The Art of Letting Go

I

In the beginning of a sunny afternoon in West Virginia, people chattered and families rejoiced as the fair commenced. Kids ran around with adults chasing after them. People ate and danced. By the field, two kids around the age of 10 quarreled like wild animals, throwing unkind words at each other.

"Cheater!" a little girl with pigtails and braces accused at her competitor.

"I did not! You saw it with your own eyes, because I was a foot ahead of you!" a slightly taller boy with a lanky figure and a bad case of acne exclaimed as he stuck his tongue out at her.

"No, you started off first!" she still bit at it with commitment even though playbacks continuously replayed on the big screens.

Because second place never really felt as good as being first.

"Stop saying I cheated! I started the same time everyone else did, I won fair and square!" he said, crossing his arms and hugging the fake spray painted gold trophy close to his chest "It's not my fault your legs are half the length of mine."

She could pass like a boiling kettle at this point.

"Said the giraffe!" she bantered back as she shoved her little finger to his chest with every word "Your," shove "father," shove "is," shove "the," shove "town's," shove "mayor!" the silver medal around her neck with the big fat 2nd engraved in the middle glinted in the sun with every move.

He took a hold of her finger and warned her "Accuse me again and I'll show you how my Dad shuts my Mom up." she wasn't so sure of where to look with the close proximity of his face and his zits.

Ever so fearless and brave, she asked "And how is that?" with a roll of her eyes.

"A kiss." he answered with a boyish grin.

Her eyes grew large and without thinking, she slammed her head onto his, forcing him to let her go and cry out of pain.

"Ow! My pimples!" he cried out, holding a hand on his forehead as the other continues to grasp tightly on the trophy he won for his victorious race against 9 other hungry for attention kids. But mostly, Hailey.

"You're disgusting! And I will never!" she yelled with so much conviction, as she runs away to look for her Mother and tell on him.

She was serious.

And so was he.

She doesn't really remember when this obsession of beating James in every single thing started. Maybe it was that day when James thought it was funny to ask her if he could take a peek underneath her dress. Or the one time he asked permission if he could sleep with her, like beside each other. Or the other time when James thought it was funny to accuse her of being the reason why their father left. Yeah, maybe it was that time. But they were 10, they were kids. They thought the world owed them everything, when in reality, it didn't owe them shit. They actually owe the world. Because on James' 12th birthday, his mother passed away.

Due to his requests, he spent the day at the Wilson's house. Hayden and Hayes' house. His only friends' house. He wasn't big on the friends factor anyway, because being the son of the town's Mayor sometimes attracts attention and not even the good kind. Some of the kids whose parents hold some sort of grudge to his father sometimes takes it out on him, and he was a lanky child, so he couldn't really give much of a fight. Even so, he never really wanted to. Because he honors his mom's morales. She was just and she was kind, and she taught him to be the same. When night came, his mom was supposed to pick him up to continue celebrating as a family back home.