"APRIL!! Get out of my stuff!!"
As far back as April Patterson could remember, people told her what she couldn't do and where she couldn't go. If it wasn't Elizabeth telling her to stay out of her clothes or Mom shooing her out of the kitchen because she was busy, she was told that she was making too much noise or running around too fast. This was nothing like television. The parents on TV had lots of time for their kids. Hmm. The parents on her favourite shows also weren't as old as Mommy and Daddy were. Maybe Mommy was angry all the time because she was so old and tired all the time.
Maybe her being old is why she said one thing when she wanted another thing to happen. Take what happened a few days ago when Mommy and the other old lady who looked like a daddy were upset because Farley and the other dog didn't do so good at playing leap-frog. Mommy said not to open the gate unless she asked someone if she could first so she didn't know what she was supposed to have done wrong. Now, if Mommy had said "April, don't open the gate unless Daddy or me say to", she could see that she'd made a mistake but Mommy didn't say that so she didn't goof up.
Anyways, if Mommy had said to wait in the yard if she was busy talking, she could have not had something really scary happen. Back in the winter, Mommy and Daddy were going away on a boat and Mommy said that she would have nothing to do but look at the water and Grandpa Will and Grandma Carrie said that mommies and daddies needed time to be away from their kids. When Mommy came back, she wanted to be with her because she'd been away sooooo long but, like always, she had to go away so Mommy could have coffee with the old lady next door who looked like a man. Everybody was too busy to play and there's Mommy talking about all the stuff she did! She said she wasn't going to do stuff! That was unfair! April decided she needed her own boat trip. She found a toy boat to play with in the yard but the puddles weren't deep enough so she went down to the river behind the house.
She was having fun at first but then she slipped and fell in. The water was soooo cold and sooo fast and she was sooo scared and Farley was soooo brave. After what seemed like forever Daddy came in and saved her only Farley died and everyone said that it was her fault, why? She just wanted a boat trip.
A couple of months later, she was at preschool when something funny happened. While she was at preschool waiting for Mommy to come and pick her up, Becky's mommy was talking to Duncan's mommy about something. Becky's mommy said "I heard that the stupid bad word didn't even take the poor child to the hospital afterwards." Duncan's mommy said "That's nothing. I heard that the screaming other bad word made the older kid take the blame for it because it was her job to look after her." Grown-ups sure didn't say things that made sense. Like for instance, what did what Duncan's mommy mean when she said "The thing about Old Potato Nose is that See-pea-ass won't do anything about her. If they didn't enough lead in their pencils to care about her first two kids, they aren't going to watch over this one."?
Anyways, she was scared of water for the longest time afterwards. That, and Mommy and Daddy going away and leaving her behind like she was something they had to run away from.