Paul's Tricycle

I visited a friend of mine a few weeks ago. It was the first time I
had stayed at his house for three years, since the time I had to
comfort him over the death of his three year old son, Paul.
It was going to be a tough weekend for him as his sister was spending
the weekend with him along with her three young children.

It was inevitable that a lot of memories would be re-awakened and none
more than the sight of one of them riding around the back garden on
Paul's tricycle.
"Look at that" said my friend, "Just watching him is like Paul is here
still."
"Yes," I replied, "He's even going backwards on it, just like Paul
always did."
Paul had never fully mastered the tricycle and always seemed more
comfortable going backwards.
My Friend looked out of the window with a distant smile on his
lips.
"I put that trike away in the rafters of the garage after Paul died,
couldn't bear to see it around but couldn't bring myself to throw it
out."
The kids played all afternoon and were totally exhausted when they went
to bed at seven. I sat with my friend and his sister that evening,
chatting about this and that, openly discussing Paul, and what he would
have done had he been there today had he been alive. It seemed to do my
friend a lot of good, He had never talked about Paul much, it seemed as
though the subject was too painful for him. Now it appeared that he had
wanted to talk, he was concerned that we were trying to forget all
about the tragedies that had dogged his life.

I thought that my friend had shown tremendous strength. Six months
before Paul's death his wife had been killed in a car accident. He had
struggled to bring up Paul and keep his job, it hadn't been easy. No
sooner had he come to terms with her death than Paul had been struck
down with meningitis. Within three days of the inset of the first
symptoms he was dead. My friend was nearly broken completely by this.
He seemed to shrink visibly, he stopped eating, didn't go to work for
weeks and his house became a mess. His family came in force to see him
through the funeral but disappeared as he became more and more
withdrawn. I spent as lot of evenings with him, not saying much, just
being there for him. It seemed that he would never recover from this
onslaught of bad fortune.

At last, I thought he was beginning to recover himself and start to
live again. Having his sister and her brood there was a trying time and
he passed the test with flying colours.

The evening drew on, it became late and we decided to turn in for the
night. I offered to make a hot drink for us all. As I filled the kettle
at the kitchen tap I looked out of the window and saw the tricycle that
the kids had left out on the patio. It was rolling around
backwards.
Was it the wind or was a small supernatural visitor out there, enjoying
a game with his favourite toy?