Walk of Freedom

          I'm Free! The thought stuck in my mind as I walked home that cold dark night on a remote back road surrounded by cornfields on one side and woods on the other. It was all over now, the secrets, the lies, the disguised friendship. The previous events of the evening played out in my mind.

Four p.m. Phone call from Suzie…
          “Can you come spend the night tonight?” she asked.
          “I can’t, my mom won’t let me,” I lied.
          “You didn’t even ask!” she threw back. “Are you mad at me about earlier?”
          “You mean about earlier when you snubbed me at swim practice, then laughed about it with Molly?” I knew this one pierced her heart.
          “I didn’t mean to honestly,” she pleaded back, “You know you’re my best friend, my other friends, they just don’t understand you, but they don’t matter.”
          “If they don’t matter, then why are you still friends with them?” I questioned. “Especially if they are so mean to me all the time?”
          “That doesn’t matter right now, the point is I want you to come over not them. Go ask your mom.”
          I went and asked her, with half of me wanting to go and the other half of me wanting her to say no I couldn’t.
          “Are you two going to get along if you go over there?” my mom asked me all the time knowing we probably wouldn’t.
          “Yeah, we will,” I told her not wanting to give away my true feelings. “We’re over all that now.”
          “Yes you may, my mom answered. Is she picking you up on the four-wheeler or am I driving you?”
          “She’ll come get me.” I replied.
          Sitting on the step I had already known I was making a mistake. I thought about this on the walk back. I knew what I had been walking into, but I went along with it anyways.
          Suzie arrived with her usual promptness and I opened the door back up. “Bye Mom, I’ll be back tomorrow morning!” I yelled into the house.
          “ We can’t go on the road, there might be cops.” She said, even though the danger of that occurring wasn’t any worse then any other time we went on the road. I knew it just meant she wanted to trespass through some fields and logging trails before we reached the forty acres of woods her family owned.
          We whipped through the trails on her property as fast as she dared to drive not slowing for anything until we reached hearing distance of the house. More than once we had been yelled at for driving unsafely on that thing.
          I grabbed my bag off the four-wheeler and we headed into the house.
          “What do you want to do?” she asked as soon as my stuff was filed away into her immaculate room.
          “Let’s play soccer.” I suggested. I was hoping for a game or sport I at least had a fair chance at.
          “No, I don’t play soccer.” Suzie replied back.
          Feeling defeated, because I knew any other sport she could whip me at, I told her “You just pick one.”
          “I want to play basketball,” she announced joyfully.
          “ I don’t want to go up there.” I pleaded.
          “Wimp!” she taunted, “You just don’t want to get beat.”
          “No, I don’t want to fall trying to get up into the hayloft.”
          “You’re not going to fall off again,” she laughed, “ my brother fixed the ladder anyways.”
          I was scared stiff because the last time I had fallen off the ladder and blacked out, but somehow I managed to make it up this time. I suffered through two games of Horse, getting beat both times. After that we wandered inside, made a pizza, and watched T.V., snacking on junk food until twelve. Then we decided to get ready for bed. Suzie had the bathroom first, and then came back to her room.
          “What are you hiding?” I questioned when she came in. She had that guilty look on her face and there was something wrapped up in her clothes.
          “Nothing, it’s your turn to use the bathroom.” She lied.
          I reluctantly left the room knowing full well she was hiding something from me. And when I came back she already had climbed into bed, turned on her radio, and was waiting for me to lie down on my cot before she turned out the bedside lamp.
          “What are you hiding from me?” I asked once more after the lights were out.
          “Nothing, just go to sleep.” She whined.
          I knew I would not close my eyes at all or at least not until I heard her snoring. And that’s when she got me.
          Sshhhhhhht!
          “Ouch!” I cried out.
          “Shh quiet!” she scolded. Then after she turned on the light it changed to “I’m sorry did I get that in your eyes?”
          “Yeah you did,” I replied crying.
          “Oh you baby, it wasn’t that much.” Suzie laughed at me.
          After a few moments of her telling me not to cry I grabbed for the bottle of shaving cream saying, “Now I get to get you with it and see how you feel!”
          But she held it beyond my reach. “No we can’t make a mess, and it’s my dad’s so we can’t waste it.” She said fabricating the excuses hastily.
          “I’m going home then,” I announced, “ I’m sick of you always being unfair.”
          She followed me out of the house and made a grab for the bag so I released my grip on it and kept going. Knowing that if she grabbed for my sweatshirt I would slip out of it she grabbed my arm instead. I twisted out of her grasp and ran into the woods. She didn’t follow me luckily so I stayed hidden and hoped that she wouldn’t take my bag in. Luckily she didn’t and as soon as she was inside I snuck over and grabbed it. Shouldered it and began the walk home.

          So here I was almost one in the morning walking back home in the dark. I wasn’t really scared; I had been on this road this late before, but always with Breanna.
          “Phooey on Suzie,” I screamed into the night. “ I don’t need her friendship.” I demanded.
          And that’s how freedom came to mind. She might insist she needs me, but I, by no means needed her.