The rest of Sunday passed without much happening. In mid-afternoon, Harold, Justin and Tom had a barbecue in the backyard. Harold had taken coarse-ground, lean burger meat and mixed it with onion soup mix and Worcestershire sauce. One burger had no mix-in, just for Tom, who shouldn't have onions or salt in his diet.

Justin cut up lettuce, spinach and tomatoes for a salad, served with a dressing made of olive oil and garlic-flavored vinegar. The buns were quickly toasted on the fire, too, then slathered with mayo, mustard and ketchup. A handful of potato chips each and a serving of iced tea made a very satisfying meal with cookies for dessert. Tom even got part of one cookie since they were oatmeal with no raisins or chocolate.

Afterward, Harold tuned in to the Dodgers who actually still had a chance to win their division and the whole family relaxed in front of the TV. Tom lay down between their chairs and his tail thumped a few times; he liked his humans close by.

"Don't wave that thing in front of the screen," said Harold. He rolled his chair back to give the big dog more room. Tom scooted over and lay down again, his flagpole tail thumped once more.

"That's better," said Harold, dropping a hand to rub the dog between the ears.

Justin laughed.

Harold sighed. "Those were good burgers, if I do say so myself."

"Yeah, but Mom made a better salad."

"Hard to keep everything you need on hand for a good salad with just two of us to eat things up."

"Woof," said Tom.

"You don't eat salad," said Harold.

"Correction," said Justin. "We don't LET him eat salad, not after last time."

The humans laughed and Tom wagged his tail; salad stuff gave him terrible gas but he loved tomatoes.

The phone rang, an ancient landline device with a handset heavy enough to use as a weapon hanging from the kitchen wall. Justin went to answer it, pulling a dining room chair over to sit in.

It was Jenn Stewart. "Hey," she said. "We missed you yesterday."

"Oh, hey," said Justin. "Sorry I didn't feel like going."

"I'm sorry," said Jenn. "I know what Zoe did to you. That was kinda rotten. And then she doesn't show up."

Justin shrugged even though Jenn could not hear that. "No," he said. "I mean I was really feeling kind of sick at my stomach."

"Oh, ha!"

"What?"

"Oh, something funny just occurred to me."

"I could use a laugh," said Justin.

"Well, I almost asked you if your period was late," said Jenn, trying not to giggle.

"Oh, ha," said Justin.

"Yeah, funny but not that funny. So what you doin'?"

"Watching football with my Dad." He glanced at the television. "Uh, no, it's baseball."

"You, watching sports?"

Justin shrugged again. "I know, huh?"

"Who wants to see a bunch of Neanderthals running around carrying a pig under their arms?"

Justin laughed. "That's football."

"You ever thought about the people who must live in the Neanderthal valley right now? What do they call themselves?"

Justin laughed again. "I saw this show that said that Neanderthals actually had bigger brains than we do."

"Yeah, well they were bigger than us, too. Heavier but not as tall."

"They were cold adapted so maybe they used their bigger brains for central heating."

Jenn laughed at that. "They said in health class that your brain burns 20% of all the calories you use, so maybe that would work."

They giggled even more about that.

They talked about the weather, friends, parents, and school, which had just started up again on Wednesday. "Why do they do that?" Justin asked. "We had three days last week and then we'll have only four days this week because of the holiday. It's stupid."

"It's like boiling frogs," said Jenn. "If we get used to it slowly we won't notice how awful high school is."

They giggled again but Justin asked. "What's that mean, boiling frogs? Sounds gross."

"Well, if you dump a frog in boiling water or even just really hot, he'll jump right out and not be that bad hurt, huh?"

"I guess."

"But if you put him in cold water then heat it up slowly, he doesn't notice at first and then...."

"Frog soup. I was right, it is gross. And you're right, high school is like that. Freshman year they take it easy on you but now that we're sophomores they start cutting up the carrots and turnips and dropping them on our heads." They giggled again.

"We really did miss you today, Justin," Jenn said.

"I bet," he said. "Two girls and their boyfriends. You needed me like...like you needed goldfish crackers."

"Huh?"

"For the frog soup!" More giggles.

Justin saw that Harold had picked up a book and wasn't actually paying much attention to the television, but the sound was loud enough that he didn't think his dad could hear what he was saying to Jenn. It wasn't Vin Scully but somebody else doing the pre-game and it didn't hold Harold's interest.

"What are you doing tomorrow, Juice?" Jenn asked. "Carmine and Ell and Shabeez and me, we're going to the sales. Plaza in the morning and Tyler in the afternoon, come back to Plaza for the band, late. Eat lunch at Red Brick maybe. Wanna come along?"

"What for? So you guys can beat up on me? You're all bigger than me and I'll be outnumbered."

"No, cause you're our friend and we all feel bad about...about what Zoe did. We knew she was playing you but we didn't tell you."

Justin didn't say anything.

"Juice? Are you mad at us?"

"No," he said with emphasis. "'Course I'm not mad at you."

"Well then, come on. We'll have some fun. Pete and his dopey friend Vince won't be along to make stupid jokes and we can laugh at whatever...."

"You guys will want to shop for girl stuff."

"And that's why we want you along. You've got better taste than any of us."

Justin laughed and Jenn giggled. "It's true, isn't it?"

"Well, if we can just keep Shabeez from buying anything orange...." They both giggled.

"Okay, then," said Jenn. "Can you be at my house by ten? We can take a bus to Plaza."

"What if it rains?"

"Then we'll go to Tyler first, it's indoors."

"You want to do some serious shopping, huh?"

"I got some money to spend, what else?" She laughed. "Come on Juice, it'll be fun."

"Well, okay," said Justin. "But I won't have any money. Just enough for lunch."

"That's okay, we'll all chip in and buy you something anyway."

"Uh...."

"Something really cute."

"Jenn...."

She laughed. "See you at ten, 'kay?"

"Okay."

"I gotta go, we're having a late dinner. Dad burned the steaks and won't admit it so we have to pretend they are fine."

"Good luck with that," said Justin.

"See ya."

"See ya." He hung up the phone.

Harold turned his head to look at him. "One of the girls?"

Justin frowned. "How'd you know?"

"You laugh different when you're talking to the girls," his father said.

"Woof, woof," said Tom, starting to stand up.

Harold put his book down on the Great Poofy's thick skull. "Stay put. Scully's about to read the line-up." Tom obediently lay back down, balancing the book on his head.

Justin walked back to his seat in the living room. "Dad, I didn't give you back the money I had for yesterday...."

"That's okay, son. You want to use it tomorrow?"

"If that would be okay. Just buy some lunch and bus fare... and maybe a coke."

"You got enough?"

"Oh, yeah."

Harold nodded. "Okay. I guess you're walking over to Jenn's?" She lived closest and near the bus stop on Market.

"Yeah."

"Well, have fun. And don't let the girls buy you a hat this time." Harold chuckled.

Justin laughed. "I won't," he said.