Mike found out before the other kids at school. Mama had picked him up from school and said that Kurt's dad said Kurt could come over. His mom must have had some appointment, or something. He didn't think anything of it.

The book club had been at Kurt's house the night before, and Mike's mom couldn't find a sitter so she'd brought him with her. Their moms shooed them down into Kurt's room to play. They hadn't played much together in a long while, maybe not since the Neighborhood Block Party several months prior. At school Mike always seemed to be around really smart kids or really athletic kids, and Kurt didn't feel comfortable with a lot of them, so he kept a distance at school. Mike knew some kids made fun of Kurt, but he tried to stay out of it. He's my neighbor, it's not cool to make fun of your neighbor. And besides, he'd noticed that Kurt never made fun of his lunches or the way Chinese people talk like kids on his bus did.

"This is your room?!" Mike asked. He was very impressed that Kurt had the whole basement to himself.

Kurt was a little relieved that Mike seemed to approve. He didn't have a lot of kids over and when he did they usually just played outside. "I've been working on redecorating."

"You got a lot of art supplies!" Mike noted, pointing to the craft table his parents had set up that was currently covered in chalk and tissue paper.

Kurt nodded. "My mom always looks for stuff people don't want anymore at garage sales. Someone was going to give a whole box of that tissue paper away!"

Mike looked at the photos on Kurt's bookshelf. He stopped at one that had been taken after a little recital from when he was in ballet class a couple years ago.

"What's that?"

Kurt looked a little embarrassed. "Oh. Um. When I was little my mom let me take a dance class," he muttered.

"Really?" Mike asked. "I wish my parents would let me do that."

Kurt lit up, surprised. "Really?"

Mike nodded, shy.

"It's called ballet. It's French dancing." Kurt told him authoritatively. "We had a recital. Some people think dancing is just for girls but I got the best part in the show because I was the only boy in the class," he bragged.

Mike nodded. "I danced in a performance at Chinese School last year. It was really neat. But my mom and dad say I have to keep up my grades there more if I want to do more activities."

"What's Chinese School?"

Mike made a face. "On Saturdays. It's like regular school 'cept I learn Chinese there. And sometimes stuff about geography."

"Oh." Kurt thought it must be awful to have to go to school on Saturdays. That's when all the best cartoons were on. "Is it hard to learn Chinese?"

"Sometimes. "

"I learned some French words in ballet so I told my mom I want to learn French when I get bigger. She says they teach it at high school."

Mike nodded. "It's cool to learn a different language. It's sort of like a secret code other kids don't know. 'Cept they have lots of homework at Chinese school. But I have lots of friends there and my Dad says I'm getting better."

Kurt thought Mike was probably the smartest kid he knew. He had a really hard time learning his times tables and was pretty intimidated when he realized Mike knew them all one day when the teacher had paired them up to practice with flash cards. But Mike was nice about it and didn't make fun of him for not knowing them all yet. That was good because it was starting to seem like most kids were always finding something new to make fun of him for.

"Hey can you teach me to do ballet?" Mike asked shyly.

"Well it's been awhile, but I was very good at it so I think so," Kurt boasted. He actually hadn't been in a class in two years. Elizabeth had put him in ballet and Burt didn't have a big problem with it until he saw that he was the only boy in the class when they had that recital. Kurt was already so… different… from the kind of kid he'd been as a boy and he worried that it wasn't good for a kid to just hang out with girls all the time. They compromised and put him in some art classes after that, which he loved, but it turned out that drawing was more of an independent activity and it didn't really result in Kurt gaining a bunch of new friends. Burt and Elizabeth were hoping that Kurt would come out of his shell as he got older.

"Can you stand up on your toes? That's called relevé. No, like this." Kurt enjoyed being the teacher. "Can you say relevé?"

"Relevé?" Mike said, trying to walk around on his toes.
"And plié means bending your knees. So in ballet you're always relevé-ing and plié-ing and when you're good at that then you can do cool jumps like this. " Kurt demonstrated with a spin.

Mike and Kurt had so much fun dancing around Kurt's bedroom that the usual boring book club time flew by. Their mothers came back downstairs an hour later to the sound of a lot of giggling.

"What are you boys up to?" Elizabeth asked, coming down the stairs.

"Kurt's teaching me French!" Mike announced.

"Oh really, Michael?" Mrs. Chang laughed. "I thought you were working on your Chinese?"

"I can learn both, Mama."

"You can teach me Chinese too, if you want." Kurt offered.

"Oh you'd like it, cuz you're good at art. You have to learn to make lots of characters."

Kurt beamed to hear that Mike thought he was good at art.

"Well if you two are opening a little language school I guess we'll have to make some more time for you get together." said Elizabeth, pleased. Mike and Kurt happily agreed.

So the next day Mike was really excited to find out that his mom had already set up a play date. He didn't notice how shaken Mama seemed. Usually going to McDonald's was a treat handed out at most a couple times a year, and he thought he'd hit the jackpot when she announced they were going to go there to play and have dinner. He wasn't paying attention while she kept checking her phone. He was having too much fun playing with Kurt and teaching him all the color words he knew in Chinese while they chased each other up the playscape.

Later they got back to his house and played outside together. Mr. Hummel picked up Kurt shortly after. Mike would always remember that it seemed like something was off about Kurt's dad that night. Kurt was babbling on about all the new words he knew in Chinese now, and asking if they could go on vacation to China someday, and his father was just sort of nodding and looking away, distant. He remembered his mother hugged Mr. Hummel and that seemed strange to him. His own dad had put his hand on his shoulder and told Mr. Hummel to let them know if they needed anything, and that Kurt was welcome to come over to play anytime. Mama made a big deal about how well behaved Kurt had been, and Kurt asked his dad if that meant he could have ice cream for dessert. Kurt's dad nodded and Kurt squealed in joy.

"Bye, Mike, see you in school tomorrow!" Kurt had said.

"Hey, say thank you to Mike's mom and dad," his dad had reminded.

"Thanks Mr. and Mrs. Chang!" Kurt yelled back as he ran in the direction of his house.

After the Hummels left, Mama started crying and Dad put his arms around her. Mike didn't know why she was unhappy. His father would try to explain that night. It was really important to be extra nice to Kurt now, he said. Kurt's mom was really sick and in the hospital. She was kind of asleep and they didn't know if she was going to wake up. Mike didn't really understand, but he kept thinking about how happy Kurt had been running off to get that ice cream. Mike didn't know it then, but it would be a long time before he saw his neighbor friend that happy again.