The boy in the brush

I bend down and draw in the sand with a pointy stick. I stand outside in my abuela and abuelo's back yard as my siblings and cousins play something inside that I have no interest in. Looking up, I notice a boy watching me.
He is quite far away so the only feature I can make out on him is hair so blond and bright that he looks like a fire cracker. After realizing that I notice him, he turns and trots away into the brush.

Crazy board as I am, I chase after him. Once reaching the brush, I see that he has stopped at least twenty feet away. Yelling, I ask why he is watching me. He does not respond. Instead he turns again and flees into his territory.

I chase him. As I trek further into his land I realize he has vanished. I search around for a short time until I find a large hole in the ground. The hole is too dark and too deep to see into so I yell into it. I ask him what he is doing, no one responds. I say that I am visiting my abuela and abuelo and that I will be staying with them for a short amount of time. If he is in this hole he says nothing. Taking a step back I wonder if he's even there. I have absolutely no desire to crawl in and find out. Trying one more time, I tell him that I have nothing to do and ask if he wants to play.

He climbs out.

I smile.

He tells me his name.

I tell him mine.

He asks me to follow him saying that there is something he wants to show me. I follow him. I am sure to watch my step because earlier that day I tripped and fell and I don't want a repeat. Suddenly, we stop walking and he shoves through some plants to reveal an oval shaped space that is around ten feet long and six feet wide. A tire is in the center it's obviously a make shift chair, glass bottles liter the floor, and hangers with things tied to them are hooked on tree branches like ornaments.

He turns, looks at the dead center of my eyes and tells me that this is his secret fort and that it can be mine as well if I help make it better, but I am to tell no one about our fort unless both of us agree that the person can know. I agree to all the terms and conditions.

Hopping into action he gestures and tells me to follow him once again. He leads me to an open plain with trash everywhere. We can see that things such as aging wood, tires, and plastic and glass bottles are laying about in abundance. More unique things such as lamps, crock pots, and a microwave lay hidden with the other garbage.

Swerving forward and to the left he grabs a tire. He turns his head, looks at me then says that I should help him move the tire back to the fort so I can have a seat. We hook our arms around the tire and we drag it back to the fort, and place it directly next to the old one. Surveying our space, we make a plan, then hurry back to the trash heap and grab a lamp, three more tires, coffee mugs, and the microwave. We bring our new treasures back to the fort; we hook the mugs to tree branches making sure that they are all in a straight line. We bury the base of the lamp of to the side so it stands up straight. We stack the three tires on top of each other and place the microwave on top of the three tires.

Now that our work is done, we sit down on our two tire thrones and look over our accomplishments. He is about to say something when he is interrupted by my mom's voice calling for me to come back. I stand up and start to return home. Pushing through the leaves I meander over to the edge of the foliage and stop right before the point where my mom could have seen me. I turn around.

He followed me.

I smile and ask if I can play with him again tomorrow.

He says I can.