“That’s different. I’m a boy. I’m supposed to do the defending.”
Quinn stepped back, looking even more lost. “Since when does that matter? I thought friends stuck up for each other, no matter what.”
“We’re not babies anymore, Quinn,” Nate said, more gently. Whatever angst he had been dealing with was passing, and he looked more himself. “I can take care of myself.” He hesitated and then added, “Besides, if it had been Leo in the middle of those boys, would you have run to save him?”
Quinn flushed pink. I stared down at my feet, kicking at the line of white paint on the bumpy asphalt. This was a total Nate thing. Whatever crossed his mind was pretty much what he said. Quinn and I were used to it, but lately, it was making both of us more uncomfortable. Sometimes we didn’t know how to answer him.
Now Quinn’s mouth twisted as she tried to say the right thing. “Of course I would. You’re both my friends, and I wouldn’t let anyone hurt you if I could help it.”
“Maybe,” Nate said bleakly. “But Leo wouldn’t need your help. That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it?”
The bell rang at that moment, and we all automatically turned toward the school building. Nate began moving in his normal jerky gait. Quinn didn’t follow him right away. I couldn’t read the expression on her face, but I could tell that she wasn’t happy.
“C’mon, Mia,” I said finally, using the special nickname I’d had for her as long as I could remember. “We don’t want be the last ones in. Do you know where to line up?”
She shrugged and started walking. Nate was far enough ahead of us that I didn’t think he could hear our conversation.
“Do you think he’s right?” Quinn asked me. “Was I wrong? Should I have let them beat him up?”
“No. I don’t know. I don’t think they were going to beat him up. They were just, you know, trying to be cool or whatever. They were mostly teasing.”
“What if ithadbeen you?” she persisted. “What would you have done?”
This was a harder question. No one had ever bullied me in school. I slid a sideways glance at Quinn, wondering how much she really wanted to know.
“I guess I would have just talked to them. Tried to get them to cool it. They’d probably stop if someone stood up to them.”
Other kids were forming lines that snaked out along the brick walls. Quinn and I caught up with Nate, and we paused, trying to figure out which line we were supposed join.
“Fifth graders on the far left!” A pretty young teacher was standing on the concrete steps, calling out instructions to the milling crowd. The three of us walked to the left, keeping our steps slower to match Nate’s.
For the first time, we were all three in different classes. At Marian Johnson, there were only two classes per grade, so every year at least two of us were together. We separated into our assigned lines. Nate never looked back at us. He stood in the back of his line, his eyes fixed on the hair of the girl who stood in front of him. Quinn looked from him to me and back again. She was still worried.
I caught her eye and shrugged. There wasn’t any mid-morning recess at Herbert Andrews Elementary, so we’d have to wait for lunch to see each other again. Quinn’s class was the first to go into the building, followed by Nate’s line. I watched them leave me behind.
