Read Harry Sue for Free Online Page B

was,
Stop in and tell me: Is it a bad day?
    She wanted to know his mood always. After he came down for the night, would he talk with her about the books they'd been studying the evening before? Would he care about the gossip she brought back from her daily walk?
    I had tried to explain to her about letting Homer do his own time.
    Poor Mrs. Dinkins was crazy with sadness over what had happened to her boy. Christopher Dink-ins had been a great athlete, a classroom mastermind, a streetwise con. Now he was as wobbly as a beat-up con, laid out on a stretcher, watching birds through a hole in the roof.
    “These books you been bringing him,” she said, rubbing her thumb and her pointer finger back and forth on her jaw. “I don't think they're doin' much good.”
    “I just get what he asks me to,” I said quietly, backing away. I didn't want to get her going.
    She kept stepping forward to keep us in talking distance. Just my luck, Beau must have finished wiping and turning and airing out Homer, because right then he started climbing down the rope. We both studied his tall lean frame like it might tell us something important. I don't know what.
    Beau nodded to me after he touched down,breathing as steady as if he'd just walked across a parking lot. I didn't know his nick from the joint as that was something he chose not to share. But if I could give him one, I think it would be Tin Man. After eight years and change, Beau had learned to live without a heart. He wasn't mean. Far from it. He just didn't seem attached to anything, didn't get flustered or upset. He was a master at controlling emotion.
    I wanted to be like Beau was, just before he left for Chicago, looking off into the distance and talking to us as if he were talking to himself.
    “There's some trouble back home, and I'll be gone at least a few days,” he said slowly, running his hands up and down the length of the rope. “My brother called. Gangbangers gone and marked the house where my Mama lives. Homer says he'll be fine till I get back.”
    Mrs. Dinkins sucked in air and started with the questions.
    “Have they assigned a replacement? Who's gonna be able to climb that rope? Homer don't take kindly to people who pry in his business….”
    Beau silenced her with a look.
    “Said Homer'll be fine till I get back.”
    Mrs. Dinkins stopped in mid-sentence and began to iron the sides of her dress with her palms.
    “You say so, Beau, then I know it's true.”
    I got another short nod before he walked over tohis car, got in, and drove off, all in that slow dignified way that said he wasn't afraid of nothing, wasn't in a hurry, wasn't even angry with whoever marked his mama's house, just needed to take care of business.
    “A man's got to do what a man's got to do,” Mrs. Dinkins said, looking after him. “For his mama.”
    “That's for real,” I said under my breath, and started to haul myself up hand over hand. “See ya, Mrs. Dinkins.”
    She was like a ball and chain, I thought as I climbed, happy to be rid of her.
    No, her sadness was even heavier than that. It was so big it pushed Mr. Dinkins out of their home and back to his brother in Indiana. It grew like one of those yeast experiments we performed in school, consuming all the sugar in its path. Homer was hiding out from it high up in this tree. But he knew and I knew there was no getting away from Mrs. Dink-ins and her pain. Mrs. Dinkins was just the kind of person the Wizard had in mind when he tried to talk the Tin Man out of his plan to get a heart. You see, some folks are so tenderhearted, they have no business with having a heart.
    Shaking Mrs. Dinkins always made me feel lighter, so light I didn't even use my legs as I hauled myself up to Homer's tree house. Being
built
was part of my plan.
    While most of his so-called friends couldn't see their way clear to visit Homer, I found being with him the most relaxing part of my day. Homer was my road dog. Unlike the crumb snatchers at Granny's Lap, who