I press my nose up to the glass and watch as my breath makes a little cloud that quickly disappears.

Mom says I can’t go out to play today because I’ve been a bad boy. I see Ricky whizz by my house on his bright green bike and scream after him but he can’t hear me so I go back to making clouds on the glass.

It wasn’t my fault, I really wasn’t trying to be a bad boy but sometimes I see things I want to do and how am I supposed to know that I’m not supposed to find them fun? Mom says I’m too young to understand what really happened and why it’s not right. I begged her to tell me, I even showed her my muscles to prove I’m a big boy, but she didn’t want to tell me so instead she makes me stay at home while my friends get to be outside and play.

Two nights ago, I heard screams from mommy and daddy’s room. I couldn’t sleep anyway, even if it was way past my bedtime, so it didn’t bother me. I heard mom scream so I put on my superman cape and went to the rescue. I ran all the way down the hall without losing my breath like I used to last year when I was in First Grade. I also didn’t turn on the lights because I’m not afraid of the dark anymore and I don’t think there are monsters under my bed and stormed into their room.

I don’t know what game mommy and daddy were playing but it looked like fun because I’ve never seen dad smile so big, with all his teeth, before. He kind of looked like the cat from the movie with the teacups.

I think they were playing at being cowboys and mommy was the horse because she had her knees and hands on the floor and dad look like he was going to climb on top of her. Sometimes Ricky and I play cowboys, but no one ever wants to be the horse so we just pretend to have gunfights and kick up a lot of dirt.

Except mom and dad weren’t wearing any clothes, but since it’s summer and mom walks around complaining about how hot it is all the time and fanning herself with all the drawings I bring home from camp and sometimes grabs a can of coke and puts it on her neck before giving it to me. They didn’t see me so I just left — I guess no one needed to be rescued after all.

Yesterday, when I got to day camp, I told Ricky all about it. He agreed that it sounded like fun and maybe we should try it out. I don’t usually like playing with girls because they smell funny, and wear too much pink, and all they ever want to do is play with their stupid Barbies, but this game seemed like fun and if dad could convince mom to be the horse, I was sure we could convince girls to be our horses. As soon as we got our break to play whatever we wanted, Ricky and me asked Lisa and Cecily if they wanted to play with us. Cecily got really red on her face and said maybe, but Lisa said yes if we promised to play whatever they wanted tomorrow and put her hands on her hips like Ms. Kelly used to do in First Grade when I took a long time coming back to class from recess.

So I promised them we would and explained the game to them.