True (. . . Sort Of)

by Katherine Hannigan

  He liked it, a lot.

  Because people were always talking at him, like it was nothing, and wanting him to talk back. But it wasn’t nothing to Brud. It was hard, and he hated it. He hated sounding wrong and feeling stupid. That never happened with Ferris Boyd.

  They sat like that for a long time.

  In the quiet, Brud could hear the birds. He could see them, too, swooping around the stoop. That’s a lot of birds, he thought.

  And one flew straight at him.

  “H-H-Hey,” he hollered, and ducked. He glanced over at the boy.

  The bird was perched on Ferris Boyd’s shoulder, like it lived there. “Whoa,” Brud breathed.

  Ferris Boyd and the bird were staring at each other. Neither one of them made a sound, but Brud could feel it: those two were telling each other things.

  “Wh-Wh-What the . . . ,” he whispered.

  The bird gazed at Brud and started chirping. It was telling him something, too.

  Brud heard it, in his head. My friend, it said.

  Brud looked at the boy. Mine, too, he thought.

  Ferris Boyd turned to him, as if he’d talked. The blue eyes were surprised, then settled into softness.

  Mine, too, Ferris Boyd told him, without saying a word.

  The bird flew off.

  But those two stayed, sitting in the warmth of the day and all the things they didn’t have to say.

  Chapter 38

  RB Pattison had had enough.

  He’d walked home every day with Cletis. He’d watched Delly stash things away, then haul them to school. He’d seen her be happy without him.

  He’d given her all kinds of chances to come clean. “When’s your project going to be done?” he asked.

  “For the one hundred twenty-second time, RB,” she hollered, “I don’t know.”

  But mostly, he missed her. He wanted her back.

  Monday morning, before they left the house, RB told Delly, “You go ahead. I’ll catch up.” Then he smiled with just his lips, no teeth showing, which was wrong.

  Delly was too busy thinking about the hide-awaysis to notice. She took off.

  He caught her at the corner. He didn’t speak all the way to school.

  At his classroom door she started to say, “RB, you’d better keep walking with C—”

  But he cut her off. “I know. Walk with Cletis. You got your project.”

  That struck Delly as strange, but not enough to stop her. “See ya,” she said.

  “Yes you will.” He smirked.

  At three o’clock RB ran to Delly’s class. He hid beside the garbage can in the hall. He waited till Delly passed him, then fell in silently behind her.

  He followed the copper curls as they bounced to the back door. Outside, he saw her sprint toward that pale, skinny girl. He watched them go on together.

  He could see Delly’s arms waving. He could tell she was having a good time. With somebody else. “You,” he whispered to her so far away, “you got a friend.” He’d never been so lonely.

  Then RB tailed them, across the playground, over the bridge, to the River Road.

  Those two were moving so fast, they didn’t notice the tiny boy tearing after them.

  Delly was telling how Novello had tried to trap her again. “He was dogging me, Ferris Boyd, calling me Little Delly with the Big Smelly. So I asked him, ‘Do you want Ms. Niederbaum to send you to the steps?’

  “‘Ms. Need-a-Brain?’ he says. ‘She’d have to grow one first.’”

  “And there’s Ms. Niederbaum, right behind him.” Delly was laughing so hard she had to quit walking. For one second she was standing in the road.

  The next second she was flying.

  RB’d built up so much speed chasing those two, he couldn’t stop himself. He plowed into her.

  The Pattisons bounced off each other like rubber balls. RB landed on his behind. Delly ate dirt.

  “What the glub?” she muttered. She flipped over to see what had slammed her. “WHAT . . . THE . . . GLUB?” she hollered at him.

  RB was stunned, but not sorry. “What the glub?” he shouted. “What the glub you!”

  They came at each other, yelling so loud their lungs hurt, “You’re supposed to be with Cletis!” and, “You said you had a project!”

  Still, Delly heard it: a scream without a sound. She turned, and there was Ferris Boyd, eyes bugging and ready to bolt.

  “Stop,” Delly told RB.

  He followed her gaze to the scared girl and was quiet.

  Delly only had a moment. “Ferris Boyd,” she said gently, “this is my brother RB.”

  The girl’s eyes were wild, but she stayed.

  “Sometimes we get mad,” Delly explained. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

  Oh yes it does, RB wanted to wail. It means you lied, and left me . . . But he didn’t, because of the girl.

  “We hardly ever fight.” She went on. “I . . .” Delly didn’t want to say it, but she would for her friend. “I love him.”

  Delly put her arm around his shoulders, and now RB’s eyes were bugging. “We’re sorry,” she said.

  Ferris Boyd looked from one Pattison to the other. They had the same skin and smallness. There was a softness between them. She relaxed a little.

  And with Delly’s arm around him, the anger ebbed out of RB.

  Till she said, “RB’s going home now, so we can get to our project.”

  “I am not going home!” he roared.

  Delly glanced at Ferris Boyd; she was getting skittish again. “Bawlgrammit, RB.” She glared at him. “What do you want?”

  “I just want . . . ” He started, but it was too hard to say. Because under all the angry, he just wanted her.

  He turned to Ferris Boyd. “I want to come with you,” he whispered. In his eyes was all the sadness of knowing that even if Delly could be without him, he couldn’t be without her. Ferris Boyd saw it.

  Delly did, too, but she knew two Pattisons would be too much for her friend. So she said, “RB, you can’t. She doesn’t like people being close and . . . ”

  RB couldn’t hear her. He and Ferris Boyd were staring at each other, having one of those silent conversations.

  Then he asked, out loud, “Can I come with you?”

  Ferris Boyd looked deep into him. She nodded once and started walking again.

  “Huh?” Delly about dropped over.

  “She said, ‘All right,’” RB cheered, and went to follow her.

  “Hold it.” Delly grabbed him. “You got to know the rules.” She wasn’t going to let him wreck it.

  “Okay.” He smiled.

  “First, she doesn’t talk.”

  “Hmm,” he said, because Ferris Boyd had already told him something.

  “And no touching.”

  RB looked at Delly as if she were teasing.

  “You can’t touch her. She goes wild.”

  “Okay,” he agreed.

  “And what I say goes.”

  He pursed his lips, like that was too sour to swallow.

  “What I say goes,” she warned.

  “And Ferris Boyd,” he replied.

  “She doesn’t talk,” she reminded him.

  “Yes she does. Just not like you.”

  Delly couldn’t argue with that. “All right then,” she said, and they ran to catch up with the girl.

  Chapter 39

  At the old Hennepin place, Delly sat on the stoop. She pointed to the spot beside her. “Sit here,” she told RB.

  So he did.

  Ferris Boyd got the bowl and her ball, and the cat came running. At the steps, it stopped and sniffed the air around RB.

  “That’s the bawlgram cat.” Delly introduced it.

  “Mowr,” the cat cried.

  RB smiled. “Hello, Mowr. I’m RB.”

  The cat flicked its tail twice and went to the bowl.

  Ferris Boyd was dribbling the ball in the drive.

  “She plays basketball?” RB whispered.

  “
Every day.” Delly groaned.

  They watched for a while.

  “She plays ball like you spit,” RB told her.

  Delly nodded.

  “What do you do while she’s playing?” he asked.

  “Tell stories.”

  “What kind of stories?”

  “Troubletales.”

  He just stared at her, so she started. “Trouble-tale Fifty-six: I parachute off the porch roof and get grounded for a month.”

  Maybe it was because RB was there. Or maybe it was because she wasn’t just trouble anymore, and it was time to talk about something else. Whatever it was, Delly couldn’t go on.

  “I’ll tell a story.” RB jumped in. “RB Story Number One: our dog, Tuba. Remember Delly?”

  “Yep.” She smiled.

  “How’d we get Tuba?” he asked her.

  “She was running in the road, and Dallas brought her home.”

  “And he named her Tuba because she sounded like a big, loud horn.” RB recalled.

  “Oof oof oofoofoof.” Delly demonstrated.

  RB giggled, then he began. “One day, me and Cletis were at the park. Danny Novello and Tater came over to us. ‘Want to try something fun?’ they asked, and we said, ‘Yep.’ So they took some rope, strung it through our belt loops, and threw it over the bar that holds the swings. They pulled on the ropes so we went up in the air.

  “At first me and Cletis were laughing, ’cause it felt like flying. Then they made us go up and down so fast our stomachs got sick. ‘Stop!’ we shouted.

  “But they wouldn’t. Cletis was about to throw up, when we heard, ‘Oof, oof, oofoofoof.’ ‘Tuba!’ I yelled. And there she was, running at us, with Delly behind her.

  “‘Let them go!’ Delly hollered. ‘Make me,’ Novello said. So Delly ducked her head, and rammed him in the stomach with it.

  “They dropped us then. ‘Come on!’ she yelled, and we ran to the river. Delly taught us to skip stones. Tuba kept running in the water, trying to catch them. Remember?”

  “Yep.” Delly did. They were both grinning.

  The Pattisons were so busy being happy they didn’t notice Ferris Boyd waiting. She put her pad in front of them. Tuba? it read.

  “She was old.” RB sighed.

  “She went to sleep on Dallas’s bed,” Delly rasped, “and she didn’t wake up.”

  Now they were all sad. But it didn’t feel so bad, being sad together.

  Ferris Boyd stared into the woods. She passed her pad to them. Another, it read.

  RB understood. “Tubatale Number Two: Tuba gobbles up Gal’s birthday cake.”

  Delly laughed just hearing the title.

  Ferris Boyd went back to playing. She only stopped to ask for more.

  Then RB told, and Delly listened, and she didn’t mind. It was good, thinking about Tuba instead of trouble. It was good being together.

  Chapter 40

  It was time to go to the woods.

  “Where are we going?” RB asked.

  “To the hideawaysis,” Delly answered.

  “Oh,” he said, because he didn’t want to seem too little to know what a hideawaysis was.

  RB was last in line. In the dark of the woods, he got quiet. “Delly.” He gulped. He didn’t say the “I’m afraid” part.

  She heard it anyway. “Come on,” she said, and let him pass her. She grabbed the back of his shirt so he’d know she was there.

  They got to the giant tree and stopped.

  “Now what?” he whispered.

  Delly looked at the cat, and it climbed. Ferris Boyd followed it.

  “Now you,” she told him.

  “Th-That’s high,” he stammered.

  “I’ll be behind you,” she promised.

  So he started up. Ferris Boyd put her head over the edge, showing him where to go.

  “Pull yourself onto the boards,” Delly hollered when he reached the top.

  By the time she got there, he was standing, turning around and around. “Wow,” he breathed.

  Ferris Boyd was in her corner, with her book and the cat.

  “It’s a hideawaysis.” He sighed.

  “Ferris Boyd’s hideawaysis,” Delly told him. She emptied her backpack. She put the sandwiches between them.

  “You got food, too,” he sang.

  Delly closed the eye her friend couldn’t see. “Ma’s trying to get me to grow, but I can’t eat it all. Ferris Boyd’s helping me out.” The eye kept winking. “You and I will split this one.”

  RB couldn’t wink, but he blinked five times while he said, “Okay. I’m full anyway,” and patted his belly like Santa Claus.

  They sat in a circle, eating the sandwiches, with RB humming the whole time.

  When they finished, Delly put on her pack.

  “Where are you going?” he asked.

  “To get rocks.”

  “How come?”

  “So if something tries to get us, we got ammunition,” she explained.

  She was halfway down the tree before she realized he wasn’t with her. She climbed back up.

  He was sitting about two feet from Ferris Boyd, taking books out of his bag.

  “RB, come on,” Delly commanded.

  “No thanks,” he answered, smiling.

  Now, RB Pattison never turned down a chance to tag along with Delly. “How about you come with me?” She tried again, with her teeth clenched.

  “I’m staying with Ferris Boyd,” he replied.

  Delly didn’t like it, him being so close to her. She thought about dragging him down the tree, but that might set the girl off. “Don’t be a bugbotherer,” she warned.

  “I know.” He waved.

  So Delly left. She scoured the woods for stones. She hauled them in her pack, then piled them around the edge of the hideawaysis, like cannonballs.

  And she checked on RB.

  The first trip back, he’d scooched a little closer to Ferris Boyd. But the girl wasn’t fussing, so Delly let it go.

  By the next time, though, there wasn’t six inches between them. RB was squinting over at Ferris Boyd’s book, like he might need to get next to her.

  “Hey,” Delly snarled.

  He looked up.

  No touching, she mouthed at him.

  I know, he mouthed back.

  Delly needed only one more load of rocks— extra-large ones for extra-large invaders. I’ll go fast, she decided, and scrambled down the ladder.

  It took longer than she figured. The rocks were so heavy they were pulling her down as she tried to climb the tree. “Oof,” she groaned as she flopped onto the hideawaysis floor. She looked up, and then she saw it.

  RB Pattison had left his book and was reading Ferris Boyd’s. He had his head on her shoulder and was leaning against her like he lived there.

  “Holy shikes,” she breathed.

  Ferris Boyd wasn’t flipping out, though.

  He must’ve snuck up slow, so she doesn’t know he’s there yet, Delly thought. She had to get him off, quick.

  Delly tried to rise, but the rocks flattened her to the floor. So she slid, like a snake with boulders on its back, across the floor to snag him.

  Just then Ferris Boyd glanced up from her book. She gazed at the boy beside her.

  “It’s over.” Delly gurgled.

  But Ferris Boyd’s eyes didn’t go wild. They rested on RB’s face. He looked up at her and smiled. Then they both went back to the book.

  And Delly didn’t even whisper, “What the glub?” She wouldn’t wreck it.

  Finally, she got the pack off her back. Quietly she piled the rocks while they read. Then she sat across from them, watching the peacefulness.

  Chapter 41

  When the whistle blew, Delly said softly, “RB, we got to go.”

  He crawled to the edge of the hideawaysis. “That’s a long way down.” He gasped.

  “I’ll go first,” she told him.

  One Pattison, then the other climbed on the ladder.

  Ferris Boyd
stayed at the top of it. Delly could feel her telling him things without talking. When they got to the bottom, she was gone.

  That’s when Delly grabbed RB by the shirt and shook him. “Why were you touching Ferris Boyd?” she barked.

  “I wasn’t,” he replied.

  “You were leaning against her.”

  “I know. Touching is this.” He took his finger and poked her with it. “I didn’t do that.”

  “Jiminy fipes,” she growled, but she couldn’t stay mad. He’d gotten Ferris Boyd to let somebody near her.

  “We got to run,” she ordered.

  So they did.

  They were on the bridge when Delly slammed to a stop. “Shikes,” she howled. “Nobody knows where you were!” Clarice would be calling the police. “We’re dead,” she groaned.

  RB pulled up beside her. “No we’re not. I told Ma I’d be with you.” He grinned. “Helping with your project.”

  “When’d you do that?”

  “This morning, after I said, ‘Go ahead.’”

  Delly was impressed with his sneakiness. But now she needed to tell him he couldn’t come again; she couldn’t risk it. “Hey, RB—”

  And RB interrupted her. “Delly,” he declared, “I love you, too.” He shot it, like a giant love bullet, straight into her heart.

  It blew her heart up. It blew the words for keeping him away out of her mouth. “Shikes” was all she could say.

  Then RB was running again. “Come on,” he hollered.

  So she did.

  As soon as Clarice got home, RB told her, “Ma, I’m working on Delly’s project every day now.”

  “Oh yeah? When’s this project going to be done?” She asked Delly, but RB answered.

  “Don’t know. Might be a lo-o-o-o-ong time.”

  “That’s all right with your teacher?” she wondered.

  They both nodded, because Ferris Boyd was teaching them things.

  And Clarice Pattison, hearing Montana wail, “Ma, the washer’s bubbling over!” let it go at that.

  Chapter 42

  Tuesday at three o’clock, RB raced to the back of the school. “Hey,” he greeted the girls, and held the door for them.

  “Jiminy fipes,” Delly mumbled, but she liked it.