“I don’t know.” I pushed a hand through the hair my mom had so carefully combed an hour ago. “It just happened so fast. I saw it was Nat, and then before I could even get in there, you ran past me.”
“It shouldn’t have mattered who it was. They were big kids, picking on someone smaller. You should have stopped them no matter who it was. But then when you saw it was your friend—“ Abby glared at me meaningfully—“your best friend since before you were born, you should have run to stop them.” Like I did. She didn’t say it, but I could read it loud and clear in her eyes.
“Nat.” I could see I wasn’t going to get anywhere with Abby, so I turned to the small boy hunched between us. “What happened? Why were they ganged up on you?”
He shrugged, still not meeting our eyes. “Mom dropped me off early,” he finally answered, softly. “I asked her to. I thought I could get in here and look around, be ready when you guys got here. I was just sitting on the bars over there.” He jerked his chin toward the rainbow climber, now covered with kids. “But then I saw there was an empty swing, and I thought I would grab it for Abby.” At last he looked up at her. “I know you like to swing.”
Abby sighed, the merest breath. “I do like to swing. Thanks for thinking of me, Nat.”
He nodded and continued. “I was just trying to get across the playground to them, and then this one kid grabbed me, and the next thing I knew, they were all standing around.” He swung his eyes up to me. “Matt was there, too. Did you see that, Jesse?”
I nodded but didn’t say anything else. Matt Lambert had been in our class last year, and he had hung around with Nat and me. I would’ve said we were friends. I hadn’t seen him over the summer, but that wasn’t unusual; his family lived on the other side of town and belonged to the community pool, which was where he spent most of his days between school years.
“Why do kids act like that?” Abby stomped her foot against the concrete and winced. I tried to hide a smile, but she looked at me and rolled her eyes. Abby had a tendency to strike out physically, forgetting that hitting hard surfaces hurt.
“They’re just. . I don’t know. Stupid, like you said, I guess.” Nat still seemed far away, and I gave him a light punch on the shoulder to get his attention. He turned his bright blue eyes to me, and I flinched at the pain there.
“You okay, Nat?” Abby stole my line and laid a tentative hand on his arm. To my surprise, he shrugged it off. I hadn’t ever seen Nat rebuff Abby’s affection—not ever.
“You shouldn’t have gotten in the middle of it,” he said in a low voice. “Now it’s only going to be worse. They’re going to think I’m a wimp, that I have to count on a girl to protect me.”
Abby raised her eyes to mine. She was surprised and not a little hurt. “I’m sorry, Nat. I thought. . .I didn’t want you to get hurt.” She bit her lip and added, “I know if it had been me they were picking on, you would have stopped it.”
“That’s different. I’m a boy. I’m supposed to do the defending.”
Abby 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, Ab,” Nat 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 Jesse in the middle of those boys, would you have run to save him?”
Abby flushed pink. I stared down at my feet, kicking at the line of white paint on the bumpy asphalt. This was a total Nat thing. Whatever crossed his mind was pretty much what he said. Abby 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 Abby’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,” Nat said bleakly. “But Jesse 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. Nat began moving in his normal jerky gait. Abby 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, Ab,” I said finally. “We don’t be the last ones in. Do you know where to line up?”
She shrugged and started walking. Nat was far enough ahead of us that I didn’t think he could hear our conversation.
“Do you think he’s right?” Abby 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 be beat him up, they were just being, you know, trying to be cool or whatever. They were mostly teasing.”
“What if it had been you?” she persisted. “What would you have done?”