The next day was hot and humid. I wanted to sit in the freezer all day, but there was no room, and my sister wanted to go to the park. I just lived with her. Even though I was only sixteen at the time, I took care of my nine year old sister. I grew up way too fast-- we both did. Our parents dealed heroin, so social services brought us to live at our rich dead aunt's house. I was only fourteen, and being the silly, ignorant teenager I was, I staged things with the neighbors to pretend they were our aunt and uncle so we could live alone. I loved those neighbors. They would bake us cookies and helped us pay for school expenses and other splurges if we would take care of their pets, water their plants, and take out their trashcans. My sister did those things because I was busy working a double shift at the country club on the weekends and lifeguarding at the pool in the summer. Sometimes, if we really needed, I would be the golf instructor's assistant, but I hated golf. Even if we needed the extra money, we usually wouldn't ask Barbara and Tom (the neighbors) for it because of our pride. I always found a way to make a few more dollars. Anyway, I went to the park with my sister and saw the girl from the dock. She was wearing starch white dress and sunglasses. She leaped from the swings and came up to me while my sister slid down the slide. "What's your name again?" she asked even though I had never told her in the first place. "Brandon." "Oh ya. I'm Lacey." My sister came running up and shook Lacey's hand. "Hi nice to meet you I'm Brynn and I'm nine years old." She said everything in a run-on sentence. "Hi I'm Lacey." She said with a cute ring of happiness. "Come here. I wanna show you something." She brought Brynn to the shade of a huge oak tree, grabbed three ice cream cookie sandwiches. She climbed over the fence at the edge of the lawn. We followed. Lacey and I went over it, but my sister went through because she could fit her head through. She lead us to this overgrown patch of bushes in between the tennis courts that no one could see. There were thousands of little blue berries on each plant. She started picking, one by one, careful not to get any leaves. Brynn and I helped and soon enough, we had picked every healthy berry to be found. She brought the basket to her white BMW. "Hop in." We did. She drove us to her house. She lived in the East Gate. Just like all the other houses in Green Hill. She washed the berries and added a few freshly cut raspberries and strawberries. She added a bar of dark chocolate in a gold and black wrapper. She tied a silver bow onto the side of the basket the color of Daisy. We followed her to the garage and into the golf cart. We drove to the country club, and she gave the berries Natalie at the front desk the basket. "I'll be sure to give them to him." "Thank you," she said smoothly, turning around and bouncing while she walked. "Who were those for?" Brynn asked. "It's none of your business," I told her. "It's fine. They're for Steven. Steven Green." We didn't know who that was but we nodded along anyway.
