Chapter 2: The Smell of Past (1/3): The Anniversary Rush in the Park

The adrenaline ran through my veins, it's setting my body ablaze. My entire body flails to maintain and extinguish the fire, so the brain can center the focus.

Supervise the joint, and you'll gain absolute control of the marionette.

The same principles can be applied anywhere, especially here, with your brain and body. By the way, even the hand of a marionettist was controlled by the brain at its core. It's just a matter of controlling the control into absolute control. The adrenaline is the key.

Not allowing the blood and oxygen to enter, you'll become the fool. Let the adrenaline dominate your body and brain, you'll become drunk. The adrenaline should be intended to boost our skills and our brain to maximum capacity.

That's the state I'm currently in with my daughter in this game of soccer. 

Doubled by the adrenaline, twenty to fifty words were processed every second in a cryptic way that we completely understand. What an enigmatic program inside our skull. Fascinating.

But only in this space that my speed match my daughter's.

  "Is that the best Mama got?" she declared as she stole my ball from the gap between my legs.

  I responded with me blocking her way to the goalpost. This time, I focused on my feet position so she wouldn't take advantage of the same loophole as she just did.

  "You're not the best yet when I'm here," 

And her response was by accelerating her dribble like crazy. The ball kept moving under her navel as if it was Tenten's dance partner. Magnificent, I must say. 

That's as far as I could comment on this precocious child with her craftiness.

"This isn't enough to beat me, Tenten."

What lacks in speed was made up for in physique and experience. With my experience, this instinct of mine has sharpened. With my physique, my body will reach the gaps in her dribbling pattern.

No matter how fast my daughter is in here, when she grew up, or any aspects of her life. If you wish to fulfill your promise to me. I'll be the wall of yours.

"Victory!"

Ah, a sweet taste of strawberry cream with her face of defeat as its topping. I ran, grabbed the ball inside the goalpost, and rubbed it on her face. Hahahaha! 

After all, victory must be celebrated. Celebration is synonymous with a firework. Since there weren't any fireworks to launch, I launch the ball into the sky with the shoes of the champion.

"Yeah!"

Tenten just watched me. Her eyes are narrowed, and her lip formed a straight, firm line. I'm a sadist for loving that face.

Oh no, I feel bad.

"Saved the sarcasm, Ma"

Her eyes were very, very narrowed until it's closed by the weight of her frustration. Which, If I noticed it earlier, I would say it out loud.

"Humph," Tenten sulked. 

Alright, alright. I don't want to drag this out any longer. I apologized to her. And to amend that, "I will buy you a drink while I grabbed the ball." 

Not much, but a small act of parental love is equal to fresh air around us, ya'know.

I better go, now. For my sweet ball of a daughter.

"Wait!" A voice intercepted me, flooded in her sweat and her breath. Currently sitting in the middle of the field, she said, "Carry Tenten with Mama."

She beckoned her four fingers on both palms faced me and directed at me specifically. 

"Tenten's leg is jelly," she added.

"Alright, I guess I deserve it,"―I offered my back to her and she climbed at it―"the same way I deserve my victory." 

The moment I said that, she reached my shoulder, sat on it, and reached for the cloud.

"Don't forget our promise. Stuffed pepper for our din― ow ow-Ow-OW." She pinched my cheeks, leaving behind a mark as red as her frustration. I hope not as red as my left eye. 

"I'll beat Mama, next time." 

A declaration that I've heard before. Under the blue sky.

"Didn't you say the same thing earlier? Where is our fried fish for dinner then?"

I provoked her a bit, can't help due to an old habit die hard.

"I'll beat Mama, next time." That last two emphatic words were said from her bitter tongue. I'll better hurry to breeze her up with a drink.

In the meantime, I better redeem myself to keep my pride as a mother. I'll just have to be honest with her.

"Can't wait for that day to come, ya'know. The day you will take care of me in my retirement."

"Tenten already did it, otherwise there wouldn't be any plates in the morning." Right. That's another reason I must not make her resent me, or she wouldn't feed me in the morning.

"Haha. . ." Nervous laughter indicated two things; either because of the thought just now or because I just got a reality check that smudges my motherly pride. Nothing personal by the end since she just spoke the fact―that I had no complaint with.

"What you said was not wrong, but let me give you a fact of my own."

We arrived in front of the vending machine.

Inserted my money in, I paid her attention with it.

"Tomorrow, on the 27th of September, will be the 7th anniversary of the Angel of Sin, the day you were reborn. Plus another three years before it, made it in a total of ten years."

Pressed the choice for her cold drink, I yearned for the breeze of the next moon.

"One decade of 'purification', one thousand men defied the inevitable of me, not one stood tall against my 10 years of my career. So―"

To my little angel on the cloud, I exchanged my present in the curiosity of her prolepsis.

"How're you gonna beat me, Tenten?"

Tenten crumbed the surface of the can with my hand still holding it. With that, she answered,

"Tenten just needs to be as great as Mama."

A declaration that I've heard before. Under the blue moon.

"It will not be easy, ya'know. It was and is never easy.

"Whether before, now, or in the future, you'll have to beat me to be me."

Promise sure is a beautiful thing.

Not much motion we are doing now other than walking to find the missing ball. My speech just now was to fill the silence as usual, like I enjoyed the usual of my daughter's cooking.

"Be better than mama to be mama, heh?" she wondered.

"Doesn't make sense when you said it out loud, huh? Haha."

"No, it does make sense for Tenten."

Hope it does, since I didn't put much thought into my wording. Rather, I just said the promise I believed, we believed, for the past 7 years, without any sign of suspension on our future.

"Don't die before that happened."

"My life is all yours, my little angel."

I can't see her expression over my shoulder. But I'm grateful she can't see the hint of sorrow on my face too.

"How many minutes we have left, Tenten?"

"Fifteen minutes before Uncle Dom picks us up according to the necklace." She put good use of my present, I see. 

"Why asked?"

Why? 

"I just wished this tranquility last for eternity."