At the end of PE, I’m so deep into thinking about what I can draw, running through different story ideas and thinking about what scenes I could draw, that I don’t bother changing out of my stinky gym shirt. I just grab my backpack and coat and head for the bus.
I’m still lost in my own head, thinking about what story to tell and how to tell it, when Luke sits down next to me. “What happened to you at the end of PE? You disappeared.”
“Sorry,” I say. “I have a lot on my mind.”
Luke pulls out his phone and starts playing Candy Crush, and I go back to staring out the window and thinking about what I can draw.
When the bus is coming to my stop, Luke says, “Want to come over later?”
“Can’t,” I say, standing up and grabbing my backpack. “I’ve got a ton of homework.”
Luke looks at me funny, and I remember that he has all the same classes as me, and knows exactly how much homework we have, which is practically zip.
“For Hebrew school,” I say, even though no one ever has homework for Hebrew school.
In the kitchen, Allie’s sitting at the table, eating a Rice Krispies treat.
I cut myself a couple of squares, pour myself a glass of orange juice, and carry my snack to the table.
When I take out the drawing stuff, Allie says, “I’ll write the story, if you want.”
“No thanks,” I say.
Her chin gets all quivery, which means that any second she’s going to start crying, so I say, “I have to do the whole thing myself. It’s an English assignment. If you do the story, that would be cheating.” I personally believe getting a little help with homework never hurt anyone, especially when it comes to English assignments, but Allie thinks it’s practically the same as murdering your parents with an ax.
“Oh,” she says. “Never mind.”
The story I want to tell happened at a baseball game two years ago, when Sammie scored a run because of me. On her at-bat, she whacked the ball way into the outfield, over the heads of everyone out there, and made it all the way to third base. Then the next kid up, Jason Diaz, struck out. A kid named Trey went next and hit the ball into the infield, right between the second baseman and the shortstop. There was a little bit of bumbling with the ball, so Trey got on first base, but Sammie was still stuck at third. Then another kid got up to bat, and struck out. So it was two outs, with Sammie on third, and I was up.
Basically, I hate being at bat. I hate standing there, waiting for the ball to come flying toward me because most of the time, I’m 100 percent convinced that it’s going to hit me. I’m thinking, What kind of idiot would stand here and wait to get hit by a small, round rock? Which makes it hard to focus on trying to hit the ball. I mean, it would be nice to hit the ball, but it feels more urgent to avoid being hit by the ball.
Anyway, Sammie was on third, and she needed a hit by me to score a run, so I managed to almost stay in the box. The pitch was thrown and I stayed in and stayed in and stayed in and . . . backed out. But as I started to back out, swinging the bat, I came down hard on my front foot, which propelled the bat right into the ball, and I got an awesome hit! It went over the head of the second baseman, plunked down on the grass, and rolled out into the outfield, far away from anyone out there. I made it to first, and Sammie got home, and when the opposing second baseman bobbled the catch, Trey ran to third and I got onto second.
I didn’t honestly care about making it to second, and when the next batter up hit a high pop that was caught by one of the outfielders, the inning was over without me scoring, but I didn’t care about that. What mattered was Sammie. I got her the run.
I don’t want anyone except Sammie to know what this story is about. I want it to be like a secret message that only Sammie will be able to decode. My hero, Melvin Marbury, has animals who act like people in his comic strip, so I decide I’ll make the people in my story into animals. I draw Sammie as a cat, and I make myself a dog. The other guys, I make all dogs too. It takes me six pages to tell the story, and I have a little trouble making enough different-looking dogs for all the other players, but in the end it’s a great story. A great Valentine’s Day gift for Sammie, to remind her of our friendship, of who we were, together, before. I staple the pages together like a book, but I don’t write anything. I fold the whole thing in thirds, get an envelope from Mom’s desk, and slide it in, then write Sammie on the front.
Friday, February 13
DAVID
I spend another lunch period in the bathroom, eating peanut butter crackers instead of spaghetti and meatballs, so I can get to math class early, right after Sammie. I mostly don’t mind the bathroom or the crackers because I’m pretty sure those meatballs are made from horse meat.
When the first bell rings, I’m out in the hall, holding my math binder with the valentine envelope slipped underneath so no one can see it. I watch Mrs. Knell’s door, and Sammie doesn’t even notice me as she walks into the class—first, as usual, with her apparently new best friend, Haley. Two beats later, Sean Cibelli appears. I count slowly to five, and then follow. In the room, Sammie’s backpack is on the floor between her and Sean’s desks. She’s bent over it, getting her math binder, so I stand awkwardly at the front.
“Are we going to have homework tonight?” I ask Mrs. Knell, watching Sammie out of the corner of my eye.
We always have homework in math, unless we’re having a test the next day, and then we still have homework, but it’s not checked because our homework is to redo the test review problems that we got wrong. Which Sammie always does, and I never do.
But Mrs. Knell smiles and says, “Of course.”
Sammie’s still bent over her backpack, so I follow up with, “Is it a lot or a little? I mean, how many problems?”
Mrs. Knell stops writing the Do Now and tips her head a bit. “Exactly the right number of problems, David.”
Sammie finally straightens up, sets her binder on her desk, and turns to talk to Haley, facing away from her backpack.
“Thanks,” I say, starting down between the rows of desks, then stopping between Sean’s and Sammie’s.
Sean is bent over his desk, drawing something.
“Did you do the homework?”
Sean looks up at me, puzzled. “Are you asking me?”
“Yeah,” I say, keeping my back to Sammie, with her backpack at my feet.
Sean motions with his chin to the paper on his desk. It’s the math homework, but in the margins are some tiny drawings. I lean over to get a better look. They’re all birds, done in pencil. One is sitting like it’s perched on a branch. Another is drawn in flight, its wings wide.
“Super cool,” I say. “That’s so good.”
“My math homework?” Sean asks, puzzled.
“The drawings,” I say. Then I remember why I’m standing here and ask him, “What’d you get for the first problem?”
Sean looks down at his paper, and I drop my envelope straight into Sammie’s backpack.
“Two seventy-three,” Sean says.
“Me too,” I say. Then I make my way to my seat while Sean stares at his math paper. As I sit down, Haley turns and looks right at me. I ignore her.
SAMMIE
David is standing next to my desk, with his back to me, talking to Sean Cibelli. I keep myself turned toward Haley, leaning a little bit to the side, away from David. I tell her about the latest episode of The Great British Baking Show, which the Peas watch religiously. When David finally moves away, I exhale and sit back in my seat. And see the envelope, faceup, resting on top of the binders in my backpack like it floated there on some gentle breeze. I recognize the handwriting: David’s. Which is smaller and neater than you’d expect from a guy. I bend over and push the envelope down in between two binders.
Haley catches my eye. “A valentine?” she mouths. I pretend I don’t understand, then turn my focus to the board and the Do Now.
At the end of math, when I put my binder away, I shove the envelope down to the bottom of my bag
so no one can see it. I leave it where it is, buried in my backpack. I don’t even take it out in the library after school.
DAVID
As we’re walking to the bus after school, Luke says, “Want to hang out?”
I’m sleeping over at Kai’s tonight. Luke isn’t invited, because Kai’s mom will only let him have three friends over and he picked me, Andrew, and Spencer. But I fudge a little. “Can’t. I’m working at the store.”
“Tonight? How late is it open?”
“Uhh, tomorrow morning I mean,” I fumble. “Early. Pop said something about taking inventory.”
“What about Sunday?” Luke asks. “Or Monday, since we have off. I could ask my dad to take us to the diner.”
He doesn’t ask about hanging out tomorrow afternoon, or having a sleepover tomorrow night, probably because he already has romantic Valentine’s Day plans with Sammie. There’s no way I can go to the diner on Sunday, or Monday, and listen to Luke brag about his date with Sammie, so I say, “Big Presidents’ Day sale weekend. It’s going to be crazy. Everybody loves a sale.” I sound almost like Pop, which kind of freaks me out.
“Okay,” Luke says, sounding super dejected. “What about the other guys? Maybe they want to hang out?”
“Maybe,” I say. And then, to test him, I add, “Or maybe Sammie.”
Luke nods slowly like he’s thinking hard about it. “Good idea,” he says, like he hadn’t thought of it. “I will. I’ll ask Sammie to hang out.”
“Great,” I say, kicking myself.
SAMMIE
At home, in my room, alone, I take David’s envelope out of my backpack and open it up. Inside there are several pieces of paper, neatly folded. I unfold them. They’re stapled together like a book. Like one of the kitten books that David and Allie make, except this one is just David’s drawings. No words.
And the characters aren’t kittens. They’re all animals, though. Mostly dogs and one cat. They look a lot like the animals in one of Melvin Marbury’s Northern Province comic books, which no one our age except David, and me, has ever heard of. I flip through the pages. It’s a story about a baseball game. The cat gets a hit and gets on base, but then two dog teammates strike out, and it looks like the cat’s never going to get past first base. Then this kind of basset-houndy-looking dog gets up to bat.
Which is when I realize that this story is not about cats and dogs. It’s about David and me. I flip to the last page, which shows the cat sliding into home.
I flip back through the pages, but there’s no note. No explanation. No apology.
I remember that game. We won. In the car afterward, David kept congratulating me on the run. Mr. Fischer was proud and happy and laughing, retelling David’s hit, and how it turned the game around. The whole team met for fro-yo at Milly’s Vanilli Yogurt Bar and everyone was replaying the play and high-fiving David and me.
The thing is, David should have been proud of that hit. It was a good hit, and he doesn’t get many hits at all, to be honest. But reading his book, I realize that his hit meant something else to him: it was a gift. For me. A gift I never knew had been given.
I never thought about what David might be feeling or dreaming or hoping. He was my friend. My best friend, when I needed one. But maybe David wanted something else.
Monday, February 16
SAMMIE
Luke texted me on Saturday, asking if I wanted to catch a movie. A dark theater with him? I texted back No.
Then he texted me again on Sunday morning. Same question. I texted back No, then turned my phone off.
Ten minutes after I turned my phone back on this morning, it buzzed. This time it was David: The fort?
I turn my phone back off.
DAVID
I spend the whole weekend waiting for a text from Sammie, some sign that she got my valentine book. I know I dropped the envelope right into her backpack, and I think I saw her lean over and look at it. I keep replaying that moment in my head, and sometimes I’m sure she saw it, and sometimes I’m sure she didn’t. On Sunday afternoon, I pull my phone out and start to text her, but then I remember Luke and I don’t send the text because maybe she’s with him. So instead of hanging out with Sammie, I spend Sunday afternoon drawing another Sammie story.
On Monday morning, I text her The fort? But she never responds.
An hour later, Luke texts me, Heading to the diner. Want to come? I do, because I want to find out whether he hung out with Sammie and if he kissed her on the lips, but I’m too bummed about everything, so I pretend like I don’t even see the text. I figure I’ll see him on the bus in the morning.
Tuesday, February 17
SAMMIE
After all the texts from Luke and David, I wake up with a stomachache and raging headache. Dad takes my temperature, which is normal, gives me Tylenol, kisses me on the forehead, and says, “You’re fine.”
As I walk out the door, he high-fives me. “Have a super day!” I try not to puke on the sidewalk.
Shake it off, I tell myself as I stand at the bus stop. But when I hear the sound of the bus engine, a block away, I know I can’t do it. I turn and run down the Anands’ driveway and crouch behind their garage until the bus pulls away from my stop. Then I head for the Greenway. It runs between my house and David’s, of course, but if I keep going past David’s, I can take it all the way to Quaker Ridge Road. And from there, I figure it’s only a half hour walk to school. I’ll probably be late, but at least I won’t be on the bus with David and Luke.
There’s still snow on the ground, but I follow the path I made through my backyard the last time I went to the fort. And the Greenway is plowed, so it only takes me about thirty minutes to make it to Quaker Ridge Road. Where there are no sidewalks. I have to walk on the side of the road. Car after car passes, splashing me with slushy brown yuck until my jeans are soaked and I actually think about turning around and going home.
I’m starting to feel very sorry for myself when a white Honda Civic pulls over in front of me. The passenger side window opens, and Haley leans out.
“Want a ride?”
“Yes, please,” I say.
I climb into the back seat.
The woman driving must be Haley’s mom, but she’s nothing like Haley. She turns her head and smiles at me. She reminds me of my mother, not in looks but in style: full makeup, big movie-star sunglasses, gold bangles on both arms, and long, dark red nails.
“Lousy day to have to walk,” she says. “Good thing Haley and I were running so late. I’m Dana.” She puts her blinker on and slowly pulls out into traffic, bangles clinking as she turns the steering wheel.
“Thanks for picking me up, Mrs. Wilcox.”
“Please, call me Dana. Or Ms. Wilcox. I never married.”
“Do you live near here?” Haley asks.
“Not exactly,” I say. “I missed my bus, and my parents had already left for work, so I had to walk. I came along the Greenway.”
“Oh, man,” Haley says. “Missing the bus must stink.”
I think to myself that it was better than making the bus, but I say, “It wasn’t so bad, until I got to Quaker Ridge. Every car that drove by splashed me. My jeans are soaked.”
“Do you have anything you can change into in your locker?” Ms. Wilcox asks.
Some girls have a whole wardrobe in their lockers: extra pairs of pants, just in case a blot of ink or splash of tomato sauce should render the ones they’re wearing unfit to be seen in public; cute shorts in case the temperature should suddenly zoom up by forty degrees; spare T-shirts and sweaters for when the super-low-cut tops they’re wearing don’t meet dress code. I’m not one of those girls.
“I think I have a pair of sweats,” I say. “I usually wear shorts in gym, but I think I brought sweats in at some point. They’re probably a little stinky, though.”
“I have a clean pair in my backpack,” Haley says. “I was going to wear them after school, for softball practice, but you could borrow them. I’ll wear the stinky pair I h
ave in my locker. Only Coach Wright will have to smell me.”
“Really?” I say, because I don’t know Haley that well, and I’m not sure I’d do the same if the situation were reversed.
“Sure. You can give them back to me tomorrow.”
“Thanks,” I say. “Okay.”
“How do you girls know each other?” Ms. Wilcox asks.
“We’re in a couple classes together,” Haley says. “And Sammie’s a jock too. She plays baseball.”
“On the boys’ team?” Ms. Wilcox asks.
“Yep,” I say. “Since I was five. Little League.”
“Haley did Little League first too,” Ms. Wilcox says. “Until girls’ softball opened up in second grade. You didn’t want to switch over?”
“I never thought about it,” I say.
“This year, playing for the school team—it’s a whole new world,” Ms. Wilcox says. “That’s why we moved up here from the Bronx. Coach Wright has a great reputation.”
“You moved just for softball?”
“Yep,” Haley says.
“I teach down in the Bronx, so living up here makes my commute a bit longer,” Ms. Wilcox says. “But I wanted Haley to play for the best team possible. To give her a shot at a college scholarship.” She glances over at Haley, sitting next to her. “Right, sweetie?”
Haley smiles back at her mother. “Right.”
I’m surprised at how seriously Haley and her mom talk about softball. And surprised, also, that the New Roque softball team is “the best.” Until the batting cages, I didn’t even know there was a softball team. But I don’t say anything. I don’t want to be called stuck-up again.
DAVID
Luke’s not on the bus Tuesday morning, and neither is Sammie.
Then Luke’s not in Spanish class. He finally shows up, halfway through the period, with a late-to-school pass.
I lean over toward him and whisper, “Everything okay?”
“I missed the bus,” he says, looking down at his desk. “I overslept, and then we had to wait like an hour until Lily woke up before my mom could drive me. I just got here. How was the sleepover?”
That's What Friends Do Page 10
