Prologue

I
t began when I was sleeping soundly one October’s night; I could hear the swift
whistle of feet moving across the blades of emerald grass in the front lawn, and
silent whispers sounded among the pitter patter of shoes that moved in a
planned motion. I hearkened silently in my slumber against my mattress until the
coarse, pained hands of my mother rattled against my back. I couldn’t understand
her soft shouts for me to wake up, as I was only two at the time. However she did
not wait for me to respond to her. Her arms wrapped around my frail, tinny waist
and she forced me against her chest as she raced out of my dark room. The house
was dim, no light from the rising sun shone or light from the demanding moon. I
wondered in my half sleep where the blurred face of my mother was taking me, but
my mother took no time to explain.

Once it seemed we had reached the kitchen, I was passed to the warm body
of what seemed to be my grandmother, who covered me under her bleach cotton
shawl. They stood there for a matter of seconds until my father rushed down the
steps with a long, wooden object in his palms. He ran to me, and he looked at me
with misery in his eyes. I glanced back under my sleepy lids. He kissed me on the
forehead and uttered soft and sweetly, “We love you. Don’t worry, we’ll be back
soon.” And he took my mother’s hand and together they exited the front door. My
grandmother stood there for a minute, staring back at them, and from what I could
hear a faint sound of mourning gurgled from her throat. She held me tighter to her
chest until I could hear the beat of her heart, and she took me and we went out the
back screen door.

The backyard was a large gray, grassy field that sung the song of the wind’s
cry. My grandmother hurried through the field as the cool air grazed our cheeks. I
could see she was headed for the woods.

Before we had time to enter the beginning of the haunting forest’s grasp, I
caught sight of many ghosts on the left side of our white wooden house. They
crowded the streets and carried torches and flames in their hands. Together they
were a horrifying sight, a sight I didn’t want to see so late among the night. Their
silent whispers were replace by an aroma of loathe and hatred, and it grew stronger
as I saw the small figures of my mother and father emerge. Then one ghost stepped
forward with a strange, metal object in its hand.

My father shouted and cursed at the ghost and swung the wooden object at
the ghost’s head. The piece of wood slammed into the head of the ghost and it
dropped the metal weapon as the dark, mighty fists of my dad pounded into the
flesh of its body. About two or three other ghost jumped onto my father, who
continued to beat the ghost, and attempted to ply my dad off. My mother was about
to run to the rescue of my dad, but the white palms of a large ghost constricted her
neck and she was helpless to watch my father struggle.

1
 My father swung the wood around and hit any ghost he could get, but the
ghosts were plenty, and he was not. They brought him down, two holding his legs
and one with its foot on my father’s head. The ghosts stepped on him, kicked him,
and laughed with extreme audacity. Finally, the one who had been beaten by my
father yelled at them to stop, and his hand traced the ground for his grey,
shimmering metal object. He bent down and whispered something to my bruised
father, who in response yelled “You can beat me, scratch me, and kill me, but
nothing you can do will make me leave without pride! You will never get my
daughter and if you ever touch a hair on her scalp to hell you will burn an eternity!”

The ghost mouthed something I didn’t catch, and pointed the metal object at
my father’s head, then he flicked his finger backwards. A shrill deafening noise bled
across the field to my ears. My father’s body went limp to the ground where he
already lay and I sat there, pressed to my grandmother’s chest, wondering what
had happened.

Seconds later my mother screamed and bit the hand that was wrapped
around her neck. She pushed through the crowd of ghosts and dropped to my
father’s limp body, and she began to cradle him protectively. As she held my father,
her arms and hands become bleached in red, sickening ooze. She spat curse words
at the ghosts, who stared at my mother, puzzled with what to do with her. The one
who had made my father go flaccid mouthed the words, “kill her”, and with that, he
brought the metal object to her head and flicked his finger, and my mother dropped
to the ground too.

I shrieked the second time I heard the piercing noise, but the hands of
grandmother muffled the sound and squeals of my throat. She glanced around to
see if the ghosts had heard my cry, and stealthily she stepped back into the forest,
and ran. She ran until two hours before dawn, and we had reached a small, wooden
house in the midst of the forest. She walked up to the door of the house and
knocked until the door was opened to a small, old, dark skinned woman. She
opened the door to my grandmother and I, and she lead us to a little couch where
my grandmother sat. I listened to her heart beat quicken and her hands stiffened
against me. She looked up to the aged dark skinned woman, and shook her head.
The dark skinned woman paced around, and walked away into a small room and
shut the door. My grandmother held me tighter as I lay there, pressed against her
chest. I began thinking about what had happened to my parents and how
frightening the ghost were, then I found myself weeping fiercely as I thought of my
father’s last words me:

“We love you. Don’t worry, we’ll be back soon.” he had said.

They didn’t come back.

2
 Chapter One

F
or nights the endless nightmares of my mother’s terrorized screams haunted
me in my sleep. I’d screech for my grandmother, and for months I slept in her
bed. It was hard for me; I didn’t understand what had happened to my
parents. I did know why they couldn’t come back home so I could hold their faces in
my petite hands. I didn’t get it.

I waited for them. I wanted to see them so bad, the feeling of my mother’s
skin brushing the tears off my cheek, or the broad hands of my father swinging me
around in his arms. I’d walk outside the small house and sit in front of the door,
waiting for them, for their figures to appear again. I’d sit for hours, leave, eat, and
sleep, then return to wait some more. More hours past. More weeks became used,
but yet I kept waiting for them, even when it stormed, even when it was dark. My
grandma would sometimes watch me as I waited, but she never watched long. I
don’t think she liked waiting.

When waiting didn’t work, I chose toask questions. I would always ask my
grandma, “Are they back yet?” and she would respond “No”. “Back yet?” I’d say.
“Not yet.” she’d respond. I did that for what it seemed like months, until I assume
she was fed up with it.

“Are mommy and daddy home?” I pronounced hopefully when I walked in the
house to her sitting on the couch. I was wishing today would be the day.

“No.” she said as her eyes scanned me.

3
 “Okay. When are they coming-” I began but was cut short when my
grandmother approached me. She grabbed me by my shoulders, looked me in the
eyes, and whispered swiftly, “Abby, they are never coming back. You will never see
them, never, never again. Enough with this nonsense. I’ve had enough of it!”

She took her hands off from my shoulders, and for the first time, she went
into the room of the little house we now lived in and slammed the door. I heard her
sob, which made me cry, and I ran outside and cried at the porch. At that time, it
seemed the pain would never stop.

Time eventually took its course, however; my grandmother and I left the
house of the old lady and we moved back into our white farm house. Grandma
decided she wanted to home-school me as soon as I was 4 and I would help her out
on the ranch so she wouldn’t have to hire anyone to do the dirty work. Minutes
turned to hours, hours made days, and days turned into years. Before I knew it, I
was eight and my grandma was kicking fifty.

“Oh my Abby girl.” My grandma sighed as she stretched her arms and sat on
the burgundy couch. “I’m definitely not as young as I used to be!” she chuckled to
herself as I sat on the wood floors looking to her.

“Your, hmm, 42 years older than me?” I said as I looked in her friendly grey
eyes. “Yup, that’s bout how much older you are than me. ‘Cept I’ll be turning nine
this November. And I’ll be going ta normal school this September, like you said. Gee,
grandma! What’ll school be like?”

“Lord, you sure know how to hit me with bricks, Abb. How am I supposed to
admire how you turn into a beautiful young lady when you keep reminding me I get
older every second?”my grandma snickered as she looked at me, deliberately
changing the subject.

“You kiddin’? You seen the folks round here, Grandma? They as old as the
Civil War. Hardly a kid to shoot rocks with round here. You’re as young as a buddin’
daisy!” I exclaimed with my fingers.

My grandma glanced at me with her half-smile. “Heh, I bet you could learn a
lot from us old-kooks. Maybe you should get back to work and feed the chickens and
pigs.”

“Okay, but can you tell me what school is gunna be like?” I pleaded with the
sweetest smile I could force.

“Later, now get!” she said as she shooed me with a grin. “And get it done,
yah hear?”

I laughed as I scurried out the front porch. The beaming late June sun shone
directly into my face, and I squinted in its light. I grabbed the feed by the screen
porch and swung it over my shoulders and began my daily march out to the chicken

4
coop. The grass tickled my legs through my ragged overalls and I could hear the
pigs oink out in their pin.

I pranced through the field and reached the entrance of the coop, but I
caught sight of a redheaded face in the corner of my eye, which initiated an
automatic smile. I quickly turned my head to see him leaning over the fence that
separated his father’s property from my grandmother’s, and he smiled back and
waved.

“Whatcha up to Ab-by?!” he exclaimed to me from the fence.

“Well I’m obviously working, which you are not! Shouldn’t you get to it?” I
giggled.

“Bleh, I’d rather help you out! Hey, you want some pop?” he shouted with a
grin.

“Why not?”

“Okay! Be right back! Don’t you go nowhere!” he replied as he rushed to his

small house and entered its front door. I could hear his footsteps crashed through
the house until he reached the cooler, plied it open, got two bottles of pop, and
slammed the cooler shut again. He pranced through the backdoor of his house and
dashed in my direction. Once he reached the fence he flung his body over and
landed on dirt of the ground, making a flurry of dust crowd his figure. I laughed as
he came closer to me with the soda in his hands, as I did every day I saw him.

“How’s that Abby? I bet I cut my average time getting to you. Here’s your
Pepsi, and I got my Coca-Cola. Hence, the original, you copier!”he bragged to me
with a smug look on his face.

My face squinted to an unimpressed smile as I glanced at him. I snatched the

pop from his hand and pushed him down to the ground with my hands, laughing as I
said “Hmm, too bad the knock-off has you beat.”

He looked up to me with his smug look turned to a casual smile, and then he
launched his foot into my leg, making be fall to the ground like he did.

“Too bad the original has skills.”

“Ha ha, you’re so funny, Dustin. You should write a comedy show.” I said
sardonically as I pushed myself up from the dirt. I rubbed my newly bruised leg.

“I know. There’s no need for jealousy, Abby-girl.” he commented as he

popped the cap of the soda-pop with his teeth. “Hey you know, Abby? We lots like
Pepsi and Coke. Both are so different, but they’re both the same types of soda, you
know? Like brother and sister?”

5
 “Uh, I guess?” I shrugged as I too popped the cap of my Pepsi and began to
chug it down. Hot Georgia summer’s always made me thirsty.

“No, seriously, think about it! Coke is cool and strong, and Pepsi is sweet and
fizzy. Kinda like your hair!”

“Shut up about that, ain’t nothing wrong with my hair, Dustin.” I said with
mild irritation. I placed my hand top my head and felt and weaved my fingers
through its strands.

“Sure is, it’s about as curly as my dog’s hair and that’s pretty wild!” he said
as he put his hands to my head to feel the texture of my light-brown curls. His facial
features became puzzled. “Hey, you sure you white?”

“Bout as white as the moon! You sure your white and not a tomato? ‘Cause
you looking mighty red.” I responded angrily.

He took his hands from my head and took a swig of his Coke. “Well I was just
curious, that’s all. I don’t know where you get it from cause your grandma’s hair’s
as straight as a lick.”

“I dunno.”

He stared at me and I looked away to glance at the sky. I could feel his eyes
inspecting me, and it was very awkward.

“You know you get really tan in the summer time? Almost like a light-skinned
negro?” he said bluntly.

“You better hush with all that. I’m white and there ain’t no questioning bout
it, so why are you picking today to get all on my case? Ain’t never been a colored
folk and I never will be, so get it outcha mind because I’m white, okay?” I lectured
as I gritted my teeth.

“Hey, I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to say you were a colored person.”

“Can we talk about something else?”

“Uh, yeah, sorry.”

The air became silent and uncomfortable, so I averted my eyes from him to
focus on the ants that were crawling on the beige grass. Dustin noticed the
awkwardness and immediately changed the subject.

“Wanna hear a secret?” Dustin said as he looked at me cockily.

“Bout what?” I asked as I took another sip of Pepsi.

“My pa! Okay, so there was this stuck up rich guy walking ‘round because he
wanted to buy my dad’s land for some dumb business, and he asks my dad if he
would sell it off for some money. My dad said no, and the stuck up guy got all red

6
and stuff and was like, ‘I didn’t want any land from any piece of white trash anyhow!
I bet you can’t even understand me with your preschool vocabulary!’ and so I
looked at my dad’s face. His face got all stiff and emotionless, you know? And
guess?”

“What, what?!” I exclaimed with excitement at his intriguing story.

“My pa slung his fist right in that man’s stuck up face! My pops punched him
in the stomach and pushed the man off the porch. Then my pa said ‘You get off my
property now, or I will shoot you.’ And I swear, Abby! That guy’s nose was broke and
he musta’ lost some teeth!” Dustin animated as he swung his fists in the air,
pretending to beat up the solicitor. “And I’ll tell you what, that man ran fast off our
property to his little expensive Ford! Bet he didn’t want the licking my dad was
gunna’ give em’! He woulda’ got creamed!”

“Ha, ha, that’s cool! Bet that showed him!” I chuckled with Dustin, then we
punched fists.

“Yup, bet that bozo won’t cross our turf again. I want to be just like my dad,
tough and strong. Except, well…”

“What?” I asked as I took the last swig of what was left of my soda.

“Well of course I havta have a girl, you know.”

I cracked up at his statement and couldn’t stop laughing. Dustin turned as red
as a cherry and his mouth fell to an abrupt frown. I could feel the tears of laughter
build up in my eyes, but I still managed between chuckles to gasp, “Ha, ha, ha!!!
What do you know about girls, Dustin??”

“Stop laughing! I know a lot about girls!” he shouted as he threw his hands
into my shoulder, which initiated a thunder of more laughs to leak from my throat.

“Shut up you goof!” he raged until I swore smoke was going to come out of
his ears.

“Okay, okay! Sorry, it’s just, what made you think of that?”

“Well ain’t you even liked somebody before?” he asked me while sipping what
was left of his pop.

“Not really. I don’t see many boys my age around here except for you and
you ain’t my boyfriend. So no, not really.”

“Well now that I’m maturing I think girls are very cool.” he mocked at me
slightly, saying that he was two years my senior.

“Glad to know, too bad you didn’t know that the last eight years. Go on, go
on.”

7
 “Well my dad just seems lonely that’s all. I mean, he is kinda old and he
doesn’t have a wife. So when I get older, I’m going to make sure I have a girl, see
what I’m talking about?” he explained to me.

“Well I guess I do… I’m not sure really. Have you liked somebody before?” I
asked in a confused manner.

“Of course I have. They have some nice girls at my school, wouldn’t you
know. But they ain’t for me, I don’t think.”

“Why you think that?”

“I’m not sure. Beats me, they don’t seem like they’re gunna go anywhere in
life.”

“Why are you thinking so far ahead? Ain’t like you, you know.” I said
nonchalantly.

“What makes you think you know how I am?” he asked with his eyebrows
arched down.

“I don’t know, I just do. I should, shouldn’t I? Known you all my life.” I
answered him in a normal tone, glancing at his blue eyes.

He stared at me for a bit with a puzzled, or what it seemed to be an

inspecting expression, then he gave me a punch in the shoulder. “You’re alright,
Abby, you’re alright. Hmm, I think I’ll call you Pepsi.”

“Why?” I said as I rubbed my throbbing shoulder from the pain of his punch.

“I think it suits yah.” he commented with a smirk.

“Then what should I call you? Coca-Cola?” I smiled back at him.

“Yeah, you can shorten it to Coke or Cola or something.”

“Heh, Cola and Pepsi. I like it.” I said to him.

“Yeah. But Cola will always be better than Pepsi.” he bragged again. This time
I launched my fist into the pit of his stomach and he let out endless bursts of
laughter.

“No, Pepsi will always be the better brand!” I laughed with him too, and
flopped to the ground and looked up to the clouds. We sat there watching for some
time, then he rolled over on his side and looked at me.

“We’ll always be friends, got that, Pepsi?”

“You betcha, Cola.”

We crossed our pinkies in a pinkie promise, and we looked up at the sky

together.

8
 When it seemed our happiness would never end, a red, ragged Ford truck
pulled up into Dustin’s dirt driveway. Dustin turned his body over to face the sight of
his father’s car park next to their house, and Dustin’s body became taut.

“Oh crap!” he exclaimed as he shot up from the ground. “If he figures out I
didn’t do my work… Dang! I didn’t know how late it was!”

I looked at him with worry in my eyes. “What’s wrong?”

“I havta sneak back to my house!” he whisper shouted, but it was too late.
His father’s sturdy steps marched to the entrance of his house, and he walked in.
Dustin waited quietly as he listened to his father shuffle through the house’s
interior. Suddenly his father’s steps stopped, and there was silence. Dustin’s skin
become turning pale and he stopped breathing.

His father’s feet began to dart outside the house and he shouted with
extreme rage at the top of his lungs, “Damn it Dustin, Get your butt over here right
now!!”

Dustin flinched at his father’s scream and immediately jumped to his feet.
“Golly, I have to beat it. When he’s mad like this ain’t no tellin’ what he’ll do. Catch
you later Pepsi!” he shouted as he departed from me to hop over the fence to his
angry father. I got up from the dirt and watched Dustin run to his father, who stood
angrily on his porch with his hands crossed about his chest. Our eyes met and he
gave me the dirtiest glance I had ever seen in my eight year old life. I step back
from the sight of it.

I saw his father say something irritably to Dustin, who in response shook his
head vigorously. I couldn’t hear what they were discussing, but I could tell it was
making Dustin’s father more infuriated. Within seconds Dustin’s father shouted “Get
your back-talking mouth in the house!!” then he whipped Dustin across the face
with his hand, making Dustin fall to the ground from the blow. Dustin lay there for a
second, stunned from the slap. He began rubbing his injured face with his fingers,
and stared up at his father’s angered, fierce eyes. I gasped as I saw his father raise
his hand as if he were going to slap Dustin again, but Dustin got up as he held his
hand to his bruised face and paced into the house. His father lowered his hand and
looked at me with more detest and loathe than I thought imaginable, and he went
inside his house.

Chapter two
i couldn’t bring myself to jubilance the rest of that day. Kids got beat, whipped, and
punished all the time. That was normal, but I couldn’t get that nefarious,

9
unemotional look out of my head. Dustin’s father scared me to death. He never
liked me, I knew that, but as I got older, he became more ghastly to me. I had this
feeling, this feeling that he didn’t want Dustin and me to be friends, and that he was
going to take Dustin away from me.

“Abby, stop playing with your food. Now.” I abruptly heard my grandmother
scold me as I came back to consciousness. I placed my fork beside the plate of my
food.

“Grandma…” I started, puzzled whether or not I should talk to her about it or

let it go.

“What is it Abby? What has you down?”

I looked blankly across the table, still debating the situation.

“Tell me now, Abby.”

“…Why does Dustin’s father hate me?”

My grandmother shivered at my words and her eyes fell to the table’s

surface. “Hush up. He doesn’t hate you.”

“But grandma you should have seen him today, he looked at me with so
much… I don’t know… it was really scary! I just wanna know what I did, why he
doesn’t like me!”

“Enough, Abby! Enough!” my grandmother shouted swiftly, as she did every

time I agitated her. She glanced quickly at my plate of unfinished meatloaf and
stated, “If you insist on not eating then you will go tonight with no dinner! Go to
your room now, and fix your attitude!”

“I didn’t do anything!!” I shouted at her, my temper rising.

“Don’t you dare backtalk me!”

“Then why do you backtalk me?! It’s not fair! I can’t talk to you about
anything! You keep me away from everything! I feel like I’m in prison when I’m
around you!!”

“How dare you!!” she yelled as she walked over to me and raveled her hand
around my arm and dragged me to the steps.

“Get off me!” I struggled away from her grip, and then she slapped me.

“Shut up! Go to your room, get!!” she yelled as she spanked me hard to get
up the steps. I didn’t wait long to sprint up the stairs, and then I slammed my door.

“Don’t be slamming doors around here, Abby!”

10
 I was so mad I went back to my door and slammed it again. I soon figured out
that this was very stupid of me, because the quick, heavy footsteps of my
grandmother walked up the stairs. I ran to the far end of my room and hid
underneath my bed.

My grandmother swung open my door and walked by my bed. “Get your

smart-mouthin’ butt out here!” she yelled as she pulled my legs to get me from
under the bed.

“Let go, let go!!” I shouted at the top of my lungs, then, she took her hands
and gripped them about my shoulders and looked straight into my eyes.

“Stop it. Just stop it.” she placed her face closer to mine. “You are acting
stupid, very stupid. So shut up, and stop this nonsense. Let Dustin’s father go. It’s
none of your business.”

I looked away, but her aged, coarse hands twisted my face back so I had to
look at her.

“I’m all you have, Abby, have you forgotten? That your mom, your father, are
indeed dead? What would happen if I wasn’t around? You would have nobody. So
don’t treat me like this.”

A knot formed in my throat and I turned away from her again.

“Look at me!” she yelled quietly as she turned my face to face hers once
more. “Stop it!”

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry!!” I cried and began shivering. “I’m sorry.”

My grandmother let me go, and walked away slowly. “Stop… stop that
crying.” and then she left the room.

I didn’t stop crying. I cried for hours that night, and even when it started to
storm I howled over the ferocious voice of the thunder. The tears strolled down my
cheeks incessantly, and there I sat, bawled up into my tear-soaked knees, cold and
crying. My headache of depression began to knock at my head and my eyes turned
red as I thought of the blurred faces of my mother and my father haunting me, the
loud noise, the horrifying ghosts, the cries of my grandmother. All of it came back to
me, saying, “We are forever imbedded in your memory.” I found myself crying until
it sounded like I was choking on needles and my eyes could no longer produce
tears.

Knock, knock, Pepsi! Open up… knock… I heard at my window. I stopped my

lamentation for awhile and faced the noise that called to me. There, in my window, I
saw a water soaked boy knocking at my window, waiting for me to let him in. Gently
I pulled myself up and went to the window that separated me from him. With my
fingers I lifted the window sill, and let the wet redheaded boy in my room.

11
 “What are you doing, Dustin? It’s the middle of the night.” I said as he slid
under the sill to the pinewood floors. He shivered as the water fell from his body.

“I’m cold.” he simply stated without answering my question.

I shook my head. I couldn’t help but smile, though. I went to my bed and
pulled off the sheets. I raveled them around him until he was snug, and slowly he
sat down on the surface of my bedroom floor. I sat beside him.

“So are you gunna tell me how you got to my window and why you are in my
house?” I said playfully.

He glanced at me and grinned. “I might as well, since I’m in your room and
all.” He began pulling the sheets closer around his drenched body. “Well after I got
whipped for disobeying my dad, I had to do all the chores and more. He was really
pissed off at me. When I was cleaning, he had a couple shots of whiskey, and he
only drinks when he is stressed out. Normally he can hold his liquor… but he started
acting really strange and I got kind of scared. He’s a good man, and he just wants to
keep me in order, but when he gets drunk I like to stay away. He likes to punish me
a lot when he is drunk. I think he thinks I’m another person or something…”

“What did he do?” I said softly.

“Well when I was in the kitchen trying to sweep the floor, he went to the
pantry and he got some grits. He went to me and he poured the grits all over the
floor. I was really confused, then I thought, ‘Oh, he’s giving me more work because I
didn’t do my chores.’ But then I figured out he had other plans for the grits. He
looked at me and he said ‘On your knees.’ He made me sit on my knees on top of
the grits for a really long time… and they cut up my knees. It was one of the most
painful things ever…

“Then I had to clean the grits up after he put them all over the floor. I didn’t
stick around long after that. Once he began reading the newspaper and the thunder
was real loud, I left. I didn’t really have anywhere to go so I went to your place. I
climbed up the ivy that leads to your window, and I hoped you’d be there. Sure
enough, there you were.” he explained to me.

“That’s awful, what he did to you… let me see your knees.” I said in
sympathy with him.

He removed the sheets from his legs and pulled up his overalls. His knees
were indeed bloody and scratched up, and the sight made me regurgitate in my
mouth a little. “Dustin, that must hurt..!”

“Trust me, it does. He’s never done that before, nothing so brutal to me. He
didn’t mean it though. He just had too much to drink, that’s all.” he said as he
pulled his overalls over his legs and covered himself in sheets again.

12
 I stared at him, wondering how he could have so much faith in such a
strange, aloof man. I couldn’t figure out what to say, and he stared at the planks of
my floor vacantly. Then he glanced at me, inspecting my eyes. “Were you crying,
Pepsi?”

My eyes widened immediately and I wiped my face. “No I wasn’t!! Little girls
cry, not me!”

“You don’t havta lie to me, Peps.”

“I’m not lying…” I murmured promptly and focused on the lines of my palms.

“I know when you are upset, Pepsi.”

“What makes you think you know how I feel?” I asked with my eyes squinted.

“Because I know who you are, too.” he said with a consoling, smug grin.

My reaction was a smile, and we did our secret handshake, which really was
just pounding fists.

“Well, I was just trying to talk to my grandma about something, and she
wouldn’t even listen to me. She punished me for no reason at all. I admit I coulda’
handled it better but then she brought up my parents… and how they are dead and
how she’s all I have left… and I think she went way too far. She tries to keep me
locked up from everything. It’s not fair…”

“What were you trying to talk about?” he asked me.

I blushed. “Um…err… Your dad… actually.”

“What about ‘em?”

“That he doesn’t like me.”

Dustin looked at me for a second, and averted his eyes. He stared at the floor
again.

“Why doesn’t he like me, Cola?”

“I… I… don’t know. I don’t think he hates you or anything… I just think he
doesn’t want me hangin’ out with you because I don’t get my work done.”

“But Dustin, he gives me these looks and it’s really, really scary.”

“H-he looks at everyone that way.” Dustin stuttered.

“I think he’s going to take you away from me.” I said to him inaudibly, not
wanting him to hear it.

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 However, he heard. “Why do you think that? Pepsi you’re my best-friend and
no one is going to take you away from me. Look-a-here, I’ll just get my work done
first and then we’ll play, okay? Nothing’s going to change. I promise you.”

“Pinkie swear?” I said almost in tears.

“Pinkie swear.”

Then we crossed fingers and we both released a smile. We talked and talked
for hours that night, about what we thought school together would be like, how the
World War ended, life, and then his voice faded into a faint, continuous snore.

“Dustin, Dustin, you awake?” I yawned, patting his shoulder. My eyelids

became heavy as I fought sleep. “Hey Dustin…” I uttered as I rested my head
against his shoulder, and I too fell asleep.

The rays of pale blue sunlight peeked in through the windows, and the chirps
of the waking birds sounded among the sleeping town. My eyes gently parted to the
morning greeting, and my neck cringed in pain suddenly as I woke. I shuffled my
feet to which I found to be on the wood planks of the floor, and my body to be
perched alongside another, slow breathing body. It was then I realized that I had
gotten a crap in my neck from sleeping oddly, and I sighed. It was another new
morning, and another new morning that would bring many more adventures, and I
wasn’t sure I was ready for that.

I turned my head to face the side of the dormant redheaded boy next to me,
who had yet to open his eyes. I listen to his faint, yet present deep breaths, and
then I looked at his chest, which was moving in an up in down motion from the
oxygen he was taking in. I smiled. He was always there for me.

“Hey Dustin… Dustin, wake up. You have to get outta here.” I whispered into
his ear as I lightly shook his shoulder. He mumbled and turned his head over, then
his hand gripped the covers and pulled them closer around his body.

“Cola, you idiot, you’d betta wake up ‘fore we get in trouble!” I whispered a
bit louder now, and shook him harder.

“Ugh…” he grunted as he shuffled his body, but as he moved he lost his

balance against the wall, and then plopped down to the floor. “Ack!”

“Ha, ha, ha!” I giggled as I watched him pick himself up from the ground and
stare at me sleepily.

“It’s too early for this… Abby…” he muttered as he replaced himself in the
spot he was in before. “I’m tired.”

“No kiddin’ Sherlock,” I replied. “But you need to go.”

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 “Me? I need to go..? You’re the one who is in my house…” he said groggily,
staring at nothing in particular.

“Uh, Dustin? You’re the one who is in my house. And you need to get. If you
actually opened your eyes maybe you’d know that.”

“Huh?” he said in reply, and then he began looking around him. His eyes
widen as he finally realized that he was not in his room at home, but in my house, in
my room, with my grandmother downstairs, and his father next door. “Crap!!”

He jumped up from the ground, which was so bright, because the thud of his
feet against the wooden planks shook the whole house.

“Abby?! What’s all that ruckus??” my grandmother yelled up the stairs, and I
flinched.

“Oh now you’ve done it. We’re done for!!” I whisper yelled to Dustin, who
smiled awkwardly and shrugged.

“Abby? Can you hear me? I’m coming up there!” she hollered again, but this
time I heard the slow creak of her feet against the stairs. They become louder as
she got closer.

“What do we do?!” I panicked as I got up from the floor. I began pacing

around. “Hurry, go outside!!!”

“Okay, okay!” I said as he trotted to the window and tried to open it. He
started to struggle with it when it wouldn’t open. “Jammed!!” he quietly shouted to
me.

I ran over to help pull the sill up, and then it opened. However, once it was
open, I heard her feet on the second level.

“Oh no, get outta here!!!” I said as I scooted him out of the window. He
weaved his body through. His head got out… his arms, his torso, his left leg, his
other…

Click! I heard as the knob turned and my grandmother stepped in. Too late.

“Had mercy, what have we here..?” she said, half-way shocked. Dustin stared
at her from outside of the window, his face stiff and unemotional. I grimaced as I
looked at my grandmother’s puzzled face, then I glanced at Dustin’s distraught
figure looking at my grandmother, and couldn’t help but gaze back at her. I started
wondering how we were going to get our punishment and how much it was gunna
hurt.

“Abigail Megan Dean, what is going on??” she said this with more anger.

“He-he was…. Um…” I stuttered, wondering what to say. I looked at Dustin,

who was struggling to come back into the house.

15
 “Abigail.” she repeated sternly.

“I’m sorry Ms. Mary. I was playing out in the rain and when it started
thundering I got scared…so I came here and asked Abby if I could stay.” Dustin cut
in, trying to help the situation.

My grandmother looked directly at Dustin. “Why didn’t you just go home,

then?”

“I was out by the creek, which is over on your lot so your place was ‘da
closest thing I could run to.” I lied nonchalantly. “I climbed up ‘dis here ivy on the
side of your house. I climbed up on the small roof and knocked on Abby’s window.
Sure enough, she was there.” he scratched his scalp and smiled. “You’ve got
yourself a good grandchild, Ms. Mary. Sorry for the hassle.”

My grandma couldn’t fight the urge to smile. She scanned Dustin’s innocent
display, but then I noticed that her eyes came to the disturbing sight of Dustin’s
knees, and I knew it was over.

“Dustin! What on earth was happened to your knees?” she exclaimed with
her hands cuddling her cheeks.

Dustin looked down at his scratched up knees that were covered in dried
blood. “I fell when I was in the creek. I was hopping across it and I couldn’t see that
there was no rock to catch my fall, yah see. And I fell in. Luckily it was the shallow
part, unluckily, that’s where all the sharp rocks are. That’s anotha reason I came
here. Didn’t wanna get in trouble with my pa.” he mouthed the lie smoothly,
planning what he was saying with extreme caution.

I could tell my grandmother was uneasy and angry, but she let it go. “Well,
okay then. Let’s not do that anymore, though. I’ll make ya’ll some breakfast, and
Dustin, let me clean your knees up.”

“Thanks Ms. Mary. We’ll be right down!” he said with a wide smile. My
grandmother glanced at us one more time, then headed for the door.

When she left, I walked up to Dustin. “Why did you lie about your knees?”

“Cause there’s no need for us to get in trouble for it.” Dustin explained.

“But it’s your pa that woulda gotten in trouble, not us, Cola.”

“There’s no point in getting him in trouble when he was just trying to help
discipline me. Anyway, that ain’t none of Ms. Mary’s business.”

“But Dustin-” I started to say.

“I don’t wanna talk about it no more.” he pronounced as he stared at me.

“Let’s go downstairs and eat ‘fore we get in trouble, okay?”

16
I looked at his aloof, jubilant face. “Okay, Cola. If that’s whatcha want…”

“Thanks Pepsi. And don’t worry about it. I’m going to always be fine.”

But I wasn’t so sure that’s how it was going to be.

17