"Hi," Simon said, coming into the sitting room and seeing the boy sitting on the couch.

"Oh, hey. You must be…Simon?" the stranger asked, sizing Simon up.

"Yeah, I'm Simon. Hey, do you know if my dad is in there?" he asked, indicating the closed door.

"Mhm. But he's with a man, someone named…Rabbi Glass? I'm waiting to see your dad too."

Simon groaned. "Uh oh. A conversation with Rabbi Glass! Man, he talks forever! This could take all afternoon!" Simon ran his hands through his hair. "And I really wanted his advice on something," he muttered.

"Packing?" the young man asked.

Simon looked surprised. "Yeah, I am. I'm on my way to college."

"Nervous?"
Simon nodded and sat down beside the stranger. "Yeah, but excited too. I mean, I can't wait to get out of here, y'know? But…I just wish that everyone would…I dunno, make a bigger deal about this. I know that it's not as if I'm going away forever, but…it's still a big step, especially for me. I just want to have my family supporting me, you know?"

The dark headed boy nodded as if he understood everything Simon was saying. "Well, from what I've seen, your family loves you a lot and all want to support you. Do they know how much of a deal you want them to make about this?"

"No," Simon shook his head. "I mean, I even told my dad I didn't want him to come down to the bus to say good-bye because I was afraid of a scene. I didn't even mean it. I just…I wanted him to protest a bit…say that he wanted to come with me. I wanted to know that he cared about my leaving; that somebody cared."

"I know what you mean. But listen, I'm not supposed to say anything, so, you can't tell anyone what I'm about to say, okay?"

Simon nodded.

"Well, your dad hasn't wanted to make a big deal about it right now because…well because they're having a surprise party for you tomorrow night, before you leave. They just wanted you to think they had forgotten."

A smile spread over Simon's face. "Really? Well that's…that's great! Hey, thanks for talking to me. Do you want to come to the party tomorrow? I promise I'll act surprised," he added, winking.

"Sure," the boy answered, a smile on his own tanned face. "I'd like that."

"Peter, this isn't working!" Ruthie cried in frustration. "I just…this doesn't look like a coal mine at all. Wait, Peter, where's the extra 'coal'?" Ruthie asked, looking in the supply bag.

Peter shrugged, putting some more toy cars on the model of the coal mine that he and Ruthie were building. "They're supposed to be in the bag," he said, deep in thought.

Ruthie rolled her eyes. "Don't you think I looked there f-" Ruthie stopped when her gaze fell on the two guilty looking twins sitting on Ruthie's bed. "Sam? David? What happened to our coal?"

"We like coal," Sam said, sticking out his tongue to show his sister how black it was.

"Yes. We want some more," David added.

Peter finally turned his gaze from the model and looked at the twins. "Guys," he moaned, "Did you eat all the licorice?"

"No!" both twins said at the same time.

When both Ruthie and Peter glared at the boys, David shrugged.

"We didn't eat the licorice," he said.

"We ate the coal," Sam said.

Ruthie lay her head down on her desk. "Of course you did," she muttered. "Of course you did."

"Are you okay?" a voice from the doorway made Ruthie look up.

"No," Ruthie said, her tone slightly rude.

"How come? Project not going well?" Martin asked, coming in to look at what Ruthie and Peter had gotten done.

"No. Sam and David ate all the coal."

"Ahhh. Well can I do anything to help?" Martin offered.

"Yeah. Could you take care of the twins for me?"

"No problem. Come on guys, we'll go outside and…play catch or something."

"Okay," Sam said.
"We like playing catch," David replied and followed his brother and the stranger out of Ruthie's room.

"Who was that?" Peter asked, looking after the young man who had just taken the twins off their hands for a whole afternoon.

Ruthie shook her head, distracted and went back to looking over the model. "I dunno. One of Simon's friends," she said.

"Oh," Peter said, looking in between Ruthie and the door. "Okay."