Blame The Weeds (gxg)

27.5

October '86

Kareena is 4

Daddy put his hands on his chest like there was something trying to escape again. So I put my hands on my chest too. He looked down at me and dropped his hands, so I did too.

The yellow bus was small, then big, then huge as it bounced up the road through all the holes and rain.

"Do you have your lunch?" Dad asked.

"Yes!" I yelled. He pulled me back from the street as the bus door opened.

"And your crayons?"

"Daddy let me go!" I ran and ran in one spot until the grass was muddy on my pink boots.

"Let me..." He pulled the tie from my hair. "No, no," he said, bunching it all back up again and snapping the band on my head.

"Ow."

"Sorry."

I touched the bunchy knot and stomped my foot. "Why can't you do it like mommy?"

Dad touched his chest, but I didn't. 

I looked over to the other houses when someone cried. A man carried a boy out of the house beside our house. The boy screamed and punched a lot. 

Dad nudged me to the bus. "Okay, let's go."

"What about him?" I pointed to the sad boy.

"He's scared."

"Of the bus?" I asked. 

Dad pushed my backpack. "Maybe. Let's—"

I went over anyway.

"Kareena!"

"Hi!" I said to the man. The boy was wrapped around his neck like a monkey, crying and crying like I did when I was sad.

Dad stopped beside me and made his scratchy throat noise.

"Apologies for not introducing ourselves yesterday. Most of our things are still in boxes." He stuck his hand out. "Lorenzo Barone." The man took daddy's hand.

"Frank Hoffmann. My wife Ida is inside. Where are you coming from, Lorenzo?"

"Austin originally, but Salt Lake the past few years."

"Well, welcome to South Seabrook. Good luck staying dry."

"We don't mind the rain." Daddy looked at me with his tired look. "This is my runaway daughter, Kareena. It's the two of us."

"Hello, Kareena," said the Frank man. "This is my son, Lukas."

"Just Luke," said a whisper.

"Lukas doesn't much like school."

My mouth popped open. "What the hell!"

"Kareena Diya!"

Frank laughed. "Indeed."

I ran around to look at the sad boy. His eyes were closed, but he wasn't crying anymore, so I jumped up and smacked his head. He opened his eyes then, and they were like the pretty blue eyes on my Barbie.

"You're loud like a baby," I said.

"You said a bad word," he said.

"Hell?" I asked.

"Kareena!" dad said.

I plucked a little yellow flower out of the ground and lifted it up to the sad boy. He sniffled and took it.

Dad reached around and yanked me back. "Stop picking weeds," he said.

"It's alright," said Frank. "Saves me the effort."

The bus went honk!

"Dad put me down," said Luke, twitching around. He shuffled over to me, so daddy let me go too. Luke reached down and picked a nicer, taller yellow flower and gave it to me. I put mine through my backpack strap. Luke did too.

"I like yellow," said Luke. 

I pointed to the bus. "That's super-duper yellow," I said and took Luke's hand. I pulled him all the way over and stopped to wave at my dad.

"Bye, daddy!" I yelled.

Luke waved too. "Bye, dad."

So, we skipped on the bus.

I pulled Luke's hand to the first open seat. I liked the window because I liked to see the gulls and the clouds. Luke sat beside me, wiping his cheeks.

I stuck my finger into the holes on the back of the seat in front of us. "These are all ripped," I said.

Luke hit my hand. "That will make it more ripped."

I crossed my arms and stared out the window at the crashing water. "Well you cry like a baby."

"You said a bad word."

I pulled his yellow flower from his bag strap and added it to mine. A little tear fell out of his eye as I took it.

We didn't talk the whole way over all the roads and two big bridges.

I took his flower from my bag and gave it back. "Sorry," I said.

He took it, looked at it, and smiled a little. "It's okay."

"Good. We should be friends, I guess," I said.

"You want to be my friend?" Luke asked. I nodded, so he said, "Okay."

We watched out the window as wood bobbed in the water. Luke said, "Pastor John calls them The Wandering Woods because they travel all over the earth and the oceans."

"Who's John?" I asked.

"The pastor," said Luke.

"Oh. I would be super tired if I was a Wandering Wood. Do you think they're tired?"

"Yeah," said Luke.

"Do you think they're hungry? I would be super hungry too," I said.

Luke pulled a half-eaten pack of gummy worms from his pocket and poured them into our hands. He ate one, I ate two, and we threw the rest out the open window. They flew away and away, all through the air, over the bridge we drove on, and into the sea.

"Do you think those will help?" I asked.

"Yeah," said Luke.