by Susan Shreve
“Thanks a lot, Mom,” Joshua said crossly.
“I couldn’t help it, darling. He breaks my heart.”
“Well, he doesn’t break my heart,” Joshua said.
“Besides, it’s only for tonight,” she said.
“Just wait and see,” Joshua predicted. “He’s never going to leave now.” He crawled under the covers and put Egypt over his face to shut out the world.
chapter four
THE RED-HAIRED MIDGET left not long after dinner. His father, a small red-haired man, excessively shy and polite, rolled up in a shiny blue sports car. He thanked Mr. and Mrs. Bates, thanked Joshua, and said how very happy he was that Sean had found a friend—a “best” friend, Sean corrected—so quickly. He also said he hoped the two would spend a lot of time together because of course Sean missed his mother and his old friends in Short Hills, New Jersey. To Joshua, Sean seemed very happy. He seemed not to have noticed for a second that Joshua would have gladly sent him express delivery back to Short Hills.
“Next time I’ll do the dishes,” Sean said.
Next time? Joshua instantly felt his stomach go weak.
Joshua’s father laughed when Sean mentioned the dishes and said, “That won’t be necessary,” and even told Sean he was welcome “anytime.”
“Except school nights,” Joshua added hastily. “And certain weekends, maybe.”
The red-haired midget’s father first shook hands with Mr. Bates and then with Mrs. Bates. Then Sean shook hands with Mr. Bates and Mrs. Bates, who seemed surprised at his formality.
Finally the front door closed and the nightmare named Sean O’Malley was gone. At least, Joshua thought, for now.
“He seems like a fine boy,” his father said on the way to the kitchen. “Very polite.”
Joshua collapsed with relief onto the living room sofa. Amanda was helping Georgianna balance her ice cream cone.
“I don’t think Sean is such a nerd,” Amanda said. “In fact, I think he may even be kind of cute.”
Joshua scowled.
“He seems halfway intelligent, at least.”
“Big deal,” Joshua snapped. “Being smart doesn’t automatically make you popular. Look at you, for example.”
“Very funny, Mr. Maturity. I guess not everyone proves how popular he is by flunking third grade.”
Joshua felt his cheeks burn. “I was promoted, in case you forgot,” Joshua said.
Georgianna began to whimper. A ball of chocolate ice cream lay at her feet.
“Oh, brother,” Joshua said. He jumped up and stormed into the kitchen.
“He’s a total nerd,” he said crossly to no one in particular.
“Who’s a nerd?” Mr. Bates asked. He and Mrs. Bates were at the sink doing the dinner dishes.
“Can I have a soda?” Joshua asked.
“No,” Mr. Bates said. “And who’s a nerd?”
Joshua was too depressed to lie. “Sean O’Malley.”
“What do you mean by a nerd?”
Joshua sat down sulkily at the kitchen table. “Someone who doesn’t fit in. Who’s not exactly regular.”
“No one is regular, Josh,” Mrs. Bates said. “Everybody has trouble fitting in at some time. You of all people should know that.”
“You know what I mean,” Joshua said. “I’m sure there were nerds when you were my age.”
“I suppose I was one,” Mr. Bates said. “Most of the good students were thought to be nerds when I was your age.”
“Well, I don’t want to be a nerd, which is lucky, because I’m a terrible student,” Joshua said. “And Sean O’Malley is a nerd.”
“That doesn’t give you the okay to be rude to him, Joshua,” Mrs. Bates said.
“You were unkind to him, Josh,” Mr. Bates said. “I was very surprised.”
“He didn’t notice.”
“He noticed.” Mr. Bates had a certain fierceness about him that made his children wary. “He was simply too polite to say so.”
“I think,” his mother said, “you might even owe Sean an apology.”
“For what?”
“For being rude and inconsiderate,” his father said.
“I didn’t even want him over,” Joshua complained. His voice was tense with anger and frustration. “I said I was sick, and anyway it was Amanda who answered the phone and asked him over. Why not make her apologize?”
“Because he’s your friend, Joshua.”
Sometimes it felt to Joshua as if his father never heard anything he said.
“He’s not my friend! He’s trying to take over my life!”
Mrs. Bates sat down at the table next to Joshua.
“Listen, darling. We’re not saying you have to be friends with everyone,” she said to him.
“Well, then I don’t want to be friends with Sean O’Malley.” Joshua folded his arms across his chest.
“But,” his mother said, “he deserves to be treated with respect. Even if you do think he’s a nerd.”
Joshua was too exhausted to argue. The fact was, his mother was wrong. It did matter if you were a nerd or not. Tommy Wilhelm and the NOs were proof of that.
“It’s just not fair,” Joshua said.
“Maybe not,” Mr. Bates said, “but that’s the way it is.”
IT WAS ONLY seven o’clock, but Joshua decided to put on his pajamas, brush his teeth, and climb into bed instead of watching TV. He lay on the top bunk in the dark, staring at the ceiling, thinking about nothing except how unfair it all was. Maybe his father was right, Joshua thought. Maybe that’s just the way it is. Maybe there would always be guys like Tommy Wilhelm and Billy Nickel and the NOs in life, and Joshua would just have to get used to it. He’d be a forty-year-old man walking down the street minding his own business when a forty-year-old Tommy Wilhelm would step in front of him. Joshua rolled onto his side and wondered what else could possibly go wrong. And then he remembered. He was failing math.
After a while his mother came in and said Andrew Porter was on the phone. Andrew and Joshua talked on the phone almost every night, and had for as long as Joshua could remember. But tonight Joshua didn’t feel like talking to Andrew.
“Tell him I’m sick.”
“Okay, Joshua, if that’s what you want.”
“That’s what I want.”
His mother left, and Joshua lay for a long time thinking. It felt as if the whole world were pressing in on him.
There was a light knock on his door. His mother came in and said if he was willing, she would like to talk to him.
“Nope,” he said. “I’m not.”
“I wonder if you’d explain to me why you are so worried about nerds, Joshua,” his mother said. “You never worried about things like this when you were little.”
“Of course I didn’t,” Joshua said. “I was too young to know the difference. But now I know the difference, and so does everyone else in the fifth grade.”
“You’re young and healthy and smart and a good athlete. You should be having a wonderful time in fifth grade, darling.”
“Well, I’m not having a wonderful time, and you’re the only one who thinks I’m smart.”
Amanda came into Joshua’s room and flicked on the light. Her hair was frizzed, and she wore her cheerleading uniform.
“Amanda!” Joshua said. He pulled Egypt over his eyes.
“Sorrrrry,” she said. “Anyway, you have a phone call from Tommy Wilhelm.”
Joshua sat up. Tommy Wilhelm had never called before. In spite of himself, Joshua felt flattered. But he was also suspicious.
“He says,” Amanda repeated in her best imitation Tommy Wilhelm voice, “that it’s very important.”
Joshua hesitated. What if Tommy had somehow found out that Sean had come to dinner at the Bateses’ house? But how would he have found out? Then why would he be calling?
Joshua felt dizzy.
“Well?” Amanda said.
“Tell him I’m sick.”
“How original.” Amanda smirked. “T
ell him yourself. I’m not your secretary.”
“Amanda,” Mrs. Bates said.
“Oh, all right,” Amanda said, and left.
“I didn’t know you and Tommy Wilhelm were friends,” his mother said.
“We’re not.”
“Then why is he calling, Joshua?” she asked.
Joshua shrugged.
“Is he still as unpleasant as he used to be?” Mrs. Bates asked.
“Worse,” Joshua admitted. “He gets more awful every day.”
Amanda came back into the room.
“He says the important thing is about a club. A secret club,” she said dramatically. “He’s sure you’ll be able to get up out of your sickbed to hear about a secret club.”
Mrs. Bates frowned.
“What’s this about a secret club?” she asked Joshua.
Joshua felt defensive.
“Who knows?” he said. “Everything Tommy does is secret. He’s practically a professional criminal.”
Mrs. Bates told Amanda to tell Tommy Wilhelm that Joshua was doing homework and could not come to the phone.
“I don’t like secret clubs,” Mrs. Bates told Joshua. “And I certainly hope you would never join one.”
“Never,” Joshua promised.
“I’ve never liked Tommy Wilhelm.” Mrs. Bates seemed relieved.
She kissed Joshua on the forehead.
“Sleep well, darling,” she said. “Maybe by tomorrow morning things will seem much better. You’ll walk to school with Andrew and you probably won’t even remember why you were so upset tonight.”
On her way out she flicked off the bedroom light and started to shut the door.
“Don’t,” Joshua said.
“I thought the hall light kept you awake.”
“I don’t plan to go to sleep,” Joshua said. He turned over on his side. “I wish I didn’t care whether or not I was popular. Like Andrew. He doesn’t care.”
“Andrew is a different person,” his mother said. “Books matter more to him than people.”
“I matter to him.”
“Of course you do. I mean people in general don’t matter as much to Andrew as they do to you. You need to feel as if you have a lot of friends. Andrew is perfectly happy just to have you.”
“He’s even kind of a nerd,” Joshua said. “Not as bad as Sean and some of the real nerds who wear their pants up to their chests and their hair slicked down. But since it doesn’t matter to Andrew whether or not he’s popular, no one notices that he’s a nerd.”
“Maybe you could try and be a bit more like Andrew,” she suggested.
“Maybe,” Joshua said sadly. The fact was, to Joshua T. Bates fitting in mattered a great deal.
Joshua had trouble falling asleep. Even after Amanda finished trying on every single outfit in her closet and turned off the hall light so she could talk in the dark and in secret to her eighth-grade boyfriend, Joshua tossed and turned. All he could think about was Tommy Wilhelm’s telephone call.
Tommy had either called to ask him to join the NOs, which was very unlikely, or else he, Joshua T. Bates, was about to be the new victim of Nerds Out. Either way, his life at Mirch Elementary was going to change.
Joshua woke up early, even before the sun had lightened the morning to day. He was full of trepidation, an unfamiliar sense of doom, not the sad humiliation he had felt in the third grade but a feeling altogether different and disturbing. He wanted to call Andrew, but it was only six o’clock. He got up, made his bed, which he simply never did unless he was asked, took a shower, which he also never did unless he was asked, went downstairs, walked his dog, Plutarch, around the block, fed him and Marmalade the cat, poured a bowl of Special K and a glass of orange juice, and by the time his father’s alarm clock rang was ready to go to school.
“Joshua,” his mother said groggily when she came downstairs in her blue robe, “what are you doing up so early?”
“I don’t know,” Joshua said. “Nothing, I guess.”
His mother got apple juice from the refrigerator and made coffee.
“I fed Marmalade and Plutarch and walked him.”
“And you’ve eaten?”
“Yup.”
“You’ve had orange juice?”
“Yup.”
Mrs. Bates sat down beside Joshua and took his wrist in her hand. “I’m sorry about last night, Joshua.”
Joshua shrugged. “No problem.”
“Are you feeling better?”
“Yeah, sure. I guess.”
“That’s good. And Joshua?” She folded her other hand over his and patted it. “Try to be nice to Sean O’Malley today. Okay?”
“Sure, Mom.” Joshua forced himself to sound convincing, but even to him his words sounded lopsided.
Mrs. Bates got up to pour some coffee.
Since he’d left his new jacket at school, Joshua put on his old ski jacket with sleeves that came halfway down his arms, slipped his arms through the straps of his book bag, and put three Kudos in his pocket for a snack.
“I’ve been thinking that maybe I could change schools,” he said matter-of-factly. “Joey Taggart did. He changed to Horace Mann because the art is better.”
Mrs. Bates sipped her coffee.
“Horace Mann isn’t in our district, darling.”
“Joey didn’t move. He still lives on Woodley Road. His parents just decided to send him to Mann because of the art.”
“And you want to go because of the art?”
“Right.”
“I didn’t know you had such an interest in art, Joshua, but we’ll look into it. Maybe you could take art lessons at the community center.”
“Maybe,” he said, and started out the door. “Also, I hate Miss Lacey.”
“I know you do, darling, but there will always be teachers you don’t like, no matter what.”
Not if I never go back to school, Joshua thought. Not if I moved to Africa.
“I just feel pressure,” Joshua said. “I can’t explain it.” He kissed his mother good-bye.
It was beginning to snow, a light thin snow, almost invisible, damp on his cheeks as Joshua walked quickly down Lowell to Thirty-fourth and turned left at Veazy Street.
chapter five
ANDREW LIVED a very quiet and orderly life with his father, who was a doctor, and his mother, who was also a doctor, no other children, no dogs, no cats, no birds, and one fish called Fish, which was the only pet Andrew’s mother permitted in the house because she disliked confusion. Which is why Andrew loved the friendly disorder of the Bateses’ lively house.
Joshua Bates turned the corner of Thirty-fourth Street to Veazy. Joshua sat down on the curb and waited for Andrew. After a while, Andrew strolled up as usual, wearing his snow jacket and wool cap and mittens, which he never misplaced, his waterproof book bag full of completed homework neatly done and on time, his Wellington boots, and his flute case. Andrew Porter was practically the only boy in fifth grade who could get away with taking flute lessons without being ridiculed. Once Billy Nickel tried to tease Andrew by asking, “Wouldn’t you rather take ballet than flute?”
“I like the flute,” Andrew had said coolly. “I’ve never tried ballet.” And Billy never brought up the subject again.
Even so, Andrew wasn’t perfect. Even he worried about Tommy Wilhelm and Billy Nickel because, as he had said to Joshua many times, they were mean and would do anything to anyone. But Andrew didn’t let them know it.
“You’ll never guess who called me last night,” Joshua said, falling into step with Andrew.
“Madonna,” Andrew said.
“I wish. Guess again.”
“Wilhelm.”
Joshua stopped dead in his tracks. “Right. Absolutely right. How did you guess?”
“He’s going to do something to the new boy,” Andrew said. “It’s too much of an opportunity.”
“Or to me.”
“Why you?”
“He’s wanted to do something to me for a long t
ime and now I’m the new baby-sitter for Sean O’Malley. He’s up for trouble.”
“Maybe he wants to ask you to join the NOs.”
“You bet.”
TOMMY WILHELM was already at Mirch, calmly sitting on the roof of the equipment shed with Billy Nickel and W.V. Wood, when Joshua and Andrew arrived.
“So look who’s here,” Joshua whispered to Andrew as they passed by at a distance.
“With W.V.,” Andrew said. “Do you think W.V.’s a member of the NOs?”
“Well, he’s a total jerk. So probably.”
W.V. was a small, skinny spider monkey of a boy who wore his brother’s too-large hand-me-down clothes. He fought with just about everybody except Tommy, and in spite of his size nobody picked on him, even the older boys. In first grade he had picked a fight on the playground with Andrew—had thrown him down on his back behind the shed and spit in his face.
“You should tell,” Joshua had said that afternoon as they walked home together.
“No way,” Andrew said. “And don’t you ever tell either.”
Since that time Andrew did not speak to W.V., and if they happened to be at the same lunch table or in the same homeroom or science class, Andrew moved to a chair as far away as possible.
“Josh,” W.V. shouted from the top of the shed. “Come on over.”
“Later,” Joshua said.
“I’ve got something to tell you,” Tommy Wilhelm said.
“Tell me in class,” Joshua said. He turned to Andrew. “Let’s beat it.”
“Fine with me,” Andrew said.
They walked up the back steps into Mirch Elementary, past the principal’s office, the nurse’s office, and the teachers’ lounge to their lockers, side by side, and near Johnny Hayes, called Jell-O because he was big and fleshy with a belly that hung over his belt. Jell-O was famous at Mirch for his obnoxious behavior and his loud voice, but he was a very good student, so the teachers liked him even if the students didn’t. Or at least most of the students didn’t like him, but it was well known that he was a friend of Tommy Wilhelm’s.
When Andrew and Joshua walked down the corridor, Jell-O Hayes was on his knees, his head in his locker and his very large rear end in the corridor.
Joshua opened his locker, stuffed his jacket and snow hat into the bottom, got his language arts book from the shelf, took the cookies out of his lunch, and put the lunchbox on top of his clothes.
