Free Secret Saturdays by Torrey Maldonado Page B

Tony and Junito toward the bleachers where the seventh and eighth graders were, I got close to him and grabbed his arm, soft. “You all right?”
    He snatched his arm, hard, and snapped, “Leave me alone.”
    He walked off and the crowd of kids broke up and got back into dodgeball. Here and there, different kids said things like, “Did you see that?” and “Chris almost got jumped.” It was just another school fight to them, but to me Sean mushing Chris was major. That was the closest I had ever seen Sean come to fighting.
    When I looked at Kyle, he just shook his head.
    Instead of playing we just kept watching Sean. When he got to the bleachers, Junito and Tony gave Sean pounds and slapped him on the back. Like he had just done something good by almost fighting. You could tell Sean’s cousin was giving him props too. They surrounded him and cheese-grinned as if Sean were The Man. Sean seemed to enjoy that too much. He was so into it that he didn’t catch Mr. K, a security guard, and Chris, the kid he mushed, quickly rolling up on him. Mr. K pushed into Sean’s circle of friends.
    â€œSean, let’s go!” Mr. K said. His eyes were mean slits. Him and the guard led both Chris and Sean away.
    Sean was in trouble.
    â€œSean told me some things about fighting,” I said to Kyle. “He said people fight when their feelings are hurt and that there are two ways of fighting: throwing hands and dissing. He said people who fistfight are dumb and can’t use their words.”
    â€œSo why did Sean almost fight right now?” Kyle said. “He could’ve beat Chris with words.”
    â€œMaybe something is bothering Sean and has his head messed up? Something from his last Saturday trip?”
    Kyle pushed his glasses up his nose with his finger and crossed his arms. “Like?”
    I was tired of trying to think about this with just Kyle. It didn’t get us anywhere. I was ready to ask Vanessa questions. If she didn’t know about Sean’s secret Saturdays, then getting her involved was smart, because her plus me and Kyle meant three heads figuring things out. Three heads were better than two people playing detectives.
    â€œLet’s go talk to Vanessa.”
    â€œBet.”
    Before, I was scared she’d run back and tell Sean we were spying on him. Plus, I was mad at her for hanging up on me. Now I didn’t care. I knew Sean trusted her and she trusted him. Maybe Vanessa knew something we didn’t. Or maybe she could find out.
    Vanessa was on the other side of the gym shooting hoops with some girls. Our gym is maybe a block long and a block wide. It’s so huge, crowded, and noisy that Vanessa couldn’t have caught what had happened with Sean unless some kid had run over and told her.
    â€œVanessa!” I yelled. When she ran up to us, I started telling her what had happened. Kyle jumped in here and there. Our lips flapped fast like fans until we had told her everything.
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    â€œWow!” she said real long. “Why didn’t you come tell me first, before you played dodgeball with Sean?”
    â€œBecause,” Kyle said. “We . . .”
    â€œ. . . we don’t know why,” I said, finishing Kyle’s sentence.
    â€œNow what?” she asked.
    â€œI don’t know,” I answered. “Maybe you can talk with him later?”
    â€œMe?” She sounded surprised. “Why me?”
    â€œBecause he’s feeling you,” Kyle said. Hearing that from Kyle made me believe it for real because he said something about somebody only if he thought it was true.
    As soon as Kyle said that, I checked for Vanessa’s reaction. She didn’t even blink. It was like she already knew Sean had feelings for her. I expected her to say “Ewww!” or be the way she’d been those times I’d mentioned Sean and her liking each other, but she wasn’t.
    â€œJustin, why you looking at me