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Partially based on true events, and I wanted to give it a happy ending. Really hope you enjoy it! ", "description_bbcode_parsed": "This is one of my older series of stories. Partially based on true events, and I wanted to give it a happy ending. Really hope you enjoy it! ", "writing": "The days went by after that. Despite the long odds, Audie and Greg remained friends and the friendship managed to grow. Even though Greg eventually made other friends and Audie did not, Greg reserved a special place for the strange kid with the awesome responsibilities. Greg understood when Audie just couldn’t get away to spend time with him, except for lunch at school, which the three of them always ate together. Greg had Audie and Kevin over to his house for food several times and both he and Audie understood that it could never be reciprocated. Greg was not allowed to visit friends if there was no adult around to supervise. Rules. Audie never had to cook at Greg’s again.\n\nOne cold winter day, Greg turned up at lunch with a righteous black eye.\n\nAudie took one look and asked, \"OK, so who’d you pick a fight with?\" He was trying to make light of the incident, pal-to-pal. The response was totally unexpected.\n\n\"I don’t want to talk about it, OK?\" Greg snapped the answer, his eyes apprehensive, made all the more so by the color of the right one. Audie immediately sensed there was more behind this than met the eye (so to speak). Probably much more. He wanted to know, so, frowning, Audie tried to draw his friend out.\n\n\"Aw, cummon,\" he pushed, \"we’re pals, aren’t we? I won’t tell. Come on, give.\"\n\n\"No,\" Greg snapped again, almost shouting. \"I said I don’t want to talk about it. Especially to you two!\"\n\n\"What’d we do?\" Kevin asked, butting in, something he rarely did, but this was an irresistible provocation.\n\n\"Yeah, Greg,\" Audie pleaded, also sensing his and his brother’s possible, no probable, involvement, \"if we did something to make you mad, tell us so we can make it right!\"\n\nThe seriousness and worry in Audie’s tone made an explanation mandatory. Greg sighed. \"You sure you want to hear it?\n\n\"Yeah,\" both boys said together.\n\n\"You won’t like it.\"\n\n\"All the more reason we have to know,\" Audie declared. If there was some friction between him and his only friend, Audie had to know because he had to make it right.\n\n\"Well, OK,\" Greg slowly spilled it, \"I got punched out by Tommy Quiggly yesterday, OK? He called you two ’bastards’ and I told him what I thought of that and him for saying it. Mr. Anderson caught us fighting and sent us to the Principal. I got sent home with a note and got the strap from my old man. I hurt at both ends!\"\n\nGreg had been right. Audie didn’t like it. Not one little bit. \"Oh, man!\" he groused. \"You got all that just for defending us? Greg, buddy, I’m so sorry!\" And he was, too. Greg saw Audie’s eyes glisten with moisture.\n\n\"Hey, man,\" he immediately said, \"that’s what friends are for. I’ve dropped Tommy. He’s not my friend any more and never will be again, OK?\"\n\n\"But that’s so unfair!\" Audie blurted out.\n\n\"That’s life,\" Greg explained. \"Shit happens. Forget it, OK?\"\n\nAudie looked deep into his friend’s eyes. With a catch in his voice he replied softly, \"No, Greg, I’ll never forget it. Thanks.\"\n\n\"Ah, don’t thank me,\" Greg demanded with a wave of his hand. \"Insult my friends, insult me. Tommy got what he deserved. You should see his nose! Ha!\"\n\n\"No,\" Audie corrected the mistaken reference, \"I meant thanks for being my friend.\"\n\nHearing that, Greg just wanted to end this conversation. \"You’re welcome,\" he said with a determined smile. \"Now forget it.\"\n\nBut Audie never did, to his undoing a month or so later.\n\nThat’s when the movies came to town. Not the pay-your-money-and take-your-seat variety; the they-gotta-be-made-somewhere kind. Some director looked at the various possible location sites scouted by the studio worker bees and decided that the fish pond cum fountain in front of Audie’s city hall was the perfect place for a murder. So, one bright spring day, a herd of vans, trucks, trailers and all that went with them showed up, the front of the city hall was cordoned off, the studio’s scenery folks went to work renaming the building and spreading around some highly suspicious looking potted palm trees with a carpet of astro turf hiding the pots and City Hall became the presidential palace of El Presidente. Soon to become His Excelente, the Ex-presidente. But that wouldn’t take place until the next day when the movie stars showed up for the take.\n\nGreg wanted to show up, too. He had never seen a movie being made and here was a chance in a lifetime (well, from Greg’s short span anyway). He wasn’t alone. Every kid in school except Audie and Kevin wanted to come watch. Audie and his brother couldn’t afford to go to the movies and TV wasn’t the same thing, so seeing them made held none of the fascination for those two that it did for the others. Alas, the script called for the murder (or more accurately, the assassination) to take place in the morning so the coup plotters could have time to blow up the presidential palace in the afternoon. This action had already taken place on the studio’s back lot and the editors would morph a picture of City Hall onto the back lot’s plaster facade at some later date. It wouldn’t be the first time the plaster shell explosion was used that way either. That was a trivial matter, however. What counted was that the action here in town would start at 10:00 AM and be done and in the can by noon. That is, while the school kids were, well, in school. The principal was even so mean and hard-hearted as to grant no time out for this event (no doubt considering what the movie moguls would have to say if a gazillion noisy kids suddenly appeared on their expensive set).\n\nGreg decided on his own, that that was way over the top too mean of the principal and so just cut class and came and saw. Unfortunately, the security guards kept him and the other lookie-loos so far away that Greg couldn’t see much of anything, and when they were finished and the people were allowed closer, all the stars had disappeared, so it was pretty much of a bust.\n\nBust, yes, Greg thought to himself. More correctly, how now to keep that from happening to him. He had the presence of mind not to show up at school in the afternoon, trying for a much more likely sick day rather than a sick morning. So he biked over to Audie’s apartment house and knocked at the door of #33. Greg knew Kevin was supposed to be home from kindergarten by then. However, nobody answered his knock. Worried that something might be wrong with Audie’s little brother, Greg hung around the apartment complex hoping to catch sight of the little guy. No such luck. It took forever, but at last Greg spotted Audie climbing the steps.\n\n\"Hey, Audie,\" he yelled, running to meet him.\n\n\"Greg!\" Audie stopped half way up the stairs at the unexpected sight. \"I missed you at lunch today. What the heck’s up?\"\n\n\"Audie,\" Greg blurted out, \"Kevin’s not back from school yet. Is he OK?\"\n\nFully alarmed, Audie gasped. \"Huh? How do you know that?\"\n\n\"Because I knocked - several times - and nobody answered!\"\n\nAudie breathed out, relieved. \"Did you call out your name?\" he asked with a smile.\n\n\"No, why?\"\n\n\"Because Kevin isn’t allowed to answer the door unless I’m there. Too dangerous. Come, let’s see.\" Ignoring, for the moment, the unexplained visit, a first for Greg at Audie’s, Audie climbed the rest of the steps and unlocked the door. Sticking his head in he shouted, \"Kevie, it’s me!\"\n\nThere was a sound of running steps accompanied by Kevin’s voice. \"Hi, Audie!\"\n\nAudie turned around and smiled at Greg. \"See?\" he asked. \"Come in.\"\n\nRelieved from worrying about his friend’s little brother, Greg allowed himself to be led inside. His first impression was how small Audie’s \"house\" was, but then he saw that it was neat and kept up. It wasn’t the slum Greg feared it might have been, given Greg’s father’s comments about its not being impressive.\n\n\"Look who’s here, Kevie,\" Audie exclaimed, dragging Greg front and center.\"\n\n\"Hi, Greg,\" Kevin smiled. \"What are you doing here?\"\n\n\"Kevin!\" Audie yelled at him and turned to Greg. \"He didn’t mean that the way it sounded.\"\n\n\"What?\" asked Kevin, not comprehending.\n\n\"Never mind, Squirt,\" Greg assured the boy with a pat on the shoulder. \"No offence taken. Did you hear me knock earlier?\"\n\nKevin shot a worried look at his brother. He was already in some sort of trouble over what he had just said and now this. But he was just following the rules! \"Yesssss,\" he replied slowly, waiting for the blow to fall, \"but I’m not allowed to answer a knock unless Audie is home.\"\n\n\"Understood,\" Greg said with a smile, reassuring Kevin that things were alright. \"That’s as it should be, I guess. What would you have done if I had called out my name?\"\n\nThat was a question! Kevin stammered. That contingency hadn’t been planned for. Seeing the look of worried confusion on the little boy’s face made Greg glad he hadn’t called out.\n\nAudie also saw Kevin’s look and immediately answered. \"Kevie, you can answer the door if Greg calls again, but make sure it’s really him before you do, OK\"\n\n\"OK,\" Kevin replied and filed the new rule with the rest. There were so many!\n\nAudie then turned to Greg and smiled. \"So, then, why *are* you here? Not that I’m not happy to see you. Come, sit down.\" Audie led them into the living room and they sat down on the sofa. Audie turned off Kevin’s TV program. Kevin didn’t object - the present doings were far more interesting. They had never had visitors their own age before!\n\nGreg got real serious. \"Uh, Audie, I need a favor.\"\n\n\"Sure, pal, anything. What is it?\" Had he known, Audie might not have been so agreeable.\n\n\"Well, it’s like this. You know they were making a movie at City Hall today?\"\n\nAudie’s mind went to work on that. Fact: A movie was being made today at City Hall. Fact: All the other kids wanted to watch. Fact: Greg was not at school today. Fact: Greg was here now and didn’t look sick or anything. Uh-oh.\n\n\"Well, I cut class today and went to watch. Useless! I didn’t get to see a thing. And now I have to come up with an excuse for tomorrow. I mean for today, tomorrow. You know what I mean?\"\n\nAudie had it figured out by now and didn’t like the answer. \"Yesss,\" he said, inviting the other shoe to fall.\n\nGreg dropped it with a thud. \"Well, I know that you, Audie, signed Kevin’s note and they accepted it. Would you write me an excuse for today? Say I was sick?\"\n\nAudie’s heart sunk. He didn’t want to do it. It was soooo risky, but then he thought of Greg’s fighting Tommy just because that brat had called Audie a name. He remembered Greg saying \"That’s what friends are for.\" Well, that settled that. Unless...\n\n\"Hey, Greg, are you sure you want to risk that. What if you’re caught? It will go all the worse for you...\"\n\n\"Yeah,\" Kevin put in. \"And Audie will get in trouble, too!\"\n\nGreg turned to Audie. \"No you won’t. I won’t tell who wrote it if they catch me, but they won’t. They didn’t when you signed Kevin’s note, did they?\"\n\n\"You’re serious!\" Audie made the statement sound like a question. Or the question sound like a statement.\n\n\"Hell, yes, I’m serious!\" Greg exclaimed. Well, that made it final. Audie had no choice. He would have to explain to Kevin later and he hoped his little brother could be made to understand.\n\n\"Well, OK,\" he said to Greg, \"but I don’t think this is going to work.\"\n\n\"Sure it will! Write, write!\"\n\nAudie opened his book bag, took out a pen and his notebook. Tearing out a page he wrote, trying to remember what his mother wrote when Audie had been sick.\n\n\"Please excuse Greg’s absence yesterday. He didn’t feel well. Thank you.\"\n\n\"What’s your Mother’s name?\" he asked.\n\n\"Ashley,\" Greg responded.\n\n\"A-s-h-l-e-y?\" Audie asked, unsure of the spelling.\n\n\"Yep,\" Greg said as he watched Audie write it down.\n\nAudie was then embarrassed. He had been friends with Greg for how long now? And he still didn’t know Greg’s last name. \"Uh,\" he stammered, \"Ashley what?\"\n\n\"Why, Ashley Carmichael, of course!\" Greg returned.\n\nAudie filed that away for future reference. \"Spell it,\" he demanded. \"We can’t take chances. Speaking of that, Kevie run get the dictionary!\" Audie signed the note Ashley Carmichael in what he hoped looked like a grown-up’s handwriting. Kevin appeared lugging the huge dictionary, almost too big for him to carry. Audie looked up \"absence\" just to make sure and handed the ersatz note to his friend. \"Hope this works, Greg. Don’t get mad at me if it doesn’t!\"\n\n\"Never!\" Greg replied like he meant it. \"Thanks, buddy. I gotta run now before my mother notices I’m late. See you tomorrow. Bye!\" Audie saw him to the door then turned to his brother.\n\n\"Get the wasps, Kevie. We gotta go get dinner.\" Audie went to the cigar box as Kevin headed for the cupboard where the weapons were stored.\n\nGreg turned in his note to Mr. Anderson the next morning and it was accepted and that was that. Or so Greg thought. What he didn’t know was that, while teachers may send notes home to parents about such things as fighting and cheating and deal themselves with the results, attendance is another matter altogether. Attendance is a matter of money. The State kept track of that little statistic and if there were too many student-days missed, the school’s funding was decreased accordingly. The State wanted to get what it was paying for. The school officials wanted to get paid, period. Ergo, they had instituted a policy of checking up on each absence by calling the parents to confirm the note. Around 10:00 Greg was summoned to the Principal’s office. Lunch that afternoon was a somber affair.\n\n\"I’m in deep trouble, guys,\" Greg had admitted as soon as he had sat down with Audie and Kevin. \"The principal called my mom to confirm the note.\"\n\n\"NO!\" gasped Audie, immediately fearing for himself.\n\n\"Don’t worry, Audie,\" Greg reassured him, \"I didn’t rat on you and I won’t, even if my dad gives me extras tonight. Trust me, you won’t be found out!\"\n\n\"Extras?\" asked Kevin. \"What’s ’extras’?\"\n\n\"Kevie...\" Audie started to shoosh his embarrassing little brother. Audie had understood. Greg wasn’t bashful, however.\n\n\"My dad’s giving me the strap tonight when he gets home. Probably good and hard, too. If he wants to know who wrote the note he may give me extra strokes until I tell. But I won’t, Audie, I won’t rat on a friend. Believe me.\"\n\nAudie zoned out for a few minutes, thinking. Mr. Carmichael wasn’t dumb. He knew that Audie and his son were close friends. He was sure to suspect that Audie was the forger. What then? All of Audie’s hard efforts to appear better than a bastard might then all be forfeited. Audie had long suspected that he and his little brother’s status was known my Greg’s parents after that incident of the fight. Although nothing had been said by anybody, Audie just knew he had been discussed. He has assumed his campaign of best behavior at all times had overcome the onus of being a bastard. Now what? Would Mr. Carmichael forbid Greg to associate with Audie the bastard-forger? Would Audie lose his only friend over this? What a stinking hole he was in! Greg, too, although in his case, Greg had dug most of it himself. But Audie didn’t want Greg to get ’extras’ just to protect Audie. Then there was Kevin to think about. What would his little brother think about Audie cheating, getting somebody else in trouble and then getting off scott free? Worse, what if Mr. Carmichael told the principal? Audie didn’t want to get in trouble at school - that might lead to the authorities coming to the apartment and taking him and his brother away from each other. That last possibility made Audie’s decision for him. Nothing could be worse than that. Aloud, he announced that decision.\n\n\"Greg, don’t lie about me or take extras keeping it secret. That may just make things worse for both of us. I’m in this almost as deep as you are. I don’t want it to get worse. Greg, I’m coming home with you tonight and standing with you. I have to.\"\n\n\"WHAT!!!?\" gasped Greg, shocked at the very idea.\n\n\"Huh?\" asked Kevin, just as surprised.\n\n(to be continued)", "writing_bbcode_parsed": "The days went by after that. Despite the long odds, Audie and Greg remained friends and the friendship managed to grow. Even though Greg eventually made other friends and Audie did not, Greg reserved a special place for the strange kid with the awesome responsibilities. Greg understood when Audie just couldn’t get away to spend time with him, except for lunch at school, which the three of them always ate together. Greg had Audie and Kevin over to his house for food several times and both he and Audie understood that it could never be reciprocated. Greg was not allowed to visit friends if there was no adult around to supervise. Rules. Audie never had to cook at Greg’s again.

One cold winter day, Greg turned up at lunch with a righteous black eye.

Audie took one look and asked, "OK, so who’d you pick a fight with?" He was trying to make light of the incident, pal-to-pal. The response was totally unexpected.

"I don’t want to talk about it, OK?" Greg snapped the answer, his eyes apprehensive, made all the more so by the color of the right one. Audie immediately sensed there was more behind this than met the eye (so to speak). Probably much more. He wanted to know, so, frowning, Audie tried to draw his friend out.

"Aw, cummon," he pushed, "we’re pals, aren’t we? I won’t tell. Come on, give."

"No," Greg snapped again, almost shouting. "I said I don’t want to talk about it. Especially to you two!"

"What’d we do?" Kevin asked, butting in, something he rarely did, but this was an irresistible provocation.

"Yeah, Greg," Audie pleaded, also sensing his and his brother’s possible, no probable, involvement, "if we did something to make you mad, tell us so we can make it right!"

The seriousness and worry in Audie’s tone made an explanation mandatory. Greg sighed. "You sure you want to hear it?

"Yeah," both boys said together.

"You won’t like it."

"All the more reason we have to know," Audie declared. If there was some friction between him and his only friend, Audie had to know because he had to make it right.

"Well, OK," Greg slowly spilled it, "I got punched out by Tommy Quiggly yesterday, OK? He called you two ’bastards’ and I told him what I thought of that and him for saying it. Mr. Anderson caught us fighting and sent us to the Principal. I got sent home with a note and got the strap from my old man. I hurt at both ends!"

Greg had been right. Audie didn’t like it. Not one little bit. "Oh, man!" he groused. "You got all that just for defending us? Greg, buddy, I’m so sorry!" And he was, too. Greg saw Audie’s eyes glisten with moisture.

"Hey, man," he immediately said, "that’s what friends are for. I’ve dropped Tommy. He’s not my friend any more and never will be again, OK?"

"But that’s so unfair!" Audie blurted out.

"That’s life," Greg explained. "Shit happens. Forget it, OK?"

Audie looked deep into his friend’s eyes. With a catch in his voice he replied softly, "No, Greg, I’ll never forget it. Thanks."

"Ah, don’t thank me," Greg demanded with a wave of his hand. "Insult my friends, insult me. Tommy got what he deserved. You should see his nose! Ha!"

"No," Audie corrected the mistaken reference, "I meant thanks for being my friend."

Hearing that, Greg just wanted to end this conversation. "You’re welcome," he said with a determined smile. "Now forget it."

But Audie never did, to his undoing a month or so later.

That’s when the movies came to town. Not the pay-your-money-and take-your-seat variety; the they-gotta-be-made-somewhere kind. Some director looked at the various possible location sites scouted by the studio worker bees and decided that the fish pond cum fountain in front of Audie’s city hall was the perfect place for a murder. So, one bright spring day, a herd of vans, trucks, trailers and all that went with them showed up, the front of the city hall was cordoned off, the studio’s scenery folks went to work renaming the building and spreading around some highly suspicious looking potted palm trees with a carpet of astro turf hiding the pots and City Hall became the presidential palace of El Presidente. Soon to become His Excelente, the Ex-presidente. But that wouldn’t take place until the next day when the movie stars showed up for the take.

Greg wanted to show up, too. He had never seen a movie being made and here was a chance in a lifetime (well, from Greg’s short span anyway). He wasn’t alone. Every kid in school except Audie and Kevin wanted to come watch. Audie and his brother couldn’t afford to go to the movies and TV wasn’t the same thing, so seeing them made held none of the fascination for those two that it did for the others. Alas, the script called for the murder (or more accurately, the assassination) to take place in the morning so the coup plotters could have time to blow up the presidential palace in the afternoon. This action had already taken place on the studio’s back lot and the editors would morph a picture of City Hall onto the back lot’s plaster facade at some later date. It wouldn’t be the first time the plaster shell explosion was used that way either. That was a trivial matter, however. What counted was that the action here in town would start at 10:00 AM and be done and in the can by noon. That is, while the school kids were, well, in school. The principal was even so mean and hard-hearted as to grant no time out for this event (no doubt considering what the movie moguls would have to say if a gazillion noisy kids suddenly appeared on their expensive set).

Greg decided on his own, that that was way over the top too mean of the principal and so just cut class and came and saw. Unfortunately, the security guards kept him and the other lookie-loos so far away that Greg couldn’t see much of anything, and when they were finished and the people were allowed closer, all the stars had disappeared, so it was pretty much of a bust.

Bust, yes, Greg thought to himself. More correctly, how now to keep that from happening to him. He had the presence of mind not to show up at school in the afternoon, trying for a much more likely sick day rather than a sick morning. So he biked over to Audie’s apartment house and knocked at the door of #33. Greg knew Kevin was supposed to be home from kindergarten by then. However, nobody answered his knock. Worried that something might be wrong with Audie’s little brother, Greg hung around the apartment complex hoping to catch sight of the little guy. No such luck. It took forever, but at last Greg spotted Audie climbing the steps.

"Hey, Audie," he yelled, running to meet him.

"Greg!" Audie stopped half way up the stairs at the unexpected sight. "I missed you at lunch today. What the heck’s up?"

"Audie," Greg blurted out, "Kevin’s not back from school yet. Is he OK?"

Fully alarmed, Audie gasped. "Huh? How do you know that?"

"Because I knocked - several times - and nobody answered!"

Audie breathed out, relieved. "Did you call out your name?" he asked with a smile.

"No, why?"

"Because Kevin isn’t allowed to answer the door unless I’m there. Too dangerous. Come, let’s see." Ignoring, for the moment, the unexplained visit, a first for Greg at Audie’s, Audie climbed the rest of the steps and unlocked the door. Sticking his head in he shouted, "Kevie, it’s me!"

There was a sound of running steps accompanied by Kevin’s voice. "Hi, Audie!"

Audie turned around and smiled at Greg. "See?" he asked. "Come in."

Relieved from worrying about his friend’s little brother, Greg allowed himself to be led inside. His first impression was how small Audie’s "house" was, but then he saw that it was neat and kept up. It wasn’t the slum Greg feared it might have been, given Greg’s father’s comments about its not being impressive.

"Look who’s here, Kevie," Audie exclaimed, dragging Greg front and center."

"Hi, Greg," Kevin smiled. "What are you doing here?"

"Kevin!" Audie yelled at him and turned to Greg. "He didn’t mean that the way it sounded."

"What?" asked Kevin, not comprehending.

"Never mind, Squirt," Greg assured the boy with a pat on the shoulder. "No offence taken. Did you hear me knock earlier?"

Kevin shot a worried look at his brother. He was already in some sort of trouble over what he had just said and now this. But he was just following the rules! "Yesssss," he replied slowly, waiting for the blow to fall, "but I’m not allowed to answer a knock unless Audie is home."

"Understood," Greg said with a smile, reassuring Kevin that things were alright. "That’s as it should be, I guess. What would you have done if I had called out my name?"

That was a question! Kevin stammered. That contingency hadn’t been planned for. Seeing the look of worried confusion on the little boy’s face made Greg glad he hadn’t called out.

Audie also saw Kevin’s look and immediately answered. "Kevie, you can answer the door if Greg calls again, but make sure it’s really him before you do, OK"

"OK," Kevin replied and filed the new rule with the rest. There were so many!

Audie then turned to Greg and smiled. "So, then, why *are* you here? Not that I’m not happy to see you. Come, sit down." Audie led them into the living room and they sat down on the sofa. Audie turned off Kevin’s TV program. Kevin didn’t object - the present doings were far more interesting. They had never had visitors their own age before!

Greg got real serious. "Uh, Audie, I need a favor."

"Sure, pal, anything. What is it?" Had he known, Audie might not have been so agreeable.

"Well, it’s like this. You know they were making a movie at City Hall today?"

Audie’s mind went to work on that. Fact: A movie was being made today at City Hall. Fact: All the other kids wanted to watch. Fact: Greg was not at school today. Fact: Greg was here now and didn’t look sick or anything. Uh-oh.

"Well, I cut class today and went to watch. Useless! I didn’t get to see a thing. And now I have to come up with an excuse for tomorrow. I mean for today, tomorrow. You know what I mean?"

Audie had it figured out by now and didn’t like the answer. "Yesss," he said, inviting the other shoe to fall.

Greg dropped it with a thud. "Well, I know that you, Audie, signed Kevin’s note and they accepted it. Would you write me an excuse for today? Say I was sick?"

Audie’s heart sunk. He didn’t want to do it. It was soooo risky, but then he thought of Greg’s fighting Tommy just because that brat had called Audie a name. He remembered Greg saying "That’s what friends are for." Well, that settled that. Unless...

"Hey, Greg, are you sure you want to risk that. What if you’re caught? It will go all the worse for you..."

"Yeah," Kevin put in. "And Audie will get in trouble, too!"

Greg turned to Audie. "No you won’t. I won’t tell who wrote it if they catch me, but they won’t. They didn’t when you signed Kevin’s note, did they?"

"You’re serious!" Audie made the statement sound like a question. Or the question sound like a statement.

"Hell, yes, I’m serious!" Greg exclaimed. Well, that made it final. Audie had no choice. He would have to explain to Kevin later and he hoped his little brother could be made to understand.

"Well, OK," he said to Greg, "but I don’t think this is going to work."

"Sure it will! Write, write!"

Audie opened his book bag, took out a pen and his notebook. Tearing out a page he wrote, trying to remember what his mother wrote when Audie had been sick.

"Please excuse Greg’s absence yesterday. He didn’t feel well. Thank you."

"What’s your Mother’s name?" he asked.

"Ashley," Greg responded.

"A-s-h-l-e-y?" Audie asked, unsure of the spelling.

"Yep," Greg said as he watched Audie write it down.

Audie was then embarrassed. He had been friends with Greg for how long now? And he still didn’t know Greg’s last name. "Uh," he stammered, "Ashley what?"

"Why, Ashley Carmichael, of course!" Greg returned.

Audie filed that away for future reference. "Spell it," he demanded. "We can’t take chances. Speaking of that, Kevie run get the dictionary!" Audie signed the note Ashley Carmichael in what he hoped looked like a grown-up’s handwriting. Kevin appeared lugging the huge dictionary, almost too big for him to carry. Audie looked up "absence" just to make sure and handed the ersatz note to his friend. "Hope this works, Greg. Don’t get mad at me if it doesn’t!"

"Never!" Greg replied like he meant it. "Thanks, buddy. I gotta run now before my mother notices I’m late. See you tomorrow. Bye!" Audie saw him to the door then turned to his brother.

"Get the wasps, Kevie. We gotta go get dinner." Audie went to the cigar box as Kevin headed for the cupboard where the weapons were stored.

Greg turned in his note to Mr. Anderson the next morning and it was accepted and that was that. Or so Greg thought. What he didn’t know was that, while teachers may send notes home to parents about such things as fighting and cheating and deal themselves with the results, attendance is another matter altogether. Attendance is a matter of money. The State kept track of that little statistic and if there were too many student-days missed, the school’s funding was decreased accordingly. The State wanted to get what it was paying for. The school officials wanted to get paid, period. Ergo, they had instituted a policy of checking up on each absence by calling the parents to confirm the note. Around 10:00 Greg was summoned to the Principal’s office. Lunch that afternoon was a somber affair.

"I’m in deep trouble, guys," Greg had admitted as soon as he had sat down with Audie and Kevin. "The principal called my mom to confirm the note."

"NO!" gasped Audie, immediately fearing for himself.

"Don’t worry, Audie," Greg reassured him, "I didn’t rat on you and I won’t, even if my dad gives me extras tonight. Trust me, you won’t be found out!"

"Extras?" asked Kevin. "What’s ’extras’?"

"Kevie..." Audie started to shoosh his embarrassing little brother. Audie had understood. Greg wasn’t bashful, however.

"My dad’s giving me the strap tonight when he gets home. Probably good and hard, too. If he wants to know who wrote the note he may give me extra strokes until I tell. But I won’t, Audie, I won’t rat on a friend. Believe me."

Audie zoned out for a few minutes, thinking. Mr. Carmichael wasn’t dumb. He knew that Audie and his son were close friends. He was sure to suspect that Audie was the forger. What then? All of Audie’s hard efforts to appear better than a bastard might then all be forfeited. Audie had long suspected that he and his little brother’s status was known my Greg’s parents after that incident of the fight. Although nothing had been said by anybody, Audie just knew he had been discussed. He has assumed his campaign of best behavior at all times had overcome the onus of being a bastard. Now what? Would Mr. Carmichael forbid Greg to associate with Audie the bastard-forger? Would Audie lose his only friend over this? What a stinking hole he was in! Greg, too, although in his case, Greg had dug most of it himself. But Audie didn’t want Greg to get ’extras’ just to protect Audie. Then there was Kevin to think about. What would his little brother think about Audie cheating, getting somebody else in trouble and then getting off scott free? Worse, what if Mr. Carmichael told the principal? Audie didn’t want to get in trouble at school - that might lead to the authorities coming to the apartment and taking him and his brother away from each other. That last possibility made Audie’s decision for him. Nothing could be worse than that. Aloud, he announced that decision.

"Greg, don’t lie about me or take extras keeping it secret. That may just make things worse for both of us. I’m in this almost as deep as you are. I don’t want it to get worse. Greg, I’m coming home with you tonight and standing with you. I have to."

"WHAT!!!?" gasped Greg, shocked at the very idea.

"Huh?" asked Kevin, just as surprised.

(to be continued)", "pools_count": 1, "title": "The Tale of Two Little Bastards - Chapter 5", "deleted": "f", "public": "t", "mimetype": "text/plain", "pagecount": "1", "rating_id": "2", "rating_name": "Adult", "ratings": [ { "content_tag_id": "3", "name": "Violence", "description": "Mild violence", "rating_id": "1" }, { "content_tag_id": "4", "name": "Sexual Themes", "description": "Erotic imagery, sexual activity or arousal", "rating_id": "2" } ], "submission_type_id": "12", "type_name": "Writing - Document", "guest_block": "f", "friends_only": "f", "comments_count": "0", "views": "73" }