Chapter Seven: Buenos Aires:

Let’s go further south. We’re going to leave North America. (We might be back for one more person later. We’ll see.) We’re going south of the equator. In fact, we are going to South America. We’re ditching the coats and going for the swimsuits. That’s right, we are going to Buenos Aires.

Antonio was hanging out on the beach with his friends. The boy threw his hands up in the air.

“Free from the Tokyo winter!” he shouted. His friends looked up at him. Antonio broke into a goofy grin.

“Nice day for it,” he said. His friends let him be. It felt good to be back. Antonio made it back to Argentina yesterday afternoon. His friends and mother were happy to see him. His mom was more surprised.

“Baby!” she said. His mother ran forward and hugged him. Antonio slowly hugged her back.

“Mom, it’s good to see you,” he said. She looked up at his face.

“Why didn’t you call me?” his mother asked.

“I did!” the boy said. “Didn’t you check your messages?”

“I just got home,” she said. Antonio tried to look into the house.

“Did you just get in from shopping?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. “I need you to help me with the groceries.”

“Okay,” her son said. He followed her into the house.

The first day was rather chill. Antonio helped his mother around the house. He didn’t complain at all. His mother looked shocked.

“You can’t be my son,” she said. “Who are you?” Antonio shrugged her off as he finished cleaning the shed in the backyard. He even helped out with cooking dinner. Antonio spent the rest of his first night closed up in his room with video games and the TV. The boy shot his girlfriend a text before going to bed.

The next morning, Antonio awoke to his phone buzzing by his head. Oh, an old friend texted him. He sat up for a better look. It was from Bruno.

“Heard you were back. You busy today?” he wrote. Antonio smiled at the screen. He typed a reply to the message.

“No,” he wrote back. Antonio hit send. It didn’t take long for Bruno to reply back.

“Want to hang out on the beach?” he wrote. Antonio grinned as he started typing his answer.

“Hell yes! I will be done in a moment,” he wrote. The boy hit send and jumped out of bed. Moments later, he got dressed and grabbed breakfast before heading out the door.

So here he was on the beach.

“Antonio!” Bruno shouted as he stood near the waves.

“Coming!” his friend shouted. The boy ran towards his friends with his surf board in hand. He was going to call his girlfriend later.