chapter two
I couldn’t miss any more school days, so if my peers wanted to stare, they’d have to witness my inflated eyeball beforehand. As predicted, many averted their glances. After a week, it all toned down. A girls suicide was quickly old news once the new episode of Keeping Up With The Kardashians was aired; I was a little grateful, as bad as it sounds. The incident wasn’t forgotten, but it was overshadowed, and I’d settle for that any day.
Most nights, when I should be completing make up work, I exhaust my brain by recollecting memories. My room is a very good place to think because I resemble somewhat of a hoarder and everything I own is basically on the floor. I remembered most of middle school by sniffing Axe spray and finding my list of usernames for Myspace years after it was considered uncool (XxIsaac_103xX).
The only thing my room lacks is the part of me that was involved with Delilah. I asked my mom more about her, quite sternly. She kept insisting how it would affect me, especially in the state I’m in, but I continued to press. Finally, one morning as I was munching on some burnt toast, she decided to fill me in.
“You were good friends before middle school. You two would run around those streets like you owned them and your biggest concern was the sunset because that meant you had to go home. Delilah was a nice girl, very stubborn, determined, and independent, but I guess that’s why you two fit. Then something happened in middle school—I don’t know what, you wouldn’t tell me—and you stopped talking with her… with anybody, really. But that’s around the time your father left, so I doubt it has much to do with her.
“Then, the beginning of this year you two started talking again. Throughout the week you’d slip out and go up into Mr. Garfield’s tree house and talk, hopefully doing nothing too bad. You still didn’t talk about her, but I caught on eventually.”
I nodded as the new information sunk in. And to my surprise, two wires connected in my mind and an image sparked. It was a girl around eight. She had green eyes, light brown hair, and a missing tooth.
“Get up, Isaac. You’re going to miss it!” Her voice rang in my ears like a roaster in the crack of dawn. I groaned as a response and rolled over; ignoring the way she kept tugging at my covers. Delilah then resorted to clobbering me with my own R2-D2 toy, something that quickly got me to sit up.
“What? What is it?” I asked, irritated.
“The eggs, c’mon!” I wasn’t awake enough to think, but I quickly scrambled out of bed anyways. I didn’t even bother to change out of my Ninja Turtles t-shirt and Power Rangers pants; I just ran downstairs as swiftly as Delilah did. Our kitchen has a door with a screen that’s ripped from a corner. I figured Delilah crawled through there and tip-toed up the stairs in order to get my attention.
We ran as fast as our petite legs could go until we were in Mr. Garfield’s yard and rising up his tree house’s ladder. Delilah was ahead of me the whole time. Her whole night outfit was purple with decorations of Hello Kitty. Her slippers were drenched in mud, but she didn’t seem to care. We finally reached the top of the ladder and climbed into the small room. There was a window that was pointed directly at a branch, and that branch just happened to hold two miniature eggs that were each cracking. The mother had abandoned them a while ago, and so Delilah and I took on the parental responsibilities that come with hatching eggs.
She wanted to be the Dad; I let her.
“Should we name them?” Delilah asked. She sat next to me and rested her chin on the windowsill.
I shrugged, “Like what?”
“I don’t know maybe—shut up, they’re hatching.”
We witnessed the miracle of birth, even though it wasn’t much more than poking and prodding. The two chicks eventually sniffed their first breath of fresh air after around an hour of just watching. I had slowly drifted to soft sleep in the midst of our waiting, but was brutally woken up just in the nick of time.
Delilah pointed at the bird on the left, “She’s a girl, and that one”—she pointed at the other one—“is a boy. You name the boy one.”
Delilah named hers Stacy Number Two, in honor of her deceased gold fish, Stacy. I wasn’t very sure what I wanted to name mine. He was wet, awkward looking, and frankly, ugly. I stared at him for a while, just trying to see which names fit him. Finally, I got something.
“Mr. Garfield,” I answered.
Delilah laughed, “Ew, why?”
“Because he’s bald and slow, like Mr. Garfield.”
“Then he’s Mr. Garfield Number Two,” Delilah corrected.
“Fine.”
I told my mom what I remembered after school. She smiled through the whole story and laughed at the ending. I didn’t see the hilarity; we were stupid kids who thought the prettiest bird was always female. But still, my mom thought it was a cute story and told me she remembered what happened afterwards. She offered to tell me; I said yes.
“Delilah got in trouble for being out late. Your father and I were too busy fighting to notice, so you were off the hook. Every day after school you told me you had to check on Delilah and yours kids, which ended up with you explaining me the whole situation. So, I helped you with the chicks. But we weren’t the chicks’ mother, no matter how many times you claimed you were, and the chicks ended up dying. You two had a funeral and everything, later on you had a divorce. Very realistic for American marriages, I was impressed.”
I smiled, just barely. I vaguely remember that funeral, but I did remember the divorce. It didn’t even end in a fight, Delilah just thought that’s what all parents do eventually. As far as knowledge over marriages from an eight year old goes, Delilah was exactly right. My parents were a great example, I even remember her using them as one.
“Did Mr. Garfield know we were using his tree house?” I asked. I was curious because that memory hadn’t decided to stop by yet. I wanted to speed up its visit.
My mom took a bite out of her Chinese takeout then shrugged, “I think so, but then again, the man only went outside to get the mail and scream at younger generations. I think he let you two slide.”
“Is Mr. Garfield still our neighbor?”
“Yeah, he’s got a couple more years in him.”
“Is the tree house still up?”
“I don’t think it could ever come down.”
I chewed slowly, thinking within every bite I took. I pondered in silence until my mom eventually caught on and asked me what’s wrong. I said nothing, she said okay, and then we both said nothing. Once she got up to dispose of the trash, I asked her if I could go for a walk. I could tell by the way she looked at me she knew where I was going, but she nodded anyways and told me to be safe and be back soon.
I jumped the fence that divided Mr. Garfield’s house and mine. I still had yet to remember where Delilah lives, or, lived. I climbed his wooden ladder until it brought me to a hatch door. Pushing it open, I was exposed to the same tree house my memory depicted. A sense of something familiar washed over me as I took everything in. I was too tall to stand up inside, so I sat down and observed.
More post-it notes of my own were scattered and there were even some that didn’t resemble my handwriting. I read as many as I could, until my hand brushed something on the ground that poked my palm. I glanced down. It was a journal, scribbled with the words, “Private Property of Delilah White."
A/N: what up with the tab system on wattpad? it perturbs me. anyways, all feedback is appreciated, thanks for reading.
