It was in the month of June when my family moved to the suburbs. It was very hot. The houses on our street were finished and we were the last family to move in. There was not any landscaping yet, so it was like a desert during the day. The asphalt absorbed the kickstands of our bikes, leaving little holes all over the driveway.
Across the street, however, only the wood frames stood quietly, waiting patiently for the next set of workers to begin.
I watched them from the comfort of my air-conditioned home as they worked. You could hear the hammers pound and the zing of the circular saws as the workers started early in the morning.
As the afternoons cooled off, and out of boredom, I would wander through these framed beginnings to see what I could find. Sometimes, my sister Terry would go with me. We would each start at one end of the house and work towards the other end, methodically.
Shiny, metal discs, about the same size as coins, caught our watchful eye. There were miniature saws with a curved handle and sometimes I found red, blue and yellow caps, used for twisting wires together, my dad told me. We spent half the day going through these houses, each filling up a quart-sized milk carton with stuff we found.
The weeks flew by that summer, and the houses across the street were almost finished. I would go inside to see what other treasures I could find there.
Terry made some new friends and did not go with me anymore. That was fine with me, as I was more of a tomboy. There were not any boys my age in the neighborhood, so I kept to myself most of the time.
One day, as I approached one of these 'finished' homes, I heard a scraping noise coming from inside. The sound got louder as I came nearer to the window opening. I assumed that a cleanup crew was working to make the house ready for the next occupant.
Mind you, I was only eight years old.
I grabbed the bottom ledge of the windowsill and quietly hoisted myself up so I could look for what was making the noise. The scraping sounds seemed to be coming from this room. Straining to get a better view, I could see a man on his hands and knees, as though he were searching for something.
He wore only a pair of denim jeans and worker’s boots, no shirt. The floor, littered, with cardboard, sand and other bits and pieces that remained after a day's work, made for a rough cushion. The man moved in a back-and-forth rhythm and that made the shuffling sound I had heard. As my eyes adjusted to the shadows inside the room, I saw that he was not alone. Soft moans were coming from the woman that lay beneath him.
I am not sure how long I watched them before I realized what they were doing. A few minutes later, the woman peered over his bare shoulder in the direction of where I was, and we locked stares for a few long seconds.
Her dark eyes, burned into my memory.
She looked mad; maybe because it was a child had watched and maybe because it was only a child that watched.
I didn't care. I dropped down and ran off.
I looked back and saw nobody chasing me so I stopped and leaned against the outside wall of a house half a block away. As I stood there catching my breath, I replayed the events I witnessed. I had heard about it, but had never seen two people actually do it.
When I got home, my mom was pissed.
"Where the hell have you been? It's almost dark and dinner's ready. Next time, tell one of your sisters where you're going."
"Ok, mom. Sorry".
"Go wash up for dinner and change your shirt, it's filthy. Damn it, Tracy, where the hell you been?"
"I was playing hide and seek and it got late, that's all," I fibbed. I was not hiding or seeking.
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After dinner, as I got ready for bed, my older sister came into the room we shared and asked me where I really had been.
"You're not going to believe it, even if I told you." Remembering what I had seen, I gave her a brief version. We sat on her bed, leaning up against the wall.
