Chapter 5

“Oh, hi,” Hubert said, suddenly eager to sit up. “Did you see? I fell. I think I’m all right, though. Weird: it don’t hurt at all.”

The golden boy nodded. “Yeah, he thunked you pretty good. You probably didn’t have time to feel it. I s’pose that’s a blessing, huh?”

Hubert nodded, too. He looked into the golden boy’s friendly face, all wide brown eyes and rosy cheeks, and smiled. Then he wrinkled his nose. “How do you know my name? From everybody saying it?”

The golden boy smiled with one half of his mouth. “Something like that.”

“I should let Big Jimmy know I’m okay. He don’t look so good.”

“Yeah, that’s gonna take him a while,” the golden boy said. He laid a hand on Hubert’s shoulder and a tingling warmth burst through Hubert like he’d been shot full of sunshine. “You’re gonna come with me, though, want to?”

“Are you like a doctor?”

“Not exactly.”

“‘Cause that’s quite a healing touch you got there.”