The Best Day

Theo was a boy who asked enormous questions.

Not enormous like a grown-up would ask — not questions about taxes or traffic or what to have for dinner. Theo's questions were the real kind of enormous. The kind that made your brain feel fizzy if you thought about them too long.

"Mae," he said one morning, standing in the doorway of his older sister's room, "does the sun know it's the sun?"

Mae looked up from her book. She was ten and a half, and she had long braids and a very serious thinking face that she used for moments exactly like this.

"Hmm," she said. She gave it a real think. "No. I don't think it does. It just burns because that's what it is."

"That's kind of sad," said Theo.

"Or kind of free," said Mae.

Theo stood there for a moment, letting that idea roll around in his head like a marble. Then he wandered away.

This was how mornings worked in their house.

At breakfast, while their dad made eggs that were slightly too scrambled, Theo asked, "If you could hear colors, what would yellow sound like?"

"A trumpet," said Mae, without even pausing.

"What about brown?"

"A cello. Obviously."

"What about clear? Like water?"

Mae chewed her toast slowly. "Clear isn't a color."

"But if it was."

"Then it would sound like a hum. The kind you hear when it's really, really quiet and you realize quiet has a sound."

Theo nodded. That was exactly right.

After breakfast, they sat on the back porch. It was Saturday, and the sky was doing that thing where it couldn't decide between cloudy and blue, so it just did both. Their dog, Biscuit, lay between them like a large, warm loaf of bread.

"Theo," said Mae, stretching her legs out on the step. "I have a question for you."

Theo looked up, surprised. Mae didn't usually ask questions. Mae usually had answers, which is a very different thing.

"What's your best day ever?" she asked.

Theo's eyes went wide.

That was enormous.

That was maybe the most enormous question anyone had ever asked him. Because how do you pick one day out of all the days you've had? Days are heavy with stuff. They're packed full. Choosing one felt like choosing your favorite star, or your best breath.

"My best day ever?" he said.

"Ever," said Mae.

Theo lay back on the porch and looked up at the sky. Biscuit scooted closer and put a chin on Theo's knee. Theo closed his eyes.

"Okay," he said. "I'm thinking."

He was quiet for a long time — which, for Theo, was about twelve seconds.

"Does it have to be one thing?" he asked. "Or can it be a bunch of things? Because I think my best day is actually a bunch of things that happened this week, just smooshed together."

Mae shrugged. "It's your best day. It can be whatever you want."

Theo sat up straight. He held up one finger.

"One. Monday morning, Dad was singing in the kitchen before anyone was awake, and I could hear it from my bed, and I just stayed there and listened, and it made me feel like the house was happy."

He held up a second finger.

"Two. I found a rock at recess that was shaped like a heart. Not a perfect heart. Kind of a lumpy heart. But still."

A third finger.

"Three. At lunch on Tuesday, my friend Priya laughed so hard that milk almost came out of her nose, and everyone was scared for one second and then everyone was laughing too, even Priya."

Fourth finger.

"Four. That night it rained, and I opened my window just a tiny crack — like this much —" he pinched his fingers together, "and I could smell it. The rain, I mean. It smelled like the world taking a bath."

Fifth finger.

"Five. On Wednesday, I got the answer wrong in math, but Ms. Ruiz said the way I got it wrong was actually really interesting and she'd never seen anyone think about it that way before. So I was wrong, but in a cool way."

He switched to his other hand.

"Six. Biscuit fell asleep on my feet while I was doing homework and my feet went all tingly, but I didn't move because I didn't want to wake him up."

Biscuit's tail thumped once on the porch, as if he remembered.

"Seven. You braided my friendship bracelet for me because I kept messing up the blue part, and you didn't even make fun of me. Well. You made fun of me a little."

"A little," Mae admitted.

"Eight. Thursday, I saw a cloud that looked like a dragon eating a smaller cloud, and I watched it until the dragon turned into just a blob."

"Nine. I told Dad a joke and he laughed so hard he put his hand on the counter to hold himself up. It wasn't even that funny a joke. But he laughed like it was the funniest thing in the whole world."

"What was the joke?" asked Mae.

"Why don't scientists trust atoms?"

"Why?"

"Because they make up everything."

Mae snorted. "That's actually pretty good."

"TEN," said Theo, louder now, because he was getting to the good part. "On Friday, I was walking home from school and the sun came through the trees and made those little spotty light things on the sidewalk —"

"Dappled," said Mae. "That's called dappled light."

"Dappled light," Theo repeated, tasting the word. "I love that. Okay, the dappled light was on the sidewalk and I tried to step only on the bright spots, like they were stepping stones."

"Eleven. Last night, Mom read to me even though she said I'm old enough to read to myself, and she did the voice for the badger, the really deep one, and I could feel her voice in my chest because I was leaning against her."

"Twelve. This morning, my cereal did that crackling sound when the milk hit it, and I put my ear really close to the bowl, and it sounded like a tiny little fireworks show, just for me."

He paused.

Mae waited.

"Thirteen," said Theo, quieter now. "Right now. Sitting here. With you and Biscuit. And the sky being all cloudy-sunny. And you asking me a really, really good question."

He looked at Mae.

Mae looked at him.

She didn't say anything for a moment. She had her serious thinking face on, but it looked different this time — softer, somehow. Like the face underneath the thinking face.

"So your best day ever," she said slowly, "is just... this week?"

"No," said Theo. "My best day ever is all those things happening in the same life. My life. Where Dad sings and rain smells good and Biscuit is warm and cereal goes snap and you help me with the blue part of the bracelet."

Mae looked down at her hands. She picked at a thread on her shorts.

"That's a really good answer, Theo," she said.

"I know," he said. Not in a bragging way. In the way you say it when something is true and you're glad it's true.

They sat there for a while longer, the two of them. Biscuit sighed the way dogs do when everything is exactly as it should be — big and slow and complete.

A breeze came through and the trees made a shushing sound, and the light came through the leaves all spotty and golden.

"Dappled," Theo whispered.

"Dappled," Mae whispered back.

And the morning went on, the way all the best ones do — slowly, and full of ordinary things that didn't know how enormous they were.