I was eating breakfast in the kitchen with my eyes glued to the window. Steam seemed to rise off the streets as kids ran through yards full of yellow and brown patches. Parents watched from inside; the presence of air conditioning tethering them to their homes. Our neighbor's children, the Covingtons, took advantage of their parents’ absence. They darted into our withering yard. I could never quite understand their fascination with our lawn; its only attributes were a stone statue and a lonely pecan tree. Perhaps they imagined it as a magical forest or found joy in the fact their parents forbade them to play there. It was while watching the Covingtons that I noticed the absence of Apollo, our next-door neighbor. All the other children, including …show more content…
The air was dry, and the night sky seemed devoid of stars. I crept up to my upstairs window, guided by some gut feeling. The only words that I could make out from their argument were dripping with hate. The sounds of objects flying across their house filled the otherwise silent street. I knew the routine. The wife would yell about her husband’s unfaithfulness. The husband would scream louder about the wife’s love of alcohol. They would go back and forth, and their fight would drive Apollo out onto the back alley, sobbing about his parents. Back and forth all night long until they ran out of hateful …show more content…
The only thing I knew, their son’s name, was picked up from the husband yelling about the wife’s poor motherhood. “Leave if you want!” the wife’s screams awakening me from my thoughts. The door slammed, and I peeked around my window curtain, looking for Apollo. To my surprise, I saw the dad sauntering out to his car. The wife’s broken sobs filled the air. For a moment, I swore I could hear her heart breaking. Finally, the door clicked open again, and Apollo slinked out the back.
“No please Apollo! Come back. We didn’t mean...I didn’t want you to hear the fight! Please honey, I need you!” she howled.
Apollo turned back to the house for a second. Then , he looked up and down the street, before taking off. He ran past my house, and before I knew what I was doing, I was in the alleyway. “What are you doing?” my voice halted him in his path. “Get out of my way,” he responded in a surprisingly strong voice. When I looked at his sunken face, glistening with tears, I almost cried out of sorrow for him. The sorrow vanished in a second when I realized what he was doing. “You’re running away. Why would y-What are you