Welcome to Fred (The Fred Books) by Brad Whittington Read Free Book Online Page B

glasses. “Yes?”
    M looked at me. I cleared my throat. “We have a question.”
    “Yes?”
    “About the Bible.”
    Dad raised one eyebrow, wrinkling the forehead that extended into his scalp. “So, thou hast come to the Oracle. Speak and I shall attend thee.” He leaned back in his chair, crossing his hands over his stomach. This little speech didn’t phase me. Dad always talked like that. If it had any affect on M, he didn’t show it.
    I hesitated, a little shy about introducing the topic. I decided there was nothing for it but to plunge forward. “M says that Moses married a Negro woman.” I couldn’t bring myself to say black even though M had just used it a few minutes ago. It seemed indelicate. My family always used the term Negro. M and I never discussed race, beyond his attempts to educate me about the people he was named after.
    Dad nodded his head slowly and looked from me to M and back. “That is certainly one interpretation of Numbers 12.”
    I raised an eyebrow of my own and stole a glance at M, who was nodding solemnly, vindicated before the authority.
    Dad flipped through the Bible on his desk. “The King James Version says, ‘And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married: for he had married an Ethiopian woman.’” He looked up at me. “Do you remember the Ethiopian missionary who visited our church last year?”
    I nodded. The man spoke very strangely, like he hadn’t quite mastered the use of his tongue, or like it was slightly too thick for its purpose. He was also the blackest person I had ever seen, much darker than even M, who rarely took second place in the battle of blackness.
    “However,” Dad continued, “the Revised Standard Version reads a little differently.” He pulled another Bible off the shelf behind him. “‘Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman.’” He looked up. “Which would mean she was a native of Arabia Chusea, where Saudi Arabia is today. Which would make her race much closer to the Hebrews.”
    “Does that answer your question?” Dad closed the Bible and returned it to the shelf.
    “Yes. Thanks,” I said, and we left, climbing to the heights of the attic. M didn’t say anything until we were at the top.
    “See? What did I tell you?” There was a touch of gloating in his voice.
    “Yeah, yeah, so you were right.” I sat down and pulled out my book, but didn’t open it. I looked out the window for awhile before I spoke again. “I guess the question is, which version does Terri have, King James or Revised Standard?”
    M didn’t say anything for awhile. He opened a book and held it in his lap, his black thumbs pressed against the white pages. Then, without looking up from the book he was pretending to read, he said, “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

    On a Sunday in March, Heidi received a new bicycle for my eleventh birthday, and my bike was finally restored to its rightful owner. M and I celebrated by riding downtown. We passed the theater, and on a whim I detoured down the alley to perform my periodic check on the Creature’s courtyard. When M realized where I was headed, he wasn’t happy. I parked my bike and climbed the trash cans. M refused to get off his bike and remained poised to shoot out of the alley at the slightest provocation.
    “Relax. She left a long time ago.”
    “Then why are you checking, man?”
    “I don’t know. Just habit.” I pulled myself over the fence and looked down into the courtyard. The catalog of debris appeared unchanged. God had neither added to its plagues nor taken away from its shares in the tree of life. I was almost back on my bike when I realized that one slight change had indeed occurred. A refrigerator box sat where the washing machine box used to be. I gasped, and M was halfway down the alley before I threw down the bike and returned to the courtyard. I crept to the