Page 74 of Mountain Pine
“Me too.”
Conner’s eyebrows go up with happiness. “Maybe we’ll be in the same class when school starts.”
“Maybe.” I’m scared to go to school. I like being home and at the playground.
“Hey,” he says, looking up. “Want me to climb this tree and grab you fresh leaves?”
“I can do it.” But no matter how hard I try, I can’t get my foot to stick to the trunk long enough to climb up. And the lowest branch is still too high for me to reach.
Conner gets a running start, jumps up, and grabs the low branch super easy, then pulls himself up without using the trunk at all. Wow. He’s a really good tree climber. Way better than me and Carly.
“Which ones?” he asks from higher up because I think he’s showing off. I would too if I could climb like him.
I point at all the leaves we should put in the magic potion, and he plucks them and drops them down to me. Each one flutters around my head, and I add them to my bucket.
“That’s good!” I yell once we have enough.
Conner climbs down the tree limbs and sits on the lowest branch, swinging his feet as he stares down at me. “This is fun.”
Yeah, it is.
“Come all the way down so we can finish it!”
“Okay.” But Conner doesn’t come all the way down because he’s stuck. “I think I gotta jump.”
He slowly stands and wobbles.
“Wait! Whoa!” my mom yells from behind us.
Conner slips, tries to grab the branch, misses, and falls right on top of me.
Mom runs over to us before I even notice my elbow stings.
“Oh, my goodness. Are you two okay?”
“Yeah.” I look at my arm and see it’s a little bloody. Then I look at Conner and he is definitely not okay.
“Oh sweetie. We need to clean that up.” Mom tries to help, but he shrinks back from her.
“I’m okay.”
“That’s a deep cut.”
“Yeah. Better put a band aid on it,” I say. Blood is already dripping onto the ground. It looks bad. Way worse than mine.
“I’m really sorry I hurt you,” he says, still not caring about his cut. “Please don’t be mad.”
“I’m not mad.” But that cut is bleeding a lot. “Get a band aid so we can play some more.”
“I don’t have one.”
“Come with me to the bench,” my mom says.
Conner doesn’t look like he want to do that.
“She’s got a whole bag of band aids in her purse because I hurt myself all the time.” I show off all the scabs on my knees and also my bruises and bug bites.
He doesn’t look impressed. He looks worried. “How’d you get all those?”
