Fulton Reed wasn't exactly the kind of guy you could go through all thirteen years of school not ever noticing. He was after all the biggest guy in my grade, he had been since 3rd grade. The rumors about him were constant and everything from he was some genetic experiment to he was accepted to colleges to play football or something like that. He was always the topic of conversation especially at the Ducks table at lunch. I had been sitting with Connie at lunch since the year before but now with the guys joining us, the topics of conversation varied slightly from what I would have been talking about.
"Hey, did you see Fulton Reed this morning?" Goldberg started his usual conversation of Friday mornings. Connie and I groaned from our seats at the end of the table.
"Man, here he comes.." Jesse said motioning for everyone to quiet down. I looked up in the direction of the entrance and saw him coming to walk passed out table, lunch tray in hand.
"Hey." I said cheerfully as he stopped to stare down at him with wondering eyes. He was almost waiting for me to make fun of him, or throw some insult his way but that wasn't my intention. Jesse, Guy and Goldberg looked at me like I had three heads.
"Do you want to sit with us?" I asked, moving Tommy's over in his seat next to me to move down a seat for him. I looked at the now open seat and back at him. He looked at me in contemplation for a moment before he turned to keep walking. Connie nudged me in the arm after he left.
"Tammy, he's weird.." She said, turning back to Guy as he smiled up at her and opened her bag of chips, placing them back down on the table in front of her. He looked at him slightly confused before continuing to stare at me. I didn't say anything, noticing that everyone else had now directed their attention my way.
"Jeez, Tammy, no one talks to us now, want us to become complete outcasts..." Jesse said scoffing down the remainder of his lunch. It wasn't that the Ducks were shallow or they talked about everyone, but no one seemed to understand Fulton. Most of the Ducks came from middle class families, you know, he one's just barely making it from check to check with the exception of a few. My parents were pretty well off, never having to worry about money or bills, my skating was always the first thing on their mind. Some of the other families though, were just barely getting by, I had a feeling, that was the case with Fulton's. While the other Ducks took Fulton's shyness as a bad trait, I really had no opinion, since I didn't know him or why he acted like that.
I only had one class with Fulton that year and that was science. In fact I had science with all the ducks, even Tommy since he was advanced to some 7th grade classes. That was one of the classes where we could choose our own seats. Fulton always sat behind me and sometimes I'd catch him staring at my back when I was trying o concentrate on the teacher. I wasn't a great student but I tried to keep my grades on b's to please my parents. It wasn't that hard once I put my mind to it. That particular day, I turned to get a pencil from my bag, slung over the back of my desk chair to find him staring intently at the back of my head. When I turned to face him, he quickly looked down, dropping his pencil to his paper and beginning to draw a picture in corner. I didn't bother to see what it was, just turned back in my seat and glanced at Connie with a knowing look that he was back to staring at me again.
"Ms. Duncan your partner for today will be...Mr. Reed..." The teacher said as I shook my head in acknowledgement, turning in my seat to look at him. He looked just as shocked, quickly grabbing his paper and pencil to follow me to the nearest lab table. We ended up sharing with Guy and Goldberg, who laughed at me, trying to hide their enjoyment from Fulton. I think they thought he would pound them if he caught them laughing. I collected the items we'd need for the experiment from the front counter as he looked on, quietly trying to hide in the corner of the table away from everyone else. I don't think he knew what he was doing but he tried to act like he did. Guys were always smitten with me at first glance, so I was use to that but they constantly tried to impress me so I knew when a guy was acting. Fulton was the biggest actor I'd ever met. He definitely was not the big macho guy he played in front of everyone else in our school.
"Okay so you want to read the results?" I asked, moving to stand in front of my paper and let him look at the dish. He looked at me, staring without saying anything outloud.
"Okay..." I said almost in a whisper, reading them myself. He copied them down and then looked to where I had been looking, trying to get what the experiment had been about.
"Do you get it?" I asked trying to look over his paper. He covered it quickly with his hands and I backed off in defense,
"Okay, I guess we're done then..." I said beginning to clean up the equipment. He quickly walked back to his seat writing something else down on his paper; I watched him with confusion marked on my face as I cleaned up,
"Gosh, how weird can you get?" I asked myself, finishing and sitting down next to Connie who was done with her experiment too.
"Hey Tam..." She said as I sat, slumping a little in the seat next to her.
"Connie, what do you know about that Fulton Reed?" I asked staring at him as he looked up in my direction. I turned quickly away, and looked at the ceiling for a moment until he went back to his paper.
"Nothing really, just that he lives over by the old paper factory..." Connie shrugged. Guy came up next to her,
"Connie, you want to go down the pond after school and skate around a little?" He asked. Connie smiled,
"Sure, Guy. Just meet me at my locker when the last bell rings..." She said as he walked away smiling. They were always going to be together, I thought as I turned back to Fulton. He looked up at me, meeting my eyes for the first time that day just before the bell rang.
The next few days were uneventful; school, homework, skating practice, hockey practice, games, and more homework...I had no time to do anything I wanted to do. I felt like my life was already decided for me and I was just going through the motions. That was until one day a couple of days later I walked into practice with Tommy and saw a tall kid standing with the coach off the ice. It was Fulton, I said to myself as Bombay turned to us,
"Okay guys..."
"People?.." I reminded him in a stern voice. I definitely was not a guy. He smiled,
"Right, people, we have a new player...I'd like you all to meet, Fulton Reed." He said as Fulton stayed on the bench, shifting nervously from foot to foot.
"We're going to have a little bit of a different kind of practice today, see Fulton really doesn't know how to skate so we're all going to go skating..." He said opening up a box to reveal rollerblades in green and orange in all of our sizes with our names on them.
"Cool!" We all yelled digging in and taking out our pair.
An hour later we were skating through the mall of America screaming and yelling, knocking people out of our way and in Goldberg's case, stealing people's food right out of their hands. Fulton stayed back with Coach Bombay the whole time except once when he went down a flight of stairs knocking a lady over into the fountain. He didn't want to get into the mess we were creating in front of him but at least he had a clear path to learn. It was over all a great night for everyone, I had never had so much fun in my entire life.
We met in the parking lot to talk as a team before out parents came to pick us up to head home.
"Okay, Fulton, you think you're getting it?" Coach asked as Fulton looked like he was deer caught in the highlights of a semi.
"A little.." He mumbled, little to no confidence in his voice. That was the first time I'd heard him talk a full sentence. Usually it was yeah or nah or something along those lines, I thought as I changed my shoes and got up waiting for Tommy, he was slower than me sometimes.
"Okay, well, we don't have practice tomorrow so just keep skating and our first game is next week.. I'll see you all then." Coach said with a wave, walking away to get into his van with his driver. Fulton sighed, standing from the sidewalk and flinging his bag of gear over his shoulder along with his skates and beginning to walk the other direction.
"Hey!" I yelled out to him, he turned like he was in trouble, his eyes wide ad looking around. I smiled,
"Do you want a ride home?" I asked in my sweeetest voice possible. He looked at me for a minute then shook his head,
"Rather walk.." He said heading home in the opposite direction, pulling his bag more up on his shoulder as he did.
"Okay.." I mumbled low as Tommy and I walked to our mom's van and got in, we were giving Guy and Connie a ride home that night. They climbed in behind us and closed the door with a bang. My mother turned around in the driver's seat and glared at Guy, who had shut the door,
"Sorry…" He mumbled under his breathe. She seemed to clam and turned back around to pull out of the parking lot.
"Dude, coach brings in Fulton.." Guy said, the fear leaving his voice as Connie looked at him,
"Guy, we don't even know him." She tried to defend as I turned in my seat to look at them. Tommy turned too so our Mother wouldn't hear the conversation. I wasn't allowed to hang out with boys on a more personal basis than hockey.
"Guy, just give him a break...It can't feel good to have everyone treat you like dirt." I said looking at Guy with a serious face. He looked down, a bit ashamed of his actions against Fulton in the past.
"I guess not. Maybe we could invite him to sit with us tomorrow.." Guy sighed. I smiled a little bit.
"Yeah, that's a good idea.." I had to give him credit, he was think on his own for once without everyone else giving their ideas and him just following.
"What about the rest of the team." Tommy said. The backseat was quiet for a moment as we all thought about the rest of the teams reaction.
"We'll think of something.." I said turning around, a look of determination on my face.
