When Nate, Leo and I say we’ve been friends since before we were born, it’s true. Everyone thinks we’re exaggerating or being funny, but we’re not. See, our moms all went to the same birth class, where people go to learn what it’s like to have a baby. For my mom and Nate’s, it was their first time having a baby, so they really needed the class. But Leo’s mom already had two boys, so she always said she was just there for a refresher course. I guess she had forgotten how to do it, which sounds weird, but why else would she go back to a class?
Anyway, it sounds like a movie, but our moms got talking and sort of became friends. They went out for coffee or whatever pregnant women drink (because I think they’re not supposed to drink coffee), and they were going to do it again, like every week, but then Nate’s mom ended up having him early. Not just a few weeks early either; my mom told me once that at first they weren’t sure Nate was going to live. He was in NICU, which is a really scary place for babies, my mom said, for like two months. So all during that time, while my mom and Leo’s were waiting for us to finally be born, they helped out Nate’s parents. My mom used to make food for his family and drive his mom to the hospital to sit with Nate.
That’s why Nate is different from Leo and me. Something happened when he was born that early, and it left him with a lot of health problems. I can actually remember when Nate started walking. His legs were weak, something to do with the muscles, and we were four by the time he could really move around by himself without this walker he used to have. He was always smaller than us, too, even though he’s the oldest.
I didn’t realize how different Nate was until we started pre-K. Nate had been in special schools when we were younger, but by the time we were four, he was able to come to school with us. I was glad we were all going to be together, and I was really happy that Leo and I were finally going to school. I had been a little jealous of Nate up to then, because he would talk about people he knew and stuff he did at school. It sounded like a fun place, even though Nate didn’t always want to go.
In pre-K, though, it was easy to see that Nate wasn’t like the rest of the kids. It wasn’t just his special way of walking, which in those days was a lot worse than it is now. He would almost throw himself from one leg to the other. Leo and I were used to it, and we always walked on either side of him, at just the same speed he did. The other kids in pre-K definitely noticed that. They also saw that Nate was smaller than the rest of us. But what really made him stand out was his way of talking.
I guess it wasn’t really how he talked so much as what he said. Leo’s mom said once that Nate didn’t have a filter. For a while I thought that meant there was something else that was wrong with him from when he was born, but then my mother explained that it meant that Nate just said whatever he thought.
“I thought that was telling the truth,” I said.
My mother sighed and thought for a minute. “Quinn, if I asked you how I looked in my new dress, what would you say?”
This was easy. “I would say you looked pretty.”
“Okay, thanks, but what if I didn’t? What if it made me look fat or something?” At the look on my face, my mother laughed. “That’s what I mean. See, you’re trying to think about how you can tell the truth and not hurt my feelings, right?”
I nodded.
“All right then. Nate doesn’t understand that. He doesn’t mean to hurt anyone’s feelings, but he just says whatever he thinks or feels, without considering how it might make other people feel.”
And in pre-K, there were probably lots of kids who didn’t worry too much about how other people felt, but it was really bad with Nate. He would tell the teacher about every mistake she made. He told the other children they couldn’t read well or counted wrong or didn’t know how to tie their shoes. It was never mean-spirited; it was just matter-of-fact Nate.
As we went through school, Leo and I tried to gently tell Nate that he couldn’t share every thought that came into his mind the minute he thought it. He never understood, although I think he learned to tone it down a little. Sometimes Leo or I would give him a look, and he would realize he was going too far.
By the end of pre-K, though, everyone knew and accepted Nate. No one ever picked on him or called him names. That lasted through fourth grade, until we changed schools and moved over to Herbert Andrews Elementary. On the first day, as I walked onto the playground, I saw Nate in the middle of a bunch of bigger kids, and it didn’t look like they were planning a game of tag. Nate was doing his swaying thing, which he only did when he was really nervous. No one else really noticed it, but I knew what it meant.
Right before I took off to help him, I saw Leo. He was standing between me and Nate, and I knew he saw what was happening. But before I could really wonder why he wasn’t doing anything, I saw one of the boys shove Nate. He almost went down. And if he went down, I knew it wouldn’t be good.
So I sprinted across the playground. At Marian Johnson, the ground surrounding the school building was a dusty field. But at HA, the whole thing was asphalt, painted here and there with maps and other pictures I guessed people thought were educational. All I knew was that I wanted to get to Nate before those kids knocked him onto that hard concrete. And I made it. I didn’t plan how I was going to stop them. They were all much bigger than me, and I never was any good at that kind of fighting anyway. Leo always said I used my words better than he used his fists. I wasn’t sure my words were going to make much difference here, but I guessed they did something, because the boys backed down.
After they were gone, I expected ... well, I don’t know what I expected. I guess maybe I thought Nate might say thanks. And maybe Leo would think I had done a good thing. But they both acted like I was the one who’d almost beat up our best friend. And I thought Nate was actually mad at me.
Things didn’t get any better for Nate the rest of the year. We were dealing with more than just the kids who had always been in our class; now we were at the bottom of the school ladder. Fifth graders overall were easy pickings for the older kids, and Nate was an especially attractive target.
But what really made things hard was what happened with Leo. As the year went on, it seemed like Leo was moving farther away from Nate and me. He didn’t always hang out with us on the playground in the mornings. He ate lunch with us, but then afterward he would sometimes go off with other boys and run around, play whatever game they put together. Nate and I sat on the bottom rungs of the monkey bars or on swings if we could get to them before they were all taken. We talked about school and about our families.
It was cool, and mostly I didn’t mind hanging out with Nate. He listened to me, and he didn’t think what I said was silly. And I liked hearing him talk about the stuff he was reading, his latest visits to the doctors and what he learned there, and about his mom and dad. But sometimes I would look out at the other kids, running and climbing and playing, and I would want to be a part of that. I didn’t understand how Leo could just leave us there, but at the same time, I wished sometimes that I were out there playing with the rest of our classmates, too.
If Nate knew what I was I thinking, he never said anything. Which of course makes me think he didn’t know, because as I said, Nate didn’t hold anything back, especially with Leo and me. Even after he learned to stop saying everything that crossed his mind in front of other people, he always told Leo and me what he thought. I thought I was pretty good at hiding how I felt. And Nate never said anything bad about Leo either, even though sometimes I saw his eyes follow whatever game everyone else was playing.
One day toward the end of the year, Nate missed a whole day of school. That was pretty unusual; not that he didn’t have a ton of doctors’ appointments and stuff, but his mom always made sure to make them either first thing in the morning, so he got to school before lunch, or right after school. He didn’t want to miss any classes he didn’t have to, because he almost always got sick at some point in the school year and had mountains of work to make up. So he avoided missing any days that weren’t absolutely necessary.
In fifth grade, though, Nate was amazingly healthy. He was in school every day until that week in late April, when he had to go for a whole day of tests at the children’s hospital in Philadelphia. He didn’t want to go, and he was grumpy the entire day before, even though I promised I would get all of his work and bring it over as soon as he got home that afternoon.
That morning, Leo was waiting for me at the bicycle rack.
“Hey.”
I brushed my hair back out of my face. It was curly and long and always in my way. “Hey,” I answered. “Nate’s not going to be here today.”
Leo frowned. “He sick?”
I shook my head. “No. Tests. Doctors appointments, you know.”
Leo nodded. “Yeah. So ... we’re going to play kick ball at lunch. You wanna be on my team?”
I thought for a minute about Nate. I almost felt guilty for wanting to play kick ball, like I was being disloyal to him. But then I thought about all those days of sitting on the swing watching the rest of the school play.
“Sure,” I said to Leo. “I’ll play.”
