Read Online Up High in the Trees by Kiara Brinkman - Free Book Online Page A

can sleep in here, Dad says. It used to be your grandfather’s study.
    We look at the room together from the doorway.
    Dad put my blue and yellow sheets on the small bed that’s pushed into a corner. On the wall there’s a painting of a sad old man holding a dead bird in his hand.
    What do you think? Dad asks.
    It’s okay, I tell him. I’m looking at the painting, so Dad looks at it, too.
    Your Grandpa Chuck loved birds, Dad says. He had a pigeon coop in the backyard.
    Oh, I say.
    I go downstairs, back to my sleeping bag in the fireplace room, where I left my letters for Katya and Ms. Lambert. Katya’s letter has turned softer from all the red coloring on it. I touch it to my face and breathe in the pencil smell.
    Dad, I call to him. I want to mail my letters.
    I listen to his feet coming downstairs. He’s wearing socks, so his feet make a quiet thump on each step.
    Dad gives me money to buy stamps and envelopes. He says I can walk into town by myself because it’s not far. It’s the same way we walked yesterday to buy groceries.
    The post office is painted brown, he says. You’ll find it. Please, Sebby, says Dad, I need some quiet.
    But we’ve been quiet all day.
    Go ahead, Dad says.
    I step outside and then turn around to look at him.
    I’m just going to lie down, Dad says, I’ll feel better by the time you get back.

    I walk fast. I’m watching my feet on the sidewalk, but I have to look up if I want to find the post office, so I slow down and look.
    I see the brown building with a sign that says UNITED STATES POST OFFICE in blue letters. It’s right next to a park that has four swings, a merry-go-round, and a jungle gym with a clown’s head on top. The clown is smiling and has a black hat with a yellow flower on it. I don’t like him, because his big eyes are looking at me.
    I run to the glass doors and go inside the post office.
    Hello, says the lady behind the counter.
    I take Dad’s money out of my pocket and hand it to her. She has dark pink fingernails and lips. When she smiles at me, I see some of the pink from her lips is smudged on her teeth that are yellow, not white like Mother’s teeth.
    I want stamps and envelopes, I tell her.
    She keeps smiling.
    Well, she says and puts Dad’s money away in the cash register. I can give you ten stamps and a pack of twenty envelopes.
    Okay, I say.
    Then she gives me back a handful of change and puts the stamps and envelopes in a bag for me to carry. Outside, I sit down on the sidewalk to get the letters ready and when I lookat one of the blank envelopes, I know I can’t mail the letters because I don’t have the addresses.
    Now the only thing to do is walk all the way back to the white house. I think about the yellow bike from the shed. Dad said he’d help me fix it up. I walk slowly with Katya’s letter in my hand. Even though I’m by myself, I pretend like Katya’s watching me. I do a skip-walk for her.

    Dad’s taking another nap.
    I can’t find any scissors, so instead I look for a knife in the silverware drawer. I pick the biggest one. It has wood on the handle part where you hold it.
    I take the knife outside with me to the yellow bike. I know purple streamers make it look like a girl bike, so I try to cut them off. I have to cut one at a time and when I’m done, there’s still short pieces of purple poking out like stupid, purple whiskers.
    Wind blows the streamers all over the front steps and the grass and everywhere. I just let them go.
    Since I don’t know how to ride, I hold on to the handlebars and take the bike for a walk with me. The faster I go, the louder the bike squeaks, so I have to walk slowly.
    Hey, says a voice from somewhere up high.
    I look around. In a window all the way at the top of a tall, blue house, I see a boy waving.
    Hey, the boy says again. He leans forward so his head’s all the way out the window. I can tell that he