Free Emory’s Gift by W. Bruce Cameron Page B

offend Dan that I could recall, but the contempt on everyone’s faces was unmistakable.
    I’d been focused on Dan and those next to him, but what about the other guys, several from my grade, all of whom had been watching as Dan blocked my passage? It felt as if a vote of excommunication had been taken. Or was it just that they were all so thankful that it wasn’t happening to them that they kept their heads down?
    Either way, I was an outcast. I swallowed back the hurt.
    I was still wallowing in self-pity and perplexity when something light popped me on the back of the head. I thought I heard a snigger as well, and when something else struck me it fell into my lap: a kernel of popcorn.
    So now my misery was complete. My dad was off on a hot date and would probably wind up getting married to the grocery gal, the love of my life was dating some man, and the boys from my grade hated me so much they were throwing food at my head.
    If I left the theater my retreat would be noted and I would lose whatever slight standing I had among my fellows. If I stayed I’d be showered with popcorn and everyone in the theater would be witness to my humiliation. There were no good options.
    A piece of hard candy shot past my ear, bouncing on the floor in front of the seats. The boys had escalated their ammunition. Now the projectiles would not only debase and disgrace me; they would hurt.
    I was so saturated with wretched unhappiness I didn’t even notice the person standing next to my seat in the aisle until I heard her whisper to me.
    “Charlie. Move over.”
    It was Kay. I blinked at her in stunned amazement. She gestured that I should take the empty seat next to me, so I did, and then she took the seat I’d just vacated, but not before standing in the flickering light, giving all the boys behind her a long, full look— this girl was no eighth grader! —and fixing Dan with her unreadable eyes.
    She didn’t say anything, just sat and watched the movie while I gazed at her lovely profile in sheer dumb wonder. When she caught me staring she gave me a small smile and then, astoundingly, laid her head on my shoulder.
    My only complaint about the movie Sugarland Express was that it wasn’t near long enough, not by far. I didn’t really follow the plot, I was just conscious of Kay, and I carefully refrained from moving the slightest bit even when her head on my shoulder gradually cut off the blood supply to my arm.
    When the movie ended and people began filtering out, Kay put her hand on my arm, keeping me in my seat. We sat quietly until the place had mostly emptied, and then she stood. “Let’s go this way,” she said, leading me to the glowing exit sign in the front of the theater. We fumbled in the dark to a door that squeaked when we opened it, and then we were in the alley, facing each other awkwardly.
    “That was a really good movie,” I said reverentially.
    “It was,” she agreed.
    “This is fun,” I told her, cleverly thinking that by keeping my comment in the present tense she’d agree with me that the night was far from over.
    “I have to go meet my friends,” Kay replied.
    Okay, not clever enough. I looked into her eyes. She was so nice and kind, so generous and caring, that there was no hint in her gaze that she knew she’d rescued me from social humiliation.
    I nodded at her, struggling to come up with something to say. Thank you ? I love you ? She smiled at me. “Bye, Charlie.”
    “Okay. Yes,” I responded with admirable idiocy.
    I watched her walk out of the alley and vanish from view.
    The stars were out as I strolled home, a blaze of them against a black sky that was on occasion scored by the straight white line of a meteor making its mark. Because of an astronomy report I’d given in fifth grade, I could look up and identify Ursa Major, the Great Bear, watching over me. It didn’t look very ursine to me, though.
    Naturally, given what was to become my life’s interest in bears, I’ve spent a lot of