Roddy used to sit at the back of the class with the naughty boys. Roddy wasn’t naughty. He was fat and a little nerdy, but he learned early on in his school career that palling up to the bad boys was his insurance against bullying. Jack, Kev and Pauly, who sat at the back with him, were not only his friends, but his protector. They took pride in that, having saved him, on many occasions, from the menaces of the local school bullies.

One other, very important, advantage of sitting at the back of the class was that Roddy had an unrestricted view of Abigail Mortimer albeit a view of her beautifully straight back and pigtails. Roddy was completely and absolutely in love with her. He had hardly said more than a few words to her despite having shared a class with her for three years. She was out of his league and he could never imagine her being interested in him. If he couldn’t be her boyfriend then being able to look at her back, whenever he wanted, would have to do.

He never let on to The Three Musketeers (his nickname for them) that he liked Abigail. It would only have resulted in ribbing from his friends probably accompanied by some good natured application of pain on his person. Despite the fact that the application of pain might be good natured it would still be pain so he took the appropriate action to avoid it.

Jack, Kev and Pauly looked after Roddy, but that didn’t extend to their social life. Roddy was forever trying to get them to invite him to do whatever it was that they did for fun outside of school hours, but it never happened. Roddy decided that he would try and get them to hang out with and him, but all invitations were usually dismissed with some sort of snide accusations about his manhood. He was pleasantly surprised when, uncharacteristically, they accepted his invitation to come to an Astronomy club meeting with him. Perhaps the fact that he promised them UFOs had something to do with it.

It was a beautifully clear night made for star gazing. Roddy prayed that there would be a few shooting stars or a passing satellite that he could pass off as a UFO. He and The Three Musketeers would not be disappointed. His three pals enjoyed the talk given by the Science Teacher who told them about all the current space explorations taking place around the world. After the talk there was tea in the quad and telescope time.

Roddy and the boys were standing around talking about Mars probes while peering into the night sky when suddenly, to Roddy’s great relief, there was the tell-tale streak of a shooting star. “Look a UFO!” shouted Pauly. The four watched transfixed as the “UFO” seemed to go behind Town Hill at which precise moment they heard a muffled crash coming from the direction of the hill.

“Oh my God!” Yelled Jack and Roddy together. They looked at each other and without a further word all four rushed out, climbed on their bikes and rushed off to Town Hill. As they got closer they saw a small fire on the side of the hill. The school side of the hill was very steep and there were no houses there. It was unlikely that many people would have seen or heard the UFO crash. On seeing the fire they pedalled even faster. When they got closer to the spot they realised that it was no UFO crash site, but a car. They could see two passengers.

Fearing that the small fire could spread and engulf the car the four jumped off their bikes and ran to the car. Kev and Jack on the driver’s side and Roddy and Pauly to the passenger side. Roddy got there first, looked inside and his heart skipped a beat.

“Abigail?” he blurted. “Quickly! Let’s get them out!” he screamed. They worked the buckled doors and eventually got them open and the passengers out. Abigail and her mother were alive, but unconscious.

“See if there are any blankets in the boot.” said Roddy before jumping on his bike and riding to the nearest house to call for an ambulance.

The boys were hailed as heroes and their pictures appeared in the morning paper.  Abigail and her mother were not that badly injured, but needed hospitalisation. The boys visited them every day, Roddy keeping them all in stitches with his jokes and funny stories.

Soon the novelty of being heroes wore off for the Three Musketeers and only Roddy continued to visit Abigail and her mom. The nurses said that it was the laughter that helped them to recover so quickly.

At the end of one his visits Abigail’s mom said that they were being discharged the next day so he would not have to visit them again. “You have been so good to us you must come for dinner” she said.

“Yes. On Sunday.” Abigail chipped in quickly.

“Yes. Sunday.” said Abigail’s mom with a little smile.