[ WP ] You are still `` it '' in a game of tag from childhood . Many years have passed and you are determined to tag the others .

Their shadows danced across the cracked, forgotten sidewalks of Mulberry Lane. James and Sally ran, their business shoes sank into the soft hill of Mr. Henderson's front yard, where we had first met, and they evaporated into the dry, March heat, leaving me and their shoes behind. My vision grew hazy, as I grew tired. I bent over a forest green and chipped brown - from rust - bench, and sighed heavily as my face dripped sweat onto the faded pavement. 
 
 Twenty years ago, I fainted biweekly at recess. The doctors told my mother that I had asthma, and that I was to not have any strenuous physical activity without the use of an inhaler. But, upon seeing the cost, she turned to me, bowed and shook her head to the man, and we took the bus back to the hotel. From then on, I read Faulkner at recess. I could n't blame her, though. She was a single mother, trying to support an overweight child. And waitresses usually do n't get paid much. 
 
 She would work until eight, so after school, I would sometimes follow my peers to their respective homes, out of both curiosity and loneliness. Some lived in sedans, others in trailers while I lived in a hotel just two blocks from a house of burlesque. But *she* lived across from him. In houses on Mulberry Lane. And they would write notes to each-other after dinner every night. It would be their secret way of communicating. But, little did they know, I was looking on with a brown, toy telescope I took from school after lunch. Her hair was golden as her face was a doll's, and she was my first *real* crush. 
 
 One windless day, I followed nearer than I usually did. And softly laughed at jokes they made, and ran through scenarios in my head of what I would respond to them. I got nervous just thinking about it. And as we walked towards their houses, they decided to take a left, down a narrow path lined with cigarette butts and green benches towards a large hill. I tepidly followed to see a white house peaking atop it. 
 
 And there started their tradition. And there ended mine. For they saw me and ran to me to broach why I followed them. But beyond outrage and concern, all I had heard was the silk of her tone and longevity of her syllables. Two seconds after they had finished talking, I forgot what they had said or why they said it. But her soft fingers touched my arm and yelled `` You're it!'' and she and him ran from me and I looked on, confused. 
 
 So I ran. For the first time in ages, I ran. They were together, always together, but I could never tag her back. After nearly grazing their clothes, they pressed their tennis shoes into the hillside and left my grasp to laugh and hold hands back to their houses. `` Same time tomorrow?'' I heard one of them yell. *Sure* I yelled in return before fainting. 
 
 So for afternoons after school, I agreed. For days on weekends, I agreed. For days in breaks I agreed. I agreed. I agreed. And fainted almost every day for the next Seven years. Contact between them only increased from then on as contact between me and her had ceased. Their notes became phone calls and their walk homes became car rides. They would summit the hill and roll down with each other, and one day they kissed in front of me. He began to drive and they soon forgot about the hill. About me. About whatever was there from the beginning. And I grew lonely again. And more curious. 
 
 But as I went to University and studied the arts of man, the conquering of Mathematics and intricacies of the soul, I realized that what was left of myself was a mere stepping stone for them, a shell for every endeavor they needed me. But I chased anyway, I chased an impossible goal at the time. Even after several failed relationships, parties, and self-discovering explorations I still wanted to catch them, to find the piece of myself that got away. To fulfill my empty childhood. 
 
 So whenever I had free time, I would go to the hill and read Faulkner. In the rain, in the sun, in times of sorrow and in times of light. After my mother's funeral and even when I had broken both of my legs, I still found a way back to the hill. And, in the process of doing so, lost what I had sought to gain again time after time. Until one day they had returned and saw me sitting upon a bench, reading under a streetlight and began again what had started when we were children. 
 
 Only, what stood before me were two, worn adults. One in a two-hundred dollar suit and one in a black dress, both expected to be on the next cover of Forbes magazine. Though prim, their inner children had not died. For they then proceeded to duck and dodge, just as they did in distant years past. Trailing me in impossible loops, having me jump over benches and under branches. And then escaping me again by climbing Henderson's hill. They laughed and squealed at their victory atop it. And, with matching rings, they overlooked their kingdom and their sweating fat jester from primary school to yell `` Nothing's changed, fatass!'' 
 
 They watched him sweat, and pant, and nearly shed tears over his loss. They watched him then clench and hold fists and stomp furiously up the hill, knocking their left-behind shoes down. They watched him edge closer, still laughing, their remorse ever absent. They watched as he grabbed them both. Then they became silent. 
 
 He wadded what he grasped into balls and extended each arm forward, toppling the couple down the hill once more. Yelling `` You're it!'' when they snapped their necks on the benches. 
 
 He's the one you want, your honor. Not me. For I am not that man. I am a tortured soul, withered by years of malice and ill-will! What *is* a man but what he was made into as a child? Fortunately they are still alive, your honor. But the consequences of actions in this case beg the question: who deserves it? 
 
 Thank you.
