In lieu of the vacationing Thursday Prompt, landed my finger smack onto "strawberry." Adding the word "blossoms" to it, then, got us chapter 48 of Neighbors. The previous chapters, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, and 47, fall under their respective numbers in case you'd like to do any reviewing...
It was a weird feeling, rolling down the street without at
least one animal sitting on me or clinging to me or batting me
in the head and telling me something I probably didn't want to
hear.
Because that pretty much summed up the last few weeks of my
life at that point. No, not just weeks. Not even just months.
More like years: the decade or so I'd been riding this
chair, my four or five years on crutches before that, my very
first cane way back in second grade. Ever since then, there'd
always been something about me that made me stand out, something
that stopped me from blending in with a crowd.
And, yes, sure, I'm exactly like everybody else in wanting
to be special, unique and remarkable. I just don't want to be
special, unique and remarkable in the weird and ugly way that I
actually am...
I realized then that I'd just crossed Delacourt Street half
a block from Deena's house, so I grabbed the wheels, slowed
myself, not sure if that would be the best place for me right
then. It was still kind of early--after nine o'clock, I knew,
but probably not ten yet; I really needed to get a wristwatch or
something--and I'm not the best company when I'm on the verge of
falling off the cliff of self-pity.
Still--and however terrible it was for me to think this--
knowing that Deena had problems of her own made me feel better
about heading over there. Not that I was happy she had all
those needle marks up and down her arms and that her mother had
left her and her dad--and not that I would ever bring those
things up in conversation, either, since, I mean, I had plenty
of things in my own life that I didn't want to talk about.
But with Deena and her dad, it was like it didn't really
matter that I was all stove in and peculiar. Like I said, they
had problems of their own, so mine didn't seem to be as "in the
spotlight" as they usually did.
About then, I started hearing Heather, her tiny yips barely
audible: "Out in the morning, out in the dirt!" she was singing.
"Out in the morning, out in the dirt!"
So I knew I wouldn't be waking everybody up...
The barest little breeze brushed against my face, so I was
able to get all the way up to the front gate without Heather
noticing me. But then she was busy squatting in the grass, her
tail a blur, her entire attention focused on Deena, down on her
hands and knees along the ivy-encrusted brick wall that ran
between the Schwarbers' place and the house next door. A wooden
pallet maybe two feet square sat beside the two of them, little
plants covering it: spiky, dark green bunches of leaves with a
few tiny white flowers scattered among them.
Deena was digging a hole in the strip of dirt below the
ivy, and I could see others of the little plants already in
their places along the wall till the corner of the house blocked
my view of them. But as much as I just wanted to sit there and
watch the pretty girl and her pretty dog wholly engrossed in as
gentle and sweet an activity as anyone could want, that struck
me as more than a little creepy.
So I cleared my throat, smiled when Heather whirled and
leaped toward me, her rapid-fire barks coming to me as: "One
more step, and I'll show you what teeth can do when properly
applied! I'll--!" Her whole body reacted when she recognized
me, and the threatening barks turned joyful. "Mr. Augie! You
smell so unlike yourself without the El Brujo kitty woven
through you, I didn't recognize you at first! But since it's
you, please don't worry: I'll keep my teeth to myself."
I thanked her, reached my hand through the slats of the
fence, and let her dap my fingertips with her nose and tongue.
"Oh!" Deena said. "Hi, Gus!"
And maybe it was just all the practice I'd been having the
last couple days, but I barely had to swallow to switch from
animal speech to human language. "Hi, Deena. I'm glad you're
up."
Her smile made me even gladder. "I probably wouldn't be,
but Dad left a message on my phone saying he had a surprise in
the garage." She stroked the nearest little plant. "Aren't
they beautiful?"
Not the word I would've chosen: I mean, they made me think
of those ferns you see in dinosaur books, all lumpy and jagged
with giant dragonflies hovering around them. "They're not
tomatoes," I finally managed to say. At least, I was pretty
sure they weren't. But for the life of me, I couldn't tell.
She laughed, and every last drop of self-pity just drained
right out of me: I was the luckiest guy in the world to be right
there right then. "I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess you're
not a plant person."
I cocked my head at her. "Out on a limb?"
It took her a couple blinks before she realized what she'd
said, and I got to hear some more of her laughter. "I didn't
mean to make a pun!"
"Always the best kind." I tickled Heather under the chin.
"Are they tomatoes?"
"Strawberries," she said, picking one of the plants up and
sniffing its single tiny flower. "They don't smell like
anything yet, but knowing what they're gonna turn into, I always
imagine I can get a little whiff from them." She swiveled back
to the hole she'd dug, settled the plant in, smoothed dirt
around the base of it, then straightened. "A couple or three
months, and we're gonna be rolling in these things!" She met my
gaze again. "So where's your entourage?"
Even if I could've explained, I wouldn't've. I was
feeling too good to dwell on all that. "They gave me the
morning off," I said. "But they'll be along to help before too
long." Though at that point I wasn't sure if that would be a
good thing or not. Still, I sat back in my chair and rolled
myself toward their front gate. "But let's see about some dog
training."
You can see about it as well by heading on to 49!
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