Me and Fat Glenda by Lila Perl

to be something.”
    The things Roddy was saying made me feel terrible. I kept walking along looking at the cracks in the sidewalk.
    â€œListen,” he said, putting a hand on my arm. “It’s not your fault. Lots of people have nuts in their families.”
    His trying to be kind about it made me angrier than anything else. “They’re not nuts,” I said hotly. “They’re my parents and I love them. Now give me back my books and leave me alone!”
    But Roddy just stood there holding onto my books as though I’d put him in a trance.
    I glared at him. “Is that why somebody left a dead cat on our doorstep? Because they’d decided we were a bunch of nuts before we even moved in?” He still didn’t say anything.
    â€œAnd then you threw that dumb note into Glenda’s house.”
    Roddy half smiled. “Oh, so you read it?”
    â€œ I did. But Glenda didn’t see it and I didn’t show it to her. Incidentally, you ought to be grateful to Glenda. She never told her mother about your throwing that paper airplane into the living room.”
    â€œSo what?”
    â€œWell, a lot of stuff got broken because of it and Glenda got into a lot of trouble. It’s costing her fifteen dollars in allowance money. But she took the blame. She told her mother it was all her fault because she didn’t want to squeal on you.”
    â€œBig deal!” Roddy said bitterly. “She’s a number one squealer from way back—and don’t let anybody tell you different.”
    â€œThen why didn’t she tell on you?”
    â€œOh,” Roddy shrugged. “How should I know? Probably because you’re a new friend and she wants to impress you with how noble she is.”
    â€œThen why would she have put that cat on my doorstep? You know what I’m beginning to think? I’m beginning to think you put it there, Roddy Fenton, to try to get Glenda into trouble.”
    Roddy whirled around in front of me. “Oh yeah? Prove it!”
    That was the whole trouble; I couldn’t prove anything. Even though I wanted to trust Glenda, I couldn’t get the thought out of my mind that she had had something to do with Mary Lou’s chicken-foot sandwich. And whoever had planted the chicken-foot sandwich might very well be the same person who had left the dead cat. So I was still wondering about Glenda—and I remembered that Mary Lou, too, had called her a squealer.
    Roddy and I had started walking again, and we weregetting close to the corner of Dangerfield Road.
    â€œYou can give me back my books now,” I said. “You might get scared by witches if you walked down my block.”
    Roddy handed me the books. “Listen, I’m sorry I made you mad or if I hurt your feelings or anything. But, number one, you want to watch out for Fat. She’s not what you think she is. And, about your folks and that yard full of junk, I might as well tell you it’s no joke. There’s a petition going around. Somebody came over to our house with it last night, and my Pop signed it.”
    â€œA petition? What sort of petition?”
    â€œWell, it’s got something to do with your folks running a junk-collecting business. It says they gotta haul all that stuff out of the yard and get rid of that garbage truck.”
    I didn’t want to believe him but his face was dead serious.
    â€œThat’s not true, Roddy. They can’t make us do that. We’re not running a . . .”
    â€œSure they can. They can make you do anything around here once they get after you. They can run you out of the neighborhood; they can put you in jail. Anything. Take it from me,” he said, moving in closer. “I ought to know.”
    â€œWhat’s that supposed to mean?”
    â€œLook. Don’t ask questions. I’m just telling you whatI know.” He began to walk backwards slowly, down the street and away from me. “No