Smack, smack, smack. Small, calloused feet nimbly sprint across the pavement, up the steep incline of the street. The asphalt is hot and sticky from the blazing heat of a summer sun and his toes and heels sink into the softened surface as he bounces from foot to foot.

	“Huff, huff” his breathing becomes laboured, his heartbeat faster and faster as the sun beats down on his naked back, his skin shining with sweat. With a burst of speed, he hops onto the grass beside the street before gradually slowing down, the morning dew cooling his warm feet. Full of energy, nine years old and as alive as anyone has ever been. Just minutes ago he’d asked, begged his Mom to let him run up to the corner store with his best friend. But after getting her to agree and hand him the two little coins that would guarantee him sugary sweets, he’d shown up and wandered into his friend’s house (after all, he was practically family) and his friend was nowhere to be found. In frustration, he’d decided to run further up the street and ask the two kids who lived up there if they’d go up with him.

I don’t know if he would call them “friends”, he had talked to them on occasion, and in the past he’d been over to their house. But they had always seemed a little bit… peculiar, almost as if they wanted so desperately to be older than they really were. Never the less, he wanted to go to the corner store, and he was going to.

He approached their house beaming with anticipation of the treats he saw waiting for him in his near future, any off-putting feelings he had about his potential companions were gone, smothered by his delight and his energy was rapidly returning. He sped up and leaped onto their raised front yard, then dashed up to their doorstep, taking the steps three at a time.

“Dinggggg, donggggggg” the doorbell calls with it’s familiar tone, he gazes up at the tall but dingy door before it swings open to reveal two grinning boys and their mess of a house behind them.

“Hello!” he exclaims, stepping closer to them.

After an inquisitive look at one another, they reply “Hi”. What he's doing here they aren’t sure, but they’re bored and tired of being inside all day. He isn’t their favourite of the kids on the street, he’s too… too childish, too excited and forever smiling for some un-definable reason. But without a word they debate and grudgingly agree to give him a chance.