''So, Ree-ree.'' She raised her teapot to pour water, pretending it was tea, into the small teacup before the empty chair. ''Should I keep calling you that, or do you have a name?''
She picked up the small pink teapot, its oval body adorned with delicate vertical stripes. Depictions of Disney princesses from various eras, each in their iconic gowns, were illustrated around the teapot. As she poured herself a cup of tea, she admired the intricate design. She wrapped her small fingers elegantly around the curvy handles of the tea cup before bringing it to her lips to have a small taste.
The location of the frequent tea party of two guests was by the veranda of their apartment. The moon was high and bright in the sky and the stars twinkled above them. The breeze was soft and gentle, which set up the right atmosphere for a play date with her best friend. She has fun with all her other friends at school, running around and jumping so high until her hands could touch the deep blue sky and play hide and seek with them. But once she is back from school and finished with her homework, she makes sure she dedicates at least four hours of her night daily to spend with Ree-ree. Her favorite person in the world.
Her brown eyes sparkled with interest when the bowl of plastic cookies moved a bit to the right. Her lips parted in slight shock that the entity she couldn't see or touch but can feel had a name apart from the boring one she usually calls him.
Charlotte leaned on the table. ''Really?!'
Her smile grew as that lovely twinkle in her eyes persisted when one of the fake cookies in the pink barbie bowl between them was flicked up in the air like a coin, and she watched how the cookie soared high in the air before dipping back into the bowl on its other side. The fact that he was able to do more than just moving things a bit to the left and right had her clapping her hands at him with a chuckle at his wonderful performance. She was deeply moved and impressed that he was also making more efforts to communicate and connect with her.
''My name is Charlotte Winchester, as you already know,'' she said with most of her teeth missing. ''May I know your name, Ree-ree?''
The silence that occurred after her words didn't dare dampen her mood. She thought how was he going to tell her his name when all he could do was to move things around. Verbal communication has always been one-sided, which has made their relationship a bit harder to maintain.
''Oh, I forgot.'' Came her soft tone as she stared at her watery tea in her small Cinderella cup. The gentle rush of breeze that blew past her face had her raising her chin up to stare at the space within her view. She suddenly had this overwhelming feeling of sadness that their relationship would always remain as one of an imaginary friend even though she believed deep down that he was real, beyond the fashion of her crazy imagination. Probably hasn't found a way to make himself visible to her yet.
She sniffed in understanding, wiped her nose and eyes with the back of her hands. Her eyes then dawned on the overgrown grass in their front yard. The reason for her parents' current fights. Her dad has been too busy watching his latest football matches to trim them, expecting her mom who works her butt off day and night to do it.
A brilliant idea, like a light bulb resonated in her. She emptied their bowl of cookies and poured away their pot of refreshment.
''One second, Ree-ree.'' She said before running down the small steps that lead to their front door and exploring the little jungle that makes up their front yard. She bent down on her knees immediately, not wanting to keep Ree-ree waiting, and began to cut the small green leaves and put them in the bowl, pick little twigs and stones to throw them inside the tea pot.
After a while, she rose to her feet and dust off the crumbles of sand from her body and palms. She carried what she'd just harvested and resumed back to the table of their tea party, gently making room for the tea pot filled with twigs and stones, the bowl filled with dry yellow leaves and some fresh green leaves.
''I have just found a way for you to talk to me more in words than to move things around to answer either yes or no.'' She smiled, happy to show him just how smart she was, even though her teachers usually tell her mom otherwise. She scrunched up her face in disgust at the terrible things her teachers in kindergarten said about her to her mom. Things they weren't bold enough to say right to her face.
They are all just jealous that they are not as lucky as her to be blessed with a phenomenon like Ree-ree. Who she wasn't ashamed to be talking to in school the moment she feels he was there, standing next to her.
''So, it's simple. One leaf represents the letter A. Two leafs stands for B, and if you take three leafs it means the letter C. You arrange them and use a twig to place in-between the letters. Once you have formed a word, you place a stone after it before you proceed to form the next word that would now later evolve to make a whole sentence. For example, I want to tell you that you are my best friend. Here is how you are going to move them to make me understand it.''
Y-O-U A-R-E M-Y B-E-S-T F-R-I-E-N-D
Charlotte started with stacking upon each other twenty-five leaves to represent the letter Y before placing a small twing beside it and then stacking fifteen leaves for the letter O and a twig was placed beside it then twenty-one leaves were placed on top of each other to form the word YOU.
She continued in that same pattern to create the word ARE, MY and then BEST.
FRIEND consisted of six leaves placed on top of each other, following eighteen leaves and then nine, followed by five before fourteen and ending by four leaves with little twigs placed in between the letters created and a stone to demarcate each word.
''See?'' She said, staring at the space before her. It might have seemed pretty complicated and stressful, but she believed as time went by she would have discovered faster and easier ways to communicate if not verbally. ''When you are ready, you can follow my example to introduce me to your name.'' She giggled, ''I bet your name sounds something like…'' Her eyes moved left and right in thought at what her mystery friend's name could be.
''Hmm, Prince Charming?''
She shook her head. That already belongs to a man in one of those Disney cartoons.
''Knight Edgar from Moonrise Kingdom? Lord Ree-ree the slayer of dragons!''
The stillness of the wind circulating around them made her pause to clear her throat while making herself sit straighter.
''Your name doesn't really need to be that fancy to be special to me. As long as I could pronounce it and call it with a swift response from you. We would then be having more tea-parties every week between me and you.''
Back in the present and in the hospital, Charlotte's quiet sobs filled the room as she gazed through the grand window near her bed, her eyes searching longingly for the moon amidst the shimmering sea of stars at night sky.
If only she hadn't forgotten his name. Perhaps, if she called it out, he might answer her in this lonely place.