Miss Suzy

I am four years old and we live in a tiny house in San Jose, California. The name of the street is Singleton, and my best mate Dax is also my cousin and we often pretend to shoot the airplanes flying by with our finger guns. I envy his big house and his many shiny new Star Wars toys. I have Luke Skywalker with the blue lightsaber coming out of his arm. He has the Death Star.

Today my mother and I just dropped off my father in the early hours of the morning when the sun is long in the East and everything we see is gold. I’m tired this morning but my mother is beautiful and she makes me crispy cinnamon tortillas again and I listen to her fat tummy and she tells me my brother’s name will be David Nicolas. She then says she likes David the King but not David the Name so we will just call him Nick.

My father comes home bringing Orange and Grape Crush again, but I don’t drink too much because the carbonation is cruel in my mouth but I want to because the orange flavor is ridiculously sweet and terribly artificial and I am rarely allowed to drink this much soda at one time. He takes me outside where he is working on the little yellow Toyota Corona, Betsy was her name, and I step on the gas because I thought that would help him but he yells at me and I don’t know why. I think I frightened him.

My mom reads Miss Suzy to me for the dozenth time and I recite parts of the book to her. Miss Suzy is kind yet timid but she has help from the brave soldiers and everything works out for her.

Soon I will begin walking to Hillsdale School. It’s right down the street and I’m not scared but I always have nightmares about getting lost on the way home so maybe I am scared. I’m the smartest kindergartener in the class, smarter than most of the older kids, so the teacher is always proud to call on me even though I rarely raise my hand. We are learning Spanish together but I will forget most of it before the first grade.

I love my parents.