I told myself I was happy without Annabelle bugging me. But sitting next to her at dinner with her never looking at me felt weird. She didn’t hold my hand for the prayer. Miss Dixie didn’t make her. I thought Annabelle would shake it off. But she didn’t.
Miss Miller came by once in a while to check on me and let me know Mom was not making much progress. This was never a surprise to me.
As the summer and long days passed by, I realized that I was going to be at Miss Dixie’s for the long haul. This meant I would go to South High in the middle of August. I wasn’t happy about this. I had looked forward to my high school years at North High. I was already a top dog. Nobody would mess with me. Now I would have to prove myself all over again.
It was early August. I leaned against my window and saw Annabelle on the bridge. It was her favorite spot. I realized that I never saw her with other girls. She wasn’t like Rico. She didn’t make friends easily. Maybe we had something in common after all. I took a deep breath and headed out of my room.
“Hey.” I stood far enough away from her so that I wouldn’t scare her. She looked at me and then looked back at the water below her. “What’s up?” She didn’t answer. So I tried again. “Can I sit?” She still didn’t move and didn’t answer. “I take that as a yes, since you didn’t say no.” I sat down near her and let my feet dangle too. I could smell her strawberry lip gloss and smiled. I knew right away why she loved this spot. You felt for just a minute like you were somewhere else. The trees along the park hid a lot of the buildings, and grass spread out on both sides of you. I had never seen so much green in my life. “Wow! Great place!”
Annabelle looked into the water. She let her legs move slowly back and forth.
“Look, Annabelle,” I said, feeling like I was doing something that wasn’t me. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.” She was quiet and her legs stopped moving. “I mean, you really freaked me out, girl.” I tried to smile. “Think about it. What would you have done if some black boy came into your room and started pulling your covers off?”
She suddenly turned her head and looked at me. Her blue eyes met mine. She held me with her look. I couldn’t tell if she was about to freak out again or laugh. She was thinking.
“I never thought of it that way.” She kept looking at me. She was so intense. I wanted to look away, but I didn’t. She finally said, “I guess I would have hit you.” A small smile started to appear. “Thanks for not hitting me.” She turned to face the water again and her legs started to swing.
“You’re welcome, I guess.” I said, wondering what had just happened. In a sort of weird way, we had moved on.
“You see that tree over there?” Annabelle pointed at a huge pine tree. It looked like the biggest Christmas tree I had ever seen.
“Yeah,” I answered.
Annabelle slowly pushed her hair behind one ear. “I dream on it.”
I frowned a little. “What? You dream on it? What the heck does that mean?” She looked at me with a frown. I smiled. “Just asking—not being mean—I promise.”
Her smile returned. She took a deep breath. “I dream one day I will have a house with a big tree like that. Maybe it will be near that lake in the picture on my wall.”
I looked at the tree and only saw a tree. Still I wanted to say something. “Some dream!”
She looked at me and her eyes held me again. “What’s your dream TJ?”
I felt stupid. I shifted. I looked up to the sky. I leaned back on my arms. I finally answered, “No idea. Never had a dream. Just want to live I guess.” I looked at her and she was still staring at me. “Does that count as a dream?”
She smiled. “I think it does.”
During the prayer at dinner that night, Annabelle held my hand. I held it back.