We like to gather in the evening when the sun makes the sky look like strawberry ice cream—the clouds swirling like whip cream and the air tasting of the sweetest sugar. We gather to talk about everything and nothing as the children dance in the field in front of us, picking wild strawberries—ones with a red so deep it’ll stain your tongue and a juice so sweet that your back teeth will hurt as if you sucked on a sour candy a little too long. We like to gather here when the heat dies down. When the air is breathable once more after the southern heat cools. When it’s too hot for the bugs to bite and when the fruit is perfectly ripe.

           

We watch the children dancing in the field together. Only old enough to keep their balance as they run through the tall grass—some still bounce when they fall. They are at a time where childhood is everlasting. A time when they all are friends. And at a time when we could watch on without melancholy. We watch them as they find the little white flowers which expose the precious fruits. The gentle ones, their pink lips, and cheeks, the same color as the wild berries, can’t see the fruits like the other children, who are just as untamed as the vines that climb the trees and crawl over the ground in the field where we sit and gather.

 

The wild ones are our favorites.

           

The wild boys will bring us entertainment. They will be our jesters—making faces and doing dances in the distance, which will make us laugh. They will be lovers—trying to court the young girls, which will make us believe in love again. And they will be our pain—never caring for us the way the gentle ones do, which makes us love them more. 

           

The wild girls will do the same. In their youth, they’ll try to mimic the wild boys, but they will fail. The wild boys will pay them no attention as they try to win the affection of the other girls. Evening by evening, they will offer their fruits to the gentle girls—their tempting gifts too delicious not to accept. The gentle girls will linger by them until the wild boys stop bringing them berries. Until their theirs become sour. Until they wished they found a gentle boy that brought his berries to his mother instead of her. The gentle girls would raise gentle children—boys that bring strawberries to his mother and girls that will fall for the juice of a wild boy’s fruits because the gentle girl knows no better.

           

These children are nothing like the wild girls, who become the most caring mothers, for they see the same wildness within their children and encourage it. They will become the most strict and devoted wives, for they had to wait for the affection of someone who saw past their wildness. And they’ll become the most sympathetic people, for they understand there is a wildness within everyone and knows how it damages.

           

These wild girls will marry the gentle boys who didn’t dance in the field but brought their mothers the wild berries so that they might have a taste of childhood again. The gentle boys will never comprehend the wildness of their wives and children. They will only love them in the way we all love the wild ones.

 

The gentle boys will raise wild children and think nothing more of want, while the gentle girls will raise gentle children and never stop wanting. 

           

We like to gather in the evening when the sky looks like strawberry ice cream. We talk about everything and nothing. We gather when the nights get cool, but the days stay hot. When the babies are just babies—barely able to walk.

           

When we want to watch the children dance in the field and, if we are lucky and look very closely, the wild strawberries may appear.