I was always told I was tall for my age, 

yet I can’t quite reach the next branch,

Stretch,

Press.

At the end of the limb I can see a lemon,

Sun bright,

Vibrant.

I can imagine the way the juice will taste on my tongue,

Stinging,

Singing.

I really hate climbing so high, but the fruit calls my name.

The cold bark presses into my skin as I shuffle higher.

One inch,

Then the next.

I feel the fruit clasped within my hand,

And I hold it in front of me

Victorious.

Now, how exactly do I get down?

 

New Year’s Day, 2013

New Year’s Day always belonged to my grandparents. It was the same routine every year until they sold the house. The house with a small town full of trains humming in the garage. The house with the kitchen that always smelled like pistachio cookies. The house with the lemon tree that grew in the backyard. 

We would arrive right before lunch, all six of us piled out of the minivan, hoping that the visit would go by quickly so we could return to the toys acquired a few days before. 

“Chloe,” Grammie would coo as she pulled me into an embrace. It seemed like I grew more and her lesser every time I saw her. Still, she was the same Grammie I had always known with the same white curls and kind eyes.

I clasped a Barbie camera in my hand. I had just received it for Christmas, and all I wanted to do was take pictures. When my sisters went outside into the crisp January air to climb the old lemon tree in the backyard, I was content to sit back and take pictures of their antics. 

“Aubrey,” Kaleigh hollered from one of the lowest branches, “Race you to the top?” Kaleigh never won against Aubrey, but that didn’t stop her from challenging her. Branch by branch, Aubrey’s lead widened until there was no hope for Kaleigh to catch up. Click! The moment Aubrey’s hand reached the last climbable branch captured.

Lynn was only six years old at the time, so she was not invited to the races of our older sisters. Instead, she sat on the bottom branches, content to play with the leaves and pick the lemons within her reach. Click! Her blonde hair and Christmas-patterned leggings were documented.

“Give a lemon, Lynn,” I hollered from my plastic yard chair.

“Come get one yourself,” she shouted back. Something about being ten months younger than me left Lynn a little salty near my birthday. She always crowed about how we were the same age throughout October and November, but come December and January, she sulked.

Unwilling to have my desire for the tart taste of lemons squashed, I met her challenge and began to climb. Despite my age, I was tall enough to pull myself onto the first branch with very little struggle. The moment my hands touched the cold tree, I regretted my choice. The bark dug into my palms, and the wind felt piercing without the house to protect me from the gusts. Still, I would have my lemon.

Despite the easier lemons on the lower branches, I climbed higher. I would not let Lynn win this. What she was winning, I was not quite sure, but it wasn’t happening. With each limb, I ascended higher. The sun was beginning to set, lighting the world in reds and pinks and oranges. 

When I finally reached a height that I felt proved my prowess, I plucked a lemon off a branch and pulled back the firm yellow skin. The flesh was perfectly ripe and separated into sections ideal for eating. Something about this tree made the lemons so sweet and tart rather than sour. I ate the whole thing. Juice rolled down my fingers, and I licked it off. By the time I finished the fruit, the sun had almost finished its descent. 

Papa Trains came out and called, “Kids, come in. It’s getting dark, and the chili is almost ready.” Every New Year, we had chili because he believed that eating black eyed peas brought luck for the new year. I sniffed the air and could make out the smell of Grammie’s cornbread.

Kaleigh and Aubrey dropped the eight feet from the top of the tree to the ground and ran into the house. Lynn lowered herself from her branch and followed in right after. I sat frozen with fear. All I could imagine was what would happen if I didn’t land right. For a moment, I sat on my branch and looked up at the stars beginning to present themselves in the sky. To climb down was to allow the bark to dig into my hands once again, but to jump was to get hurt. So, I thought I would sit there forever.

It felt like I sat out there for 30 minutes before I finally dragged myself out of the tree one branch at a time. When it made it back to the safety of the ground, I grabbed my Barbie camera off the plastic yard chair and shuffled through the sliding glass door into the warmth of the kitchen. Everyone was just taking their places at the table, bowls loaded with chili and plates stacked with cornbread. 

They sold the house that summer. Next New Year’s was spent in the claustrophobic hold of a retirement home, the cloying smell of dust and age permeating the air. Papa held on to his trains for a few more years before giving them all to Aubrey. She, too, held on to them for a while before selling them; he still doesn’t know they are gone. Grammie died this last January. I guess that’s what happens when you turn 90. When you enter his apartment now, there is no quiet hum of miniature trains, no smell of pistachio cookies and no lemon tree.