Gordo scratched his head like an ape, looked over at Mazz, then flicked his eyes back toward the boy sitting behind him. This boy was the smallest kid in class, and I had noticed that he didn’t laugh along with everyone else; in fact, he hadn’t reacted to all the noise at all. 

Gordo leaned over and whispered something in Mazz’s ear. Mazz nodded and smirked. 

They were up to no good. 

* * * * * 

When the final bell rang, Bones and I beelined it through the school doors and started walking down the sidewalk, then we realized that we hadn’t made plans with Yogi for how we were going to meet up with him after school. It was about a full mile to the junkyard, and that wasn’t even the worst of it: we had left our bikes there, so we had no choice but to walk. 

The sun was blisteringly hot, and we had no phones and no money. We hadn’t been walking for more than a few minutes when Gordo and Mazz flew by us on their bikes. They saw us and skidded to a stop. Gordo was riding a blue bike, and Mazz was on a shiny, new red bike. 

I hadn’t noticed it when we were in Apostolu’s class, but they were both wearing T-shirts that said, “Goon.” Gordo’s was blue, torn, and frayed, and Mazz’s was red, almost matching his hair, and it looked like it had just come off the store shelf. I think his mom must have ironed it.

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