Imagine That

a short story by Zoie Morgan

Alice Hinsley is seventy-three years old. 
 

I’ve never been assigned the same child twice, much less when the child is grown up, and waiting for the whisper of death to take them home.
 

It’s why I’m so confused to be back in a body I’d nearly forgot I used to be. 
 

The gray skin itches at first, but I get used to it by the time I materialize in her room.

The hardest part about being an elephant, imaginary or not, is that no matter where you are, your trunk is always in the picture. 
 

My breath catches when I realize I’m not just an elephant, I’m her elephant. Again. 
 

“Alice?” My voice is barely a whisper, and I worry if I say anything louder, she might crumble under the weight. 
 

Her smile. Even after all these years, her smile and her eyes are the same. I still see the young eleven-year-old girl underneath all that age. It pains me to see her like this.

“Humphrey.” Her voice shakes, rattles. If you’ve ever heard the creaking sounds of an old house, she sounds somewhat like that. Like a whisper, like I’m still here. Breathing, alive, don’t leave me. 
 

“Alice,” I say again, braver this time. “Alice, you grew out of me nearly sixty years ago.”
She reaches for my trunk, taking it in her hands and stroking it. I’m glad her room has no windows. No one will laugh at her like they used to when she was young. “I needed you again.”
 

I watch her. Take in her skin, nearly as pale and saggy as mine. Her white hair, loose at her shoulders, but nearly gone. The way the green of her eyes fades away when seconds before, it was brighter than anything you’d ever seen. 
 

“Humphrey, I don’t have much time,” She pauses, to wipe away a stray tear. “I have no family, no friends. I made mistakes in life, Humphrey. I need you again. I need someone to stay with me before I go. I don’t want to be alone.”
 

It’s different, now that Alice is older. When she was eleven, she talked like a grownup, so

I did too. Now, she is grown, and I can’t bring myself to believe it. I don’t want to see her like this. 
 

But I have to. I have to do my job. I was called here, I will be her friend until she doesn’t need me anymore. Then, I’ll start a new job, as someone else, to accompany another person until they no longer need me, and so on. That’s how it goes. 
 

That’s how it’s always been.
 

“Humphrey, talk to me before I go. Tell me a story.”
 

“I’m not a story-teller, Alice,” I pull my trunk from her wrinkled fingers. I don’t want to watch her as she dies. I can’t watch another child of mine die when I can’t do anything to stop it.
 

It’s not fair.
 

“Humphrey,” She reaches for me again, and I see her eyes flash with determination. She’d always been the boss, no matter how I tried to reason with her. 
 

I didn’t mind that she was bossy, in fact, most of my children were. It was the fact that she wasn’t one to think. She was the child that said let’s jump out of trees and throw eggs at Melinda Calkins because she made fun of me on picture day. 
 

“I want to hear about her, dear. About the one before me.” 
 

I am once again surprised. First, I am called back to a child I have already been assigned to, as an adult, then she wants to know about the child I was assigned before her?
 

“How do you know about her?”
 

She ignores me, with a flutter of her fingers, begins to talk again. “I wasn’t aware even imaginary friends grieved. I didn’t know they had other children either. Growing old has its perks, dear friend.” 
 

I watch her intently, tiring to the point where she can’t look at me anymore.
 

“I began to see things as I got older, and maybe it was the Alzheimer’s, but I began to swear I could see you, working your way to different children as I aged. And every year I got closer to this moment, you became clearer.” She closes her eyes, breathes hard. “I know it was you, even with your new names, and costumes. One doesn’t ever forget their first and only real friend.”
 

“I always watch out for my children,” I say. It’s an odd feeling, talking to her again, about real things. About me. I’ve never been able to do that. “It’s why I’ve never left this town.”
 

She nods, absently. “What happened to her, Humphrey? To the girl before me. Why was she different from the rest of us?”
 

I swallow. Shrink down to the size of a house cat, and squirm in my chair. “She died.”
 

“You’re other children will die. I will die.”
 

“She was seven-years-old when she passed.”
 

Her heart monitor slows but doesn’t drop too much. She’s falling asleep. “Humphrey, do keep telling me. I want to know.” 
 

“Her name was Polly.” I begin to unearth my secrets. Spilling memories of Polly like water from a spout. I have no choice really, Polly tumbles from my mouth like a trapeze artist, slipping from the bone of my teeth and rolling down the trunk of my nose. She lands in a heap on the floor of Alice’s room. 
 

The wounds are open. I watch the blood paint the picture. 

Polly was six when I first came. I was still sneezing out the remains of my cat fur when I plopped out of a tree and into the farmyard directly in front of Polly.
 

She immediately knew my name, Rutabaga, after her favorite plant her mother grew. I looked down at her, and then at me, at the purple scales in my claws, at the chubby legs that protruded from my large belly. 
 

I’d never, ever, been a dragon before. 
 

A snake, once or twice, a house cat more often than not, and occasionally a rabbit or a lion, but never a mythical creature. 
 

She took me by the claw and I began to help her water the yard, and feed the animals. 
 

Polly said she made me a dragon so she wouldn’t lose me in the sea of farm pets. 
 

I told her she was very considerate. 
 

Polly was one of my favorites. 
 

Now, please, don’t get me wrong. I love all my kids, every single one—even Andre, who lit my tail of fire twice—but Polly was different. I often forgot I wasn’t real, because her family included me, so much I wondered if at first, they could see me, too. It didn’t take me long to realize, they couldn’t, but that Polly’s mother, Charlotte, had been one of my first children. 
 

I was well-aware imaginary friends changed everything from name, to appearance, and even sometimes personalities when we were assigned new children, but I’ve always been a firm believer, that just like we remember and can pick out our kids, they can do the same with their imaginary friends, even if we are invisible to them. Especially since most of us do stay local, for that purpose exactly. 
 

Back to Polly, she made me feel like I was there for more than just her. She was six-years-old, and her power of love was so strong, it nearly made me real. She loved me so much, her family could feel my presence. That was huge in my world. 
 

Back home, it was nearly unheard of that a child could love their imaginary friend that much. It had happened maybe a total of four times in the entire lifespan of however long we’d existed. 
 

I knew Polly was meant to change the world. I was with her for fifteen months. I stayed with children anywhere from a few months to a few years. It wasn’t unusual that I was with her for so long. What I couldn’t understand, was why. 
 

As far as I knew, she didn’t need me. She had friends, a healthy family life. She was a good egg, as good and safe as it gets. 
 

I began to dread that every day would be my last with her, because she just kept getting happier, stronger, growing into something wonderful. I was always prepared to say goodbye. 
 

I was always prepared to wake up, back in my home. Ready for the boss to assign me another child and give me a day to prepare for them. 
 

It wasn’t until the winter after Polly turned seven, that I realized what she would need me for. 
 

We were piled into the chuggy little green minivan, looking at Christmas lights. 
 

I was plastered against the window next to Polly as we took in the fluorescent lights of every house. 
 

In all my life, I’d only ever seen them here, with Polly. 
 

I loved them. They were by far my favorite part of human life; well except for the children themselves. 
 

Polly took my claw in her little hand and pointed to each house that caught her eye. She’d say, “look at that one!” and I would. 
 

We were driving home. Polly had fallen asleep, and I was shrunk about the size of a small dog, all tired in her lap. 
 

Her brother, Cam, was nearly out, playing tough, like boys who are ten do, and trying his hardest not to let himself drop off. 
 

It was nearly eleven o’clock as we turned onto that desolate street. The speed limit must have bumped up because the car picked up speed, getting fast enough that Cam stirred. “Are we going home?”
 

Charlotte nodded and reached for him, hand on his leg. “Almost, baby. Try to get some sleep.”
 

But Cam didn’t try to get some sleep.
 

Instead, he cried out, “Dog!” 
 

Their father tried to swerve out of the way, and if it hadn’t been for that patch of ice, he would have. The patch was large enough that the car skidded a good ways off the road, in a haze, Mr. Jenson lunged for the breaks and somehow hit the gas, sending the car straight into a tree. 
 

Polly never stirred. Never once, did she wake up, even when her little body flew from the backseat to the front, because I hadn’t even noticed she’d never put her seatbelt back on. 
 

I sat there, in the seat, the only one unscathed, and wondered why I hadn’t fallen after her. 
 

I wasn’t real. I couldn’t do anything. 
 

I jumped from my seat to Polly, lying there on the floor. She moved now, her little body shuddering. I reached to wipe away the blood on her forehead, but it wouldn’t come off. 
 

I wasn’t real. 
 

I tried to tell her to keep her eyes open, she had to do that. Humans can’t sleep after they hit their heads. I tried to shake her, but I couldn’t lift her. 
 

I wasn’t real. 
 

Cam cried in his seat. He said, “Mom, it’s Polly!”
 

Charlotte was already stumbling out of the car, running on shaking legs to the house across the street. 
 

Mr. Jenson had hit his head on the wheel, he wasn’t talking either. I saw his eyes, they were open. I saw him close them. I saw him shake away his son’s voice. 
 

I turned to Cam once more, tried to calm him down. He couldn’t see me. I wasn’t real. 
 

I put a hand on each of theirs and talked, even though neither could hear a thing I said. 
 

I opened my eyes to a large man opening the door. I watched both of them get pulled onto large stretchers, too big for their bodies. 
 

I slipped out of the car, jumping onto Polly’s lap. She never felt it. 
 

I told her she had to wake up because she still had to change the world. I told her I still needed her. 
 

I heard one of the medics say she’s slipped into a coma, that they weren’t sure if they could wake her. They said she shouldn’t have closed her eyes. 
 

I shouldn’t have let her close her eyes. 
 

The hospital was dark, empty. Maybe I just couldn’t see the people. Maybe I was too focused on Polly. 
 

She was the only one who wasn’t okay. The only one who the doctors couldn’t fix in a couple of days. 
 

I watched in horror as they hooked up her monitor, as the nurse shook her head at her little body and went to find a smaller breathing tube. 
 

The machine breathed for her. She couldn’t do it alone. 
 

I held her little hand and told her about the world she changed. I told her that she did change the world, she changed my world. I realized then, that she needed me because she was never meant to change the whole world. She needed me so she could change one life before she lost hers. 
 

That was why I’d been with her so long, and why I was here, now. 
 

I told her everything about all my other kids, and how she was my favorite because she made me feel real. I told her I was sorry I couldn’t keep her alive. 
 

I told her every story I could, emptying every thought in my head until her monitor finally deadlined, and she was gone.
 

It was the only time I got to say goodbye to one of my kids.
 

And it was the only goodbye I wished I never had to say.

​

Until now. 
 

Alice stirs in her sleep, eyes blinking open. “Humphrey,” she says, she reaches for my trunk and I have to place it in her weak hands. “Humphrey, she was beautiful.”
 

I nod. I can’t really say anything else. I never thought I’d have to say goodbye again.
 

“I don’t have much time.” Her voice begins to shake. “There’s a man by my door, can you see him? He’s waiting for me to say goodbye so he can take me home.”
 

I look to the door. I see the outline of a higher power than even me. The same one I saw when Polly left. I nod in his direction. Feel a flicker of calm in the pit of my belly. His doing. His condolences. 
 

Her hands grow softer in mine. When I turn, Alice is no longer an old woman, but a young girl again, with her hair in braids and her favorite boots back on her feet. 
 

She slips from the bed and kisses my trunk. “I’ll say hello to Polly, dear. Thank you for everything. Goodbye, Humphrey.”
 

I watch her leave, and I feel myself evaporating from this world, waking up in my own. 
 

Starting over, because that’s all you can ever do. Start over and keep going. Living for those who can’t anymore. 
 

I take a deep breath, walk into the boss’ office. Pick up my new mission. 
 

Take care, Polly, Alice. Goodbye.

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