All Good Children Read Online Free PDF Page B

might be able to elucidate.
    I shrug and say, “I’ll look around when I take her to school tomorrow.”

    I’m ready for Tyler when I leave the apartment in the morning. I have a steak knife in my jacket pocket but no idea how to wield it. Fortunately, he’s sleeping in, as all suspended children should be.
    Ally chatters about rodents the whole way to school, a stream of useless facts like, “Mice have poor eyesight,” and “Chipmunks nest underground.” She shuts up as we approach her school, pushes me away when I hug her goodbye.
    I linger by the fence and chat with the eight-year-olds who rush up to me, make faces, tattle on their friends, ask who I am.
    â€œHello, Max,” Xavier pants. He towers at my side, half-naked, as if he teleported from a gymnasium. He smells like raspberry crumble. “I ran five miles cross-country and now I’m sprinting to school. Will you run with me?”
    â€œI’m not allowed at school this week,” I remind him. He looks confused. I raise my swollen hands. “Remember how Tyler tried to waste you and I beat him down yesterday?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI got suspended for that.”
    Four high school girls fall silent as they approach. They gawk at Xavier, who’s wearing a pair of shorts that reach his knees, a pair of sneakers that reach his ankles, and nothing else except a sheen of sweat.
    I give the girls a wink. They giggle and walk on, whispering and glancing back.
    â€œYou should get to class,” I tell Xavier. I smile like it’s premium fun being suspended, then turn back to Ally’s schoolyard.
    The first graders line up early again. Their ranks have swollen with a few dozen grade twos. Melissa stands near the front, staring at the closed doors. A supervisor walks the line, watching me where I lurk outside the fence. I wave and say, “Hey!” She doesn’t wave back.
    The older kids play on the jungle gyms, run across the concrete, throw balls at the fence and try to scare me. When the bell rings, the sour-faced supervisor calls in the stragglers. “I can’t wait till next week!” she shouts to another supervisor across the concrete. Ally looks my way but doesn’t return my wave. The supervisors yell at her to get in line.
    Where the youngest children wait near the doors, the lines are royally neat. No jostling, no hopping, not even pairs of girls holding hands. The line snakes out as it lengthens. The fourth graders at the back are toxic, switching places, yapping, pushing each other down. The supervisors yank on their arms to no effect.
    Eventually everyone slithers inside, and I’m left standing with my fingers threaded through the fence, staring at silent concrete. Xavier jogs on the spot beside me. “What are you still doing here?” I ask him. “You’re going to be late for class.”
    â€œWill you run with me?” he repeats.
    I laugh. “I have to go home, Xavier. I’m suspended for saving your life.”
    Xavier can deconstruct my personal mythology faster than I can fabricate it. “I don’t like you to fight,” he says. “I like you when you’re nice.”
    Sometimes Xavier reminds me of Ally because he’s kind and innocent. But once in a while when he’s not speed-talking— because he looks so old and white and serious— he reminds me of my father. It saddens me and I don’t know why.
    â€œGo to school before you’re late,” I tell him. “I can’t run with you today.”
    â€œOkay. Bye, Max.” He sprints away, supremely fast and strong, out of sight in thirty seconds. If he could manage relationships and violence, I’d recruit him into football.
    Stray children rush past me, trying to get to school on time. Older teens and adults ride to work on bikes. I watch them for a while. Then I have to admit that I have nowhere to go but home.

    â€œYou forgot to put the