Category : Stories

Sub Category : Thriller

 I thought it was going to be one lonley summer. That is untill she moved into my life. The neighbor house to our right had been empty for a few months. Ever since my best friend, Thomas Keith, ran away from his abusive father. Stricken with grief, Tom's father went drunk driving one night and found himself splattered across the asphalt. So the house was cleared and with very few kids on the secluded street of South Bay Terrace Drive, I was doomed to spend the summer alone.
 Then one day, in the midst of June, a large u-haul pulled up to the neighbor house. I had been playing in the thick line of trees between the houses. Out here, the whole area had been surrounded by trees. It was a perfect area to inspire a child's imagination. Tom and I often came across a long ago fallen tree, or clearing within the woods, that we would use as forts or battlefields. We were soldiers, ninjas, superheroes, fighting the bad guys that were invisible to the adults, but had been very vividly real to us. Now I am left to fight that battle alone.
 Stick in hand, I traversed the tree lines fighting off demonic minions when I heard doors of the u-haul shut. I ducked towards the edge of the tree line where I could catch a glimpse of the new neighbors and still not be seen. Two men opened the back of the truck and began unloading furniture. These men obviously were hired and not the new neighbors. 
 An S.U.V pulls off to the side of the road and the edge of the neighbor's lawn. A woman stepped out from the driver's side. I couldn't tell her age exactly, all adults just seemed old to me, but she looked close to my mother's age. In her forties, I guess. I spent mere seconds inspecting the mother, when the daughter came into view and stopped my heart.
 Her grace as she walked, the long silky Brunette hair, and tannish skin struck me hard. My god, she was beautiful. Tom would of made fun of me, telling me I was patient zero for a cooties epidemic. Still, I fell hard for her at that moment. My heart started racing and I felt light, as if I could just float over to her. Yet, I remained hidden. I watched the mother and daughter make their way into the house, moving men right behind them.
That night I told mother...
 "I don't want to see you with that skank, Jimmy."
"Mom, she is just the new neighbor kid and there are very few of those left...Since Tom ran away."
"Tom's father was a good man. He beat some sense into that ungrateful son. Just as I should beat the sense into you."
 My mother threaten often with physical violence, but its the drunken verbal abuse that keeps me awake some nights. Tonight ended up being one of those nights.
 How the youth can be wide eyed throughout the night and  still be able to spring out towards day remains a mystery. I ate breakfast with the gusto of a kid who had a full nights sleep. Through the whole morning routine, I thought of ways to have a chance encounter with the new neighbor girl. My mother sat out in the living room cussing out a dead beat father on Jerry Springer.
"He's your son, no dick!"
I often wish I could question her if she knew how stupid that comment is, but the response would be something like...
"You would know, you have a small dick too. No need to lie, I used to diaper you."
 No talking sense to that kind of logic.
 All my hard work thinking of ways to meet the neighbor girl had been for nothing as I opened the door. There she stood before me, smiling in a way that threaten to melt me. Her eyes, big and brown, looked so full of life. She had a tinge of  a " will go wild" aura about her.
"Hello, I am Vada. I noticed not many kids around here, but I saw you spying through the trees yesterday. Thought we could play?"
 She couldn't have seen me. That is impossible, Tom and I are trained in stealth.  So stunned by this, all I could manage for a response was...
"Ok"
 So off we went...
 At first the play date was quite awkward. I went through many attempts to start a conversation.
 I asked where they moved from.
"Ohio."
 I asked if she missed being there.
"No."
 I risked asking about her father . She gave me a stern look and told me he was in a bad place. I apologized cause I thought he died. She said nothing more about it.
 We had been standing in my front lawn for about ten minutes till she finally asked me a question.
"What do you do for fun?"
 I smiled and asked, "Do you want to see a whole new world?"
 I became very confident at this moment. The forest was a kids paradise and I had a whole magical world to show her.
 I took her first to the "Oasis of Green Fish".  We walked to a pond in the middle of the forest. I guided her up onto a tree stump in the pond. As we stood in the middle of the body of water, I point out these neon green fish swimming below us. I tell her the story.
"It was only a few months ago that this spot was dry. These fish lived in a pond on the other side of the bay. It rained real hard one night in May and the pond moved over here. This was not the first time the pond moved either. These fish show up in different areas all around the forest. They are magic fish in a magic pond." And I showed her proof.
 I bent down and reached out toward the surface of the pond. With extended fingers, I tapped the water in the rhythm of "Singing in the Rain". The fish swam up to the surface, poked their heads out of the water, and began humming. Then the second fish from the middle took lead and they all started singing in a barbershop quartet style. 
 "We're just singing, Oh baby, Singing in that rain."
 I tell her the forest is magic. It had been filled with the imagination of children of many generations. What we play becomes real in the forest.  
 As we spent the day enjoying the wonders of the forest, the sun had been sinking in the sky. I took Vada to my treehouse in my backyard to watch the sun set. 
 Under the clear, cool, starry night sky, Vada and I continued to sit together in the treehouse. We had our feet dangling over the edge as we gazed upon the white light of the moon blanketing across the forest. I was so close to Vada that I felt her heat and the warmth felt good to me.  I laid my head upon her shoulder, clinging closely to her. I felt her body stiffen and I sat upright again. The last thing I wanted to do was make her feel uncomfortable.  She spoke to break the awkward moment.
"So, I hear the boy that lived in the house before me was murdered."
 I laughed and asked her what fool told her that. She told me one of the movers had.
"The boy that lived there was my best friend, Tom. His father was an abusive drunk. Tom had took the beatings for a few years till he had enough and ran away."   
"Do you know where he went?"
 I stared into the dark silhouette next to me. I was debating telling her the truth. It shamed me how much of a coward I was. I looked out toward the forest where I knew the tree with the sign on it that stood in front of the path.The sign read, "Private Property: Abuse not Welcome". No one knew the origin of the sign. Tom and I had asked around the neighborhood. It wasn't till we dared to ask Tom's father that we found anyone who even knew it existed. Tom's father responded with more anger then usual.
"You two never go out there or I'll skin your hides."
  Tom being the type to "touch something hot and then decide to test again, asked..
"What's out there?"
 And he got slapped for it, and again, and again.  I wanted to hurt Tom's father so badly, but my small boy stature would be nothing but paste to this ungodly brute that was beating down his son. 
 So, with the lack of information and abundance of imagination, Tom an I came up with an idea of what was past that tree and down the path. It was a place to be free. A magic place for kids with bad parents. Kids like us, who needed to escape the abuse and live safely.
 I tell Vada all this, everything. I explained how I was a coward. How I was too scared to run away with Tom. How I didn't have enough faith in our dream to think I could be free of my mother. I stopped talking abruptly. I felt tears forming and if I went on I would of definitely cried. I felt Vada lean her head against my shoulder, clinging closely to me.  All the hurt washed away and I felt free. We remain that way, in silence, for a good hour. Vada must of been fighting off sleep as she stirred upward, stretched, and yawned.
"Got to get home. Could you walk me back?"
  I agreed to walk her back home. We had a few more laughs and said our goodnights. If my mother had any abusive words for me, I didn't hear them when I got home. Every thought in my head floated through the events of the night. Somehow I found my way to bed and drifted happily off to sleep.