“Yo,” Fabe bit off.
Archie gave Fabe an I’m sorry look then turned to Jag.
“Okay, well, we’ve had a bit of a name-calling incident.” Archie explained Fabe’s attitude and the I’m sorry look.
“I’m getting smoothies. Do you want a smoothie?” Fabe asked Archie a question Jag didn’t understand since they had a soda fountain stocked with ice cream, so who in their right mind would go and get a smoothie when they could be sucking back a malt?
She shook her head.
Fabe looked to Jag and arched a brow.
Jag shook his head.
Fabe stormed off.
Jag turned to Archie. “What happened?”
“Fabe was trying to do a man-to-man with Mal to get him to talk and Mal called him a poof.”
“Poof” was better than some things Mal could have called him.
Regardless, he shouldn’t be saying shit like that at all.
Jag shouldn’t be, but he was curious.
“Is Fabe, uh…?”
Archie rolled her eyes and told him, “He’s pan.”
“He’s what?”
“He does chicks. He does dudes. He does dudes and chicks together. He does trans. He fucks whoever he thinks is pretty. And he thinks a lot of people are pretty.”
Well, that answered a question that hadn’t been burning in Jag, but he had it.
“The fact remains it’s uncool to call people names,” Archie went on. “Especially people who have been awesome with you.”
“Yeah,” Jag agreed.
“I think Mal looks up to you,” she told him. “He asked me the other day when you were coming around again.”
That surprised Jag.
“No shit?” Jagger asked.
She shook her head. “No shit.”
“Is he in the library?”
“The what?”
“The library, your book section.”
She smiled at him. “I dig you call it that.”
“I dig you dig that, baby. But can you answer the question?”
She nodded. “Yeah. Last I saw of him, he headed in there. He reads. This is another reason I know something is up. When he gets into his head, he gets into it with a book. Problem with that is, we have homework time right after school and he starts reading and doesn’t do his homework. Which is how this all began. I asked him about his homework, he wasn’t cool with me. Fabe waded in. And it went south from there.”
Jag drew in a breath to gain some cool at the thought that Mal gave her shit, then he bent, touched his lips to her forehead, and made his way to the library.
He found Mal in that mini-maze of shelves, sitting in an old armchair, nose in a book.
He didn’t miss Jag showing, his eyes flicking Jag’s way, then he made a point of ignoring him, shifting in the chair to send a shoulder Jag’s way.
Jag tamped down his annoyance and evened out his voice when he said, “Soda fountain, bud. Now.”
“I don’t want nothin’,” Mal mumbled, not meeting Jag’s eyes.
“I didn’t ask,” Jagger replied. “Let’s go.”
There was more belligerence in it when Mal turned fully to him and snapped, “I told you, don’t want nothin’.”
“Ass to a stool, I’m making you a malt.”
“I don’t got money for a malt,” Mal retorted.
“I’m buying,” Jag offered.
“That’d be awesome, if I wanted something. But…I…do…not.”
“So sit with me while I have a cherry Coke.”
With that, Mal lost it.
“Why can’t you just fuck off?” he bit.
And Jag immediately leaned over him, it was threatening, and he meant it to be, but it was the wrong call.
Mal lurched back into the seat, his eyes widening in fear.
Okay, where did that response come from?
Jag eased back an inch physically as well as with his attitude and again modulated his voice when he said, “I give a shit. I was at work, Arch texted, and I jumped on my bike to listen to what you might have to say. You don’t have anything to say, all right. But I’m havin’ a cherry Coke and I’m makin’ you a malt or whatever you want and we’re gonna just be. But we’re doing it together. You with a guy who cares and me there to listen if you decide to talk. So, will you go to the soda fountain with me?”
Mal took a minute with that before he nodded.
Jagger straightened, and Mal slithered out of the chair.
They walked together to the fountain, or Jagger walked, Mal slunk.
He didn’t miss Archie watching them, Joany standing beside her.
Archie looked worried. Joany looked irritated (and worried).
They were part of Mal’s village.
And so was Fabe.
Mal just needed to get that.
That and the fact that you didn’t shit in your village.
“Hop up,” he muttered when they got to the fountain.
Mal hoisted himself up on a stool.
Jagger went behind the counter. “What do you want?”
“Chocolate shake, made with syrup, not chocolate ice cream.”
That was specific for a kid who didn’t want anything.
Jag didn’t comment on that.
He put his hands to his hips and stared at the stuff behind the counter, primarily the old-fashioned three-rod shake machine, then he looked at Mal. “Do you know how to work any of this shit?”
Mal stared at him open mouthed a second, then he cracked a smile.
Okay, the smile was good.
But Jag didn’t comment on that either.
Out of nowhere, Archie ordered, “Sit down, you goof, I’ll make your stuff.”
Jag watched Mal clam up completely in the face of Archie.
He then gave her a look.
She mouthed, “I’ll hurry.”
Jag rounded the counter, sliding a finger across her hip as he did, then rested his ass on a stool by Mal’s.
She didn’t lie. She hurried.
Mal avoided watching her.
It wasn’t that long ago Jag had been Mal’s age so he knew what was going on with this.
He was crushing, huge.
So much, whatever was fucking with his head had come out in an ugly way, a way that he’d disappointed her, and now he was embarrassed he’d acted like a dick.
When Jag had his cherry Coke, Mal had his shake, and Arch had taken off, he let Mal have a couple of swallows before he admitted, “All right, kid, I lied.”
Mal looked up at him.
“You’re gonna get a lecture, a short one, but an important one,” Jag went on.
Mal’s face started screwing up.
Jag was quick about saying what he had to say before the boy said something he’d regret.
“Fabe’s a cool guy. We both know that. What is not cool is you talking trash to him. And I’ll just say that’s to him or about him if he’s not around. He is who he is and how he is and that’s none of your business, outside how he treats you. And I know he’s cool with you. So there’s not one single reason for you not to be cool with him. Are we on the same page with that?”
Mal looked guilty and hid it by turning away and slurping up more ice cream.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” Jag said, lifting the glass and taking a sip (and Archie had bona-fide Coca-Cola glasses, with the bulbous top and the narrow base).