Manny and Stu reached the Fletchers’ house a little while later. Manny gave Stu his bag of baseballs and his glove.
“See you at school,” Stu said. “And thanks.” Then he disappeared inside and Manny went home.
There, he found his mother high on a ladder cleaning the gutters. As he approached, she yanked out a fistful of acorns and threw them to the ground. Unfortunately, Manny was standing beneath her when she did so.
“Ow!” he cried as acorns rained down on him.
“Oooh, so sorry!” his mother cried. “I didn’t see you! Are you hurt?”
“Nah, I’m fine.” Manny rubbed his head where he’d been hit. As he did, he thought of Stu. If a few little acorns can make my scalp sting like this, how bad must it have felt when that baseball hit him?
Then he shrugged. Stu said he was fine, he reminded himself.
At his mother’s request, Manny spent the rest of the afternoon helping with the gutters and other outdoor projects. By dinnertime, both of them were starving.
Fortunately, Mr. Griffin had started supper. When they came into the kitchen, he lifted the lid off a big pot to peek inside. A cloud of steam billowed around his face. “Homemade clam chowder,” he announced, turning to greet them.
Manny and his mother took one look at him and burst out laughing. The steam from the chowder had fogged Mr. Griffin’s glasses. He laughed, too, and then removed the glasses to polish them, blinking rapidly as he did so.
Manny grinned. His father always wore the funniest expression when he didn’t have his glasses on—like he was surprised to find that the world had suddenly gone out of focus.
It’s the same look Stu had after he got hit. The thought came out of nowhere, and he frowned.
“What’s wrong, Manuel?” his mother asked.
“Huh? Oh, nothing.” Manny shook his head to clear it and hurried upstairs to change.
After dinner, the family watched a time-travel mystery movie together. It was a great film, with tons of plot twists and surprises, but very long. When it ended, he was more than ready to go to bed.
He awoke the next morning to see the sun shining through a crack in his window shade. He stretched and got up to get ready for school. His father offered to drive him in that day, and Manny accepted. It was only after Mr. Griffin had dropped him off that he realized he should have called Stu to see if he wanted a ride, too.
Oh, well, he thought. He’ll just have to sit on the bus without me!
Stu must have missed the bus, however, because he walked into homeroom late.
“Overslept,” Stu muttered when the teacher asked why he was tardy. Halfway down the aisle to his desk, he stumbled. The class tittered, but Stu didn’t seem to hear. He slumped into his seat and stared at his desktop for the rest of the period. When the bell rang, Manny saw him start as if he’d been woken up.
“Dude, are you okay?” he asked as they funneled into the hall with the rest of the class.
“I didn’t sleep very well last night,” Stu admitted. He punctuated the statement with a wide yawn.
Manny lowered his voice. “How’s your head?”
Stu shrugged. “Aw, it’s fine. I have a little bit of a headache, but, like I said, I didn’t sleep well last night, so it’s probably because I’m tired.”
They parted in the hallway, Manny for science class and Stu for Spanish. Their schedules didn’t intersect again until lunchtime. Manny almost walked right past Stu in the cafeteria because Stu had his head down in his hands.
“You don’t look so hot,” Manny said, sliding into the seat next to him. “Is your head—”
“My head is fine!” Stu said sharply. Then he groaned. “It’s my stomach that’s bugging me. I bet it’s from the cafeteria food smell. What are they serving, anyway?”
Manny glanced at the next table. “Looks like grilled cheese sandwiches.”
Stu grimaced. “Well, it smells like grilled toe cheese sandwiches. I’m going to see if I can use the bathroom.”
With that, he shoved his lunch to one side, got up, and left.
Manny didn’t see him again until that afternoon, on the bus. Stu usually talked a mile a minute on the ride home, but today he just sat and stared out the window. Manny stayed silent, too, only speaking to his friend to say good-bye when the bus dropped him off at his stop.
He’s just not in the mood to chat today, he thought as he watched Stu shuffle up the walkway and disappear into his house. Nothing wrong with that.
Yet deep down, a little worm of worry had started to wriggle in his gut.