One in Every Crowd Read Online Free PDF Page B

snow white, and between his poo-smeared butt cheeks bulged a giant purple egg. It was a horrible hybrid of a blood-blister and a bruise, and it throbbed and pulsed like a swollen creature from a science fiction movie. Even the nurse at the walk-in clinic in the mall claimed she had never seen anything quite like it, and said that she bet it hurt something terrible. Then she patted the sweaty curls on top of Chris’s head with a manicured hand, and gave him an envelope that had twelve real painkillers in it, not just orange-flavoured baby aspirin, and a frozen bag full of what looked like blue jello. Gran called us a cab from the pay phone outside of the 7-Eleven, even though the mall was only ten blocks or so from our house and we had no luggage or groceries. We were all acting super nice to Chris, since we felt bad for thinking he was being a big baby because it we had mistakenly thought he had barely wiped out at all because we couldn’t see any blood or wounds, but how were we supposed to know he had a giant purple lump in his shorts that hurt so much it made him shit himself? My sister even gave him her winning Oh Henry! wrapper she had kept folded up in her pink plastic wallet for weeks. She had been waiting for the right time to trade it in for the free Pepsi she had coming, saving it for a rainy day, she said, which really meant a day when the rest of us were broke. Carrie was like that, she used to hoard a good chunk of her Halloween stash every year too, just so she could haul it out a month later and eat it with dramatic relish in front of the other kids without sharing. But she gave her free pop to Chris, and Gran let him sit in the front seat of the cab alone, and she made him a jam sandwich right before dinner, just because. Chris was good about it all, he didn’t lord his injury over us able-bodied kids like some would, he didn’t make us get him stuff or hog the couch or fake a limp so he wouldn’t have to help with the dishes or go move the sprinkler. Gran watched him wince as he slowly settled himself onto a chair at dinnertime. He sat lopsided, perched painfully atop the blue ice pack, and laced his fingers together so we could say grace. Gran thanked God for the meal we were about to eat, and made the sign of the cross. Then she picked up her fork and shook it at the four of us, clucking her tongue like she did when she was about to say how something was a crying shame. “Look at him, poor little wretch. It’s a crying shame none of yous had enough sense to put on long pants before you went out fooling around on them things, just a crying shame. Count yourself lucky that nobody cracked their skull wide open, thank Gawd.” She looked up at the ceiling tiles, and crossed herself again. We sat with our hands in our laps and our heads bowed, just in case this particular crying shame needed any further explanation or perhaps an extra prayer. I mulled it all over in my head, wondering how long pants could possibly prevent head injuries, and whether or not Chris would still have got poop all over the dryer door if he had crapped in his jeans instead, and would any of this have happened at all if he hadn’t been born with giant feet that only fit into the crappy roller skates? And didn’t that mean the whole thing was in fact an act of God? I pressed my lips together to keep myself quiet. It was best not to ask too many questions, especially ones about the Good Lord Above. I was old enough to know it was a sin to blame God when bad things happened, even things that could only be his fault, like floods or earthquakes or innocent children from good homes who died too young or babies who got born with a rare disease or a weak heart. It was blasphemy to question his will or his wisdom or the way he went about his business, to even suggest that God might have thought twice before burdening a boy with feet that did nothing for his self-esteem which was a big part of why he had to repeat grade two and go see the