Chapter Text
Summer really flew by. In two weeks we go back to school and we start our eighth grade year. I’m not all that excited. I mean, I’m glad junior high will be done with but we still have four more years of high school to go through. So, yep not too ecstatic about that.
On the bright side, I’ve become friends with Juli. Like real friends.
I… I guess I’m finding out that I never really knew Juli.
Yeah, I know I said she’s pushy and stubborn beyond belief. But really, she’s open to everyone’s opinion she just.. She has her own ideas and her own way of going about things.
A lot of kids our age don’t have that. I know I don’t.
It goes along with "the whole being greater than the sum of its parts”. We’re just bundles and bushels of ideas and traditions from outside forces. We, as people, won’t start generating our own thoughts and ideas until we’re about eighteen.
It’s interesting stuff. It makes my head hurt sometimes when I get deep into it, but it’s pretty neat to think about. And if I’m being completely honest, it’s terrifying.
It’s terrifying how we’re easily we're influenced by the outside.
But now, I’m beginning to understand the things that are going on around me.
I can now see why Lynetta, my sister, is talking back and fighting my dad. She doesn’t agree with him, she’s breaking away and choosing her own likes and dislikes. And I guess, my dad’s one of the dislikes.
I also now understand what my Grandfather said. I now know what he meant when he said “I’d hate to see you swim out so far you can’t swim back.”
He saw that I was becoming my dad. Becoming this person who easily lies and is so… so…
I don’t know, but I don’t want to be what my dad is. Not really.
But since I’ve been hanging around Juli, my thinking and my sight is changing.
Well, not sight. What’s the word? Perception.
Yeah, that’s what changing. My perception and outer and inner body awareness is changing.
I’m glad it is. Because there’s so many things I was blind to that I’m seeing for the first time now.
I’ve grown a lot, I think.
At least, that’s what I was thinking when I was coming up the sidewalk while on a leisure stroll.
See, I find that I like absently walking around and thinking to myself.
Probably because I never thought much before.
But now, I quite like it. Sometimes my grandpa would join me and we’d talk. I liked to hear him talk about grandma.
These strolls I take happen on early mornings or late afternoons. They’re uneventful to say the least. But it's what I’ve grown to like.
My thoughts were interrupted by a football coming my way. I didn’t get hit by it. I heard someone holler “Watch out!” and I turned in time to catch it.
The guy who hollered looked about my age. Black hair and the greenest eyes. His face was round and he had a… what is it? Beauty Mark.
He had a beauty mark just above his right eyebrow. His hair was slicked back but I could see rebellious curls coming through. He was coming towards me, and that’s when I noticed where I was. I was in front of the house where the Sycamore Tree was. This guy lived in the Sycamore Tree house.
I know it was pretty dumb of me, but I kinda felt mad at him. Y’know for ruining what was once there? But it was completely stupid to blame him for that.
When he was finally in front of me. I handed him the football and planned to go about my way but he introduced himself; after apologizing of course.
“My names Jack. Jackson Lee Lecce” he said as held out his hand for me to shake.
“Bryce” I said simply as I shook his hands.
“My family just moved into the neighborhood. I...” I wan't listening. I was observing. I've been working on being a bit more attentive so I just analyzed him a bit. He was taller than me by like half a head. His eyes were super green. And his hair was ridiculously dark. Honestly, his face looked like it was the kind you’d see in a magazine.
“You wanna throw around the pigskin?” he asked.
I politely declined, and was about to turn to leave when he asked another question.
“Hey, there’s a girl who sells farm fresh eggs, right? My ma’s been wanting some. She heard from a neighbor that they’re sold at a good deal and that the girl raised the hens herself.”
“Juli?” I said without really thinking. I knew Juli’s egg business had grown to be fairly local around the neighborhood but I didn’t know it grew to over here too.
“Is that her name? Does she deliver?”
“Uhh, yeah. Yeah, she does. I can tell her about her new customers when I catch her. She lives by me so I’ll let her know to come up this way since there’s people who want to buy eggs.” I said.
And that was that.
When I saw Juli in the afternoon I didn’t tell her straight away about the new family who was interested in buying eggs. I should have. But I didn’t.
I think I was subconsciously trying to protect her. She had been hurt about the tree being taken down and she avoided really going by the area where the tree used to stand. So, I guess I didn’t think that she’d want to interact with the people who ordered the tree to be cut down.
I did tell her about the Lecce family, really quickly though. I was heading home and I just kinda slipped it into my ‘goodbye’ of the day.
I might have underestimated Juli’s strength. Okay, no, I do that a lot. I did underestimate Juli’s resolve.
With the way Juli talked about the tree, how she loved the view it gave her, what it meant to her, I didn’t think she’d want to be around the people responsible for the uprooting of her tree.
But in the morning, Juli was heading out to the house where the Sycamore Tree used to be, eggs in hand.
Thanks for reading. -V