High Jinks — Oversized Tee

There is a particular stretch of path on which walking suddenly seems like a timid use of the available space. You are alone, the ground is level, and nobody has asked you to arrive with dignity. You take a few quicker steps. Then, for reasons you would struggle to defend in a meeting, you skip.

Your body remembers immediately. This is slightly irritating. It has forgotten several useful passwords and the reason you came into the kitchen, but an elaborate method of travelling nowhere efficiently has survived in perfect working order. You do it again, with more room between the steps.

You have missed this sort of pleasure. Nothing to record, no route to compare with last time, no person in your ear insisting that you have nearly earned your breakfast. The wide lilac tee was chosen because you liked the amount of it. Your oldest trousers are making no demands on the occasion. For a short distance, getting there has become the entertaining part.

Someone appears at the bend. You return to walking with a composure so sudden it is considerably more suspicious than the skipping. They nod. You nod. Two adults pass each other, each apparently engaged in the solemn business of using a path.

A little farther on, you hear quick uneven footsteps behind you. You resist turning round for nearly three seconds. When you do, they are smiling. They have remembered it as well.

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