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A squeal rang out of her as she tightened her arms.

“Last one home has to rake the front yard!” Silas shouted.

He was nothing but a blaze of lightning streaking down the street.

“Hurry, Trevan, hurry! Don’t let him beat us,” Elena shouted.

Elena laughed and giggled like crazy as Trevan pushed himself as fast as he could go with her attached to his back. The little girl bouncing all over the place when he finally caught up to Silas and passed him by.

“So sad, so slow!” Trevan called as he sprinted past, taking the next turn onto their street at a clip.

He kept careful hold on Elena the whole way as they pounded down the sidewalk, Silas’s shoes thudding only a few steps behind.

They were on the last stretch, Silas and Elena’s house coming into view, when Elena squeezed his neck in excitement. “L-l-look, Trevan! The apples got red! Can you get me one because you’re so, so tall?”

There was an open field between Silas’s house and the neighbor’s. An old swing set was in the middle of it, but at the highest point was an apple tree that had grown there for years.

It was the first year there’d ever been any fruit on it.

Trevan hesitated for a beat. Wanting to touch down on the steps that would gain him victory.

“Pwease!” She tugged at his neck like her arms were the reins and he was a horse.

And he realized he couldn’t tell her no or disappoint her, so he turned course and cut a path up through the field to the tree.

The branches stretched out, dense with leaves, and a single apple dangled low.

He extended his hand and plucked it. “Here you go, Little Apple.”

Elena squealed. “I’m n-n-not an apple.”

“Sure, you are. Sweet as can be.”

By the time they made it back down and around to the house, his breaths were rasping from his lungs.

Silas was on the stoop, laughing and bent in two as he wheezed and sucked for air. He tipped up his head as they jogged the last couple feet.

“Score. Looks like someone is on raking duty.”

“Ha, ha, ha,” Trevan grumbled, though it was with a smile as he climbed the stairs and followed Silas inside through the screen door.

It slapped shut with a clang behind them, and Silas went straight for the kitchen.

Meems and Silas and Elena’s mom, Christina, were in there.

Brody was on the floor playing with some cars, and Meems was singing as she mixed some kind of batter in a big bowl.

Christina was wearing her work uniform for the only steakhouse in Crimson Creek, and her hair was wound up in curlers.

Her face was bright and full of love when they came in.

So different than the way his mom always looked at him in disdain.

“There are my babies.”

Silas groaned as she smacked a big kiss to the top of his head and hugged him tight, though Trevan could see his secret smile that he couldn’t keep hidden.

“What?” Christina’s voice was all a tease. “You think you’re too big to hug your momma?”