we do, it’s like a saving grace, until we get on and realize it’s the wrong bus and we have to move onto another one. At least this one had air conditioning, I think I’d die being in a bus full of people and with nor AC. That’s a nightmare, to me at least.
The bus ride is long and I somehow manage to sleep during it, yet when I wake up, I see it. The tunnels leading into the city and how huge the skyscrapers are.
It had been years since I’d last come here to look around like a tourist. Now, I am older, not so much wiser, but definitely older. A womanly older. In my culture, turning 15 is the most significant moment of a young woman’s life, so that’s why this trip was taken so seriously. Instead of a huge lavish party, that many girls turning 15 prefer, I instead wanted a small trip with my family. (Even if I did end up having a Sweet 16 the next year, so I got the best of both worlds).
The trip was full of sightseeing and walking, lots of walking. The skyscrapers looked as if they could lean down and just eat me. The sky was so blue and the flowers were already blooming. Purple, delicate little flowers, one that I picked and kept in my backpack and still have to this day. The flowers probably dried and if I pick it up, it’ll break and disintegrate. I snapped pictures of everything and anything I could see. The weird looking building of hexagonal shapes, that made no sense architecturally, but nonetheless I snapped away.
We walked all across the city, We went from the heart of the city and found ourselves in Times Square. It looks so much better on New Year’s Eve with the huge ball drop and more anticlimactic in person. The bustling, brash, and bursting sounds from all the noise in the city. It falls faint on my ears as it turns into background noise. The honks from yellow taxis, shouts of pedestrians, and the screeching of cars coming to a halt. The hundreds of people in the streets, trying to scam any tourists in sight. My family and I included, but I was smarter than that and led us away from them. We took pictures and filmed until the storage in our phone ran out. It wasn’t the most special thing we could’ve seen, but the celebration made it even more special.
As we exhausted our feet we finally realized that we should get some lunch, just to kill time. Tacos for lunch, at least that’s what I can remember. The entrance to the restaurant was normal, yet we were led underground to sit and eat our food. It felt exclusive, special, and I thought it was because of my birthday. And the restaurant was right in Times Square, the heart of the city, how more adaptable could we get? Time seemed to fly by as we sat around and ate and chatted. The smell of scrumptious food that we devoured because of how hungry we were. Our bodies needed fuel to keep on trekking to the water to get on the boats to see Lady Liberty.
As we finished up our meal and managed to walk a couple blocks. I ended up calling it quits and begged to take a cab. It was my birthday after all, and we had already walked for so long. What would spending a couple bucks on a taxi cab hurt? We took the cab and crammed ourselves into it and made our way to the docks. We bought our tickets and waited for the boat to come to take us to Ellis Island.
The heat was starting to win in the fight with me. Time seemed to still as I was finally able to catch my breath after walking all morning. The red from my face, almost as if I were a tomato. The only thing I could hear was my breathing trying to normalize. I sat on a bench as I did so, yet the back of my thighs burned from the heat. The hot bench felt like it was burning into my skin. If I stood up I could just picture the burn marks on my legs. I started to feel like an idiot for wearing all black. The slight ache in my feet from all the walking, to the layers of sweat drenched behind my long hair. It all seemed to be so overwhelming. The heat, the sweat, and the blisters that were already forming on my feet. But, I was so glad I brought a hair tie, or two, and tied up the mane of hair that was practically sticking to my neck. I put on the little bucket hat we had bought while walking around the city, to shield me from the sun, as we sat and waited for the boat.
Once the boat arrived and we took our seats. That’s when the rocking began. I personally don’t have seasickness, but some of the people I was with, did. It was awful almost seeing them shake with fear and their faces greening from the rock of the boat. The subtle shake that boat got from the waves. I never understood seasickness, but I could feel the slow rock of the boat and if you looked overboard. You’d feel sick too. The terrifying height of the boat from the water and how dusky it was. If you fell in, what would be in the water to greet you?
I shook those thoughts from my mind as I felt the sudden stop of the boat. It approached the dock and everyone started to trickle out. As I stepped out the atmosphere shifted, the cool sea breeze of being on Ellis Island. I walked around with my family and we stumbled upon a small store. We all stopped and got ice cream and lemonade to cool off. The air helped, the way it brushed against me and made my hair flow in the wind. The sweetness of the lemonade and the slight tang from the physical lemons in the cup. Yet, the sweetness trumped it all, once I started to eat my chocolate ice cream cone. It felt like an ice cube on my tongue, cooling off the warmth of my insides.
My family and I walked around as we finished our lemonade and ice creams. Until we realized in all that relaxing, we had a boat to catch. We all made sure to race back before we’d be stranded on an island for the rest of the day. The sun shining down on us wouldn’t have been too good. As we managed to get back on the boat, the rocking sensation came back. It felt as if I were to take one wrong step, I’d fall off the boat entirely! The shaky ship sailed back to shore and we made it back in one piece.
Once we were back on land we took a taxi back to the center of town and continued to walk around. At this point my legs were basically killing me. We all made the trudge back to where the buses would meet us. The sun was setting and the skies began to darken on the walk back. We stopped at a little vendor’s cart and got water to quench our thirst. The cold water hitting my tongue was like finding a single drop in a dessert. I savored that water and finished the entire thing, before going back to get another. As we made it back to where the buses dropped us off, we found a little bench to rest on. I laid down and rested my head on someone’s lap, my shoes kicked off from all the walking I did, but I didn’t care.
As soon as we noticed the buses pull up, I sprinted with what little might I had to get to the good seats. Sitting down was such a relief, I can’t even remember the bus ride. I’m sure I fell asleep and then when I woke up, we were back in Philadelphia. The car ride back home was uneventful, until we stopped at Giant and rushed inside to get a cake before they closed.
Once we were finally home and settled in. We sat around the dining room table and unboxed the cake. It was my favorite and I couldn’t wait to sink my teeth into the first slice. We sang happy birthday in both English and Spanish and then I got to cut the cake. Huge slices distributed to everyone around the table. Once I took a bite, I was in heaven. The chocolatey sweetness of the cake. How soft it felt to bite into.
The perfect way to end the perfect dream of a day. Even if it wasn’t as lavish as a huge poofy dress and a room full of people celebrating, this day was the next best thing.
As I made my way upstairs, I made sure to take a shower. My hair was wet after taking a rejuvenating shower, and comfy pajamas to settle into bed with. Alongside the AC on being on full blast. Yet, I could still feel the ache in my feet as I crawled back into bed. I knew this would be a memory I would never forget. I drifted off to sleep and went back to the long hallway with doors that opened to my memories.
If only I could’ve cherished this birthday even more, if I had known what was to come. Never will I forget my 15th Birthday.
