The Perfect Moment

I could never master the perfect duck bill, not like my sister could. She knew the exact way to position the Pringles in her mouth to form a cookie cutter replication of the feathered swimmers that quacked and honked behind us all the way to 12-mile island. My potato chip always broke in my mouth and my sister and I would laugh as I grabbed her sun tanned arm, knowing even in my 12-year old mind, that was the perfect moment. A moment I would spend decades searching for, chasing, like the first hit of a crack pipe.
We didn't know then that years later, when 12-year old you should have been making duck bills, you had to learn how to swallow with one side of your mouth. When you should have been creating your perfect moment, you were living your worst...our worst. There would be no more moments. No more longing for summers on the Mississippi. No more sun tans or feathered wings.