The Breaking Truth

The sound of the school bells were ringing through my ears. Chairs began to slide backwards across the floor as many feet trampled the ground and were beginning to run for the closest exit doors. My classmates’ excited and cheering voices overcame our teacher’s friendly reminder to not forget that homework was due Monday at the beginning of class. School was over for the week! It was finally the weekend and all the kids were going crazy talking about what they were going to be doing. I had overheard some of my classmates saying they were leaving to Arizona to go camping with their parents and even some of my friends told me they had plans to go hunting with their dad or go visit their cousins for a day or two. In fact, my twin brother and I had just been talking earlier in class about the plans for the weekend and brainstorming all the options of what we could do.

As we were walking through the halls on our way to get picked up by our dad in front of school, we decided we wanted to do something out of the normal and make something! This something had to be really fun and entertaining, something that not a lot of our friends have done before, and something we could do with our dad since we wanted to spend time with him. Our dad is a fixer-upper kind of guy and I’d like to think he uses his hands to fix just about anything and everything. Actually, I am almost positive he hasn’t met a challenge in which he wasn’t able to fix it. Anyways, our dad was there waiting for my brother and me in the car to pick us up and take us back to the house to enjoy the weekend. My brother, Sean, rushed to the car and opened the door as fast as he could so as to jump in and tell our dad about what we wanted to do for the weekend. Once I sat down in the backseat, I heard Sean come up with the bright idea of jumping off the house and onto the trampoline in the backyard which would then launch his butt into the pool. As soon as he said this, my dad gave him this look as if he were out of his mind. There was no way in the world my dad would let Sean and I risk our lives doing that! So, my dad turned on the car and started on our way home.

Once back at the house, after some hard and thoughtful brainstorming, I came up with the idea of making our own homemade zip line and putting it in the backyard.  How cool is that! I immediately yelled out the idea to my dad and brother and they actually thought it was a great idea and could be pretty easy to put together! All the materials we needed were stored away in my dad’s garage. Now how perfect was this going to be! Once inside the house, we threw our backpacks into our rooms and ran to the garage to start helping our dad put together the zip line. It was fairly easy and all we really needed was a long rope, a pulley, handle, ladder, and two end points in which we could tie the device to.

It was such a beautiful Friday afternoon. The sun was out and it wasn’t too hot outside. Spring was my favorite time of year because I could do everything outdoors and go around exploring the outside world. The leaves on the trees ranged from a dark green to a bright yellowish color which caught my eyes as I was climbing up the ladder to reach the top of the zip line. My dad had tied one end to the top of our biggest tree and the other end extended all the way to the other side of the backyard which was tied to a sturdy fence. At the time, the backyard was almost an acre big entirely filled up with lush green grass and tall, healthy trees were spotted throughout. This was going to be the best start to the weekend. Nothing could be better than enjoying time with family and being out of school for the weekend. I couldn’t wait until my mother got home from work because I wanted to show her what we had all built in the backyard! Once I reached the top of the ladder and tree, I grabbed hold of the pulley, secured my grip, and pushed off immediately gliding down the rope. I felt the wind rush through my hair and hit my face at high speed as I hit top speed. I could see my legs getting nearer and nearer to touching the ground which meant I was getting close to the end of the line. As soon as my feet started dragging across the grass I let go and did and small tumble to the ground and safely landed back up on my feet without a scratch. By far the best homemade zip line my dad could have helped make for Sean and I!

We were having such a blast on this new toy of ours. The backyard had never seemed this fun before! Round after round of sliding down the rope to end in a tumble over the grass was going on for over an hour now. It was Sean’s turn to go and I remember him ascending the ladder getting higher and higher away from me as he was reaching the top of the tree. Sean, at the time, was about four feet tall had a scrawnier and skinnier build. He also had a more oval face with a defined, slightly pointed chin and a sturdy jaw line. A narrow, oblong face with angular cheekbones made up his face. His bright blue eyes are small and spaced evenly apart, sitting just below his blonde eyebrows that curve as a natural extension of his broad, slim nose. A pair of dark rimmed glasses sat in between his shaggy blonde hair and mellow ears. Sean gave off this bright face full of excitement and his quirky expression showed a sense of immense happiness as he made it to the top of the zip line. He was having so much fun with me and we couldn't have had a better time with our dad. Sean grabbed the handle connected to the pulley, held on tight, and as he pushed off his gliding decent immediately changed to a quick falling. Right away the knot the pulley was connected to slipped undone and he started his fall to meet the bottom of the tree. Sean fell right onto his arm making a loud thud as his body weight pressed his forearm into the biggest tree root protruding out of the ground.

My dad was on the other side of the fence in our neighbor’s yard watering their flowers and playing with their two dogs at the point of this happening. Once he heard the loud noise of my brother crashing to the ground and the root snapping his arm in half, he turned around and took off in a quick sprint towards my brother, hopped the fence, and picked my brother up and quickly told me to go to the car to unlock the doors. Sean was put into the backseat with me holding onto a big back of ice covering his arm. As I looked over closer, I could see his middle forearm had sunken in as if it was creating a big wave or a letter “U”. My dad has never driven so fast before. It was as if he was Vin Diesel on a critical mission in Fast and Furious and he had to save the world. With one hand on the wheel, and the other holding his phone to his ear, my mother’s voice started yelling from the phone and that’s when I knew my dad had just explained to her that one of her babies had completely smashed and broke their arm in half! Wow, what a day this turned out to be!
           After waiting in the hospital, my brother’s arm was in a sling and he had a huge smile across his face again just like the one he had right before he took off from the ladder. My mom had left work and was at the hospital too now, alongside my brother giving my dad some nice, loving glares and she held Sean close to her. My family and I spent the rest of our Friday evening back at the house making sure Sean was cared for and my dad and I were lucky enough to get out of the house away from my very concerned and distraught mother taking down the zip line and to never set it up again (her orders…!). After all, my dad probably should have asked her for permission to set up the zip line in the backyard first. He does deserve some credit though for two things: first for turning down Sean’s first idea of jumping off the roof and secondly for giving me a memory I will never forget. Overall, Sean breaking his arm was a learning experience for me and my family. The truth is, just because something bad happened to Sean, we both still enjoyed our homemade experience zip lining and still today, we want to ride the longest zip line in the world!