Young Writers Society

I am not a believer in making multiple trips from the car to the house. It is raining buckets in a gloomy street lined by town houses that were built a century ago, my feet are soaked from an unfortunately-placed puddle, and I am marching painfully slowly toward a small door with three large suitcases in tow. I notice, before I throw myself through the door of my family's new home, that our front yard is very, very small and I will likely not be playing soccer with my little sister in the future.

There is no floor mat down yet, though that will probably be one of the first things that Dad takes out of its box after he gets a look at my dirty footprints, now going up the stairs. If I had stayed in the doorway for two more seconds, I would likely have been felled by a television in a box, wielded by two buff moving guys who march into the house at a remarkable speed. They move out of view as I ascend the stairs ( not carpeted, thank goodness ). The two wheeled suitcases click at each step. My inner elbows will be rubbed raw after this.

The stairwell is small, but seems to take quite a bit of time for me to straggle into my new room. I lay down the cases and sit down right there in the entrance. It is pretty good compared to the cramped hotel room I had to share with that sister I mentioned earlier, Cass, for the past couple of days. You could sense the hostile energy the moment you set foot in the space, crackling like electricity in the air. But here, it smells like air freshener and wood polish and new beginnings. The walls, soon to be covered with posters, are white and there's a window facing the street. It's sort of small, but it's good. I never asked for something similar to my old room when I moved two states. That needlessly large room, made oppressive by the mistaken idea of my eleven year-old self that navy blue would be a fitting color. No, this one is much better.

Mom chats with Cass as they pass by me, sharing the weight of a box. I hear them set it down in the next room with a "thump", and then Mom's voice. The ghost of a Brooklyn accent, worn away from decades outside of the city. "Get downstairs n' help unload the car, sweetie. Those boxes aren't gonna move themselves."

We spend the next few hours moving boxes and unpacking essentials. Cass insisted that she set up her bed by herself; she had taken a liking to the electric screwdriver. I managed to get both my bed and the nightstand up before dinner. My red blanket is the only spot of color in the room. After I finish, I stare at my furniture, comparing it with the empty space that was. I think Mom ordered pizza for dinner; the smell of tomato sauce wafts into my nose.

There is a noise outside, probably a bird call, and I open the window. Warm air washes over my face, humid from the recent rain. The city was built on a swamp and it seems to me that once you enter, the temperature outside rises slightly. I poke my head out and look around, breathing in the scents of the oak trees lining the street, mixed with that of roses. It's a little bit hard to see in the darkness, but the neighbors to our right have a garden. Small trees obscure the center of it, and the fence is lined with flower bushes. I need to take a closer look at it tomorrow.

My eyes move to the houses. Mostly red, sometimes purple and blue. They are elegant, if you can use such a word to describe inanimate structures. One has a bit of English ivy growing over it. Except for the sounds of the main roads and the occasional fire truck or ambulance in the distance, it is peaceful. In that sense, it's sort of like home, back in Pennsylvania. We lived in the suburbs. The way-out suburbs, where more dense suburbs meet the rural areas. The property was pretty big, and my friends and I used to play around the woods, hollering and play-fighting with sticks. Sometimes someone got hurt. Usually a scratch or a bruise, but one time I broke my arm when I fell out of a tree and a friend of mine, Bruce, tore his leg right open when he tripped and got sent sprawling into the stream. Both of us, on those occasions, didn't realize that we had been hurt until we had gotten up, cleaned ourselves off, and ran around for another two minutes. Then it hit us, and we had to be helped home, gritting our teeth and trying to laugh at the jokes others made. I was just trying to look cool and tough, and I assume Bruce was doing the same.

And in the fall, the air would be crisp and cool and during school, at that time of year, I would occasionally sneak out of the cafeteria at lunch and watch the leaves fall with every breeze while I ate the sandwich I had packed. My friends thought it was odd and teased me for it, but of course I did it anyway.

I would go home to a one-story house and get to my homework. Mom is a nurse, and she didn't get home until around ten or eleven o'clock, Dad was usually in his office looking at papers, and Cass didn't get home from school until four, so the house was mine for an hour. Doing two hours of homework would be split between the living and bedroom depending on the amount of people doing stuff about the house. Then surfing the web, and dinner, and afterward more surfing the web until I got tired.

It wasn't all good, of course, but I'm not living there anymore and can afford to see it through nostalgia-clouded lenses. I miss it a little bit right now and I'm certain that it will intensify as time goes on. I am about to close the window back up when Mom yells up for dinner, so loud that I start and almost snap the frame closed on my neck. "I'm coming!" I call back as I remove my head and close the darn thing properly. The dark wooden floor creaks under my feet and I almost slip on the stairs down. As I walk in, I notice that the kitchen walls are painted a muted green in a very Dad fashion.

Mom turns to me. "Ok, we don't have the plates and table and such unpacked yet, so your father made a run to the convenience store and bought plastic plates. We'll have to eat on the floor of the dining room."

"Sure."

"Good. We have pepperoni and cheese." she leads me into the dining room, a hexagonal room with a ceiling that I could reach up and touch. Dad and Jess sit on opposite sides, munching on pizza slices. I grab a plate and two slices of cheese and sit down next to the door. Dad tells us what's going to happen tomorrow, Jess and I engage in a fierce debate about whether or not she will be popular at school next week, and before she descends into snarling fury we finish our food and speed off to our separate rooms. I can't do anything but sleep, so I change into pajamas and crawl under the covers. The pillow smells like home, but the room is unfamiliar. I cannot seem to fall asleep for an hour, and only then do I realize that I forgot to brush my teeth, right before I drift off.

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The morning greets me with the mixed song of birds and car drivers slamming aggressively on their horns in a nearby street. My clothes are neatly packed in the suitcases and I throw on a T-shirt and shorts. Mom must have woken up early to go to the grocery store, because when I go downstairs and into the kitchen she sets a box of corn flakes and a milk jug on the counter. "Your father and I stayed up late unpacking the plates and cutlery, so they should be in the cabinets and drawers." she says, and I smile gratefully. I go to explore the kitchen attempting to find a bowl and spoon. The corn flakes are coated with sugar and they turn the milk sweet.

When the dishes are washes and drying on a paper towel, I ask Mom if I can go outside. She nods, reminding me not to stray from the row of houses. The sun is already high up in the sky when I open the door, glaring through the leaves of the trees. I go to stand on the sidewalk so that I can get a better look at where I live.

The house is brick, painted white, with a deep green door. It appears to be one of those styles that looks like something out of the 1770's... what's the word? A colonial, I think. There is a bench in the front yard. Or maybe "a stone path with mulch and overgrown bushes filling the three feet or so of extra space on the sides, lined by a rusty chain link fence" would be a more accurate description of it. Maybe Jess can turn the fence into a project of hers.

"Hey, you!" a voice, coming from the neighbors' house. I turn to look, and see a girl sitting on the front steps. She stands and walks up to the fence when she catches my eye. She has a side shave; the left half of her head covered with black hair trimmed almost to the skin and the right harboring a curly mane of dyed maroon hair that sways and bounces with the slightest movement. "Aren't you one of the new neighbors? I saw the moving truck the other day." 

I blink a few times, caught slightly off guard by her loud, rough voice and appearance, then nod. The girl laughs, the deep dark circles under her eyes crinkling. "I know, the haircut always looks a little weird to strangers. I'm Constance Delacruz." she sticks out a hand, and I shake it nervously. I was never good at meeting new people. "I'm Adam Miller. I-it looks cool."

"Thank you! You don't have look so worried; I don't bite. What grade are you in? I'm not going to ask you what school you go to, because you look about the same age as me and we're probably in the same school zone." she reaches up to brush her hair out of her eyes; she is wearing long sleeves in summer. 

"Um... I'm in eleventh."

"Awesome! Same here." a grin lights up her features. Before I can reply, the door to her house opens and a woman with bobbed black hair and a slight frown peeks out

"Constance! We're having brunch with Stella in twenty minutes, and you need to be ready by then!" she calls, unaware of my presence, but her eyes find me and her face changes, a pleasant smile spreading across her lips but not reaching her eyes, which remain intense and calculating. "Oh, hello. Are you a part of the family that just moved next door?" she asks. Polite neighbor small talk. I nod, feeling like a deer in the headlights and shuffling under her gaze. I have mastered the art of silent introductions.

"I'm Mrs. Delacruz. I see you've already met my daughter, Constance." she steps on to the porch and reveals her hands, which are covered with pieces of dough. "I wish I could shake your hand, but I've been baking a little something for the brunch and I don't want to get your hands dirty. I have to run; it was nice meeting you..." she pauses. I realize I'm supposed to fill in the blank and I bleat out my name. Mrs. Delacruz nods, smiles that nice neighborly smile once again, "It was nice meeting you, Adam," and disappears through the door.

Constance looks back at me. "Well, I should probably go. As my mom said, it was nice meeting you, Adam!" with that, she bounds up the steps and into the house after her mother, closing the door behind her. I stand there for a few seconds, my eyes hanging on to the place that she vanished, before realizing that I probably look like a creep and head inside my own house. Feeling a little more calm than before.