I see that a fair amount of people have been reading but not reviewing!:o whaaaat. Come on, review pleaaase! Again.. i do not own any of the original stand by me stuff just the new things youve never seen before!
Chapter 3- a French man, a pregnant dog and a dead kid.
The weeks that followed were amazing. The boys and I got a lot closer and that smile of Christopher's still never failed to make me melt. We did everything together which was mostly hanging out in the tree house which was where we were on that fateful day. The day that begun the journey of Ray Brower.
'Hey, how do you know a Frenchman's been in your back yard?' Chris said with a cigarette pressed firmly between his teeth. 'Hey I'm French ok!' that was probably a lie. Teddy was a compulsive liar but I have to admit he was pretty good at it. 'Your garbage cans are empty and your dog's pregnant.' I rolled my eyes at Chris' immaturity but cracked a smile as he turned to wink at me. I don't know why but my love for Christopher wasn't like the other boys. I mean, I love them too but not like Chris. This was different, it was an overpowering love that I couldn't quite put my finger on, but I loved him none the less.
.knock
'thats not the secret knock Vern!' i said as I lay my head on Gordie's lap whilst flicking through his Mighty Mouse comics. 'Awh come on Nancy I forget the secret knock let me in!' Chris rolled his eyes and lifted up the door of the tree house. 'Seriously man..it's been two years, you need to learn the knock!' Chris replaced the crate that held the cards that the boys were handling and I couldn't help but stare as his arms tensed in to sculptured ones of a man. 'Like what you see Fisher?' I snapped out of my day dream , 'Huh?' Chris laughed and shot me a quick wink before going back to the game of cards that he and Teddy had once again begun. My cheeks turned a scarlet red as I lifted the comic a little higher to hide my face. 'You guys want to go see a dead body?' Everyone stopped what they were doing and in an instant each and every eye was on Vern. I sat up from Gordie's lap and listened instantly to Vern. 'Well I was under the porch digging you know? When I overheard Billy and Charlie talking about something, so i stopped digging, you guys know how curious I get..so I listened to what they were saying and they were talking about that kid that's been on the radio, you know.. that Brower kid?' we all understood what Vern meant. We had followed the Ray Brower story closely as he was a kid our age. A few days before he had gone out to pick blueberries and no one had seen him since.
'They found him! Out back Harlow road! His body! They found it!' we all sat in silence whilst we took in what Vern said. 'Vern if they had have known you were under there they would have killed you!' Chris said pointing his index finger firmly in Vern's chest. 'Could he have gotten all the way from Chamberlin to Harlow? That's really far..' Gordie was right, it was at least 60 to 80 miles long. 'Sure. He must have started walking on the tracks and just, followed them the whole way.' Chris replied knowingly. 'You guys.. I bet anything if we find him we'll get our pictures in the paper!' Chris' voice was strong and bold that it made me wince at its sound. 'Yeah, yeah! We could even be on tv!' 'Yeah!' 'We'd be heros!' 'Sure!' 'you guys i don't know, Billy will know how i found out,' Vern was the pussy of the group and the baby. He was afraid of everything..god! he was even afraid of his own shadow. 'Vern! They aren't gonna find out cause it's gonna be us guys that find him not Billy and Charlie Hogan and the boosted car. They'll probably pin a medal on you Vern.' I smiled as Vern's head raised from his hand. I loved cheering the boys up. 'you think so?' he chirped, 'suree!' I replied, 'but what'll we tell our folks?' I could see the clogs in Gordie's brain mash together and the lightbulb suddenly glow bright as his amazing mind thought of an idea. 'we'll tell our folks we're tenting out in your back field, you tell your folks you're sleeping over at Teddy's then we'll say we're going to the drag races the next day. We're rock solid till dinner tomorrow night!' I grinned how could on boy be so smart? 'Man that's a plan and half!' Chris said proudly whilst the two of them 'skined it'. I stood up and placed my hand on Chris' shoulder. 'So it's settled then?' Chris nodded in response, Teddy mumbled a yes through his puffs of smoke and Gordie did a little solute which I took as an immediate yes. 'Vern?' he slouched in his chair and rested his head on his hands. 'Gee guys i dunno...' I rolled my eyes, 'Veeern!' 'Vern!' 'verrrn..' 'Come on Vern-o!' 'COME ON VERN-O!' 'Ok,ok!' he said as he finally cracked. 'ALRIGHT! Too cool. Too cool! Very cool. Very very cool YEAH!'
So that was it, we were about to head out on the search for the missing kid named Ray Brower. Little did we know that, that particular journey. Would change our friendship forever.