But they dropped their stones and walked away.

She stood up to Clarence Keaton,

who sat behind me in third grade and pulled my braids,

not in a friendly playful way, but hard.

She told him, “A boy pulled Bumble’s braids last year,

and I told on him, and he ended up going to jail,”

which was completely not true,

because we didn’t even know each other in second grade.

And no one would put a second-grade kid

in jail for pulling someone’s hair.

They’d probably get in-school suspension.

But Clarence never pulled my braids again.

It is a very useful thing sometimes

to be best friends

with the bravest girl in the school.

Things I’m Afraid Of

Shots at the doctor,

though mainly just the minute before the shot

when I see the nurse coming toward me

with the needle.

Getting tests back

when the teacher hands it to me facedown.

Scary music in a movie

when the movie is already scary enough

that I don’t need creepy tones to make it scarier.

Dogs that have rabies.

Dogs that don’t have rabies

but might bite me anyway.

My mother when she’s stressed.

Loud noises.

Worms on the sidewalk after it rains.

Mushrooms that sprout up on the lawn after it rains.

Lizard sometimes,

when she gets that glint in her eyes

like she’s going to talk me into doing something

I’m going to be sorry for afterward.

Lizard sometimes,

how mad she might get

if I didn’t let her talk me into things

I didn’t want to be sorry for afterward.

Having everybody,

especially Lizard and my mother,

think I’m a fraidy-cat.

Things Lizard Is Afraid Of

Nothing.

Lizard (and Me) at School

We were both in Mrs. Henderson’s class

in third grade.

Sometimes I wonder how different my life would be

if the person at Sandrock Elementary who decides which kids

to put in each class hadn’t put me and Lizard together.

Who is that person? Is it the principal?

Or the school secretary? Does a computer do the picking?

Or is it Fate, which Lizard says doesn’t exist,

but I think maybe does.

Why else would two girls named Elizabeth

both have braids with blue ribbons on the first day?

My braids were the color people call dishwater blond.

Hers were black like a night with no moon and no stars.

“I hate braids,” Lizard said

(only she wasn’t Lizard yet).

“I think they look dumb. I’m taking mine out.”

And then Lizard didn’t have braids anymore.

I loved my braids, but I said,

“I think they look dumb, too.”

But I didn’t take mine out.

My mother wouldn’t like it

if I came home without them

after she had gone to so much trouble

to put them in.

“Yours don’t look as dumb as mine,” Lizard said.

That’s when I started liking Lizard.