We lived just above the highway, in a small house. Our house was part of a long strip of houses, squished tightly together, all of them long and narrow. The strip, that’s what we called it, the strip. It was an ugly place to live, just above the highway, with tangled itchy grass across the street. There, in the grass, was a long metal railing blocking the way to the rushing, roaring highway. 

    Jerry and I would always swing our legs over that railing, and look down at the speeding cars. The sun would be hot on our heads, and our feet would swing, back and forth, back and forth. We would sit there for hours, talking and dreaming and making up stories.

    “That guy is the president of Jamaica,” Jerry would say, pointing to a nice Porsche. 

    “What’s he doing here?” I would ask.

    “He’s visiting his daughter who moved here twenty years ago. They haven’t seen each other since.”

    “I’d like to see them meet,” would be my reply. And our sunburned feet would go on swinging over that railing, back and forth, back and forth.

    Sometimes we would make faces at the people in their cars. We would cross our eyes and stick out our tongues and laugh. Sometimes the people smiled back, sometimes they frowned. It was fun, really fun.

    “He’s on his way to be executed,” I said one time, pointing at a police car.

    “Why?” Jerry asked.

    “He’s a serial killer. He drowned thirteen people.”

    “That’s cheerful, Anne.” Jerry laughed.

    There was one time we sat there and suddenly Jerry's mom came, and she yelled at us.

   “What do you think you’re doing, sitting on the edge like that?” She screamed.

    “Sorry, Anne,” Jerry whispered and he slipped off the railing and hurried away to meet his mom's wrath.

   I never did like his mother.

    There were days that we would sit on the roofs of our small houses and look up at the sky. We would look up at the white gulls that sped through the big blueness, and the black specks that were airplanes. We would look below, and see the clotheslines heavy with laundry, swaying in the wind. We would stare beyond, at the highway bridges, and the twinkling lights of buildings far away.

    “I’m going to the church.” I would say after a while.

Jerry would grin, and give my yellow hair a tug. “You and that big ol’ church.”

    Then we would part ways, him going to his house to read, or tease his dog Mac, and me going to the church. The big ol’ church, like Jerry said.

    It wasn’t that I believed in God or anything like that. I just loved to look at that church. It had a green tiled roof, set against the great blue sky. It was an old, old, church, and it was beautiful. The only beautiful thing in the strip, where I lived. Sometimes I would stare at it so long, and my heart would ache, trying to hold in all that beauty. 

    Slowly, the long lazy days would come to a close, and school would begin. I didn’t care, as long as Jerry and I took the bus home, along the highway, and walked up our hill to the strip. We would race across the street to our railing and we would feel its icy coldness, and we would say, “just wait till summer, you cars. Just wait till summer.” 

    It was strange how different the highway looked in the winter, the grass grew in yellow stalks, and trees were bare and gnarled. The cars didn’t glisten the way they did, beneath the summer heat, instead, they were dirty with city snow. There’s nothing I hated more than city snow, the brown lumps of it. 

    I would go look at the church in winter too, it was still beautiful. I loved the way it donned icicles that shone from its highest, green-tiled, rooftop. I would stare at it and wish that there were more beautiful things in the world, more for me to look at other than this church. I would stand there, staring at the old stone structure my nose dripping, and my arms hugging my body for warmth.

    I was always relieved when summer rolled around again, the highway grass turned green, and school let out. Jerry and I would rush to our railing and swing our legs right over it on the first day of summer. That’s how it always was.

    I was laughing that day, pointing at a small bug that had climbed up Jerry’s leg and laughing. He laughed too and swatted at it with the palm of his hand. The sun was hot on our necks and the railing felt sweaty beneath my hands. Our legs were swinging, back and forth, back and forth. 

    There was a loud thumping noise and a shrieking of tires. Jerry lurched upright and so did I. A big white van rolled on its back into the gated highway grass, and it was burning. It was burning in flames, red hot fire, billowing from its broken windows.  I remember screaming.

 “Oh my god!” I shouted, “oh my god!” 

    And Jerry, he just sat there, his eyes big and stretched out on his face. Both of us weren’t able to move, both of us glued to that railing, our eyes on that big white van. There were wailing sirens and flashing lights rushing down our highway and I watched the action, half horrified and half excited. 

    And Jerry, he just sat there with big tears on his lashes, his eyes dark and scared.      

    There were ambulances and stretchers and burnt-up bodies. I closed my eyes, my stomach writhing, and my chest heaving. The white van lay burning in the highway grass, and the ambulance lights flashed and blinked on the back of my eyelids, the images branded there. 

    But Jerry didn’t close his eyes, he just stared and stared, his mouth gaping open and his breathing ragged. I was able to hear his uneven breathing, and I was able to feel the fear that permeated from him. He was scared, he was so scared. 

    The other dwellers of the strip began to hear the noise and see the lights, and they came out of their squished together houses to look down at our highway. They gasped and shuddered. “Why are you kids watching this?” They said, “you shouldn’t see this.”

    But Jerry and I couldn’t budge, we were stuck to that railing, our legs swinging back and forth, back and forth, just like always.

    And then the ambulances wailed away, blaring their mournful sirens into the night. 

    “Let’s go, Jerry,” I said when they were gone. “Let’s go.”

    Jerry didn’t move a muscle, he sat on that railing staring down at the ever-moving highway. He wasn’t smiling now, there was no laughter in his face. 

    “Let’s go,” I said again, louder.

   A tremor ran through his body, but he stayed right where he was, his hands firm on the railing, and his feet swinging back and forth, back and forth. 

   “Jerry!” I was scared then, really scared.

“I’m going to get your mom. I’m getting your mom, Jerry.” 

  I ran to get her while Jerry sat there, his eyes never leaving the highway and his feet swinging on and on forever.

I haven’t seen Jerry since that day. 

   The summer moved on, and every day I would wait by the railing for him. I would wait by the railing, ready to do the things we always did. Our feet swinging, and our eyes on the cars. 

    But Jerry never came. 

I would knock on his door, ready to climb up to his roof and look out into the beyond. To look at the distant bridges that made arches through the sky. And to look down at the clotheslines that shook with the wind. 

   But Jerry never answered his door. Not then, and not ever again. 

    I missed him. I missed him so much my heart felt sore. I would sit on the railing alone and dream. I would lay back on the roof of my house and wish. Often I would wonder about him. Does he remember this? I would think, does he remember me?   

   I would remember the time his shoe fell over the railing and I climbed down to get it for him. The time one driver rolled down the window and cursed at us, the veins in his forehead bulging, and Jerry and I ran as fast as we could. 

   “Dad,” I said to my father, “I miss Jerry.”

He patted my head with his big hand and said, “Sorry. That’s life kiddo.” And he tied his laces and was off to work. 

   Well, I guess I didn’t like life too much, then.  

   My only consolation was the church, the towering turrets, and the ringing bells. I would look at that big ol’ church like Jerry always said, and I would laugh and cry remembering. 

    Even as I grew older, I would sit with my feet swinging over that railing, back and forth, back and forth. 

   I was afraid that if I stopped, I might lose Jerry forever. 

   Now and then I would think of Jerry, does he remember? Does he dream too? I wondered. And my feet would continue their swinging and my mind would continue its dreaming and Jerry was no longer with me.