OCR Text |
Show Why we Cry Butch and Fenn Stories 172 "Butch," I start. "With school starting and all..." I nearly say. Don't your parents want you to go to school? Then I see the whole picture. Butch has moved out of his house. He's moved out; he's not going to school anymore, and he wants to map the world. "What's it going to be?" He's mad now. "That or this." He waves the tube toward my face. Then I say the truest thing I've said all summer. It just comes out. "I'm not sure I'm ready, Butch. I'm not sure I'm ready to map the world." "Fine." He shoves the map tube into a milk crate and goes over to Haslam's fence. I follow. The crickets in our path are bold, having never seen human beings before, and they barely stop roaring for a moment while we pass. Butch leans against the abandoned refrigerator, his back to me. "You probably got a lot to do at the new school, I mean with all your new friends." "There are a lot of kids, Butch. You'd like it." He turns his head slowly to me and says, "I'd like it." It's a voice I've never heard before. "Well, it's going to be good, meeting the new kids." I don't know what to say, so this comes out: "It's good, it's okay to have more than one friend." "Right." He says softly in the dark and turns back away from me, but it's too late. I could see in the dirt on his face that he is crying, and his voice tells the whole story. |