summer surprise

My teenage daughters sleep on the fornt porch most summer nights. It's not really a porch - more of a stoop - a raised wooden platform big enough for two, maybe three girls and a cat. The four corners are bounded by large flower pots, some painted,some plain clay.

They are there this morning when I open the old screen door to let the dog out. He'll have to use the kitchen door since I don't want to disturb them - ever. I want them to always be there on cool, damp late summer mornings.

A single toe sticks out of the blankets, a jumble of mismatched textiles. An old, faded quilt with a fraying jade green border is ripped in several places, some of it's 1950's vintage squares are just shreds. The corner of a paisley, Indian sheet shows beneath a burnt orange, woven bedspread, also of Asian origin. A rust colored, silk basket-weave afghan is tangled with the old quilt, and under the heap are a pale yellow comforter and a folded green sleeping bag for padding.

A very old, lumpy black and white cat with a smudgy nose sleeps between the two girls, mostly on the orange pillow, his head nestled against some touseld golden hair that is not attached to anything visible.

They could be a bundle of blankets - ragged ones at that - left out on the porch after a picnic or little girls' tea party. They do leave their blankets there most days after they climb languidly out, making the porch seem messy and unkempt. But I don't mind. They've been sleeping there off and on all summer, but it is still always a surprise to me to open the front door in the morningand find there are girls in the jumble of quilts and blankets - as if they magically appeared in the summer night while I was sleeping. So I never disturb them. I want them to stay on my porch as long as they will.