Does it always rain here? Playing outside was fun and all, but it was always raining. Hawaii was always warm and sunny. Except when it rained, then it was warm and rainy. There, I was always outside, here, Mom always made me go outside. Like today, all I did was go into the kitchen and start helping her. I didn’t mean to drop that bowl of salad, it was heavy!

“Go outside and play with your friends, I’ll call you when it’s ready.” She said, irritated.

Fine, this was boring anyway. I put on my jacket, sat on the floor, and began to shove my feet into my shoes. I still wasn’t very good at tying the laces while the shoes were on my feet but I discovered that if I put the shoes on a table in front of me, I could tie a perfect knot. Once that was done, I could just slip the shoes on and off and I wouldn’t have to tie them anymore! I smiled, remembering what a great idea this was.

Walking out the front door, I stomped my left foot. I always had trouble with that one. The back would bend in and I would have to shove a finger down into the shoe and pull it back up. Somehow, I managed to do this while continuing to walk forward and closing the door at the same time. I could hear some other kids shouting and squealing in the distance. At least it wasn’t just me.

I crossed the street and went through the gate of one of the neighbor’s houses, putting the latch back in place like I had been told to. I ran my hand along the side of the house as I headed toward the backyard. The old wood tried to shove splinter after splinter into my fingertips but none would take hold. As I rounded the back of the house, I looked in through the sliding glass door – a bunch of grownups. Boooooring. I kept walking through the yard and out the rear gate, putting the latch back in place.

I walked down a short path covered in smashed red and yellow maple leaves, over an old, dead tree that had fallen during that wind storm a couple of months back, and stepped onto the overgrown grass of the school grounds. I could see all of the kids crowded together on the tetherball court at the far end of the playground, over by the portables where I went to class. Most were hunched over, arguing about something that was very important. I walked past them to the second group of kids. Most of them were my friends.

“Whatcha got?” I asked.

“Cards!” Fred said.

“Marbles!” Heather called out.

“Nothin’!” I shouted. They laughed and handed me some cards, marbles, and a piece of gum.

We traded cards back and forth, knowing that at the end, we’d have to give them all back to Fred anyway.  That was okay. They belonged to us while we had them. The marbles just sort of rolled around on the ground. After a bit, we piled them up on the grass so they would stay put. The sun had just started to dip below the tops of the trees and every few minutes, one of the kids would jump up and run off screaming. I would look up, watch him or her run away for a moment, and then return my attention to the trade at hand.

Then, suddenly, it came – like the rise and fall of a siren that only I could hear – warbling through the trees and across the heavy autumn afternoon.

“SEEEEEeeeeeaaaAAAAAAAANNnnnnnnn!”

I threw the cards at Fred and ran off from the group, screaming at the top of my lungs for no reason as I left my friends behind. My feet quickly tromped off the cracked cement square and began to make squishy noises as the wet ground sucked at my shoes in a desperate attempt to claim one for keeps. Every so often, a patch of thick grass would jump beneath me and I would slide forward, eyes wide with fear, only to catch myself with an awkward stutter step. Not even half a breath later and I would lurch forward again, arms flailing and body twisting into impossible poses to keep me from landing face-first into . . . whatever that was, over there.

Finally, the trees parted and my feet landed on the old gravel path that ran beside the big two-lane road leading to my street. No chance of slipping here so I ran even faster, the gravel sounding like angry gray snow under my rubber soles as it went crunch, crunch, crunch. Left, right, up, and down were all a blur. All I saw was the “t” in the road ahead of me. My house was a left turn. Keep going straight and you’d be at the 7-11. I slowed a bit, remembering the Coke Slurpee I had yesterday. I blinked hard, the fog lifted, and I was off again.

I ran along the path as it curved past the big red tree at the end of my block. Don’t know what it was, but it was big and it was red. During the summer, the thin bark would peel off in small strips like sunburned skin. Today, after the fresh rain, the tree was quiet and gray. I saw a small paper bag shoved in the indentation where the ground, roots, and trunk all came together. I locked my legs in front of me and came to a skidding stop. Whatever was in that bag, I wanted it. I couldn’t stay because if I took too long, Mom would yell at me. I can’t take it home because if I brought it in the house, Mom would yell at me. I decided to cover the bag with a fallen pine branch from the side of the road. “I’ll come back for you later,” I whispered to the bag and started running again.

The gravel gave way to asphalt.  They had just finished putting in new stuff last week. I wrinkled my nose because even now it still made the neighborhood smell a like wet dog. Everything that smelled bad smelled like wet dog. The only thing that smelled bad but didn’t smell like wet dog was my Mom’s kimchee soup. That smelled like wet dog poop. It was so bad that I would run out the front door and sit against the side of the house until the clouds of stink stopped pouring out of the windows and chimney. The house smelled bad for days. I hope she wasn’t making that for dinner. Please don’t be making that for dinner.

The street was quiet, but if I tilted my head, I could hear the people inside of each house laughing and talking about stuff. Forks and spoons would clink loudly against plates and bowls. Laughter again. Looking to my right, I counted off the houses in my head as I ran by. I stopped at three. The rusty metal numbers nailed to the right side of the doorway read “2 . . . 5 . . . 0 . . . 6.” My house! I cut across the corner of the driveway towards the small steps leading to front door of the split level home. Turning my feet slightly to the right, I stepped on two hibiscus bushes and headed straight for the cement retaining wall next to the front door and proceeded to climb up the side of the cement entryway. It was a good two feet taller than me but I was able to grab the bottom of the short section of black rod-iron rail and drag myself up onto the lower steps. I put my hands flat on the ground and pushed myself back up, wiping the moss and dirt off on my pants.

I reached out to open the door, but I heard the deadbolt release and saw the brass doorknob shake back and forth as the lower lock was undone. The door swung inward and the smells of turkey, pie, and stuffing poured over me like a thick, delicious fog. I could hear my sister and her new boyfriend already arguing at the table. The bright light from the hanging lamps in the foyer made me squint for a moment as the door finished its quarter-circle path into the house, catching the corner of the rug like it always did. I smiled and looked up . . .

“Smells great Mom! No kimchee soup this year, right?” I teased.

“Bah,” she said, trying to sound irritated. “I haven’t made that in years.” She took two small steps back to let me squeeze through the door.

“I know, I know.” I said, laughing while I hugged her.

She glanced down, perplexed. “What’s all over your hands and pants?”

“Oh,” I said sheepishly. “Nothing”