draft #1: in which ryan owns your soul

My neighbor Ryan is, first of all, a girl; secondly, around nine or ten; thirdly, cute as a bug (I got that expression from my grandpa); and fourthly, will one day own her own lemonade-making company probably and wind up wealthier than anyone you know and maybe own your soul. I bet you.

Ryan's mother, by the way, is Amy, who I believe to be the person responsible for most of the sinister food items left on our property. Amy's the type of person who finds a random piece of fruit at her house and would rather leave it on someone's porch than risk it going bad before she can eat it. That's where Ryan gets it from.

Every summer, and sometimes during the off-season, Ryan and her tiny friend with the big glasses (I will call her...Steve) mix up some lemonade and pour it into dixie cups. Steve, by the way, is seriously tiny. She's about three feet tall with gigantic glasses and the cutest little bossy personality. She's like a tiny, blonde, bossy leprechaun with gigantic glasses.

Their marketing strategy goes like this: each girl carries two cups (two hands, right? It makes sense.) and they go door-to-door down the block (foregoing the meth dealers next door, presumably, because Amy is possibly less keen on those guys than we are) and sell their cups of lemonade for a quarter a cup. It's such a great deal that I usually buy two.

Sometimes Ryan and Steve set up a lemonade stand at Ryan's house and then come knocking on our door to ask us if we want them to bring over some lemonade for us to buy. We always do, of course, even if we're not thirsty. Because we're afraid of Steve.

Come to think of it, when we met Ryan, Amy was having a yard sale. Ryan, who was maybe seven at the time, manned her own little table at the yard sale. She set up a box of store-bought donuts and a box for money, and those donuts sold like hotcakes. Raphael personally bought three. I'm guessing hotcakes are probably next. Signs on the power poles! Flyers in security screens! Pancake brunch in Ryan's driveway! Only two dollars for two pancakes! A quarter extra for syrup!

Steve probably flips hotcakes like a muthaf***er. I bet you.