The Jump Kick

As boys looking for adventure, my brother and I hit the jackpot. We had a volcano so big it looked like it was practically in the back yard. There was jungle at the end of the street, and outside every household, at least one giant hand sized shiny black and yellow banana spider hung upside-down from a large web. A world of color and danger everywhere and we were unafraid and free to explore it together.

Darkly tanned from playing under the sun, every hour of everyday it was shinning, we almost passed for local kids except for our matching blue eyes and starkly sun bleached crew cut heads. Our feet were calloused and tough from the combination of dirt fields and rough white-hot concrete neighborhood roads covered with blistering strings of black tar. We never wore more than shorts in the sweltering wet heat of the Philippines except on school days, which are difficult to remember at all compared to the blinding bright days of adventure and play together.

Big brother and little brother, we were a set to be reckoned with in our own minds. The locals in our neighborhood treated us like kings because we were Americans. We wanted for nothing and survived the jungle’s wild boars daily. Once, while the country was still under martial law, we had climbed the boarder wall to walk along the top in defiance until the armed boarder guards would come to chase us away.

Spending our rainy days watching Bruce Lee reruns in Chinese with no subtitles and reading comic books during typhoons, we fed overactive imaginations and played out every idea that we could dream up. Having noticed our fascination with martial arts Mom surprised us with private Karate lessons! We had a very over dramatic sense for it all and studied hard, practicing in the meadow next to our house for hours after each lesson. The two of us would be as good as Bruce Lee one day, of that we had no doubt.

The men worked as hard in the sun as we thought we played and had more than half way constructed the new house after two months using only hand tools. These construction workers next door to our meadow seemed unstoppably tough and we would pretend to fight this ruthlessly evil gang of dark natives daily, kicking their butts but good! We were quite the foolish and entertaining show playing in our meadow.

Often the workers would invite my brother and I over for lunch breaks. Conversation about martial arts and food suited us just fine. Our friend Billy, who had one blinded gray eye and a hell of a, “how it happened story,” would stick up for us when the others tired of our endless questions and attention. The lunch menu was always wonderfully strange and many bargains were struck that led to trading our peanut butter or bologna sandwiches for popcorn shrimp, white rice, papaya, and dried apricots. We tried everything at least once. If one brother were squeamish the other would dare him into eating anyway. We were boys in love with a foreign land and this new adventure with new friends.

Change came after us in the middle of the summer when all the workers seemed to be very irritated about something gone wrong with the mortar of a new gray block wall they had built. This mistake was going to be taken out of their pay if something didn’t happen to cause the wall to be rebuilt. After eating with the men I approached our friend Billy with a plan of action. I bet that my brother and I could kick that wall down. Both little and big brother were eager for the test, especially in the name of friendship. Ha! In our comic book fevered brains this was at last the chance to be “real heroes” and help our friends!

We were in the back yard before the word, “yes,” finished falling from Billy’s mouth, but only because it took all the men so long to finish laughing. As the older brother with the idea I got to make the first attempt. I jumped up, my foot connected with that wall and WHAM! The jolt back from the wall traveled up through my leg then hip and spine to the base of my brain. I had nailed it; the kick was picture perfect and surely as hard, as high and as cool as Bruce’s would be! Never mind that I was only seven and a half and skinny as a rail. I watched, as the wall flexed and swayed like a wave, amazed and waiting for my ultimate triumph in this fantasy-land. In front of these tough grown men, the wall cracked away from a sidewall in one corner and then . . . held fast. Standing there upright and still again, the defiant gray wall was staring back at me and my eyes watered up with disappointment.

My little brother’s turn now, I felt sorry for him as I blinked back tears, there was little chance of his success. He lined up to attack but was both shorter and lighter than me. His run was determined. Hey, why didn’t I run? His jump was a vault! I’ll remember to run on my next try. He connected with all his weight behind and through his leg, what a kick! “Good One,” escaped my lips, forced out by brotherly pride. The wall shook, a solid thing turning fluid, my brother didn’t even notice. The smaller boy already walking away from a dancing monster like it didn’t exist. Knowing he had failed, he was making way for big brother’s next attempt. I was hit by the momentary fear that the massive gray wall would fall on him and crush him, but then the wall gave over and fell out of the yard away from us smashing itself to ruble on impact with the ground.

As my brother jumped in celebration, a selfish little thought shot out of my mouth powered by hurt pride and the petty jealousy of a first born son who had been bested for the first time. “It was my jump kick that loosened it or it never would have fell.” I inhaled sharply as if they could be pulled back. Words in the air, then they hit my brother’s ears, muddied the color in his eyes and could never be taken back. Big brother set against little brother, the jumping stopped and more than his victory was diminished.

We turned from each other to our friend Billy hoping for a victory celebration or some thanks for our help. That was when Billy turned his one gray eye on us, ”Run you @#*^ American brats, go and get your Father,” Billy yelled,” HE IS going to pay for this right now!” Both in tears, never talking to any of these grown men again we took our one-way trip the shortest possible route out of the yard through the new back exit, crossing over the gray rubble of the wall.

The meadow was never the same again and in fact this entire fantasy-land took on a cloudy, overcast quality. There was a brief reprieve from feeling we were super dupes after our scolding from Dad. He said to us, with a smile and a wink, ”Boys, honestly it was well worth the money to see the proof with my own eyes, I’ll be damned.” Then brief reprieve over both of us boys would grow up.

No, the truth was that only one of us would grow up and the other is starring here in this, our last great childhood adventure together. I write to keep what I have left safe from a fickle and forgetful adult mind. Oh, there are still fantasies of dancing walls and shared adventures in daydreams, but we can never cross back over to our time before the jump kick.