As a small child in the 90s, my Batman bike was my prized possession. It was beautiful. Black and blue, with an oval, glow-in-the-dark Bat symbol attached to the front of the handlebars. My sister and I spent hours looping around our basement, hurrying past the “scary part,” an unfinished area filled with storage boxes and Nordictrac equipment scarcely used. Our home had been built in the 1920s. It creaked and slanted and felt “lived in,” by us and by others.
I was in the lead that Saturday morning. I turned the corner and entered the “scary part.” I told myself to be cool. Be brave. Nothing was there. Until there was.
In a sea of cardboard boxes, something stood out. A face. A boy.
“STOP! It’s mine!”
He pointed at my bike.
”That is mine.”
I spun out, into the wall. Moments later, my sister caught up with me.
”Why’d you crash, sissy?”
I grabbed her hand and ran upstairs as fast as my wobbly legs allowed.
My dad said it was an imaginary friend I hadn’t met yet.
”Introduce yourself,” he said with a smile. ”Maybe he’s like Champ.”
Champ was my invisible German Shepherd friend.
”I don’t think he’s like Champ,” I whispered in his ear, afraid the boy might hear.
He patted me on the head and told me to go and play.
——
That night, I tossed and turned. I was afraid, and then I was angry.
”It ISN’T his. It’s mine! What if he takes it while I’m asleep?”
I grabbed my color changing flashlight and crept downstairs. Darkness permeated every corner of the den. It was a different house at night.
Flashlight on, I tiptoed down the basement steps. We didn’t have a light switch on the wall. Instead, a single bulb with a long string dangled just out of my reach. I was too scared to find the step ladder. I felt eyes on me as I turned the corner, the “scary part” illuminated only by the light of the moon in the window.
”I had a bike.”
The boy. I didn’t see him. It sounded like he was everywhere and nowhere.
”It was mine.”
And there, in the retired rocking chair from my sister’s nursery, he sat. Rocking gently. Back and forth. I steadied myself.
”Listen… I don’t want you to think that my bike is yours. It’s mine. I got it for my birthday and I just wanted you to know.”
The rocking stopped.
I wanted to run. My legs were stuck to the floor. He smiled.
”Are you my friend?”
The way he said it unsettled me, like he was daring me to say “no.”
”Um… If you’re nice, we can be friends. Are you nice?”
He started rocking again.
”I can be nice. Are we friends?”
I nodded.
”Good,” he said with a smile. ”Friends share.”
And he was gone. The chill I hadn’t noticed until that moment seemed to dissipate. I ran like I was being chased all the way back to my bed. Two words filled my head in the darkness:
”Friends share.”
I kept my flashlight on all night.
——
I found my Bat bike wedged behind my Mom’s crafting table and a box labeled: KITCHEN CRAP (DONATE.) I knew it wasn’t my doing. My sister and I parked our bikes by our blanket fort. We’d even made a “driveway” and labeled parking spots out of construction paper and sparkly markers.
”Friends share.”
Every morning for a month, I’d find my bike in random places around the basement. Once, after I’d searched everywhere, my dad found it in turned upside down, perched precariously on a stack of boxes too tall for me to reach.
”Be more careful with your stuff, kiddo! How’d you even manage to do this?” He laughed. I faked a smile and made up an excuse.
The boy was drawn to me like a moth to a flame. My sister believed me but she never saw him. I was glad about both.
Before long, my sister, and our friends, would “lose” toys at our house. Every play date, something went missing. My best friend never found his Nerf slingshot. We’d been playing with it moments before it vanished.
But my Batman bike was the boy’s favorite.
——
I grew up. Memories faded like old photographs. Five years ago, my wife and I had a son. His birthday was in May. I surprised him with a Paw Patrol bike. He was so excited. He lived on that thing.
Until last week, when the rhythmic ”thum thump” of his wheels rolling on and off the carpet in the hallway came to an abrupt halt. I leaned back in my office chair and craned my neck, partially revealing the dim hallway. At the end of the hall stood my son, his back to me.
”No!” he screamed, startling me. He stomped his little foot.
”It’s mine.”