…and so she found the house…a long walk from the little apartment on the second floor with the old wooden stairs, but the day was very nice…  She found the street, and the address, and came to the…place…  And…as she slowly climbed the steps of old uneven broken stone and all out of place, she already knew the truth, but maybe it was because she was young, and…could not even imagine, even in a story, how anyone could do this, could say the things only…a friend…at school, would say.  But she walked up all the stairs to the top…and…yes, what her mind and feelings deep in her stomach almost more than a 100% already knew, that…that…she didn’t want to say, did not want to see, did not want to know…  

There was no house here. Even when she walked to the middle of the space, a space of dirt and weeds and broken bricks and glass, and she raised her hand and felt all around, where, yes, she knew there must be a house, there was no house. And as she turned all around she closed her eyes and felt all around and strained her ears to hear the sounds of the party of children shouting and laughing and singing happy birthday…and almost she could smell the flames of the birthday candles soon to be blown out with cheers and laughing, the taste of a wonderful cake with an inch of sugar sweet icing and ice cream oh, vanilla or chocolate, it didn’t matter, almost also upon her lips.

And then, when she finished her slow hoping-in-magic turning, she opened her eyes and…there…was still no house, but at some time, maybe long ago, surely there must have been happy birthday parties for happy children and happy invited friends with presents and all laughing and glad to see each other…  But not here, not now as her…friend…had invited her to…with lots of other children around, that…she wanted her to come to her birthday at 734 Pierre St. on Saturday afternoon with lots of children and cake and ice cream…and she wrote it all down on a paper to give to her.  And she had said yes, for before no friend had…  She had no friends…but she didn’t know why… No one had asked her to come to a birthday party before…and…and…  Her thoughts stopped, they could not go on anymore…  No, she didn’t want them to go on.  After a moment, her shoes moved her feet slowly one at a time to the stairs and then they would go no further and she just sat down and thought of nothing, for everything was sad, so sad and…even the old stone steps, they were sad and sadder still as she sat upon them…

…and then years later, a lifetime later, a different lifetime it seemed, she now watched from the spacious front porch her own daughter, not as old as she was back then, skip down the long driveway to the waiting car, carrying a present, picked up by her friend’s mother, and she waved back as her daughter turned, smiled, and waved happy and held up the pretty present they both prettily wrapped together as they laughed and sang happy birthday, not because her daughter didn’t know the words or the melody, but because they always sang it before any birthday party, sometimes days ahead, to make the coming birthday party, the coming birthday party with cake and ice cream, always special, for even now, at times, there was still the pain and hurt and sadness and deep, deep, down…maybe a fear this would befall her precious, more than precious, little girl now all getting older and bigger…  She still did this all for her…and for herself…for a reason…well, some reason…maybe even now not fully understood…but some reason…and one never whispered or spoken of… 

Though at times, the soul itself whispers…and the songs of hope, soft and still upon the horizon, such as her daughter happy and going to a happy birthday party waving back to her, lifted and spread the quietness and peace from deep within to her lips, as now, as the car with her daughter slowly pulled away, one gently whispered song, an arrangement of happy birthday and something beyond, slowly fashioned a smile of beauty upon the lips of her now deeply thoughtful face and within her far-seeing eyes.