Day 168: Younger than You Feel

The Prompt: An adult decides to act like a child for a day.  What happens?

The first thing Henry did when he found out that he was stuck in a child's body until the professor could fix his invention was crawl into one of those tiny motorized cars that children often ride around in.  He had kept one around for his nephew, but since the boy wasn't here, Henry saw no reason why he couldn't use it.  Without his parents around, and with the professor busy in Henry's basement repaired the machine, Henry quickly accelerated from a stiff, well-mannered business associate to a rambunctious, unsupervised seven year old boy.  He rode the red car up and down his driveway as fast as he could, nearly hitting into a tree the last time.  The near calamity prompted Henry to try something else.  As he hopped out, he felt energy that hadn't coursed through his body in years.  Henry decided to try this younger body out and ran as fast as his short legs could move all over the yard.  He jumped, skipped, did a cartwheel, hung and swung from a few tree branches and even balanced the railing to his back porch.  He had no reservations or sense of danger.  He thought he was smart enough to be safe, or maybe his mind was reverting to a child as well.

After he had tired himself out, Henry went inside to get a cold drink and suddenly had a craving for a popsicle.  He hadn't had one in ages, but playing in the heat brought back the sweet familiar taste of blue raspberry.  Thankfully, there was a blue raspberry popsicle buried in his freezer from his nephew Alex, and Henry munched on it merrily.  The cold snack rejuvenated him, and he practiced his moon-jumping, or jumped on the couch.  Munching on a cherry popsicle, Henry made a fort with the fallen cushions and read a comic book that had been sitting on the basket next to the couch.

Tossing the book aside to try a grape popsicle, Henry was curious what children watched on TV nowadays.  After five minutes, he feared for humanity and decided to try a Wii game instead.  That proved much more enjoyable, and Henry spent the next two hours playing the game that his older nephew Brice had left behind.  After ten levels and seven popsicles later, Henry had a terrible headache and couldn't stop yawning.  He happily curled up against the cushions as he realized that as a child, he was free to take as many naps as he wanted.