Wait Two Seconds

The pigeon had stolen a french fry.

Not a fry that had fallen on the ground.

Not an abandoned fry.

No.

It had waited for Samy to turn his head, it had approached very quietly, as if it had absolutely no bad intentions, then it had grabbed the biggest fry from the container and had left with it.

Samy had shouted:

"Hey! That was the best one!"

We had started running after the pigeon.

Which was completely useless.

But at the moment, it had seemed like an excellent idea.

The pigeon had flown onto a bench.

Then onto a trash can.

Then onto a branch.

And from up there, it had eaten the fry in front of us.

Calmly.

As if it had won.

I think I had never laughed so much over a fry.

All the way back, I was thinking about how I was going to tell Oummi about it.

I already knew exactly how to start.

I would push the door open.

I would put down my bag.

And I would say:

"Oummi, you won't believe what a pigeon did today!"

Then, I would imitate Samy.

Maybe even the pigeon.

I was very good at imitating pigeons.

Well, I thought so.

When I got home, Oummi was sitting in the living room.

Her phone in one hand.

I came in almost running.

"Oummi, you won't believe what happened at the park!"

She raised a finger without taking her eyes off the screen.

"Wait two seconds, Rayane."

I stopped.

Okay.

Two seconds.

I put down my bag.

I stayed standing next to the couch.

Oummi was typing something.

I looked at the TV screen which was off.

Then the window.

Then my shoes.

I wondered how long two seconds really lasted.

So I started counting in my head.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five.

At twenty-three, I stopped.

Oummi was still on her phone.

I went to drink some water.

When I came back, she had started a voice message.

So I went up to my room.

The pigeon could wait.

---

At the table

That evening, during the meal, I remembered.

"Oh yeah! You know what happened to Samy at the park?"

Abi looked up at me.

"What?"

I smiled.

I was finally going to be able to tell.

"He had bought fries and there was a pigeon that..."

Abi's phone vibrated on the table.

He looked at it.

Just a second.

Then he unlocked the screen.

I continued anyway.

"And the pigeon, it came closer and..."

Oummi received a notification in turn.

She picked up her phone.

I stopped.

No one noticed.

I waited a bit.

Abi was typing.

Oummi was reading something.

My little brother was eating his bread.

So I picked up my fork.

The pigeon wasn't as funny anymore.

---

At our house, there were a lot of "waits"

At our house, there were a lot of "waits."

"Oummi, look at what I drew."

"Wait two seconds."

"Abi, can you come see?"

"One second, my son."

"Oummi, I have a question."

"Wait, let me finish this."

Sometimes, they really did come back.

Oummi would come into my room ten minutes later.

"You wanted to show me something?"

And then, sometimes, I couldn't quite find what I wanted to say anymore.

Or the urge had gone.

Sometimes Abi would say:

"Sorry, Rayane, what were you telling me earlier?"

I knew he was making an effort.

So I would start again.

But starting a story again is not the same.

The first time, you have the whole story in your head.

The gestures.

The voices.

The details.

You want to get it out right away.

Later, often all that's left is:

"It was nothing."

---

The very dangerous machine

One Wednesday, I built something in my room.

It had started with a big cardboard box that we had kept after a delivery.

At first, I wanted to make a boat.

Then I decided it would be a spaceship.

Then, I added four wheels drawn on the sides, so it also looked like a car.

Finally, I didn't know exactly what I had built anymore.

But it was huge.

I had cut out buttons from paper.

I had made a steering wheel out of a paper plate.

I had even written:

DO NOT TOUCH, VERY DANGEROUS MACHINE

on the side.

I went downstairs to get Abi.

He was sitting at the kitchen table with his phone.

"Abi, come see what I made."

"I'm coming."

"Now?"

"Yes, yes. Two seconds."

I went back up.

I sat in front of my machine.

I waited.

Then I moved a button.

Then I added a second button.

Then I started testing my machine by myself.

I pretended it was going to the Moon.

Then to Mars.

Then to the bottom of the ocean.

I don't know how much time had passed when Abi came in.

"So, where is this thing you wanted to show me?"

I was half lying in the cardboard box.

I sat up.

"There."

He looked.

"Wow! What is it?"

I shrugged.

"Nothing."

He laughed.

"What do you mean, nothing? It takes up half your room!"

I smiled a little.

But I didn't explain everything.

I had already taken the trip without him.

---

The shot

A few days later, we were at the park.

There was Samy, Bilal, and me.

We had decided to have a contest with our balls.

You had to shoot from a line we had drawn with a stick and hit the trunk of a tree.

Bilal had succeeded on the first try.

Samy on the third.

Me, I had missed.

Then again.

Then again.

The ball went to the left.

To the right.

Once, it even rolled behind me.

I still don't know how I did that.

Samy had made so much fun of me that he had fallen sitting in the grass.

So I practiced.

Again.

And again.

The next day, I came back.

Then the day after.

I wanted to succeed.

Not to win something.

Just because I had decided I was going to do it.

And one afternoon, I placed the ball behind the line.

I stepped back.

I shot.

THUNK.

Right in the middle of the trunk.

I stood still.

Then I raised my arms.

"YES!"

Samy shouted louder than me.

Bilal came to high-five me.

And immediately, I thought:

I have to tell Abi about this.

I even imagined showing him the shot the following weekend.

Then I went home.

When I opened the door, Abi was in the living room.

Phone in hand.

He looked at me.

"Are you okay, my son?"

"Yes."

"What did you do?"

I opened my mouth.

Then I looked at his phone.

"Nothing."

I went upstairs.

I think that's the day something changed.

---

I was telling less

Before, I used to tell a lot of things.

Even things that were useless.

A huge ant.

A cloud that looked like a shoe.

A car with three dogs inside.

A man who had sneezed so hard that Samy had jumped.

I always had something to tell.

Then I started telling less.

Not because nothing was happening anymore.

On the contrary.

Lots of things were still happening.

I was simply keeping more things in my head.

When Oummi asked:

"Did your day go well?"

I would answer:

"Yes."

"What did you do?"

"Nothing special."

And often, that was it.

One evening, I was in the hallway when I heard Oummi say to Abi:

"I feel like Rayane doesn't tell us much anymore these days."

Abi answered:

"That's true. Maybe he's growing up."

I stayed behind the door.

Maybe I'm growing up.

I didn't know.

But I knew that wasn't exactly it.

---

At Grandpa and Grandma's

The following Sunday, we went to Grandpa and Grandma's.

Grandpa was sitting in his armchair when I arrived.

As soon as I had taken off my shoes, he asked me:

"So Rayane, what's new?"

I told him about the ball.

About the shot against the tree.

About Samy falling in the grass.

Then I remembered the pigeon.

So I told the story of the fry.

Grandpa was laughing so hard his eyes were almost closed.

"Wait, wait!"

He was still laughing.

"The pigeon really ate the fry in front of you?"

"Yes! Like this!"

I started imitating the pigeon.

Grandpa was laughing even harder.

So I told him about my cardboard machine.

I explained all the buttons to him.

The trip to Mars.

The bottom of the ocean.

Even the red button that was absolutely useless but that you must never touch.

I was explaining why when I caught sight of Oummi at the entrance of the living room.

She was looking at me.

She wasn't saying anything.

Her phone was in her hand.

But the screen was off.

---

"Because you always say wait"

On the way back, she was quieter than usual.

Then, in the evening, she came to my room.

My cardboard machine was still there.

It was starting to lean to one side.

Oummi sat on the edge of the bed.

"Rayane?"

"Yes?"

She looked at the machine.

"You told Grandpa a lot of things today."

I nodded.

"Yes."

She waited.

Then she asked me:

"Why don't you tell me all that anymore?"

I looked at my hands.

I didn't know what to answer.

Because there hadn't been a day when I had decided:

From now on, I won't tell anything anymore.

It had just happened little by little.

Oummi waited.

So I said:

"Because you're busy."

She frowned slightly.

"All the time?"

I shrugged.

Then I added:

"You always say wait."

She didn't answer anything.

I thought she was going to tell me that sometimes she was working on her phone.

That some things were important.

That adults had things to do.

And it was true.

I knew that.

But she didn't say that.

She put her phone on my table.

"I'm sorry."

I looked up.

"I didn't think you felt that way."

Then she asked:

"Did you think I didn't want to listen to you?"

I thought about it.

"No."

Then I changed my mind.

"Well... I don't know."

Oummi looked down for a moment.

"You know, sometimes when I told you to wait, it was really something important."

I nodded.

"But sometimes, it could wait."

She looked at her phone on the table.

"And I think I wasn't telling the difference very well anymore."

I didn't say anything.

Then she pointed to my machine.

"So... will you explain it to me?"

I looked at the cardboard.

"Now?"

"Now."

I got off the bed.

"Okay. So first, it looks like a car, but it's not a car."

She smiled.

"Okay."

"And it looks like a spaceship, but it's not just a spaceship."

"Okay..."

"And there, especially, you must never touch."

I pointed to the red button.

Oummi reached out her finger.

"This one?"

"OUMMI!"

She burst out laughing.

Me too.

And I told everything.

Even Mars.

---

The phones didn't disappear

After that, the phones didn't disappear from the house.

Abi still had work.

Oummi still received messages.

Sometimes, they also watched things just because they felt like it.

And me too, sometimes.

But some things changed.

During meals, the phones stayed away from the table more often.

And when I came home from the park, Oummi tried not to ask me a question while looking at something else.

She would say:

"So?"

And she would really look at me.

One evening, I was explaining to Abi why Bilal and I had decided that a snail found near the park had to be called Mourad.

I don't remember why anymore.

It was obvious at the time.

Abi's phone vibrated.

He picked it up.

I continued for two seconds.

Then I stopped.

Abi looked at the screen.

Then he looked at me.

He put the phone down.

"Sorry. Continue."

I smiled.

"So Mourad..."

And I continued.

---

Tell me

A few days later, I came home from the park.

Oummi was sitting in the living room.

Phone in hand.

I took off my shoes.

She looked up.

Our eyes met.

Then she put her phone down, screen against the table.

"So? Tell me."

I stayed standing for a few seconds.

Because actually, I had something to tell.

Something very important.

Well...

Important to me.

"Do you remember the pigeon that stole Samy's fry?"

Oummi nodded.

"Yes."

"It came back."

Her eyes widened.

"No."

"Yes."

I came closer.

"And this time, Bilal had a sandwich."

Oummi started laughing even before I had finished.

So I told.

Everything.

The shouts.

The sandwich.

Bilal running.

The pigeon that had flown onto the same bench.

Even Samy repeating:

"I told you it knew us!"

It wasn't a very important story for adults.

No one had won a medal.

No one had accomplished something extraordinary.

It was just a pigeon.

A sandwich.

Three boys running in a park.

But I think I understood something that day.

For a while, I had thought that maybe my stories were too small.

That they could always wait two seconds.

Then two more seconds.

Then later.

But some things are small only when you're not the one living them.

And I was eight years old.

So sometimes, a pigeon stealing a sandwich...

was a very big story.