The wailing cries of a little girl caught the attention of a young man who’d been focused on his laptop. He got up from the couch immediately and followed the cries of his daughter to the backyard, where she’d been for the last few hours. As soon as he was outside he saw her on her scratched knees crying into her tightly clenched fists.

“Honey, what’s wrong?” He asked rushing over to her.

“Daddy!” She continued to cry, sniffling between a couple words. “I was- I was working, o-on my project, you know, for class.”

“Art class?”

“Yeah.” She answered in a shaky voice. “I’ve been working on it for days, and-and it was coming along fine, but then! But then before it dried up the wind knocked it over, and now i-it’s ruined!”

Her dad looked at the cardboard and papier-mâché structure she put so much time into, now in shambles. He’d seen the work in progress beforehand, when it barely had any shape to when it started taking form.

“I-I worked so hard on it, and it’s due in two days! It’s a disaster now and I’ll never get it done!” She was sobbing now, tears gushing from her eyes and her face was red. The afternoon heat beating down on her didn’t help.

Her dad put his arms around her and held onto her. “Shhh, shh, it’s okay sweetie. Don’t worry, it’ll be alright.” He told her in a calm tone to comfort her. “I know you can do it. You still have time left.” Her crying died down to sniffles as he continued hugging and cradling his child. “How’s about you take a little break from this I’ll get you a treat to cheer you up?”

She sniffed and wiped a tear from her eye. “Okay.”

“And I know just the thing that’ll help.” Picking her up he walked back into the house, set her on the couch, grabbed his wallet and put it in the back pocket of his pants, picked his daughter back up, and walked out the front door.

Minutes later they arrived at a local ice cream place not far from their house, a small place called Sweet Dream Creams. The brightly colored letters of the sign and cartoon designs of ice cream cones on the side were inviting to the little girl’s eyes. He walked inside, his daughter still in his arms, the bell above the door signaling a familiar face working there.

“Hey Dave!” The man behind the counter greeted the father. “What brings you in?” The interior of the shop was simplistic, with white walls and a black and white checkered floor, but it still had a charm to it.

“Hey Martin, I’m getting something for my little girl here. She’s having a bad day.” Dave motioned his head in her direction. She stopped crying minutes ago, but her expression hadn’t changed much.

“Oh, you are, Debbie? I’m sorry to hear that. What would you like to cheer yourself up? I got at least ten different flavors here! There’s gotta be something here to perk yourself up.” He gestured to all the containers full of ice cream on display through the glass above the counter. “Pick any flavor you’d like. What’re you in the mood for today?”

Debbie hummed in thought as she looked over the flavors to choose. There were a few of the classics (rocky road, vanilla, and strawberry) as well as a couple less conventional ones: sweet dreams, coco paradise, the Elvis, and the one that caught her eye, magic. It was one of the most bright, vibrantly colored ice cream flavors she’d ever seen. Pink, white, and yellow that seemed to glitter in the light, and if that wasn’t enough it also had purple star shaped sprinkles decorating it. Already she could feel the sugar coursing through her veins.

“That one.” She pointed to the magic flavor.

“Excellent choice! It’s one of our best flavors here.” Martin commented, grabbling a scoopful and putting it on top of a waffle cone. “You want anything, Dave?”

“I’ll just have a vanilla cone.”

“Alright, coming right up.” He said as he handed the first cone to Debbie. “Be careful not to drop it.” Then after giving Dave his cone, the father sat down in a seat next to a wide window with his daughter, letting her take a seat next to him.

After a few licks of her ice cream Dave asked, “What do you think?”

“I like it.” She answered. “It’s super sweet.”

“Good.” A few more seconds of silence followed before he asked, “Feeling any better?”

“A little.”

“Still upset about the project?”

“yeah.”

“You know, it’s not as bad as it seems. It just needs some patching up. You did a good job with it so far, I’m sure it won’t take long to fix it. You’ll be back on track in no time.” Dave encouraged.

Debbie didn’t reply.

“You’ve already come so far, Deb, you can’t give up now.”

She still said nothing, staring at her ice cream.

“What’s wrong, sweetie?”

“I shouldn’t have let it sit outside.” She finally said.

“Don’t beat yourself up over that. Everyone makes mistakes at some point in their life, it’s not the end of the world. Life still goes on, and you can pick yourself up and keep going. In life you have to keep yourself going and moving forward. Whatever mistakes you made you can learn from them and grow and better yourself in the future. You’re only nine years old, you still have so much potential ahead of you, there’s still so much you’ve yet to do, and I know whatever it is you want to do, as long as you keep yourself going and pushing and put in all the effort you can, you can go far. You’ve got all the time in the world and plenty of growing up to do, and already you’re doing good.”

“But I only have two more days, I’ll never get it done.”

“You can do it, I know you can. You’ve been able to get through projects like this before, you gotta have some faith in yourself. You’re a strong girl, you know you can do this. I believe in you.” He let the last four words sink in. “If you’d like I’ll help you fix it and with whatever else you’ll need, okay?”

“Okay.” She said, her voice in higher spirits.

“There ya go! I promise I’ll help you get it done in time.” He said with a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “You want to stay here and finish your cone or do you want to head home and finish it on the way?”

“Just a minute.”

“Alright.” Dave went back to finishing his cone. “After we finish fixing it up, is there anything you’d like to do later? Maybe we could watch a movie together?”

Debbie gave it some thought. “Okay!”

“Which one would you like?”

“The Little Puffin.”

“Sounds good!”

“Can Puffy Jr watch, too?” She referred to her stuffed puffin toy she named after her favorite character in that film.

“Sure!”

The sun’s heat had lessened, a cool breeze assisting with that, along with larger shadows cast on the ground to seek shade in. On their way home as Debbie’s ice cream was beginning to melt, and nearly dripped on her pink baggy t-shirt, she asked, “Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“Why is this flavor called magic?”

“Why? Hm…” He paused to think of an answer. “Maybe because it’s so good that you’d have to be a wizard to make it.” They both laughed, Dave chuckling and Debbie giggling. His daughter’s laughter was enough to make him smile.

Food for Thought © 2018, Jackie Caslis