I Pledge Allegiance Read Free Page A

excited,” Ivan said to Rudi.
    “Don’t lie. He’s nobody’s friend. Get lost and mind your own business.”
    I walked over to Rudi and pulled him up by the arm, since he didn’t seem capable of getting up on his own.
    “He’s our business,” said Beck firmly.
    So we were all standing there with the tension building. The big fifth graders looked tough up to a point. But there was enough school-yard history here — especially with Ivan — to know it wasn’t as simple as: older guys win. And their faces showed it.
    “Oh,” Teddy tried, “so it’s gonna be four on two, is it?”
    “Don’t be a jerk,” Ivan said. “This guy” — pointing his thumb at Rudi — “obviously doesn’t count. And this guy” — me — “couldn’t fight his way out of a wet paper bag.”
    Here was my chance to come up big. “Ah, I think I probably could,” I said.
    The point was made, anyway. Ivan and Beck stepped right up close to the big guys, and stood there and stood there.
    You could smell in the air how this was going. Ivan alone was enough of a force to settle this. We were all just waiting now to see how it was going to fizzle out.
    “Rudi, pick up your stuff,” Beck said, staring down Teddy the whole time.
    Rudi practically dove to the ground to collect his books and what all. The jerks took that as the break they needed. They walked, first backward, then turning away up Moraine Street. Arthur made an embarrassing little attempt at waving us off dismissively, but Ivan wouldn’t even let him get away with that much.
    “Try this again, boys,” he called out, “and you’ll be picking his stuff off the street next time. With your lips.”
    We watched them slither away, and it felt like a long time. Moraine Street is long, sloping down slightly to the pond, and by the time they crested it, they had checked back over their shoulders three times, slouching a little more each time they saw us again.
    That was a whippin’.
    That was our pal Ivan.
    “Thanks,” Rudi gushed, rushing up and shaking Ivan’s hand crazily.
    Ivan sneered at him, then took his book bag and dumped everything out again on the ground.
    That, too, was our pal Ivan.
    But Rudi was a lot happier picking his stuff up that time.
    And that was a moment,
the
moment. Somethingchanged there for us as a foursome. Maybe it was kicked in by Rudi being needy and making us feel needed. It was as if we had adopted an orphan and we could never give him back. As if the responsibility changed us somehow. I don’t know for sure. What I do know for sure is that from then on we hung together, fought together, thought together, fought each other, from then on, forever. Something clicked there, that made us
more
than before, more than four.
    It made us, if it’s okay to say this,
better.

CHAPTER FOUR
No, I Won’t Be Afraid,
No, I Won’t Be Afraid
    W hen Ivan had his first punch-up with his old man, he stayed at my house for four days. When Rudi’s mother developed a habit of forgetting to pack him a lunch, Beck’s mom developed a habit of packing an extra sandwich and a second bag of Fritos into his.
    When my dad died, all three of the guys slept on my bedroom floor every night until I told them they could leave. Then they stayed until I told them they
had
to leave.
    We all chose the same high school when the time came. Even though Beck could have chosen some special genius school, he decided not to. Even though Rudi could have flunked out at any moment, he managed not to.
    And when the Vietnam War started pouring into my living room, just like everybody else’s living room, and I started getting nightmares, we all pledged none of us was going to go over there voluntarily. I just couldn’t live with it.
     
    Thursday night, Arboretum. Ivan and Rudi bring the drinks, I bring a bucket of Fontaine’s amazing boneless fried chicken, Beck brings a pan of his own butterscotch brownies made from scratch, because Beck is a freak. We meet at the top of Peters Hill