I didn’t intend to have a bad day, most eight-year-olds never do, they just sometimes happen. It started with a trip to the stable. I wanted to see how Misty was doing. I had a new rescue puppy with me. He must have been six months old, which is older and bigger than I usually had.

The puppies I brought from the pound were always adopted within days. I mean when a blonde-haired, blue-eyed little girl looks at you imploringly you will anything for her. That is unless you are one of her brothers, then it is, “Go away brat!”

I took the puppy with me to the stables. This proved to be a big mistake because the pup didn’t like the horses and started barking and nipping at their heels. The horses were naturally upset with this and tried to kick him. He was faster than them, but they were tearing down their stalls.

Ben came running in to see what the commotion was all about. He had been doing something outside. He grabbed the pup and got bit in the process. He hurried out of the barn, pup in arms and me crying behind. Say what you want about me, but I know how and when to cry.

Ben told me that I could never come into the stable without an adult present and that the dog was not to come near the horses ever again.

Unfortunately for me, I didn’t take this well. I grabbed the pup and ran back into the house through the kitchen. I immediately ran into a maid who had just picked up a stack of dishes that she had just finished drying. Bumping the maid, I knocked the dishes loose. The maid attempted to catch them, in doing so overbalanced and fell, cutting her head on a table edge. There was blood everywhere as head wounds tend to bleed a lot.

With all the crashing and screaming going on Mum rushed into the kitchen to see me trying to staunch the blood flow with a towel. Mum settled things down and started in the inquisition, uh, I mean she tried to find out what happened.

She told me that the pup was going back to the pound until it learned to behave itself. Since I had to go right by it on my way to school on Monday, I could drop it off then.

I didn’t know what else to do so I took the puppy to my room for the weekend. It was Friday but we didn’t have school today because of a teacher’s meeting. I don’t know why they meet. Maybe it is to compare how many spankings and timeouts they have given. The meanest teacher wins.

Since I had nothing to do, I decided to go sunbathing. Our house has a four-story tower attached. You get to the top with an elevator. I went up to the top floor and started to walk up the last set of steps when I remembered the sign.

When I was in kindergarten Ricky walked in on me and a bunch of my friends sunbathing topless. After that, Mum had a sign made up to put at the bottom of the steps, “Ladies sunbathing.”

When Ricky asked Mum why she was doing that for a bunch of little girls she told him that maybe the big girls would be up there. I don’t know which big girls she meant. The only ones I ever saw go up there were Mum and her friends.

Anyway, I remembered the sign. It was a beautiful day; it was kind of windy, but my lounge chair would be below the level of the parapets. That is what Ricky called them, I think that is the same as a carpet but made of stone.

I took my top off and placed it on the parapet and lay down on a chaise lounge. I must have fallen asleep for a little while because my skin was red, not bad, but I did burn. Just as I was reaching for my top, a strong breeze came along and blew it away.

I panicked for a moment then I remembered that Mum kept some towels in a cabinet in the corner. I wrapped one of those around me and went down to my room on the second floor. When I got off the elevator Eddie was there with two of his friends. He started yelling, “Naked girl, close your eyes, naked girl.”

Mrs. Hernandez came out of her room and saw the boys standing around me and chanting. She chased them off, when I told her what happened she explained how you laid on top of your clothes when sunbathing topless so they wouldn’t blow away or some heathen like my brother steal them.

She also warned me about them pouring ice water on your back to make you sit up. Boys are terrible.

Now I had little to do, so I decided to try on my clothes. It was a good thing I did. Mum and I had picked this dress and its matching shoes out a long time ago, I think six months. My feet had grown. The toes were so tight they hurt my feet, being tight was okay, they looked good. But when my feet went numb, and I fell over I knew there was a problem.