I was relieved, but I also felt like a weenie. When I'd seen where my kite was trapped, I
wassure it was a goner. Not Juli. She scrambled up and got it down in no time. Man, it was
embarrassing.So I made a mental picture of how high she'd climbed, and the next day I set
off to outdo her by at least two branches. I made it past the crook, upa few limbs, and t
hen — just to see how I was doing — I looked down.Mis-take! It felt like I was on top of t
he Empire State Building without a bungee. I tried lookingup to where my kite had been, bu
t it was hopeless. I was indeed a tree-climbing weenie.Then junior high started and my dre
am of a Juli-free existence shattered. I had to take the bus, and you-know-who did, too. T
here were abouteight kids altogether at our bus stop, which created a buffer zone, but it
was no comfort zone.Juli always tried to stand beside me, or talk to me, or in some other
way mortify me.And then she started climbing. The girl is in the seventh grade, and she's
climbing a tree — way, way up in a tree. And why does she do it? Soshe can yell down at us
that the bus is five! four! three blocks away! Blow-by-blow trafficwatch from a tree — wh
at every kid in junior high feels like hearing first thing in the morning.She tried to get
me to come up there with her, too. "Bryce, come on! You won't believe thecolors! It's abs
olutely magnificent! Bryce, you've got to come up here!"Yeah, I could just hear it: "Bryce
and Juli sitting in a tree …" Was I ever going to leave the second grade behind?One morni
ng I was specifically not looking up when out of nowhere she swings down from a branch and
practically knocks me over. Heart attack!I dropped my backpack and wrenched my neck, and
that did it. I refused to wait under that tree with that maniac monkey on the looseanymore
. I started leaving the house at the very last minute. I made up my own waiting spot,and w
hen I'd see the bus pull up, I'd truck up the hill and get on board.No Juli, no problem.An
d that, my friend, took care of the rest of seventh grade and almost all of eighth, too, u
ntil one day a few months ago. That's when I heard acommotion up the hill and could see so
me big trucks parked up on Collier Street where thebus pulls in. There were some men shout
ing stuff up at Juli, who was, of course, five stories up in the tree.All the other kids s
tarted to gather under the tree, too, and I could hear them telling her she had to come do
wn. She was fine — that was obviousto anyone with a pair of ears — but I couldn't figure o
ut what they were all arguing about.I trucked up the hill, and as I got closer and saw wha
t the men were holding, I figured out in ahurry what was making Juli refuse to come out of
the tree.Chain saws.Don't get me wrong here, okay? The tree was an ugly mutant tangle of
gnarly branches. The girl arguing with those men was Juli — the world'speskiest, bossiest,
most know-it-all female. But all of a sudden my stomach completely bailed on me. Juli lov
ed that tree. Stupid as it was, sheloved that tree, and cutting it down would be like cutt
ing out her heart.Everyone tried to talk her down. Even me. But she said she wasn't coming
down, not ever, and then she tried to talk us up. "Bryce, please! Comeup here with me. Th
ey won't cut it down if we're all up here!"For a second I considered it. But then the bus
arrived and I talked myself out of it. It wasn'tmy tree, and even though she acted like it
was, it wasn't Juli's, either.