H e b r e w T r e e

There is very little I remember about the playground at Kelly School. I remember the blue gate that separated the elementary school from the junior high school. I remember the place inside the hall where I put my lunch box and jacket before I attempted to do the monkey bars with my eyes closed, and I remember the awful sound the bell made for recess to end. What I remember most about the playground at Kelly School was where I hid from Zach Perrucci’s Grandmother every morning when she dropped him off.
Zach Perrucci was the most annoying, disgusting, insensitive boy I had ever met at age five. He would chase me around the sandbox and although he told Mrs. Sandy he did not mean to accidentally spill his apple juice all over my new flower dress at snack time, I know he did. The only thing that was worse than Zach Perrucci was Zach Perrucci’s Grandmother. A tall, slim lady with long, wrinkly, skeleton hands that always found their way to my cheeks to give them a good pinch. Every morning when she dropped Zach Perrucci off at Kelly Elementary she would find me and say, “And how is my little granddaughter-in-law dooooing!” with her teeth clenched and the longer she drug out the word “doing” the harder she pinched my cheeks.
That woman scared me more than anything else. She would always tell my mom that Zach liked me and I was playing hard to get—I was having him chase me and we were going to get married. My mom would always laugh and then tell my dad she was crazy. Nevertheless, I decided that I hated Zach Perrucci and there was nothing that could have changed my mind up about that the day he pushed me down in the sandbox and scrapped my knee.
I remember the event like it was yesterday. I had just got done with the monkey bars when I felt an impulse to put my jacket on. I dropped down from the bars and let the tingling feeling you get in your legs when you dropped down from the monkey bars settle before I started my way to the hall where I had left my jacket before recess. I started to venture through the sandbox and made it past the triplets who always play ring around the roses, and through the gymnastic bars where competitions were held to see who could do more flips in a row. The only thing I had to dodge before I was safe on concrete and feet away from the hall where my jacket was calling my name was the game of tag.
I stood waiting for my opportunity to sprint across the game. I finally decided to take a chance and go for it. It felt like I had never ran as fast as I did in that moment. I look up, trying to judge the distance I had left before I reached solid concrete and was safe and sound through the game of tag—and then there he was. Clear as day. Zach Perrucci coming straight up ahead. I was running so fast, I couldn’t stop, and then BAM! Zach and I collide. I hit the solid concrete I had been trying so hard to get too in a much different way I imagined. I look up and see Zach Perrucci standing straight over me, hovering, pointing at my knee calling over ‘the guys’ to come and see. Tears already swelling in my eyes, I look down at my knee and all I can see is red. The tears begin to pour.
The next day I had planned on being as mean and rude as possible. I even practiced a few hair flips in the mirror and asked my brother for some choice of words. I get to school and Zach Perrucci is nowhere. I don’t even get my cheeks pinched from his crazy grandmother. I initially think that Zach Perrucci is planning something against my other knee and don’t let me guard down the entire way up until break. I walk into the sandbox and head straight to the monkey bars—I have to get rid of some of this anger. I’m just about to climb on when who other than Zach Perrucci is all of the sudden standing right in front of me. “That’s a pretty cool Barney band aide you got there on your knee.” I had never seen Zach so introverted before. “Thank you.” I said still with my intent to say something really mean, like poophead. “I brought you this. I’m sorry.” Zach shoves a little clear plastic half-circle container with a yellow plastic lid keeping whatever was inside secure, in my hands.
As he ran off to the other side of the sandbox, I look inside to find the most beautiful twenty-five cent ring with a neon pink gem fixed in the center of it. Standing in the middle of the sandbox, I look around to see where Zach had ran off too and I catch him at the corner of the sandbox playing tag. I put the plastic container in my pocket, the ring on my finger, and run over to the game with no thought of obeying the rules of the sandbox. I didn’t wait for the triplets and their game of ring around the roses, or the kids spinning around and around on the gymnast bars. I had my eye fixed on one thing: That game of tag. I make it to the other side of the sandbox in one piece and still only one knee scrapped. I run straight to Zach Perrucci, feeling the smile that covered my face I say, “Thank you…I love it…TAG! You’re it!” With a forceful poke I take off, and let him chase me around the sandbox.