The Planet of Junior Brown by Virginia Hamilton

Junior told him. “She only want me to be sure that once I do come home, I don’t bring nothing from outside in with me.”
    The way Junior spoke touched Buddy. Gently he said, “You had yourself a time today, didn’t you, man? What happen up there with you and your teacher?”
    Finally Junior said, “You won’t have to wait outside next Friday.” He could see the Broadway bus stopping down at 72nd Street. “Miss Peebs say you can come in while I take my lesson.”
    Buddy kept quiet. His mind clicked off the pieces of Junior he could put together. Junior had tried to get rid of him every Friday. Now Junior was telling him he could go someplace he never was allowed to go. Junior had been late this Friday. Something had gone on at the lesson. Junior had come out of it not afraid to have Buddy say a little something about his mother.
    The bus arrived. After they had found seats together, Junior couldn’t make himself tell Buddy what had happened to Miss Peebs’ piano.
    This relative started messing with Miss Peebs’ piano and she had to throw all kinds of stuff at him—how was that going to sound to Buddy? Or, you see, she had this cup of coffee in her hand and she threw it at her cousin and got coffee all over the piano keys. All right. But how do you explain the hammer marks? Did her relative do that just because he hated noise? Or was he vicious?
    â€œHow come I can go with you now?” Buddy broke in on him.
    It took Junior so long to find an answer Buddy was ready to believe he wouldn’t answer at all. But then Junior began to stammer, “You … you know … Miss Peebs is different … you know it better than me … some people are different from all other people …”
    Junior didn’t know how to describe Miss Peebs in a way that would explain her to Buddy. The place she lived in would seem like a madhouse if he tried to talk about it.
    â€œShe is having some trouble,” Junior said. “She’s got this somebody, this awful relative who forced himself in on her. She has to let him stay because it turns out he’s pretty sickly, even though he can still get around.”
    â€œWell, what was he like?” Buddy asked him.
    Softly, Junior began about it. “I was so afraid of him.” His voice, getting louder, “Oh, man, he was dirty. He stank. He was stinking from his filthy socks!”
    Junior heaved himself in a rocking motion, the way a caged bear will sway in a summer’s stifling heat.
    â€œJunior, stop it,” Buddy said. “You about to knock me out of my seat!” Buddy grew alarmed. People on the bus were turning around. The bus driver kept his eye on them through the mirror.
    Abruptly Junior stopped when he realized, like an explosion in his head, that the man he described to Buddy had been someone he had imagined.
    â€œFool,” Junior said, “why do you have to bother me all the time? I didn’t even see him. I wasn’t anywhere near him.”
    â€œThen how come you have to lie like that?” Buddy said. “I’m through with you!” Disgustedly, Buddy folded his hands on the seat in front of him and rested his head on his outstretched arms.
    â€œI didn’t see him because he slipped out of the house,” Junior said. “I didn’t want to tell you since she’s got to get rid of him. But he ain’t just sickly, he’s so bad off, he can infect a lot of people.”
    Buddy sat up, looking at Junior. “You mean, this cat’s got a disease so bad, he supposed not to go outside?”
    Junior had not thought about diseases. “I guess so,” he managed to say.
    â€œAnd you stayed in that house where there’s a cat with a disease and you want me to go there too?”
    â€œI didn’t even see him,” Junior said again, “I wasn’t anywhere near the room she makes him stay in.” He lied without knowing