Read Waterways for Free Online Page A

I’ll be a little late.”
    “I’m sure she wouldn’t mind. We’re about a fifteen minute walk from here, and then it’d be about half an hour.”
    Kory considered. His mom would freak out, absolutely have a conniption, if she found out he’d taken a ride with a strange woman. Strange, to his mother, was anyone she hadn’t shared a meal with. But his mom didn’t have to find out. And he would get to hang out with Samaki a bit longer. “Okay,” he said.
    The fox’s muzzle lit up with a bright smile. He put a paw on the otter’s shoulder, rubbing briefly. “Great! Come on, this way.”
    They walked down the street together at a more leisurely pace, through a few blocks of the main shopping district, passing only a few people. Samaki turned down a dark street and strode confidently ahead, his light shirt and white tailtip bobbing ghostlike in the darkness. Kory took a couple steps in and hesitated, letting his eyes adjust. He heard the fox’s steps stop, and saw eyeshine as Samaki turned.
    “Oh, you don’t have good night vision, do you? I’m sorry. Here.” He reached out a paw. “It’s just this one stretch. It’s a shortcut.”
    Kory placed his paw in the fox’s and felt the warm pads close around his fingers. The warmth was nice in the night air.
    “It’s not dangerous,” Samaki said as he padded slowly down the street. Kory felt more confident with the fox’s paw around his, and matched his pace. “The people who live on this street are all nocturnals—foxes, raccoons, mice, possums, one skunk family down that way—so they petitioned the city to get the street lights turned off on the street. It’s not dangerous, either. They do a neighborhood watch. A couple years ago there were some drug dealers that tried to set up shop here, but they ran ’em off.”
    Drug dealers, like gay people, were something Kory read about online or heard about in health class, not something that merited only a casual offhand mention. “Are there a lot of drugs around here?”
    “’Bout average, I guess,” Samaki said, and Kory felt him shrug. “I don’t bother with em.”
    After a long pause, the fox said, “You ever try em?”
    “Jeez, no!” Kory shook his head. “I heard about one kid in my class, this mouse who tried some stuff, but I didn’t know him real well. None of my friends ever had any.”
    “I know some guys on the football team who tried some steroids.”
    “Does that stuff really work?”
    Samaki shook his head. His form was visible now as a dark patch in the grey twilight at the end of the dark street, resolving as they stepped further into light. “I guess it does, sort of. If that’s what you want.”
    Streetlights, lit here, shone softly on a quiet, residential street that reminded Kory of his own, scaled down: well-trimmed lawns and low white fences bordered a small cottage. Plants and bird feeders adorned wood-fenced balconies on a four-unit apartment building. Kory hadn’t seen many apartment buildings in his neighborhood. “Like budding houses, waiting to fully blossom,” he said, inspired by the sight.
    “That’s great,” Samaki said. “I really like that.”
    “Oh, it’s just a thought,” Kory said.
    “It’s a nice image,” the fox said, and Kory shrugged.
    “I used to know a kid in one of those apartments, but he moved away,” Samaki said after a moment.
    Walking past the building, the otter saw a masked face in one of the windows looking out at him, and realized that he was still holding onto Samaki’s paw. He let go, as casually as he could, and Samaki didn’t comment. Kory stuck his paw in his pocket.
    “Just around here,” Samaki said as they reached the end of the next block. They crossed the narrow street at the stop sign and walked half a block down to a small house with an old VW Fox in the driveway. Samaki led Kory up a small flight of wooden steps onto a white painted porch. Lights burned in the first story and the television flickered with a low