Twas' a fine summer day. The perfect weather to bounce around with your neighboring children while you play in the outfield. I was eight, my brother six.
We grabbed all the toy guns that each child had, it didn't matter what kind. Nerf guns, cap guns, wooden guns, water squirters, and all the ammunition that a five year old could ask for. We equally distributed all the guns we had, most children choosing their own personal weapons, and split ourselves into two teams. One team had the ditch, the other chose the forest. In between each of us was a decently sized field, with a garden to the left and a stretch of long grass elsewhere.
We started when the judge blew his plastic whistle, and we each had a plan. Before the game started, my team tied sticks to the fronts of the wooden guns for bayonets. They were the first wave. Second wave had water balloons and grenades. The third wave was to creep through the neighborhood to the side of the opposite base as this all happened. We each had one medic, and Dora band-aids were the only way to bring back the dead.
But like all games, it's fun until someone gets hurt.
After my brother went charging with the first wave, it was my job to creep around with the third. As we weaved through familiar property, we heard a scream and a cry for the medic. The lieutenant told us to stay put, but curiosity killed the cat, and I skipped to the noise.
There I saw a huddle of friends surrounding my brother. They had all dropped their guns, and I unknowingly ran towards him.
"Hey Will, what's up?"
He turned around to reveal a large puddle of blood on his face. It was dripping down his good eye onto his shirt. I could tell he was crying, but the red made it difficult to see his tears.
My heart twisted as I stared at him. My brother was hurt. Who did it? What should I do? I panicked.
"I-Morgan...it was an accident!" My brothers best friend was sobbing behind me. "He got too close and I accidentally hit him with it..." he dropped his weapon into the dirt.
At first I was mad. I was so mad, and I didn't want to hear a single thing from him again. I wasn't crying yet, but I felt like I was about to.
Then a third wave private fainted as she discovered her own hemophobia.
Two girls held each other close to the right side of me, red eyed and puffy, while to the left and front all the other kids were either shocked, felt sick to their stomachs, or wanted to leave.
I wasn't the general of the army, but I knew I had to do something. I wasn't going to let my brother become embarrassed, and I needed to do something. If I cried he would have realized how bad it really was, and he would not get the treatment he needed. It was scary for him. I knew William couldn't see, that he was hurt, and in distress. I calmed down.
"Dylan, it's okay" I told my brothers friend. "Can you go get my dad for me?"
He ran as fast as he could through the baseball field and onto the road where my house awaited.
I got on my knees. "Hey Will!" I smiled and gently grabbed his shoulders. "You know that microscope that we got for my birthday?"
His bawling turned down to a sniffle. "Yeah?"
"Maybe if we get a tray real quick we can get a drop of your blood! Then we can see all the tiny little cells that live in there." I cut off part of my shirt with the medics scissors and pressed the fabric to his forehead.
He hiccuped sad tears, but burst out laughing at the same time. "Let's do it right now!"
He grabbed my wrist, and started to hustle towards home. All the friends behind me stopped crying, but they didn't laugh either. "What are cells?" Kiki asked behind me. Then the older friends of the group jumped right on her question, and soon enough they became so engrossed in their cell description that they all forgot about what happened to my brother.
We got halfway across the baseball field when my father picked up my brother and carried him to my mom. She was a doctor, she would be able to do more than Dora band-aids.
I ran into my room and got a slide. I gave it to my mom and she helped me get a sample of his blood before she diagnosed him for stitches.
So there you go, my brother was clubbed with a gun and all I cared about was preserving his blood for my scientific experiments. The End.
