Sophia Kirwan

    The Man-Hunt Memory

I love October a lot. Mostly where fall lands in the year. I have the best memories from the fall months. One of the best days of my life was on Friday, October 9th, 2020. I had just finished online school for the day. I quickly grabbed my clothes, my towel, and my other necessities to jump in the shower and get ready for my cousin’s 14th birthday party. I was extremely excited because this was my mom’s side of the family. My favorite. I had to make sure I was ready by exactly 3:30pm for my aunt to pick me up. I knew that we were going to have a lot of fun and play a lot of games, so I quickly put on a short-sleeved navy colored shirt with a Paterson fire department badge that was stitched in, my lucky adidas joggers, and pink checkered vans. When it comes to my cousins, we walk everywhere and run from playing games to the point that we run out of breath. So I make sure to wear shoes with enough grip on them. 3:30pm comes along and I grab my red Manchester bag, my white JBL speaker, my charger, and wallet. My aunt beeps the horn from her beige colored car so I say goodbye to my dog, Jack, head out through the basement, into the garage, and leave. I make sure the garage door is closed and we are on our way. 

We get to my cousin’s house and it feels like home. The grass smelled like it was freshly cut, I could smell the grill running, and I could see the grill smoking as it was getting ready to grill soon. I greet my cousin Willy with a hug and ask where his daughter and his son, the birthday boy is. He tells me that they’re in each other’s rooms. So I went to my cousin Guile’s room. He’s got a PC set up with a rainbow keyboard and mouse. There was also a mirror and LED lights around the corners of the medium sized room. I greet him by doing a handshake and a hug. He was chilling in a black Nike t-shirt with black sweatpants and Nike sneakers. Every time I see him he grows taller, has a deeper voice, and his attitude gets a lot calmer. Puberty I swear.. I also greeted his other cousin from his mothers side who was chilling on Guile’s bed. I go ahead and go to the next room over and hang out with my number one favorite cousin, Mariah. She was wearing a bomber jacket with baggy jeans and Ugg’s. My other cousin Annabella was also here too. She was wearing jeans with an anime character shirt and adidas sneakers. We greeted each other with a big hug and soon listened to lo-fi, hip hop, and a few slowed & reverbed songs. More of Mariah and Guile’s other cousins came and we soon came to an agreement to come up with a game plan.

We eventually decided to go to the train tracks to throw firecrackers. Before we left, Mariah gave me her cantaloupe orange colored jacket with a NASA sign stitched in. We told Cousin Willy that we would be by the field and eventually started walking. I started to play music on my speaker to hype up the mood while everyone was walking together along the long cracked sidewalk, the air felt crispy and sentimental. The street lights lighting up our dark path next to private and secure apartments. People looking from their balconies being as nosy as they could be. We could hear and see an elementary soccer game happen in the field, some people cheering for the yellow team or the blue team. As we got closer to the train tracks, I could feel my heart racing, filling up with excitement and adrenaline. The trees would creak, branches would break, and leaves would crunch as we quickly sneaked to the tracks. Everyone was excited for the first firecracker to be thrown and explode in the sky. As guile threw the first firecracker up in the sky, it hit the cable car with a loud boom that interrupted the soccer game from down below. While everyone was taking a turn throwing each firecracker, I started to walk off a bit, I noticed a big yellow light illuminating from the dark like a black hole. I knew I couldn’t waste any time, so I screamed to them as loud as I could, “Everyone, run, NOW!” and ran as fast as I could. I closed my eyes, and let my legs take the lead. “Damn Soph! Where are you going?”. I opened my eyes and before I knew it, I had ran so fast that I ran down the hill and onto the cracked sidewalk and   beat everyone in the 10 seconds we had started to run. We soon ran out on the cracked sidewalk that led to the side of the field and back to the private apartment complex, all out of breath.

We thought of another way to spend the night having fun and that was manhunt. One of the most competitive games to play with my family. Now even more adrenaline and excitement was flowing through my body, from my brain all the way to my feet. As soon as the hunter was chosen, we all scattered scared but pumped up to find our best hiding spots and be prepared to run for our lives. Unfortunately, at first I couldn’t find a good spot, knowing the hunter was nearby. There were about a dozen bushes by an orange street light that illuminated only a small portion of the cracked parking lot. It was me, Annabella, and another cousin from the other side of my cousin’s family quietly running, making small movements through the wood chip pathway behind the bushes. A few minutes go by and we see the hunter. Annabella gave in and so did the other cousin. Luckily she didn’t snitch out my position. Confused on why they didn’t see me, I took advantage of my chance to run to a nearby tree in the darkness and pray that they didn’t see me. They finally leave to go look for Mariah and Guile. I sighed in relief. I finally realized that the jacket that Mariah had given me made me blend in with the bushes and the light above me and the clothes I had on. I sneaked back to my last spot and chilled for 15 minutes. Do you believe that? But my time had come too soon. Or did it? All of a sudden Mariah emerged from the darkness with the hunter and the rest of the players. I was the last. But Mariah was the last one I had to beat. I had either two choices. Run or Give up. I wasn’t giving up. So, I ran for my damn life. I felt like I was floating. I felt like I was in the Olympics as I jumped a low single chain gate and ran down the street by the field. “You Win! Come back.”