Total pages in book: 24
Estimated words: 23821 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 119(@200wpm)___ 95(@250wpm)___ 79(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 23821 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 119(@200wpm)___ 95(@250wpm)___ 79(@300wpm)
“And who are you?” she wanted to know.
“Brian,” I answered. “Brian Christie. I live next door.”
“And what can I do for you, Mr. Christie who lives next door?”
“He said I could go after him.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Who said you could go after him?”
“The boy on the roof.”
She gasped and grabbed my hand, yanked me into her house and—even though I didn’t know it yet—into her life, and both of us made it up to the slanted roof just in time to see the go-cart whip by. It hit the edge of the ramp, flipped over—there had been no way to get it flush against the wood shingles—and propelled the boy through the air and into the maple tree next to the house. The cart didn’t have the same luck. It hurtled to the ground, thirty feet below, and smashed into a hundred pieces.
The boy, her son, Varro Dacien, broke his right arm—I could tell from how it was backwards—was scratched and bruised, and had his left wrist run through by a branch, but was thankfully rendered unconscious on impact with how hard he hit the oak. The sound that came out of his mom, the high-pitched horrified scream—I had no idea anyone actually made sounds like that outside of the movies—scared me and nearly made me cry at the same time.
“I’m going inside to call 911. You watch him,” she ordered.
“Mom, I’m here,” the brother said to her retreating back.
But she wasn’t speaking to him.
“I knew I was gonna be in trouble too,” he grumbled, turning to look at me. “I guess you have to watch Varro now.”
I wasn’t looking at him. My gaze stayed on the boy in the tree, who was waking up. “Hi,” I said, waving to him.
His eyelids fluttered, and then he startled.
“Don’t move,” I instructed, smiling and getting as close to the edge of the roof as I could. “You don’t wanna fall.”
He groaned when he saw his wrist.
“Does your arm hurt?”
“Kinda.”
“What about your other arm with the tree coming out of it?
His gaze met mine. “Nuh-uh.”
“That’s good.” I nodded.
He looked around and groaned. “Man, she’s gonna murder me.”
I was pretty certain of that fact myself. “Your mom is calling an ambulance, or firemen, maybe.”
He swiveled his head back to me. “You think maybe they’ll hafta cut down the tree?” he posed sadly, like that was the worst thing he could think of.
“Or they get you with a helicopter,” I offered brightly.
“You think?”
I shrugged. “I dunno. Have you been stuck like this before?”
“Yeah, but not this high.”
“It was awesome,” I assured him.
His smile was blinding, and that fast, I was addicted to seeing it on his face.
Firemen brought a ladder with one of those baskets at the end that they stood in, and one of the men held Varro still while the other used a small jigsaw to cut the branch instead of pulling him off it. Paramedics wrapped the hand and the piece of the tree up together. Both Varro and I were disappointed that there was no helicopter.
We all followed the ambulance to the hospital. Me too, since I was alone in the house. It turned out that Varro and his older brother, Nico, were big believers in speed. Even as we rode to the hospital in the minivan, Nico was considering modifications to the ramp. Meanwhile, Mrs. Dacien sounded like she was having a heart attack.
From the passenger seat, I reached over and put my hand on her thigh, patted it gently, and told her everything would be all right. Once we were there, she took my hand in hers, rolled it palm up, kissed it, and pressed it to her cheek.
She then parked where I wasn’t sure we were supposed to and marched through the emergency room doors after the paramedics. The fact that the nurses there greeted her by name, the looks on their faces sympathetic and not judgmental, clued me in that her boys, or maybe just Varro, were frequent visitors.
What was nice was that she had taken hold of my hand on the walk in and did not let go.
Five hours later, she, Nico, and I were home. Mr. Dacien—Ancel, Varro’s dad—was at the hospital with him, in Varro’s room keeping vigil over his son, crooning soft words in lilting French. I hugged Mrs. Dacien good-bye, waved to Nico, and headed back to my house, still dark even though it was after seven at night.
I never made it out of their yard. Mrs. Dacien came after me, took hold of my hand like she had all day, and pulled me back inside with her. She was on the phone to Child Protective Services minutes later. I never went back to the empty house next door.
People came—a social worker, a policeman—and my things, which fit in my one duffel, were moved into the Daciens’ guest room. There was no fanfare, just Mrs. Dacien with her flashing eyes and crossed arms. Everyone scurried around her, intimidated by the woman talking about neglect and nonsupervision, my weight for my age, and the holes in my clothes. Who was supposed to be checking on me? What in the world was going on? Her voice rose with righteous indignation and judgment, and because no one had ever been mad for me, only at me, it was a revelation. It turned out her lawyer was a great deal scarier than anyone working for the State of California, so what normally would have taken months happened very quickly. Mrs. Dacien was not a patient woman, a trait she had passed on to both sons.