Chapter Five
The next morning, the sound of Dad’s chainsaw could be heard all over the neighborhood, as we helped him get that huge fallen limb cut up and removed from the driveway. Really, it was more like half the tree had split away. Mom couldn’t get her car out of the garage till it was cleared. My friend Brian, who lived next door, and his dad, Dan, came over to help.
“Hey Dan,” shouted Dad as he cut his chainsaw off.
“Hey Ron. We thought we could help,” said Dan.
He also brought his chainsaw and soon, both were cutting away. Brian and I started hauling cut branches to Dad’s white Dodge Ram truck, still parked on the curb. I’m the shortest so I did more hauling while Sean and Brian tossed stuff into the truck bed. As the truck began to fill, Brian jumped into the bed to arrange branches so more could fit.
I looked at him and for some reason, there was a big red ‘C’ printed across his chest.
What?
I didn’t know why I was suddenly seeing a big red ‘C’ on him. The rest of the morning, every time I looked at him, there it was. I didn’t know what to think about that. It wasn’t like it was a design on his striped polo shirt. The ‘C’ looked like it was on his body. He noticed that I was looking at him strangely.
“What’s wrong, Noah?” he asked.
I didn’t know what to say. Brian wasn’t aware that sometimes I see things that aren’t really there. He knew I was somewhat weird because of the way I talked sometimes. I didn’t want him to know how truly strange I got. The rest of the morning, I made a point of not staring at him.
We worked hard, but also had fun. I didn’t like the uneasy feeling I had about Brian so while I tossed some small branches into the truck, I told a joke.
“Hey Brian. Do you know how to bake toilet paper?”
“No, but I can brown it on one side,” he responded. We laughed.
“Aw, Noah, that’s such an old joke,” Sean said with scorn in his voice as he flung a branch on the truck.
We had told this joke to each other many times, but it still got us laughing.
“Okay, Sean. You tell a new one,” I said.
“Why do hummingbirds hum?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I responded as I tossed a smaller branch.
“Because they don’t know the words,” he said, laughing. “Now your turn, Brian.”
“Okay. Knock, knock,” he said.
“Who’s there?” asked Sean
“I am.”
“I am who?”
“You don’t know who you are?” asked Brian.
We were all laughing, even the men, as we kept coming up with knock knock jokes.
Soon, the truck was loaded. Dad moved it further down the curb, and Brian’s dad pulled his own red truck to the spot on the curb. We filled that one with branches and smaller chunks of the trunk of the big old tree as the men cut it down. Dad said we would have to get a professional to remove most of the trunk and the stump. I felt sad to see it go. I think we all did.
We were down to twigs, so I grabbed the water hose to wash down the driveway. As I splashed, the water felt cool, so I sprayed it over my sweaty head and face.
“Hey, I want a turn,” said Sean.
He sprayed his own head, then Brian took a turn. I grabbed the hose back and sprayed Dad. “Uh-oh.” But he was laughing.
We piled into my dad’s truck for the trip to the landfill. Brian’s dad followed in his truck. After we emptied the trash, we were hot and sweaty and hungry. We rode with Brian’s dad on the way back.
When we got home, all of us went inside our houses to change clothes. Dad asked Mom if we could take her minivan to get lunch since we could now get it out of the garage. Brian, Dan, and my family piled in and went to a good hamburger place and stuffed our faces. I thought about throwing a French fry at Sean, but I was too busy eating. The men talked about maybe going to a Rockies game together soon.
Even though Brian had changed his shirt, I still could see a big red ‘C’ on his chest. I still felt uneasy about it. But what could I do? I didn’t know why this was happening. I thought if I told Brian’s dad, he would just think I was weird.
When we got back home, Brian and his dad went on to their house. Dad and Sean and I went inside. The house smelled wonderful. Mom had baked a cherry pie while we worked outdoors.
“Phew. You guys stink,” Mom said when Dad hugged her.
“That was a lot of hard work,” Dad said.
“Thank you for doing it. It was nice of Dan and Brian to help. Now I can get my car out of the garage. All of you take a shower and put on clean clothes. Except for you, Ozzie. Then we can have dessert,” she said with a laugh, patting Ozzie’s head.
Cherry pie is my favorite. We had vanilla ice cream too. Dessert was almost enough to make me forget about the red C, but I couldn’t stop picturing it on Brian’s shirt every time I thought about the busy day we’d had.