the night before life goes o n ( harper ! )

[leighton sabrina adams]

The small figure of the fourteen-year-old girl was perched precariously on the branch of a tree, one hand pressing into the trunk and the other grasping a branch above her. The grin on her face reached her bright, sparkling eyes, giggles erupting from her mouth every few moments as she stared down at the older boy with his camera. She wasn't actually that far off of the ground, but enough that if she fell she could seriously injure herself. The boy was frowning, shaking his head and trying to get her to come down, but she was refusing out of sheer enjoyment. "C'mon, Koko, I'm not that high up, no worries! Just take the picture, you know you wanna!" she called out, lapsing into another fit of giggles. She knew that her older adoptive brother liked taking pictures of nature, and that he wasn't so fond of taking pictures of people, but she wanted him to take a picture of her on the tree. Besides, she knew he would make it a really good one, and he'd brought his camera along to get pictures of the wilderness anyways, so she didn't understand why he was so opposed to taking a picture of her in the tree. "It's dangerous, Leigh, now would you please come down?" he called back, starting to worry that she would fall before she had a chance to get down voluntarily. Leigh sighed, her lips pulling into a pout. "Only if you take the picture first, Mister Kody Alexander!" she told him, playfully calling him by his first and last name.

He sighed, holding the camera up to his face, and Leigh grinned happily. He snapped two pictures of her, and before he could ask her to actually come down, she let go of the branch and tree trunk and jumped down. She didn't land correctly on her feet, however, and before Kody could grab onto her, she fell backwards onto her butt, her eyes wide with shock. "Leigh?" he asked tentatively. "You okay?" It took her a minute, but she blinked rapidly and jumped up, her wide smile returning. "Of course I am Koko, I'm not a baby!" she giggled, her green-gray eyes sparkling mischievously. Kody's features relaxed, glad to know his younger sister wasn't hurt, but they almost immediately took on the worried look once more as she bounded off in yet another fit of giggles. "Leigh, what the hell?" he sighed, chasing after her and clutching his camera with one hand. "That's a bad word!" the bubbly teenager cried over her shoulder, darting to her left and climbing the tree that was right there. Kody hissed under his breath. One problem with Leighton was that she really didn't know how to listen. She didn't particularly understand danger, and he knew that, but he couldn't keep her from getting hurt if she wouldn't listen to him. Sometimes he wondered if it was her lack of the ability to listen that had caused his parents to almost immediately let his aunt and uncle gain custody. At least they hadn't abused her - at least, not that anyone could tell.

"Leigh, please stop climbing trees. They can't hold your weight, they'll break and then you'll fall and get hurt," he told her desperately, but Leighton simply shook her head, stuck out her tongue, and climbed onto the second branch above the ground, sitting herself down on it with her hands on either side of it. "You worry too much, Koko!" she called down, still grinning childishly. Kody was starting to lose his patience with his sister, but he knew that if he took his eyes off of her she was bound to fall or go run and hide and make him go frantic searching for her, so he couldn't even turn and take pictures of the other trees around them. "Would you please stop calling me that, Leighton?" he called up, his voice laced with exasperation. He really hated that nickname, but no matter how much he tried to tell her to stop using it, she called him that anyways. "If you come down you can take a few pictures!" he told her, wondering if bribing her with being able to use his camera would work. He never let anyone touch his camera, short of Harper, since she actually knew how to hold and use it, but Leigh usually tried to. She tilted her head from her branch, staring down at him and considering the offer, looking between her brother's face and his camera, wondering if he was serious. "Promise promise?" she said finally, staring at him. Kody sighed with relief. "Promise promise," he repeated, watching her climb down. She almost lost her balance on her branch and he held his arms out to catch her, but she jumped down lightly and held out her hands for the camera.

As he handed it to her and placed the strap over her head, he smiled and shook his head. "You're crazy," he told her, keeping his hand on her back so she wouldn't try and run away with the camera. "Kody, was that teasing? Or were you serious?" Leigh piped up after a minute, looking up at her significantly taller brother, her eyes and voice genuinely curious and confused. Kody laughed lightly, stopping when she did and watching her carefully as she held his camera up to her face and tried to snap a picture of a squirrel. "Both, Leigh," he replied, glancing around before pointing over her shoulder at another squirrel, which she instantly turned to and snapped a picture of. Glancing up at the trees, he couldn't help but remember that Harper had fallen out of one of them. She hadn't been too hurt, but she hadn't found it quite as funny as he had. He wouldn't have laughed if Leigh had fallen out of the tree. That was different. "Well, you did better with the trees than Harper did," he chuckled, talking more to himself than Leighton, although she didn't ask what he meant, too focused on trying to take pictures as good as Kody's usually were - not that she was going to tell him that.