Tricycle

We looked like sisters. We were the same height. We had the same silky hair the same warm chestnut, worn the same length below our shoulders. Our skin was the same shade of Pale Late Spring Tan with Olive Undertones. Only her eyes were brown and mine were green. Kim and I had been sent outside to play while the grownups stayed inside to talk about grownup things.

My family was moving to another town. Her family wanted to buy our house, the only home I’d ever known, the house across the street from my grandmother. I had become used to finishing breakfast and running across the quiet street to visit with my grandmother until lunch time. There had been other families come to look at the house, but none with children to play with, and none had come back, and they were never mentioned again. I had felt secure that we wouldn’t really leave until Kim’s family showed up. Now I was trusted with the job of entertaining Kim like a good hostess, like the good hostess my mother was to Kim's parents.

Outside, the yard was surrounded by pine woods which sighed softly in the breeze. We roamed around the back yard for a while. We tried out the swings. Kim swung her legs and sent the swing into overdrive quickly pushing up over my head. But my legs and arms were desultory, limp, dissatisfied. We headed to the driveway, where my red tricycle winked at us. Without sitting I grabbed the handle bars and put my left foot on the step behind the seat. I pushed off with my right foot and rode the trike down the driveway, standing behind the seat. Kim ran along behind me while I used the wind in my face and the screeching jay birds to forget she was there.

At the bottom of the driveway, down a slope, at the edge of the quiet street, I stopped the trike and got off, ready to push it back up the slope for another ride down. Kim caught up with me there, and reached for the handlebars. I jerked it away from her. What was she thinking? This is my tricycle. I’m not sure what I said to her, but she ran crying all the way back up the driveway to the house. At least now I would get to play by myself, I thought, kind of knowing this wasn’t the end of it.

Sure enough, no sooner had she gone inside than my mother came out, walking straight toward me, with a hard look in her face, Kim in tow by her hand, running to keep up, trying not to trip. My mother shook her finger at me, ordered me to share my toys and play nice. I glared at Kim, trying to make her disappear in the heat of my stare. I scuffed the ground with my shoe. I felt my eyebrows knit together and my lips set hard and tight. Why should I share my tricycle with her? She’s getting the house.