Tilak+B

media type="custom" key="2990956" Tilak Balavijayan Creative writing 11/5/08 memoir Tilak Balavijayan Memoir The Kickball… Up There

There it was. The sacred kickball. It was a hot summer day in the parking lot in Hidden Valley Drive and we were in the midst of an intense kickball game. It was a game up to ten runs. The score was nine-eight and we were down. The pressure was on. Goutham went up to kick and I was on first base. We just needed two more runs until we won the game and took home eternal pride and glory. The ball was pitched bouncing slightly across the bumpy blacktop. Goutham pulled his leg back… and WHACK. He hit the ball straight through the center of the ball. As I sprinted from first base to second, I watched the ball make its way up to the top of the trees and I knew we both were going to score, winning us the game. The ball was falling down now, and I was running for home. Branches were guiding the ball down when tragedy struck. All the way at the top of the skyscraper-like tree, the ball was caught and the intersection of two branches. Silence. Goutham, Akhilesh, Raghav, Keerthan, Deepa, and I watched misery. Our most prized possession, the kickball, was no longer in our hands to play with. Immediately, I came up with a dangerous plan. “I will climb up the tree,” I said. At this point in the day, children in kindergarten were playing around in the backyard with their overprotective parents watching over them. “Are you sure?” questioned my sister, Deepa. “Yea. It’s for the ball,” I said in a courageous manner. Akhilesh and Goutham gave me a lift so that I could reach the first branch of the tree. I reached and grasped it. With all my might, I pushed myself upwards with my legs, and I started making progress. I got about ten feet high but I was still about fifty feet short of the kickball. Before I grasped the next branch, an adult saw me in my desperate climb for the ball and told me to get down. Soon enough, there was a whole group of overprotective women gathered below me telling me to get down at once. I had no choice but to climb back down the tree. We all sighed and started to devise a plan B. With no ideas, we started wondering through our beautiful neighborhood. As we passed by our backyard, we saw a tall table next to the garbage can. We thought that we may be able to utilize the wooden table so we carried it to our secret shack. After much contemplation, we had come up with a plan. Operation Squirrelboy. I was agent Squirrelboy, my sister was agent Squirrelgirl, Goutham was general ASAP, and Akhilesh was commander Branch. We were to wake up at six o’ clock am tomorrow morning when no one else was around. I was to climb up the tree, my sister was backup, and general ASAP and commander Branch were to carry the table to the tree. The plans were set and we returned home. BEEP. BEEP. The alarm sounded at six am, and we were wide awake. We met at the tree and immediately got to work. Goutham and Akhilesh set the table and I was ready to climb. Before I could begin, my sister said that she would do it because she was worried for me. She ended up climbing the tree. She was at ten feet and kept going. We were all cautious. Before we knew it, she had reached the ball. She threw it down and we celebrated. Now she had to get down. She scurried down the tree with ease and we were delighted. We had a wonderful day of kickball and the next day was the same… until… the ball popped. Oh! The pain we felt. We never got over this tragedy and it still haunts us to this day.