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'Boy, did you think I wouldn't find out? I didn't say anything then - because we're friends. But I don't know, Dennis. There has to be a line, and I think I'm drawing it. Why don't you just leave my car alone and stop butting in where you don't belong?'

'First of all,' I said, 'it wasn't your father and your mother. Your father got me alone and asked me if I'd take a look at what you were doing with the car. I said sure I would, I was curious myself. Your dad has always been okay to me. What was I supposed to say?'

'You were supposed to say no.'

'You don't get it. He's on your side. Your mother still hopes it doesn't come to anything - that was the idea I got - but Michael really hopes you get it running. He said so.'

'Sure, that's the way he'd come on to you.' He was almost sneering. 'Really all he's interested in is making sure I'm still hobbled. That's what they're both interested in. They don't want me to grow up because then they'd have to face getting old.'

'That's too hard, man.'

'Maybe you think so. Maybe coming from a halfway-normal family makes you soft in the head, Dennis. They offered me a new car for high school graduation, did you know that? All I had to do was give up Christine, make all A's, and agree to go to Horlicks where they could keep me in direct view for another four years.'

I didn't know what to say. That was pretty crass, all right.

'So just butt out of it, Dennis. That's all I'm saying. We'll both be better off.'

'I didn't tell him anything, anyhow,' I said. 'Just that you were doing a few things here and there. He seemed sort of relieved.'

'Yeah, I'll bet.'

'I didn't have any idea it was as close to street-legal as it is. But it isn't all the way yet. I looked underneath, and that header pipe's a mess. I hope you're driving with your windows open.'

'Don't tell me how to drive it! I know more about what makes cars run than you ever will!'

That was when I started to get pissed off at him. I didn't like it - I didn't want to have an argument with Arnie, especially not now, when Leigh would be joining him in another moment - but I could feel somebody upstairs in the brain-room starting to pull those red switches, one by one.

'That's probably true,' I said, controlling my voice. 'But I'm not sure how much you know about people. Will Darnell gave you an improper sticker - if you got picked up he could lose his state inspection certificate. He gave you a dealer plate. Why did he do those things, Arnie?'

For the first time Arnie seemed defensive. 'I told you. He knows I'm doing the work.'

'Don't be a numbskull. That guy wouldn't give a crippled crab a crutch unless there was something in it for him, and you know it.'

'Dennis, will you leave it alone, for God's sake?'

'Man,' I said, stepping toward him, 'I don't give a fuck if you have a car. I just don't want you in a bind over it. Sincerely.'

He looked at me uncertainly.

'I mean, what are we yelling at each other about? Because I looked underneath your car to see how the exhaust-pipe was hanging?'

But that hadn't been all I was doing. Some but not quite all. And I think we both knew it.

On the playing field, the final gun went off with a flat bang. A slight drizzle had started to come down, and it was getting cold. We turned toward the sound of the gun and saw Leigh coming toward us, carrying her pennant and Arnie's. She waved. We waved back.

'Dennis, I can take care of myself,' he said.

'Okay,' I said simply. 'I hope you can.' Suddenly I wanted to ask him how deep he was in with Darnell. And that was a question I couldn't ask; that would bring on an even more bitter argument. Things would be said that could maybe never be repaired.

'I can,' he repeated. He touched his car, and the hard took in his eyes softened.

I felt a mixture of relief and dismay - the relief because we weren't going to have a fight after all; we had both managed to avoid saying anything completely irreparable. But it also seemed to me that it wasn't just one room of our friendship that had been closed off; it was a whole damn