Part 3
Our tree, I’m sure is the biggest tree in the world. None could be any bigger because this one is already bigger than the sidewalk and curb allow. The big rough roots that look like a giant’s legs are growing up over the curb on one side and up over the sidewalk on the other.
My little green soldiers can hide between the roots and cling to the scaly rough bark. Somebody made a little platform for me with two nails driven in part way and sticks laid across them. This is the most special place on the tree. The place for my very most favorite soldier.
Who did that for me? Who put those nails in so cleverly? Brother? a big sister? I think I’ll ask tomorrow. Or maybe I’ll let it stay a mystery.
The only other tree besides ours that’s anywhere near this big is halfway down the court. These are the ones that lift great slabs of concrete in the sidewalk I run on, my breath racing, my heart pounding, the sun on my bare back. These are the slabs that catch my bare toes and make them bleed and make me howl. But I always get up and run some more.
I remember the fear I felt when one of these tree fractured slabs caught my running boy self and threw me to the ground with such force that I was left staring up at those leaves in the sidewalk-wrenching tree looking up at a sky that seemed to be wavering in and out of my pounding head.
And I was dying. My poor, slammed down body had forgotten how to take in the air. It was gone, just gone. I was going to look up at that tree forever, a dead boy, scared and sad.
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