One day a young girl named Zoey at 4 years of age with dark red hair was playing with dolls in her room. Her mom had told her to come down. She wondered why but she didn't question it. She ran down the stairs to the kitchen where her mom was sitting at the table.
"Yes mommy?" She said.
"Come on we're going to meet the new neighbors. They have a child that is your age!" Her mom replied.
This made Zoey excited. There had never been anyone her age on her street. Most people were elderly or parents with teenagers that didn't want to play with Zoey.
Once her dad came up to the rest of them everyone started to make their way outside. Her mom closed and locked the door behind them and they walked a few steps to the new neighbors house.
"Do you want to knock?" Zoey's mother asked her.
"Yeah!" Zoey replied with a huge smile on her face and knocked fast and loudly on the door. She heard footsteps coming towards the door. She was jumping up and down and her smile had only gotten bigger. Then somebody opened the door. It was a man. He had dark brown hair and was wearing a t-shirt and jeans.
"Hello Mr. Smith," Said Zoey's mom, "We just wanted to welcome you to the neighborhood. Is this a good time?"
"Absolutely, come on in."
The three people in Zoey's family stepped in and Mr. Smith welcomed them to sit on the couch.
"Mike!" Called Mr. Smith
Zoey wondered if Mike was the child her mother was talking about. She waited eagerly on the couch until she saw a figure and her thoughts were correct. It was a boy about her size with spiky dark brown hair like Mr. Smith's
"What?" Mike asked.
"We have company." Mr. Smith told him.
Zoey decided she should walk up and introduce herself so she pushed herself off the couch and walked over to Mike.
"Hi, I'm Zoey!" She said.
"Hey." replied Mike, "Want to go outside and play."
Zoey nodded and Mike led her out the door to his backyard. Mike had a pretty big backyard that had a forest behind it.
"Do you want to explore the forest?" Mike asked. Zoey looked over to the forest. She didn't know if she should. What if she got lost and never saw her mommy and daddy again.
"I don't know." She said, her voice shaking.
"Come on!" Replied Mike, "Don't be such a chicken."
Since Zoey didn't want to be called a chicken and really wanted Mike as her friend she decided to venture into the forest with him. She looked around. There was trees everywhere with green leaves considering the summer season. The ground was mostly dirt and there was the occasional log or stick on the ground.
As they ventured into the forest, Mike and Zoey found a tree house.
"Come on, lets go in!" Said Mike.
"Um, I don't know," Said Zoey, "What if it belongs to somebody else?"
Mike shook his head and motioned her to come forward but Zoey was still hesitant. She wasn't sure if she should but because she wanted to be friends with Mike so bad she walked up an old wooden latter that felt like it would break under her feet any minute. When she got into the tree house she saw two chair and a dusty rug. She figured that nobody could have came up here in ages since it looked so old and dusty.
"It looks pretty old up here. I guess we can go up here since it looks like nobody's been up here in a while."
"Okay, so it's our tree house now but we need to make sure people know that." Said Mike. He took out a small spiral notebook with a pen through the spiral part and wrote down "Mike and Zoey's tree house." Then he took a piece of tape which he also for some reason had in his pocket and taped the paper outside the tree house.
Now that it was officially their tree house they decided to talk to each other about thing they liked. They found out that they have a lot in common. Zoey just knew they were going to be great friends. They were in the middle of a conversation about their favorite colors when they heard footsteps.
"Who's there?" Asked Zoey.
"Relax, it's just us." Said a familiar voice. Zoey thought about it for a second and realized it was her parents.
"What are you two doing in here? You had us worried sick!" Said Mike's mother.
Mike and Zoey frowned and apologized for what they did. Their parents forgave them but told them to never go anywhere without their permission. The two chidren nodded and with their parents walked back to their separate houses.
From then on, Mike and Zoey hung out whenever they could and continued to go into their tree house until one day two years later when Zoey's mom told her some sad new over dinner with the family.
"Honey, we're moving." Her mom said. Zoey just sat there, tears forming in her eyes.
"But mommy! What about Mike? I can't leave him. I won't! I'm running away with him!"
With that, Zoey ran out the door and over to Mike's house. Luckily, he was the one who answered the door and not his mom or dad.
"Hey Zoey!" He said, "What's up?"
"My mom says that we're moving but I can't move from you so we need to run away to our tree house." Zoey said as tears rolled down her face. Mike nodded and they headed out the door and into the forest that their tree house was located in. Once they got there they ran up the ladder and slammed the door behind them putting one of the chairs up against the door so no one could get in. However, a few minutes later there was a knock on the door.
"Let us in!" Zoey's mom said.
"No! I am not moving!"
"Well, we're your parents and we will make the final decision."
Zoey sighed and walked out knowing that it was hopeless. She was moving and she wouldn't see Mike ever again. Well, at least that was what she thought.