Patchwork

by Matt Grimm, 2003

    Saul awoke to the sound of gunfire, about an hour before sunrise. Scary, to most people; hell yeah it would be scary. He still jolted every time it happened, but he was more than accustomed to it by now. He knew he wouldn't be able to get back to sleep again, however....danger in most forms seemed to chew on his brain, nagging him for hours after any incident. He wearily drew his gaze over the alarm clock, which blinked in anticipation in the corner of the room, "12:00". Fucking power outages. I wish those rich power company execs could live here for a few weeks, then maybe they'd have some goddamn respect for a poor community's needs...straighten some shit out.
    He swallowed the dryness in his throat, more for lack of other options than an anticipated relief. The chill air in Saul's room bit at his skin as he pushed his legs over the side of the bed. It was only amplified by the frozen cold of the cement floor on his feet, barely masked by the thin shag carpet thrown haphazardly over it. He clumsily found his way to the shower, smiling at the prospect of a quick fix of warmth in the bitter morning air.
    Somehow the shower was a temple of solace in the midst of the agony of waking up. Turning the knobs, Saul was taken aback by the initial icy snap, but it was soon replaced by relaxing liquid heat. He waited for the water to form an aura of invigorating warmth around him before venturing any movement. A flood of memories from his dreams surged into his head, and he drifted with them while he scrubbed any residue from the last twenty-four hours off. The shower made him so content that he toyed with the idea of spending the whole day there, but after twenty minutes he felt bored and unproductive. Turning the water off, Saul was stung again by the cold...dissipating steam and towel being a mocking remedy in comparison.
    His next footsteps would lead to the kitchen, which he found to be an odd phenomenon in the earliest hours of the day. The calmness of what was usually a strong focal point of the house was anything but unsettling. Eating seemed to be a very scheduled activity...food three times a day, around the same times. Even the making of food required constant attention to the clock; any cook worth his salt at least knew that time management was the most important skill to have. It was strange to be in such a hectic place when the usual bustlers were asleep.
    Saul felt ambitious; it was going to be eggs for breakfast, rather than the routine cereal and toast combination which had plagued him for too long. Breakfast is tricky when time is short, thank god for the random days when I'm up early. It's strange, the days aren't so bad once you get out of bed...but it's a battle to get here. He winced at the prospect of refrigerated air hitting him and turned the thermostat up to seventy-five. People will be waking up soon anyway.
    Taking out all the necessary preparations, his mouth began to water. Cracking the eggs into the heated pan reminded him of his earlier childhood; his mother always used to let him feel like he was doing all the work whenever she made simple foods. Whenever she did anything simple, really. It was a nice gesture on her part, but unfortunately it took him awhile to work out the idea that people would not always be there to help him up. On the other hand, however, it facilitated a strange confidence that everything would turn out well if ridden out, which was one of Saul's more admirable qualities, or so he thought. He enjoyed the smells and sounds of the eggs as they fried, noticing small dimples that formed on the surface wherever a grain of salt landed from the light flurry he tossed over them. When he was done cooking, he laughed at himself for breaking one of the yolks in the process of removing them from the pan. I must be getting rusty at this whole cookin' business. Maybe I'll make dinner tonight. He frowned at the prospect of walking to the store in the cold to get dinner supplies. Looking at the oven clock, he noticed time creeping back up on him. Shit, I godda leave for school in a bit. Saul wandered over to the bay window to eat his breakfast, and grabbed his backpack from the hall.
    Placing his headphones in his ears, Saul pressed "play" on his walkman, and began his trek to school. The morning was still cold, but the sun had crested the far off hills and was slowly warming up the air. Even just the prospect of sun on the skin offered some warmth. The air smelled crisp, somewhat like a long drink of cream soda, but perhaps maybe more like an atmosphere filled with the rising remnants of morning dew on the grass and streets. Saul's left shoe produced a steady click as he walked; he inspected it for rocks and discovered that a hole had been worn into the left heel. Any water that got inside was quickly compressed and then released, causing the noise. Sighing, he rounded a corner, his steps falling into the beat of the music so that the click didn't bother him. The remaining half-mile was as pleasant as usual. Lacking the concentration skills to meditate, Saul focused his thoughts as he walked, which made his journey to school an important time.
    Arriving at his school, Adams High, Saul ventured towards the cafeteria. He knew he would find his usual crew of friends there, joking around before classes, generally stocking up on fun so that the bullshit of their average days didn't wear on them so much. Turning to investigate a tap on the shoulder, he found Deacon, one of his good friends, smiling brightly.
    "Sup dude, you look like you're in a bit of a zone," joked Deacon.
    "Hey man, you know how it is. I dealt with all this shit yesterday, and the day before. On top of that, Mr. Carlton has us working our asses off on random Colonial history papers. Thank god it's Friday. I'm pretty sure today is a Frisbee day.."
    "I hear you, man. Aw, shit though, I can't skip class until fourth period. We're doin' this crazy shit in Chemistry," said Deacon. "Let's hit the café, I'm feelin' the need for some caffeine."
    Walking into the cafeteria, they casually brushed off all the hustle and bustle. Hundreds of high-schoolers were clustered around the tables; most talking, some eating, some sleeping. Foraging their way to the side of the room, they slipped dollar bills into the vending machines and each collected a pack of bold chex mix and a surge. After making some social rounds, the two sat down at their usual far end table with their kindred, an eclectic collection of westsiders.
    "Hey fucks, how you doin?" screamed Joel, one of the most loveable of the bunch. "I got this wicked itch on the bottom of my foot, you know, the ones that you can't scratch without taking off your shoe, no matter how hard you try? Yeah, I've been tryin' to wriggle it out for the last ten minutes. Fuck it, the shoe is comin' off."
    The few girls at the table winced at his humor, while all the guys laughed heartily at his overly dramatic antics. In the end, he collapsed on the floor, having fallen off the bench in too strong an effort. Saul couldn't help but laugh out loud. I'm glad these kids are always around to lighten my mood a bit. They're more worthwhile than any other bastards at this school.
    The next twenty precious minutes before first period were riddled with laughter and a savory enjoyment of the mixed flavors of chex mix and surge.
    "They should package this shit together, man, they'd make a fortune," said Saul.
    "Don't mind this kid and his half-baked ideas. He comes up with 'em every ten minutes."
    The voice came from the south side of the table, and Saul turned to find one of his best friends, Hudson, hunching over the table with a maroon backpack slung over his shoulder.
    "Like the time you wanted to start selling weed just so you could sell puppy chow along with it, 'cause you thought stoners would drop as much as they could on that sugary shit." Hudson smiled, his eyes incandescently glazed over.
    "They would too, you stoned fool. Think about it. 'Gimme, an eighth of chronic, and a quarter-pound of your best puppy chow. Yeah, man, that's the shit right there,'" Saul joked.
    "I wouldn't, anyway. But shit, how you doin', Saul? You get started on that paper for Carlton's class?"
    "Nah, man, nah. I thought about it, for sure, but I just got tired, like I always do. It's hard to write when you could be sleeping. I think sleeping is probably one of my favorite things to do. At least top three, if you don't consider that and dreaming two separate things. I would way rather be doing that than sitting here, talking to you fucks." Saul, laughing, dodged a bombardment of chex.
    "Alright, whatever. Well, you down to skip first and chill with me here?" Hudson chimed in, ceasing the onslaught.
    "Sorry bro, I gotta go to this one. I'm behind in my limited understanding."
    "Bull, shit, man. You're a genius. Take it easy on the schoolwork, alright? You got that shit, I guarantee it."
    Just then, the school bell rang. After exchanging goodbyes, the crew dispersed to their respective classes. Saul's first class was Physics, and he hated going to it every day. It wasn't the teacher's fault, he was actually alright; it was more the prospect of rigorous mathematical work early in the morning. Physics, conceptually, didn't seem too hard; in fact it seemed downright easy to grasp. After all, I have been subject to these laws for most of my waking life. If only there was a physics theory class, and I could sidestep all this equating of things. Ah well, I'm here. Stepping into the classroom, he located an empty seat at a table of three other kids and sat down.
    The others at the table were familiar to him, just not to a social point. He could somewhat make out their personalities visually, but didn't actually know any of them well. Saul had seem them in passing many a time, just never had a conversation of any substance with one. Two of them nodded to him upon his arrival, and he smiled back, trying to remember names in case they became necessary. Luckily, just as one started to speak, the teacher began lecturing about electricity.
    Turning their heads away from each other, the class focused in. Saul at least tried to focus...however he was constantly distracted by random thoughts. His career in high school so far wasn't exactly admirable; whenever he needed to listen, his mind decided to run off on a thousand different tangents. Despite this inability to concentrate, his grades remained decent, for he usually put in extra effort when he found himself with some free time. Physics had a certain flair to it, when the subject was more conceptual than mathematical. Unfortunately, today's plan was the cold calculation of electrical circuits.
    Saul gazed around the room, watching people's faces as they grappled with the teacher's words. I wonder if these kids actually understand everything that's going on here. They seem like they're in agreement...that kid even nodded his head. I wish I had the patience that it takes to do the homework without getting distrac...oh shit, the homework! I knew I forgot something last night. Pulling out his green notebook, Saul turned it to the side and let it fall to where the page-marker was. He stared blankly at a ruled page with nothing more than "pg. 244, #5-31, odd" written at the top, with a bold underline. He laid his hand across the span of the page, then closed it, crumpling the sheet into a jagged ball. He tossed it over his shoulder and looked down at the table. As he ran his eyes over the swirling wooden grains, he cursed himself for forgetting yet another assignment. Gazing to the chalkboard, he saw his teacher swiftly swooping chalk numbers into small boxes. The chattering sound of the chalk hitting the board annoyed him, so he closed his eyes and attempted to numb the sound from his ears. He opened them again to a tap on his arm.
    "You alright, man?" asked one of the un-notables.
    Saul glanced back, averting his eyes as he tried to recall a name. Alas, the lost and found box in his brain was too cluttered.
    "Um, yeah, thanks. I just forgot to do the homework, that's all." Saul put his middle finger and thumb on his temples to alleviate the headache that was not there.
    "Shitty. It was pretty hard anyway. I doubt if half the class will even have it done. I had to work on this one for like, two hours," said the guy.
    "Drag, dude."
    When class ended, Saul watched as everyone went up and turned their work in. Pretty hard, huh guy? Whatever. He took his headphones and put them in his ears, waiting impatiently for the beat to drop. The teacher glanced quickly in his direction; he wouldn't say anything outright, but Saul caught the vibe of annoyance for his not turning anything in. Grabbing his backpack, he left the classroom.
    The weather outside was beautiful. Despite the cold snap earlier that morning, the sun had fully come out and bathed the Westside in warmth. Saul could feel his rising energy, and watch the energy of others pick up just from getting out of the classroom. Walking across the courtyard, he became flustered by the crowd of people moving in every direction. Everything is in such a hurry. It took his best effort to navigate the gauntlet without hitting others; people were everywhere, walking on the left and the right. Isn't there some sort of unspoken rule of everyone who is going in the same direction walking on the right? I guess that shows how much those unspoken principles really matter to your average person. He watched a squirrel leap from one tree limb to another, and consequentially ran into the shoulders of three people.
    "Sorry. Sorry..." he mumbled. One kid flipped him off.
    Eventually fighting his way through the doors of the south building, Saul made for his locker. En route, a freshman slid on a slip of paper and tumbled to the ground, spilling his books in an array on the tile floor. Saul couldn't help but laugh, especially after seeing the kid's embarrassed recovery to his feet. What is the next generation coming to? The freshman collected his things, glaring straight into Saul's eyes while he retook the hallway pace. Huh...that was weird.
    Traversing the stairs down, Saul soon found himself at his locker, which opened only after repeated attempts and much elbow bashing. In the grand scheme of locker distribution, Saul had gotten utterly screwed. His locker was downstairs, main building, and in shitty condition. The downstairs of any building got insanely cold in the midst of what was soon to be wintry weather, and the main building sheltered a mere one of Saul's five classes. You'd think they'd have a better system for determining this shit! But naw, let's screw Saul just a little bit more. The condition of the lock was just a 'coup de gras' to his balls. Ah well, though, I guess I barely use this piece of shit anyways. Pulling out two notebooks and replacing his physics text to its place of rest, Saul slammed the door as he knew he would need to. The lock fell into place with a half-assed click. Turning, he caught a glimpse of two bright green eyes before they were quickly drawn back to the hallway she was walking down, the hallway where Saul's locker resided.
    It's Sam. I should say something. What am I talking about; I've barely even talked to the girl... Her scent wafted down the hallway after her, and Saul took a long draw of it. Wow. I would kill to just be able to throw my arms around her and smell that while she rested up against me. That shit reminds me of everything that's ever made me happy. Saul watched her as she drifted down the hall, turning left before the red door at the end. He thought he saw her look back for half a second....No, that's just my imagination. Wow.
    "Aaaaaay, Saul, how was physics?" boomed a voice right next to his ear.
    "Jesus!" cried Saul, jumping back. "Oh, Deacon....shit...don't scare me like that!"
    "Scare you? I'm makin' casual fuckin' conversation in the hallway and I'm scarin' you? Since when has anything, ever........" said Deacon. His eyes lit up. He then proceeded to sniff the hallway, nose low, tracking like a bloodhound on a scent. He stopped short in the middle, then looked back to Saul. "Ahhh. Which one was it? Megan? Amelia? Sam? I know that look, and that smell, fool."
    Saul laughed, looking at his shoes. "It was Sam."
    "Ha. I knew that shit. You're so predictable, dude." Deacon closed in and smiled, silent for a second, then professing his inspections, "Look at you! Shit, you still got it for this girl...have you even had like, a real conversation with her yet? It's been like, 4 months!" He smiled coyly.
    Saul continued to look at his shoes.
    "I knew it, but I didn't know it, motherfucker! You stopped talking about her weeks ago. Shit, I even saw you ignore her once when she walked by us at the café! I assumed your ass was over your little crush." As he spoke he paced back and forth, reminiscent of old villains of bad TV shows. "So, what's to do about this? Hey, let's skip class and chill in the cafeteria for a bit."
    "Nah man, I gotta go to my next one, or I won't go to Carlton's. Go ahead if you want to, but I bet you won't make it to that Chemistry shit that you were so pumped about. That's the way shit works with us." Saul smiled. "Enjoy it for me though. I'm outro."
    "Alright Saul, peace."
    Deacon went on his way, and Saul walked down the hall, which was nearly empty by this time. I must've missed the bell... He looked at a clock, and found it to be three past the hour. Great, I'm late again. Looks like I get to stand again in Spanish.
    After booking it to the west wing, Saul peered into the door of his Spanish class. Class was proceeding as usual; they were doing question drills. Fuck. He opened the door, and quietly walked into the classroom. His teacher, Mrs. Arnell, preferred to ignore his presence for the time being, shooting him nothing but a quick glance as he entered. He made his way through the aisles and sat down in an empty desk, pulling out his notebook with "Spanish" written on it in bold magic marker.
    "Oh, Joaquin, I believe you are to be standing this period," the teacher chirped as she finished the drills. "You are deliberately late, and have disrupted my lesson already."
    Saul looked around to see what she could possibly mean by "disrupted". Everyone seemed alright, save that all eyes were on him. "Umm, yeah, I don't know what I really dis..."
    "Enough! Stand in the back, Joaquin." She beamed at him innocently, but the tone of her voice was menacing.
    Saul rolled his eyes and grabbed his backpack, proceeding to the back of the room. There were two girls already in the back, and they shot him sympathetic glances, one of them shrugging her shoulders and laughing silently. He took his place beside them and tried to look attentive.
    As hard as it was to concentrate normally in Spanish, it was always tenfold when standing. Saul propped his notebook up in his arms, cradling it as he wrote down the outline of what to study for the upcoming oral test. His mind drifted away, merely directing his gaze to the overhead screen and copying the words that appeared on it. This would take so much less effort if she would just make some print-outs of this shit. His mind was in no zone to piece together what the loosely tied strings of words meant, or to listen to anything the teacher was potentially saying. Instead, he chose to think about the breeze that was floating in through the open window. As it swept by him, it carried countless smells from nearby open parks. Trying abstractly to separate them into single, recognizable scents, he thought he stumbled upon some sage. The thought of it took him back to the hikes that he used to embark upon with his family, trekking out paths in the mountains. He remembered the canteens that they used to drink out of...huge, metal, padded canteens straight out of the '80s. He laughed at the thought of how technology has managed to improve even upon something as simple as a canteen; now they could be strapped to your back, and had tubes so that you didn't even have to stop moving to drink. The irony of the inactivity of drinking effortlessly out of a camelbak when doing something as invigorating as hiking was for some reason overwhelming, and Saul let out a short chuckle.
    "Is something here funny to you, Joaquin?" The teacher crowed. Looking back at her with surprise, he saw her eyes burning through his. "And what, pray tell, is so amusing about prepositions?"
    "Ahm...nothing, really. I was just thinking of something that happened earlier." Saul replied. He imagined that his voice echoed throughout the small room.
    "So, not only are you not here physically at the beginning of class...you are absent mentally, when you are. Tell me, as a personal five-point pop quiz, how would you go about saying 'the storm is very close'? If you don't mind concentrating for a minute, that is."
    "Um. La....tormenta, es..." Saul stumbled. He nervously fumbled with the words. Damn, I hate it when she does this shit. Why does she always single me out? I'm not a bad guy. Fuck.
    "Muy cerca," whispered the girl next to him, covering her mouth with her hand in a nose-itching motion.
    "Muy cerca!" Saul quickly spat out.
    "Well...muy bien, Joaquin. Try not to get distracted from now on," the teacher said uncomfortably.
    When class resumed, Saul turned to the girl. "Hey, thanks a lot. She woulda made a complete ass outta me if it wasn't for you."
    The girl smiled at her paper while she continued writing notes. "Don't worry about it. You woulda done the same for me, right? We latecomers have got to watch out for each other, otherwise we're in trouble."
    He liked her. She was confident in herself, but didn't come off as cocky at all.
    "So, you're Joaquin, yeah? I'm Corazon." She held out her hand in expectation.
    "Well, I'm Joaquin in here; on the outside I'm Saul," he responded, shaking her hand.
    "In that case, I'm Jamie." She continued writing after the teacher shot them both an annoyed glance.

Chapter 2

    Deacon stepped lightly on his way out from first period; math was nothing too tasking for him, and it set him up to feel good about his scholastic endeavors for the rest of the day. No matter how bad I do in school from here on out, I've already kicked the shit out of math, suckas. He smiled at anyone he even vaguely knew in the hallways, kick-stepping to an intangible rhythm running perpetually through his mind. Upon walking outside, he made a conscious effort to absorb as much warmth from the newfound sunshine as possible, slowing his pace through the courtyard. More than a few people passed him in an annoyed rush, but he paid them no mind. He looked around himself and saw a thousand potential possibilities of where to go...it dragged on his mind to have to follow as strict a routine as the school represented. Sighing, he turned his head back toward the main building. At least I have lunch to look forward to. Oh, and Frisbee before and after that. It's so good to be a slacker, boyee.
    After reaching the main building and lamenting the loss of sunshine, Deacon rifled through his back pockets. After failing to find his disk for networking class, he directed his path downstairs. Fuckin', I'm always forgetting important shit. I gotta start concentrating. Taking out a blue pen, he scrawled "concentrate!" on his left palm. He knew it would probably just wash or rub off later, but he wasn't fond of writing strange personal notes on the top of his hand, where they might be better protected...they would also be better inspected by random people. Following the stairs down, which by that time had appeared in front of him as if by magic, or an unattended perception of movement while writing, he came to the bottom of the stairwell and turned to the right at the juncture. As he jauntily strolled, he ran numbers through his head, trying with much effort to remember Hudson's locker combination. Arriving at the locker, he was afforded multiple failures before stumbling upon the correct set. With a click the locker sprang open, spilling papers and emptied snack packs upon the tiled floor. Without warning, three small bouncy balls rolled out, as if they were on a complex time delay and managed to be released at the same time. Deacon cracked a smile as he watched them bound through the feet of passing kids down the hallway. He remembered the lunch two weeks ago, where Hudson had decided that he had to get a stuffed throwing star out of a King Soopers crane game. Two dollars and fifty cents later, they had dejectedly walked away with the three bouncy balls.
    Deacon gazed back into the shady depths of the locker. "Fuck, Hudson! You unorganized mothafucka...." He rooted through the rubble until he spied a small black disk, lodged in between the partially unscrewed locker bottom and the red metal backing. He yanked it out, noting its slightly bent disposition. "Dammit. This thing better still work." Deacon cursed himself for having lost his own locker privileges for unwittingly having a lock-back knife in his own locker earlier that year. Fuck it. How the hell could I have known they would have been rooting through lockers for drugs that day. Nothing I could have done to prevent it.
    Slamming the locker door elicited a satisfying slam, and the consequential rush of air sent papers flying through the hallway. Visually following a green sheet as it whipped up and away, Deacon lost his gaze upon the paper, and his eyes focused further down the hallway. Well if it isn't Saul, staring into space like a moron. Double-stepping down the hallway, Deacon was soon right behind Saul.
    Aaaaaay, Saul, how was physics?" Deacon boomed in anticipation.

Chapter 3

    Hudson chose to remain in the cafeteria for first period. Gazing out over all the students, he chuckled to himself. Most of them were upright young citizens, no doubt legally entertaining themselves in their designated free period. He received funny glances from random groups of people that passed him; most couldn't pinpoint the smell of pot exuding from his clothes, at least they didn't assume anything more than that perhaps it was the scent of a different brand of cigarette. That's the problem with these right-wing eastsiders...too innocent to know anything about the world. They just revolve in their little worlds, hoping to someday stumble upon or be given a wife, fantastic desk job, and 2.4 children. I'm lovin' it. He rubbed his eyes and rooted through his corduroy pockets for eyedrops. Finding none, he dramatically threw his arms up in comic disdain. Nobody of any note was around at the time to see it...that was just his way.
    Glancing, or rather staring, at the clock, Hudson struggled to determine the time. It wasn't that it was particularly distant...his mind just decided to run away on a thousand tangents when he tried to engage in the simple task. After noting the time, he returned to his musings, only to realize that he hadn't actually noted the time. Perhaps just the relative positions of the hands. I think the big one was near ten? He refused to look again, however, and ran under the auspices that the bell would ring whenever time became an issue. He watched as the janitor slowly lumbered over and began to sweep the chex mix, that had earlier been tossed at Saul, into a dustpan on a stick. The top of the stick had a trigger on it, and whenever it was pulled, the plastic door to the dustpan creaked open. Hudson ventured a guess that there was some kind of wire running down the length of the stick, which assuredly must have been hollow. He smiled as he once again slipped into awareness of his technical observation.
    Turning his head toward the window, Hudson felt a rush of fury momentarily as he saw a bird swoop down onto the cement to pick at some stray seeds. His anger wasn't directed toward the bird; Hudson was all for nature. Instead he remained frustrated with the school officials, who had taken it upon themselves to decree that students could no longer loiter about outside the buildings, not even on their free periods. It wasn't long ago when I could sit outside by myself and collect my thoughts in peace during first hour...now I'm confined to this fucking cage. He had sensed frustration from other kids, as well, but they had gotten used to the idea after a few weeks. He looked at them now and was annoyed with their lack of motivation to fight for liberties. Pulling out a red notebook, he flipped to a page covered with scribbled thoughts and added a few to them.
    When he put down his pen, he got up to take a stroll around the gigantic room. Shoving his hands deep into his corduroy pockets, Hudson made for the windows on the west side, standing there to observe the grassy land surrounding the establishment. His eyes slid over the scene, trying to keep pace with a breeze that rolled through the yellowed grasses. He saw the mountains in the background, solid monoliths erected by anything but human influences. What the fuck am I doing in school, man? There's so much shit to appreciate out there, and I'm stuck I here trying to prove that I can learn some completely irrelevant shit. This is whack. He began to feel chilly, and resumed walking about the room.
    He passed the vending machines, and he was reminded of the time when some random gangsta' had decided to roll up on the school. He remembered him strutting into the cafeteria like he owned the place, flirting with some sophomores, and walking over to the machines. Looking around, he had slid on a pair of brass knuckles and thrown a solid left to the glass. It shattered, sending shards all over the floor, and he had proceeded to casually remove a box of Nerds (one half grape, one half cherry), and a bag of Sour Bright Crawlers. That was all. Then he had just walked off amidst the dropped jaws of the teachers on their rounds. Nobody wanted to fuck with him, and nobody did. After he left, all the kids in the cafeteria had swarmed the machine, looting it for all it was worth. I guess that goes to show you how much excitement a dose of real life and a Baby Ruth can hold in contrast to this routine machine of school. Hudson noted "routine machine" as a good rhyme, and scribbled it down on the back of his hand.
    He brainstormed as he passed the cluster of resident teachers, trying to come up with a plan for them all to bail out of the café during fourth period, a mere two hours away. He knew Deacon and Saul would come; they almost always did. He thought back to his backpack, and wondered if he had even remembered to bring the Frisbee. I was pretty busy smoking that blunt before school; I hope it's there. Looking to his right at a group of freshmen, he saw one pulling pretty strongly off of his inhaler, trying to convince the other kids that it was getting him "high". They told him to shut the fuck up; at least they were smart enough to know that was impossible. Ah, that...just might be the ticket. Hudson wandered back to his table. He scoured his backpack and indeed discovered the Frisbee to be in the big pocket, giving it a few upward tosses to test its structural integrity before putting it back. Looking up, he spotted Amelia sidling into the table across from him.
    "Hey Hudson, how's free period?" she said, whipping out a few science-looking textbooks.
    "Oh, you know, surrounded by morons, with nobody to talk to. I tried to get Saul to chill with me, but he had some Physics bullshit to deal with." He covertly watched her as he slipped in Saul's name, waiting for the flicker in Amelia's eyes when he dropped it. Yup. There it was.
    "Saul....how is he doing?" Amelia beamed, doing a bang-up job of concealing her over-curiosity. She began tapping her pencil on the table rapidly, staring at her unopened textbook in a studious manner.
    "He, lost his arm in a car accident last night. Didn't you get a call?" he replied, a serious overtone in his voice.
    Amelia looked at him mockingly. "Fuck you," she smiled.
    "Well, what do you expect? He's fine, fine. He keeps on stressing school like he'll be down and out if he doesn't study so much; that kid doesn't have any faith in his own potential. Don't get me wrong, I love the kid, but he needs a little shaka buku." Hudson said.
    "Shaka, whata?"
    "Shaka buku. A, 'swift kick to the head that permanently alters one's consciousness'." Hudson recited.
    "Ah yes, one of those," Amelia said sarcastically, "where the hell do you come up with this shit?"
    "Reading, my dear Amelia, reading. Ever since that elementary school program where they gave out free personal pan pizza coupons for reading a grip of books, I've been hooked."
    "Yeah, but that was for like, Flowers for Algernon, and 'Nancy Drew' books. Something tells me you've ventured much deeper than that."
    "Well, books are good shit. Look 'em up sometime."
    "Hey...I read." She looked on the defensive, and her mouth curled into a cute little frown.
    He decided to fuck with her a bit. "This shit, " Hudson said, picking up and dropping her science textbook, "is not, reading. This is social construction." He stared into her eyes and awaited her fury.
    "Bastard, I read a lot of real shit! Maybe some of them are English requirements...Great Expectations, Catcher in the Rye....but I've read other books. I read Walden without any school motivation, and I bet I could tell you more about that book than anyone you know, dick." She was actually getting angry, so he decided to back off.
    "Hey, take it easy. I'm just kiddin'," Hudson replied, "but just so you know, Saul knows more about Walden. I promise. It's like, his favorite book."
    Amelia's demeanor changed immediately, like a mood ring going from the shelf to a finger. "Really? I've never talked about books with him. What else does he like?"
    "Oh, Jesus, come off it." He zipped up his backpack and stood up. "I'm not gonna tell you the kid's life story. Why don't you ask him sometime? I think you guys have a lot in common. Anyways; peace, Amelia. Catch you later."
    She looked contemplative. "Huh. Alright, later Hudson."
    Walking off, his thoughts turned to the Cisco Networking class he was about to have to endure. He looked back before he got to the doors, and Amelia waved goodbye.

Chapter 4

    Hudson and Deacon both somehow managed to arrive at networking class on time, and at the same time. They exuberantly greeted each other at the door, and didn't fail to exaggerate the cosmic chances of neither of them being late, let alone arriving together. The teacher was obviously taken aback by their punctuality; she usually breezed right over their names in the roll call, but today was forced to break routine and not neglect them. Unfortunately, they were still near late, and the only seats in the class were far from together.
    "Dude, sign on," whispered Deacon before they parted ways.
    "Aiight man," replied Hudson.
    Sitting down at their respective computers, the two booted up the comps and pulled out their disks. They loaded their identification and progress, which allowed them access to the entire system, including internet. This was a foolish oversight on the behalf of the school; they blocked certain websites based on content, but they allowed free-for-all downloading from anywhere. Hudson and Deacon both went to the same site and downloaded a messaging program, signed up, and logged on. Now they could freely ignore any potential learning energy and focus completely on casual conversation.

    TheHud12: so whassup today
    D-KN: not too much, man, just dealt with math
    TheHud12: yeah, I was philosophizin' in the café
    TheHud12: guess who showed up
    D-KN: who dat is?
    TheHud12: amelia
    D-KN: that's cool, how's she doin?
    TheHud12: oh, the usual
    TheHud12: you know that theory I have though?
    D-KN: the one about those square watermelons?
    TheHud12: no, the amelia theory
    D-KN: oh, about her liking saul. yuh, what of it
    TheHud12: just got me thinking, so I gauged her responses when I dropped his name
    D-KN: what happn'd?
    TheHud12: she was actin' strange for sure. she either likes him or hates him, methinks
    D-KN: I was just talking to that cat about sam
    D-KN: remember when he was nuts over her?
    D-KN: yeah, so he still is, he just masks it well now
    D-KN: she seems high-maintenance, I don't know if they'd mesh well
    D-KN: not that it's even a viable option, considering that he's barely even talked to her
    TheHud12: maybe. but he never fails to surprise me
    D-KN: word
    D-KN: well, what do you think? amelia is crazy dope...she's really cute, plus she has an amazing personality, and a good heart
    D-KN: I don't know much about sam
    TheHud12: neither do i. she's really bangin', though. how about those eyes?
    D-KN: yuh, perhaps the bangin'st
    TheHud12: heh
    D-KN: what about saul, though...it seems pretty obvious that he'd go well with
    TheHud12: yeah?
    TheHud12: dude?

    Hudson looked over at his partner in crime. The networking teacher was
    hovering over his computer, swinging the power cord in her hand. Deacon's computer was pitch black.
    "Well, it seems that some people prefer chatting it up on the internet to listening and learning something that might actually get them somewhere," the teacher snarled, "as an example-setter, Mr. Deacon, you'll be getting detention, today, after school. I'll see you then, Mr. Deacon." Deacon sighed, slouching back into his seat. The teacher slithered back to her podium, and began lecturing once again. Hudson quickly closed his messaging screen, casting a sympathetic glance to Deacon. For the remainder of the period he watched the minutes roll by slowly on the generic clock face above the door.

Chapter 5

    Third period found Hudson and Saul sitting next to each other in a pair of desks along the ordered vertical rows of Mr. Carlton's American History class. The hour had much potential to be a fun: the collection of people in the class was composed of good ones, at least somewhere around sixty percent of them. Unfortunately, the energy that should have been manifest was drowned in a pool of apathetic and monotonous historical babble.
    "Alright class, now who can tell me why the American Revolution took place, and was it really necessary?" droned Carlton.
    "Um, those British assholes were trying to fuck with our liberties?" Saul said.
    "Well, very...eloquently put, Saul. Do you think it was absolutely necessary?"
    "Ah, I guess so. I guess there is probably a breaking point where diplomacy fails."
    "Saul," Carlton paced around the room, "is it still considered international diplomacy, when we originally came from Europe in the first place?" Carlton gazed quizzically at Saul, one hand upon his chin, and the other arm placed behind his back; his posture was perfectly erect. Jeez, he looks like he should have a Sherlock Holmes pipe in his mouth or something. This guy is way into the role he seems to have adopted for himself...it's pretty funny actually.
    "Ahm, I guess not...maybe? Actually, I think it still is. See, though we came from Europe, we kind of broke ties with them, yeah? I guess it's kind of all encompassed by the name of the war...ya know, the Revolutionary one?" Saul fidgeted with his click-eraser while he spoke. The ratchet sound might have echoed through the semi-quiet classroom were it not for the commanding hum of the janitor's floor waxer, whirring away down the hallway.
    "Quite, quite," replied Carlton.
    Saul began to scribble on the back of his History notebook. By the time Hudson looked up from his own abstract creative process, Saul had etched a fairly formidable caricature of Mr. Carlton, decked out fully in a woolen Sherlock jacket, with a monocle on his left eye and a pipe to his lips. Stifling his laughter, Hudson put his head down on the desk while his back spasmed in a telltale manner. Saul smiled, handing him the notebook, and told him to add his own flair to it. They passed it back and forth over the next ten minutes. Carlton's likeness had soon acquired a Napoleon-esque military hat, a musket, some British colonial lapels, a mobile cannon, and a sieged fort which burned away in the background, complete with squiggly lines of smoke curling into the air. Unable to control himself when he saw the stick figures running away from the fort, Saul erupted into laughter, but quickly regained his composure. Carlton stared at him, and Saul tightened his lips, small reports of smothered laughter escaping in short breaths through his nose. Carlton rolled his eyes, returning to the dry-erase board to pen in a few important dates.
    "This, people," he said, pointing to a large '10/17' that he had effortlessly inscribed upon the board in fading red, "is the due date for your thesis paper. Note that it is only a week and a half away now. I trust that you will all have them into my mailbox by the end of school, that day." Carlton returned to his desk, sitting down and putting on his reading glasses. He pulled a few papers out and starting marking them with the red colored pencil he was so fond of grading with.
    "Shit dude," Saul whispered across the aisle to Hudson, "I can't even begin to think about what to write mine on. Did you start yet?"
    Hudson stared at him blankly for a minute. "Did I...start mine yet? Man --- try and remember who you're talking to here. You're the studious one here, not me. I'll probably procrastinate for another, oh, week and two days, then whip out a bullshit C+ paper. That, is my way." He spoke the last sentence in a dramatic, regal tone that elicited a chuckle from Saul and a few surrounding eavesdroppers.
    "Yeah, I guess you're right. I gotta stop letting school get such a grip on me. Stressing classes is like having your nuts in a vice grip and letting someone else tighten it."
    "Um, yeah. That." Hudson responded, joking. He gave Saul a playful punch on the arm. "Man, remember. Most shit....ain't shit."

Chapter 6

    Saul sat on the cafeteria bench in anticipation. If there was one thing that could repress and bottle up energy, it was listening to teachers drone about standardized subjects in the morning hours. I think the morning is probably one of the most active times of day for my creativity and appreciation. Too bad it's spent holed up in these walls, and not cooking breakfast from scratch and walking around in dope-ass nature spots. I really don't know what to make of that. Out of the corner of his eye, Saul caught a glimpse of Hudson's epic hairstyle, a massive mob of impure blonde curls, breezing through the doorway. Saul stood up, and caught his attention.
    "Yo, Hud!"
    Strolling over to the table, Hudson rolled his right shoulder, allowing his backpack to fall down tracing the length of his arm. He cupped his hand when it neared the floor and the strap caught faultlessly on his hand, catching the bag right before it would have slammed the ground. It hovered over the speckled tile for a moment before he slung it up onto the top of the table.
    "Ooh, stylin', you profilin' fiend," Saul uttered, pretending to be impressed. That was actually pretty neat. "So, what's the plan?" Saul looked at Hudson's pack, noticing it's conformity to the circular object surely within, and nodded to himself.
    Without a word, Hudson held up an asthma inhaler. He grinned.
    "Huh. Okay, I think I see where you're going with this...but probably not. Where the fuck is Deacon? He was stoked about somethin' in Chemistry, but he wouldn't spend extra time in a class for anything. Anything."
    "Maybe he's gettin' beaten with a belt in a dark room. We got caught talkin' in Cisco and the teacher flipped. Don't know what the fuck her beef was, but he got detention after school, for sure." Hudson grimaced, pulling his head back a bit.
    "Aw, that's bullshit. Why does he always get the shit end of the stick when it comes to authority.....she didn't do anything to you, though?"
    "Well, when I say 'we' got caught, I mean 'he' got caught. Don't take it to mean shit that I say when I say what I say, but rather what I mean when I say what I say, okay?" Hudson tilted his head back and narrowed his eyes, mouth partially open.
    "Truly, your intellect is dizzying," Saul responded, eliciting a laugh-cough.
    "So, whatch'you got goin' on tonight, Saul? It's finally Friday, whether we should be stressin' that thesis paper or not," Hudson said.
    "Word, man, you're right. It is fuckin' Friday. I don't know...I was thinkin' about cooking dinner for the fam; its been far too long since I've gotten to do that. But aside from that, I don't know."
    "Yeah, I don't know of anything goin' on specifi..."
    "Wait a sec, didn't Lindsey say that she was throwing a party Friday night? I think her parents went to New Mexico for the weekend, or some shit. Did I just make that up, or did it really happen?" Saul asked energetically.
    "Oh, yeah man, you're right. Wow, she was spittin' about that halfway through last week. It's weird that so much time has passed since then; I completely spaced it. I haven't heard anybody talking about it, though; I wonder if it's still goin' down."
    "I'd say as long as her parents are still gone, it's still goin' down. Lindsey is crazy as shit, man. She rocks so many parties, it's almost a crime that she hasn't had one herself. I hear she has a nice-ass house, too. Unless she's mad worried about people wreckin' it, I don't think she would back down. Besides, remember how excited she was about it?"
    "Oh yeah, she was sayin' that it was gonna be like, a triple-kegger."
    "Man, speaking of triple-kegger, have you ever actually been to one? Fuckin', it seems like something that doesn't actually happen."
    "Saul...what are you talkin' about, dude? We've gone to like, quintuple-keggers, together. Were you really that stoned that you don't remember? I know you were rockin' at least one with me."
    "No, fuck; you're not understandin' me. You're not, hearin' what I say when I say what you say."
    "You fucked that up," laughed Hudson. "Learn from Deacon, he's the master of linguistics."
    "Whatever. What I meant is, have you ever actually been to a party where, you roll up, and there are like, five kegs, sitting there, side by side. That would make a pretty fuckin', picture...but what I'm saying is, it's not exactly practical. I hear kids talk about 'Oh, man, there was this crazy party up in the foothills Saturday night! There were eighteen kegs, waaaaahhh! It was nuts! They had twelve people doing kegstands at the same time; it was like a race! Waaaaahhhh!' and shit....but if you think about it, it's not exactly practical to have more than one keg anywhere, anytime."
    "I'm know what you're saying with the parties, but I'm not following any further," Hudson dropped, obviously intrigued by the prospect of an everyday occurrence that most people don't take the time to think about, at all.
    "Okay, so, like.....huh. How can I put this?" said Saul.
    With an abrupt thud, Deacon pounced on top of the table. "Aaaay, what's goin' down here? How you guys doin'? You tryin' to think of a way to break out this shithole, and toss some disc? 'Cause I got a good one, I think."
    Saul retook his seat after his initial jump backwards, now catching his breath. "Jesus, man, what's your deal with scaring me today?"
    "I don't know...I don't see any ladies around ta be distractin' you, dude." replied Deacon, widening his eyes in mockery.
    "Hah. No though, man, we were just talkin' about some captivating shit, so you should let us continue for a few minutes, and get in on this. I already got a plan to break out for Frisbee, so don't sweat it. We can use whatever crazy shit your ass came up with, some other day, aiight?" Hudson clasped his hands, and looked at Saul.
    "Oh, right. Wait...what was I saying?" Saul narrowed his eyes and looked at the fake wooden tabletop.
    "About the kegs; you were having a run at 'party theory'. Last I checked, you sounded like you knew what you were talking about," said Hudson.
    "Ahh...right."
    "Party theory?" chimed in Deacon.
    "Donny, shut the fuck up. The world does not stop at start at your convenience, you piece of...." Hudson quoted.
    "Good one, Hud. Sorry though, continue," said Deacon.
    "Okay, soooo...right. These parties. People say that they're rockin' shindigs where there are like, twenty kegs, right?" Saul recapped, looking at Deacon, who nodded. "Yeah, so, do the math. A keg of shitty beer, which we'll say is about the furthest extent of means for a Westside high-schooler, is like, forty bucks. The keg shell, on the other hand, runs about thirty bucks; that is a large-ass expense...if you cash one in when you pick up a new one, then, and only then, is it forty. Otherwise, that runs you another thirty clams. Then, on top of that, if you don't got a tap...that's around a thirty dollar deposit, per tap. So, fuckin', think about that shit. I'm sure you can envision a high-school crew coming up with, say, one-hundred an' twenty bucks to throw a triple-kegger. That's feasible, especially if you got some Eastside richness influence in your crew. But check it. To throw an actual triple-kegger, you'd need three shells and three taps, 'cause that's not some shit that your average seventeen-year old has just layin' around. That, is one-hundred bucks per keg, which makes a grand total of three-hundred bucks, just for a tri-keg of shitty beer. That's bullshit, and it grows exponentially per keg. If you had one keg, and filled it five times...that's sixty for the keg and tap...then, two-hundred for the five fills. Deacon, work 'dat math for a quintuple-kegger, if you will."
    "Shit. That's....two-sixty for the single, and five bills for the five kegs. Damn, that's some shit, ain't it? I never thought about that before," Deacon mused.
    "Yeah kid, you got some mental ventures goin' on, that's for sure," Hudson responded.
    They sat in silence for a few minutes, contemplating. "I guess we never have been to a real triple-kegger; just one where they filled the keg three times," Hudson said, breaking the silence. "Ah, fuck it. Let's play Frisbee."
    Taking out the Frisbee, Hudson laid it on the table. Next he took out an asthma inhaler, placing it beside the Frisbee. He looked up to find quizzical looks in return.
    "Okay, it's simple. Saul, you're having an asthma attack."
    "I don't have asthma."
    "Saul....you're having, an asthma attack."
    "Oh. Alright."
    "That gets us out. Deke, you take this, and come after us in two minutes. Tell that security bitch that you forgot that Saul dropped his inhaler earlier, and that you have it now; you should show it to her."
    "Word....but this is a lame plan."
    "It's a great plan. Not too complex. You'll see." Hudson flashed his eyes at Saul in an unspoken cue, not that it was necessary.
    Saul started wheezing, coughing, and generally pretending to be choking. Fuck, I have no idea what an asthma attack looks like. I hope this works out. Hudson rushed to his side with great concern, and put Saul's arm around his neck; then slowly, but with great haste, walked him over to the glass doors. The security guard greeted them with only slightly cordial concern.
    "What's wrong with him?" she said, her eyes widening.
    "This is my friend, he's having an asthma attack." Hudson stated impatiently. Saul shakily nodded in agreement, wheezing to the best of his lung capacity. "I gotta get him to his locker so we can get his inhaler."
    "Alright, that's fine. Come back when you've got it."
    "Thanks, ma'am," Hudson replied, his head turned downward to mask his grin.
    Once out of the doors and out of sight, Saul and Hudson rejoiced in the plan's success.

Chapter 7

    The field was as beautiful as it had ever been, if one were to have been looking. The fall sun hit the trees, their leaves, and the still mostly-green grass; the light brightened or darkened the light and dark spots, respectively, and created a contrast that seemed to magnify the possible spectrum of colors, stretching a wider gap between such similar colors as orange and brown than one would have ever thought possible living merely through the other three seasons. It seemed that the atmosphere lent itself to a heightening of the senses...whereas summer heat would dull them and winter cold would numb them, the crisp snap of the autumn air kept every faculty tingling; on edge, prodding toward exploration. The void of scent left in the air, courtesy of the dwindling plant life, allowed for an unhindered perception of other smells, underlying essences that were, in truth, essential; always there, but mere phantoms in comparison to the more dominantly tangible scents of the other seasons. The rusted football uprights, usually an eyesore, became photogenically kindred with the antiquated atmosphere. Death and age, perhaps, but presented magically and perceived by the wise as a spoke in a wonderful wheel.
    Saul and Hudson bounded out to the middle of the field, and there they waited impatiently for Deacon's freedom. Saul walked in small circles. Upon finding an untouched leaf, he was quick to step on it; but the action was much slower in his head. He would place his tarnished shoe over the leaf, then slowly push downward as he anticipated the savory crinkle-crush noise. Though the leaf was small and inconsequential, he could ever so slightly feel the small bit of resistance it offered...the resistance that anything offered to being moved by another force, conscious or no. That's fuckin' static friction, ha. I love that Physics theory; I do I do.
    Hudson laid out on the slowly, but perpetually hardening grass, arms and legs extended to the furthest polarities possible. He issued a deep sigh of relief and closed his eyes, slowly absorbing the natural feel of reality. Upon opening them again, he spied a collection of billowing white clouds in the north, and stared at them for some time.
    "Hey Saul."
    "Yeah, what's up dude."
    "You ever see a bunch of clouds, and just realize what bullshit most of the shit we deal with everyday is?"
    "Occasionally, yeah...but don't get too revolutionary on me now; I got a paper to do in a few days. I can't afford to have my world shattered, you know?" Saul turned to Hudson, who had a huge grin plastered across his face.
    "This one looks like a huge dragon, only, you know, cloud-style."
    "I'd say you have dragons on the brain then, Hud." Saul raised his eyes to the sky, squinting and shading his eyes with a hand. " 'Cause it looks like a big tree, to me."
    "...................A tree-dragon." Hudson mused. Saul collapsed on the grass, breathing deeply.
    Saul began to beat-box a rhythm, simple at first, then gradually more complex. Soon, Hudson picked up on the rhythm; he began singing 'treeeeheee, dragggoonnnah' in a high pitch, on cue every four meters. They could have amused themselves all day...soon even Deacon started whistling a melody. They went on for another minute, then stopped and laughed.
    "What the fuck happened to you, guy?" wheezed Saul.
    "Aw, I ran into the fuckin' vice principal in the hallway. I got twenty questions before he let me on my way, to look for some kid having an asthma attack. He wouldn't let me go 'til I showed him the inhaler," Deacon sighed.
    "Knew it was a good plan. I love to say I told you so," Hudson chimed.
    "Yeah, yeah."
    Regaining their feet, they all stretched half-assedly. Hudson reached into his backpack, producing a yellow Frisbee. Scratches covered most of the surface, indications of past utilization. Saul stared at the Frisbee as though it was a relic from a past life. Time is funny. Hudson bought that disc two years ago, and we've played with it ever since. Now, our skills are probably so fine-tuned that it would take decades to build up that many scars on a new Frisbee. Realizing that he was in company that would appreciate the same notion, he vocalized his thought.
    "Yeah man, we're crazy good now. Maybe we should buy a new one, and try not to fuck it up at all. We could make a rule where we get to hit anyone that fucks it up." Hudson said.
    "But when random people walk into our games, they always mis-throw that shit. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for hitting random people, but that would be a pretty intimidating factor. Girls would never play with us anymore. Fuck that!" Deacon snatched the Frisbee stealthily and tossed it up into the air a few times. "Besides, this mothafucka has character; a history. With us. Remember that time Saul threw it on the roof of the gym?"
    "Yeah, how we got the cheerleading squad to form a human pyramid to retrieve that shit...that was amazing. I can't believe they were down to do that for us," Saul reminisced.
    "Yeah dude, girls love me. They told me. All of them, ever," Deacon joked.
    The three spread out across the field, forming a gigantic triangle formation. Deacon tossed the Frisbee, missing Hudson by a mile.
    "Jesus Deke, you'd be gettin' your ass kicked already if we'd gotten a new Frisbee!" screamed Saul, laughing from across the field. "What the hell was that?"
    "I'm warming up, bitch, gimme a second here!"
    Hudson launched the Frisbee over to Saul, a near perfect throw, if not too far. Saul, twisting and leaping into the air to catch it, grabbed and tossed the Frisbee to Deacon before his feet ever came back down to the ground. Saul used a whip of the wrist to toss, which gave him incredible accuracy and formidable distance. Unfortunately, the throw set him off balance, and he tumbled to the grass as the Frisbee landed in Deacon's outstretched arms.
    "Nice one, Saul. You alright?" Deacon said, as Saul sprung back up to his feet.
    "Yeah, I'm fine." I'm always fine.
    
Chapter 8

    Half an hour later, the three walked back from the field just in time to mingle with the passing period. The concrete of the courtyard felt different under their feet than the grass; all three of them noticed it, but said nothing. Lots of things like that have come to the point where it seems so commonplace, nobody even notices them anymore. Plus, lots of people are so intent upon where they're headed that it probably never even crossed their minds in the first place. I wonder what it's like to have such direction. I wonder, if it's all misguided direction...Saul put his ring finger to his mouth, nursing a callous that that never failed to reappear whenever he played Frisbee. Tasting the dirt on his hands, he wondered why his mind was so adamant about cleanliness.
    "Ah, shit." Hudson said, stopping in his tracks. Deacon and Saul stopped a few feet past him, and looked back. "I forgot my backpack on the field. Shit. I'll see you cats in photo." He turned abruptly and sauntered off.
    "You fools and your backpacks," Deacon said. "If you just carry shit in your pockets, it's always right there, right?"
    "Yeah, if you don't have to carry anything, ever. You can feel free to bitch at me next time I see you totin' a Frisbee in your back pocket, alright?" Saul taunted.
    "That's what lockers are for!"
    "Yeah, for those of us who still have those..."
    "Ooh, bastard. Don't forget I got 'cho combination. Friends have the potential to be your worst enemies," Deacon said, grinning villainously.
    "I'll keep that in mind."
    They walked down the hallway towards the art rooms, constantly trying to innovate a new way to trip each other in mid-step. After many successes by Deacon and mostly failures by Saul, he took a long sidestep directly to the left and completely stopped, causing Deacon to run into his back.
    "Ha. Good one," Deacon laughed. "Hey, what are we doing in photo today anyway?"
    "It beats the hell outta me, man. She seems to have different needs on a day-to-day basis."
    "Word. That day a week an' a half ago, when you were sick, she had Hudson and I practically teaching the class for her. It's cool that she let us all be teacher's assistants...but kinda strange of her. She definitely gets shit from other teachers about it. I'm definitely glad for it though, it's nice to get two credits a semester for doing, pretty much no work at all," Deacon beamed.
    "Yeah, for sure. I think she just likes our personalities, especially when we're together. Our presence makes the class a lot more fun for the students, I think. I'm mostly glad for it because we get access to the lab without having to worry about actually getting graded on our shit, you know?"
    "You said it. That's chill as fuck of her."
    As they rounded the corner to the photography room, they suddenly found themselves enclosed in a mob of middle-school-looking kids, whose eyes darted around nervously. Saul and Deacon's walk was pulled into a faster pace, and their motions became jerky, forced to imitate the movement of the crowd in an effort to not inadvertently bash into any of the little ones. Saul looked over at Deacon's face, finding what was surely a reflection of his own bewilderment. He shrugged his shoulders, turned forward, and attempted to navigate his way out of the human maze. Saul heard Deacon's voice behind him, clouded by the chattering that pervaded the hallway.
    "Yo, Saul, what the hell? Excuse me, kid...um. Saul, I'm followin' you."
    When they arrived near the head of the crowd, they were already inside the photography room. Saul looked around, locating the teacher in the far corner. She was talking to another lady who was wearing glasses, their eyes skimming over the group. When she saw Saul and Deacon emerge from the chaos, she smiled and waved at them, indicating that they should come over. Saul placed a perplexed look upon his face and negotiated his way to them.
    "Judy...what the hell is all this?" he said, swooping an open hand in the direction of the crowd.
    "Saul, Deacon, meet Mrs. Fornhan," Judy said, gesturing toward the lady with the glasses. "She's a middle school teacher, and this is her art class. They're just touring the school, seeing what it will be like for them next year."
    Saul and Deacon introduced themselves to Mrs. Fornhan, who quickly took her leave, taking her students with her. Looking down the hallway after them, they were witness to a tempest of candy bar wrappers and torn papers, remnants of the young art class. A clay pot from the earlier pottery class lay in ruins, brushed off to the side, no doubt meant to be hidden under a desk. Judy snuck up upon them and placed her hands on their shoulders.
    "Well guys, guess what you get to do!"
    "Aw, crap," said Deacon. "You can't be serious."
    "Aw, it won't take but a minute. I think there are some brooms in the lab closet," she said, baring her teeth as she smiled. "After that, you can take that laundry basket full of art smocks down to the 'home ec' room, and throw them into the washing machine. That should be easy enough."
    "What the hell is going on?" Hudson said, now standing in the doorway, complete with backpack. "I just had to battle my way through an unruly horde of barbarians, and now this?"
    Deacon looked at Hudson. "Um, yeah dude, Judy says you gotta clean this shit up whist we run the smocks down to get washed. Peace!" he cried, latching onto the shopping cart and barreling his way towards the door. He was stopped by Hudson's hand, pressed against the door frame.
    "You think I'm falling for that shit? Grab a broom, bitch. We're gonna take care of this, then the smocks, jokah."
    Judy and Saul laughed uncontrollably in the background.
    "Don't think you're escapin' this either, Saul. Let's get to work," Hudson said, pointing his finger.
    "Alright, alright," Saul said, having difficulty stifling his hysterics. He took two brooms and a dustpan out of the closet, and tossed them to his friends. "This will go quick with three."
    They started sweeping, silent and annoyed at first. Christ...those little kids had to come and leave shit all over our room...they couldn't have done it in any other room. Ah well.
    "Hey, I was just thinking," said Deacon, "how weird is it that all candy bars look exactly the same? In the same genre, I mean. The snickers that this little bastard kid was eating, is exactly the same as the one that some guy is eating way over in Japan an' shit. That's crazy, to think about, every time you buy a snickers, you know exactly what you're getting. Any given snickers that I may eat today is exactly the same as a snickers I ate in elementary school. Wrapper and everything."
    "I think, that it's a little different each time, based on who you are and how you've changed," Saul said. "You can never view something exactly the same as you have before....or something. No, maybe I don't agree with that. I don't know. Maybe you would appreciate different aspects of it at different times."
    "Like, I'd be diggin' on the peanuts on a Monday, and the caramel on a Thursday?"
    "Yeah, something like that. Maybe."
    "Did you know that Coke used to actually have cocaine in it?" Hudson chimed in.
    "Yeah, that's true," Judy interjected from afar.
    ".........."
    "Yo Saul."
    "Yeah Deke?"
    "I think...I think that when I'm munchin' on a snickers...I think I'm more into the whole, piquant, blend, of flavors, than any particular one, you know?"
    "What the fuck does piquant mean?"
    "Flavor-tastic."
    "Oh. Well yeah, yeah. I don't know. I know what I mean, and what you mean, but not what I want to mean in relation to what you're meaning you want to mean." Saul looked at Hudson, who looked into the air for a minute, then nodded back at Saul.
    "I think you got that one. I think it made sense." Hudson laughed to himself.
    "Tight," said Saul. "Anyway, I've got no personal investment in my 'snickers appreciation' theory. You're makin' me hungry."
    "The almost-lunch-ness of right now is making you hungry," Deacon said.
    "Well, yeah, it was that before. Now I specifically want a snickers, or eight. I'm making up a commercial I my head, where there's caramel and chocolate pouring over everything. Oh man."
    "How cool of a word is caramelized," Hudson said. "Not too many words can put a taste, or a texture in your mouth. Dustpan."
    Deacon swooped up Hudson's sweepings with the dustpan, and dumped them into the trash can.
    "But, how cool would it be if words could do that," Saul said. "I've thought about that shit before."
    "Dude....I would talk all the time. And write all the time."
    ".........."
    "And now I'm hungry, too."
    Once they got their techniques and rhythm down, the sweeping flew by. The hallway was wide, and the disarray great, but it was soon triumphed over. They strolled back into the art room, put the brooms back, and loaded up the stray shopping cart with art smocks. Wheeling it out to the hallway, they found Judy inspecting their work.
    "Not too shabby, gang. You know where the home ec room is, right?" she said. They nodded. "Good. Well, take all that crap down there, and tell the teacher that I need my smocks washed. She should help you out."
    "Cool. See you latah." said Deacon, motioning for them to go. "Someone get on!"
    "Try not to hurt yourselves," Judy sighed, as Saul climbed into the front of the cart. They were out the door before her sentence was finished.
    Deacon and Saul barreled down the hallway, swerving to the left and the right, narrowly avoiding collisions with many a random person and brick wall. Hudson lumbered casually after them, shaking his head and laughing; he never lost sight of them, for the home ec room was simply down one conveniently long hallway. As a teacher exited a room on the far side, Deacon screeched the cart to a slow pace and began whistling casually, as if pushing people around in shopping carts were an everyday occurrence at the school. He saluted the teacher in passing, and received a hasty nod in return. The teacher cracked a smile after he passed the two, but only Hudson was in a vantage to see it.
    Soon enough they found themselves at the door. They began running the cart in small hallway donuts as they waited for Hudson to catch up, but he was quickly upon them.
    "That was funny as shit," he said, walking up to the door. "I thought for sure that teacher was gonna try and give you another detention; I was about to start taking count of how many you'd get today."
    Hudson opened the door, allowing the others to go in first. Deacon and Saul didn't think to consider the consequences of one person rolling another, in a shopping cart full of dirty art smocks, into an orderly high-school classroom, but they were soon made aware of them. As the class burst into laughter, the teacher spun around and issued them a fierce eye-narrowing. It was at first a solid drop of the both eyebrows, in annoyance, but soon gave way to both being raised in shock and confusion. Luckily for the three, the eyebrow motions were abandoned as a smile crept onto her lips.
    "What the hell are you supposed to be?" she said, placing her chalk on top of the metal chalk-holder.
    They smiled awkwardly and waved. "Hey, ah....we're Judy's photo assistants," Saul said, his voice unsure. "She said we should bring these smocks over here, where we could throw them into the washing machine....and, uh.....yeah." They watched her face, waiting for a response.
    "Judy?"
    "The, ahm....art teacher."
    "Ohh, Judy. Fine, I guess...." she stared at Saul, whereupon he realized that he should remove himself from the cart. "the ah, washing machine, is back there." She pointed to the back of the room, where indeed there appeared to be a washing machine, among other eclectic things. Her face turned stern. "Don't ever just interrupt my class like this again, though, okay? These people are here to learn." she said, gesturing towards the students who jointly rolled their eyes.
    "Yeah, sorry about that." Saul scratched the back of his head as he climbed out of the shopping cart.
    The three took a slow walk to the back. The cart's wheel, apparently injured during the donuts, cast an echo of high-pitched squeaks about the room. Deacon, who was pushing it and gritting his teeth in mock agony, could barely contain his laughter. The eyes of the entire class, including the teacher, followed their trek back to the washing machine, and it was only when they arrived there that class began again. They began sorting the smocks into whites and colors, unsure whether or not it was really necessary based upon the wide array of paint colors splattered on any given one.
    "Smock is a good word," Deacon said, breaking the room-corner silence.
    "Yeah, it's alright." Hudson gave up and pushed the two piles of smocks into each other.
    "It's just fun to say. Smock, smock."
    "Smock."
    "Smock, smock smock. You're right; it is fun."
    "How the hell do you work this thing, anyway?" Saul said, twisting random dials on the washing machine. I hit "start." Hmmm...what else can I do?
    "I donno. It doesn't look like any washing machine I've ever used before. It's all, industrial-style. Maybe someone in this, class about how to use washing machines, can help us out." Hudson's eyes browsed over the classroom, finding a lone pair of dark brown eyes looking back towards them. "Amelia? Ha! It's Amelia." He beckoned for her to come help out. She slipped out of her seat quickly as the teacher's back was turned.
    "Amelia?" Saul said, bashing his head on the dryer door as he jolted his head up. "Ow! Mothafucka...." He winced as the pain ebbed for a half-second, then concentrated intensely on the back of his head. He sat down on the floor, opening his mouth and blinking repeatedly.
    "Hey guys!" Amelia's eyes turned to Saul, just pre-door-bashing, then recoiled. "Oh my god, Saul, are you alright!?" she said, rushing to the dryer.
    "Oh, I'm fine," he said in a daze. "How you doin'?" God, damn, that hurts...
    Hudson and Deacon stood off to the side, laughing. "Damn dude, that was baaad...bad as in good, as in hilarious," Hudson managed to say in between breaths. Saul smiled, rubbing his head, and Amelia threw her arms around him.
    "You guys are morons," she said to him. "What do you need, anyways?"
    "This crazy-ass machine won't start." Deacon pointed to the washing machine. "What's up with that?"
    Amelia looked at the washer. "Well, first of all, you should throw these clothes in." She rifled a load into the open door. "Then detergent."
    "Smocks."
    "What?"
    "They're smocks."
    "Okay, smocks," she said, smiling. "Then, you should plug the washer in..." She reached over to the wall, dramatically plugging in a large socket. The washer hummed, shaking from side to side for a minute.
    "Ah," they said unanimously. "Ahhh."
    "Always thinking," Deacon said, tapping his right temple.
    "Always," she said, mimicking his motion. "Nice entrance into class, by the way. We've never seen that before."
    "Yeah, well, we try," Saul joked. "Gotta add some spice to this class, you know? What are you doing in here anyway, Amelia? Word on the street is that this class is worthless."
    "Oh, it's worthless." Hudson leaned on the counter. "I assure you of that."
    Amelia sighed. "Yeah well, I gotta learn how to cook for myself, right? College isn't too far off, these days. It's true, this class mostly sucks...but hopefully I'll get something out of it."
    "This place, is not the place to learn how to cook." Saul shook his head. "Try flipping on the food network sometime, or just starting with something easy, and adding what sounds good. You'll have it in no time."
    She laughed, one hand in her pocket, and her eyes softly caught his. After a few seconds, he felt a throbbing between his ears, and looked back down at his shoes while he rubbed the back of his head. That's weird, it doesn't hurt at all.
    "Oookay, well, we should be going now," Deacon said, wavering awkwardly. "Smocks're all gettin' washed!"
    "Yeah, thanks for the help Amelia. Enjoy class." Hudson offered Saul his hand, which he clasped to pull himself up.
    "...Okay. Bye guys," she said distractedly, hand still in her pocket. She occupied the other one brushing her hair back behind her left ear. "See you soon. Don't forget your shopping cart..."
    They watched her as she walked back to her seat, regaining themselves when she sat down. Deacon playfully hit Saul in the arm. "What was that all about, man?"
    Saul blinked and shook his head. "What was what about, D?"
    "Hah."
    As they exited the classroom, the wheel's squeak once again resonated through the large room. Deacon painstakingly extended it's length to the furthest reaches of time possible to spite the teacher, who pretended to ignore it. Her marks on the board were pressed so hard that tiny crumbs fell off the chalk.
    Hudson turned the doorknob. "Thanks! We'll be back Monday to pick it up. Good class you've got here," he said, laughing as he closed the door.

Chapter 9

    Their steps were light as they headed out to the parking lot, inwardly beaming for the much needed break. I mean, it's not like our classes are the most tasking ones in the world or anything, but I just can't take it for four hours straight. Thank god it's senior year. I don't know how much more of this shit I can take. When they arrived at the old, rusted duster, they threw their bags into the backseat and leaned on the dented gray hood.
    Deacon leapt on top of his car, sprawling out across the coarse metal. "Damn dude, there isn't a cloud in the sky. Except for that little one over there. Dammit."
    "I wonder if that means it's really windy up there, or not windy at all," Hudson said.
    "All I know is I'm hungry as shit." Saul said. His stomach rumbled on cue, as he had been anticipating. "I could go for a snickers about now."
    "Ohhh, those bastard little kids," Hudson rasped. "I feel like we should go to their school and take a huge crap on the front lawn. Whoever's ceramic pot that was, is gonna be pissed. It was almost done being painted an' everything."
    "Anybody that makes a ceramic pot is just begging for it to be broken, I think," Deacon responded. "If people were clever, they'd just paint some fuckin' Tupperware."
    "Truly," Saul said sarcastically, "that would be high art."
    "Hey, let's go get some fuckin' food, yeah?"
    "Word. Let's hit it. Shotgun."
    "Fuck." Saul climbed into the backseat.
    Sliding off the roof of the car, Deacon tumbled into the driver's seat. He slammed his door, and fumbled around in his pockets for his keys. He pulled out a pencil, two pens, indecipherable scribblings on many scraps of paper, an indeterminate amount of money wadded up into a ball, and finally, his keys.
    "Get a backpack, loser," Saul echoed from the backseat.
    "Fuckya kid I hate 'em; murr, murr," Deacon quickly spit.
    Turning the key in the ignition, the engine churned for a while, trying desperately to turn over. After the trial was repeated twice, Deacon began rolling down the window.
    "Man, this car is a piece of shit," Hudson said, laughing out the passenger window. "You gotta get it looked at or somethin'."
    "Yeah dude, your non-car is pretty sweet," Deacon retorted. "Way better than my actual one."
    "Yeah, yeah....I'm just sayin', the 'method' takes too long. What if we had to get away from some fuckin' pirates or somethin'? We'd be run through long before you ever got this motor running."
    "At least it always works, eventually," Saul chimed in.
    Nodding in agreement, Deacon finished rolling the window down a third of the way. He tuned the radio to 95.6, which wasn't actually a station at all, and turned on the emergency blinkers. Hudson sighed, opening the glove compartment and pressing the yellow button to pop the trunk.
    "Okay, window, radio, trunk, and lights. Got 'em all."
    Deacon turned the key in the ignition and pumped the gas pedal; the V8 engine roared to life. He turned and grinned widely at Hudson, who smiled as he gazed out the window.
    "Ha-hah! That shit is ten times better than any security system, mofuckaz," Deacon playfully screamed. "I'm lovin' it."
    "Yeah, people are definitely gonna want to be stealing your busted-ass ride. Two weeks ago it barely even had a windshield!" Hudson got out and closed the trunk.
    "Swoop!" Saul said, jumping into the front seat. Hudson's "Fuck!" from outside was barely audible through the glass, after which he opened the door and climbed into the backseat. "Good one, you bitch."
    "Yeah, but that windshield shit was barely my fault," Deacon said as he pulled out of the parking lot. "Unless you count the car rolling while I was driving it as my fault. Then maybe."
    Twenty minutes later, they found themselves parked in a lookout over the city, part of a dirt road that eventually went deeper into the mountains. Sitting on the edge of a guardrail in front of the duster, they munched happily away at their respective meals from Wendy's while they surveyed the city.
    "Oh, this junior bacon is fantastic," Deacon hummed. "For some reason, I never get tired of Wendy's. McDonald's can suck, my dick, but Wendy's is always delicious."
    "That's what I used to think," Saul replied, "but I'm getting tired of it all lately. I mean, all of it. I can barely even walk within ten feet of a Taco Bell. It's like kryptonite for my appetite."
    "Good rhyme. I get that way every so often." Hudson chomped down on his burger, chewing and smiling as he spoke. "I think maybe it's a seasonal thing. Actually, it happens a lot more than I give it credit for. I just get tired of all the shitty food; I feel like eating nothing but fruit for a month. Fruit is so good...an orange is way better than any candy I know of, it just takes work to get to it. You gotta, have some on hand, then peel all that shit off of it. Then, when you're done with it, your hands are all sticky and orange-smelling."
    "Oranges smell fantastic."
    "Well, I'm not contesting that. I meant to say, the stickiness is that which sucks, in the context."
    "Ha."
    "The problem is, the ready availability of other shit to stuff ourselves with. I mean, who wants to walk all the way to the sto', just to get some fruit, when there are always vending machines right in front of us with crappy food in 'em."
    Deacon's eyes lit up, and he was silent for a moment. "What if they had, fruit vending machines! That would be amazing, especially since fruit, in general, is cheap. You'd just have to drop like, a quarter on a banana, and you'd be much happier, and healthier."
    Saul tilted his head back. "That's actually, a really good idea." He stopped chewing his frostee-covered fries. "You might have to refrigerate some of it though, or it'd go bad quick. That would chalk up the cost a little bit."
    "Well, they were still making money off selling a banana for a quarter. Bananas are cheap as shit!"
    "Depends on the season," Hudson offered.
    "True. But if this got to be a big market, I think eventually there would be a grip of greenhouses somewhere that would enterprise on this shit, and prices would probably get competitive," Deacon said. "That would only help."
    "What about fruit that's more rare than that already, or just wouldn't work in the climate?" Saul said.
    Hudson looked up at the sky. "Well...I guess shit would just be higher priced, based on the dankness, and perhaps rarity, of the fruit in general. Like, if you had some kiwis up in that bitch, they'd be like, a dollar."
    "Oh man, kiwis are the chronic."
    "You're damn straight they're the chronic; that's why they're a dollar. Also, shit that takes a longer time to eat, in general, is higher priced, because you enjoy it more. That's America for you. Thus, a box of nerds is way more expensive than it should be.....if we had some pomegranates in this thing, they would be accordingly expensive."
    "What's a pompagrant?" Saul asked, staring blankly at Hudson.
    "Seriously?" Hudson widened his eyes, tilting his head forward.
    "Yeah...?"
    "It's a red fruit...I can't believe you haven't had a pomegranate, you fuckin' barbarian." He shook his head. "We'll get one tomorrow. They're good, um...they have all these crazy little seeds in them, that are covered with this fleshy-fruit stuff. You chew it off of 'em, then spit out the seeds. It takes forever."
    "What do they taste like?"
    "Huh...I haven't had one in awhile...I remember them being kind of tropical, sweet tasting."
    "Don't get that fuckin' juice on you, though," Deacon warned. "It stains the shit out of anything it touches."
    "Yeah, word," Hudson agreed.
    "Well shit. Okay, pompagrants in the vending machine."
    "Pomegranates."
    "Whatever."
    Hudson stood up to stretch, clasping his hands behind his head and arcing backwards. "Shit would still be expensive. I think pomegranates are a crazy-seasonal thing as well."
    "Maybe the FDA would support it, and fund it based off of the potential health benefits. Then shit could stay cheap," Deacon mused.
    "I doubt that."
    "Yeah, those assholes." Deacon polished off his burger, crumpled the tinfoil, and made a majestic three-pointer into the adjacent trash can. "What." He danced an end-zone jig at the opportune moment, causing Saul to spray Dr. Pepper all over the hillside, laughing.
    "Okay," Saul said, wiping his chin as he feinted a tackle at Deacon. "So what if people don't catch onto it, and they just end up with a bunch of rotten fruit? What then?"
    "Huh. Well, I guess they'd have to just try it out in a few places first, and see whether or not it worked. Maybe people really do enjoy being shitty to their bodies, is that the hypothetical scenario? I don't think it would happen...but hmmm...I guess they could, use the rotten food to fertilize the next crops? All that shit runs in cycles."
    "Bullshit." Saul sat on the car's hood. "You think they're gonna pay to ship all the fruit around in the first place, then pay again to ship it back to where it came from, with no profit involved? I think it either takes off, or it sinks into the Marianas Trench of history."
    "Well, maybe. Maybe that is the way of things."

Chapter 10

    Done eating, the three ventured onto the hillside that awaited them on the opposite side of the road. The earth dropped down in a slope from the pavement, but soon leveled out into a meadow. The colors made it look like the bottom of the ocean; orange coral in sporadic bursts throughout the sand. They waded through the grass in a file; Hudson spread out his hands, which brushed the tips of the tall grass, and the other two, following, mimicked his action. After a short walk they found themselves near a border of trees, the beginnings of a forest which extended over the mountains.
    "How much time do we still have?" Hudson called back to the others, who were stopped a ways back, looking at a bug that had landed in a barren patch. They quickly regained pace.
    Looking at his pager, Deacon said, "We've got an hour. Remember, we dropped our sixth period classes so we could have an extended lunch?" He raised one eyebrow to Hudson.
    "Oh yeah. Awesome. In that case, let's hike a little bit." Hudson bounded into the trees, patterned shadows falling onto him from the canopy above. As Deacon and Saul strung along, a grey cloud skirted the sun momentarily, dimming the contrast of light on the forest floor.
    "I hope it isn't about to rain," Deacon said, sidestepping a collapsed tree.
    Saul planted his hand on top and swung over it. "I hope it's about to rain. Rain is my favorite weather, by far."
    "Weirdo."
    As they ventured deeper into the forest, the sounds of the city, though still in close proximity, were gradually muffled. They were replaced by breezes of wind through the trees, the crunch of leaves, pine needles, and other deciduous matter beneath their feet, and familiar clicks and rustles from the rarely seen, but often known, wildlife. They walked in silence for a time, taking in the atmosphere and letting it settle into them. Hudson led; he had hiked over many parts of the foothills with his family when he was younger, and generally had a good sense of orientation.
    They came to a small stream, no more than a foot in width, in the middle of a small clearing. The surrounding colors of the trees, the darkening sky, the clouds, and the ground were mirrored in it, and gave it a metallic essence as it babbled down its course. In the eastern side of the clearing, a tiny bridge had been built over it with fully bark-laden tree limbs and a collection of the largest rocks to be found in such a place. It was obviously the antiquated work of a young child, or perhaps multiple children, after having scoured the surrounding area for materials.
    "That's awesome, man," Hudson said, slowly drifting over to the bridge. He gazed down at it with affection. Hands in pockets, he hopped onto it with one foot, remaining shakily balanced on top, and bounced up and down for a moment. The bridge merely flexed a bit under his capricious weight test. "Sturdy, too!" he said.
    "I wonder how long that's been there," Deacon pondered. "It looks pretty worn."
    "That reminds me of when I was little; taking small rocks and piling them on top of each other, trying to dam little streams like this," Saul said, staring into the stream. "I mean, I know we didn't know each other that long ago or anything, but I'm sure you did it too. I used to think that I could dam up any river into a lake, if I waited long enough,""For sure; that was every kid, ever." Deacon hopped across the stream on one foot. "I'm on the one side," he said, then hopped back; "I'm on the other side. This ain't exactly the Mississippi."
    "Robin Hood, Men in Tights," Hudson laughed. "Good one."
    A rumble to the west caused Saul to inspect the sky. The clouds remained white overhead, but the closer to the horizon his gaze strayed, the darker they got. "Yeah, it is definitely gonna rain sometime in the near future."
    "Fuck!" Deacon balanced himself above the river with one foot on each side. "I definitely am not diggin' on some rain right now. That means no more Frisbee."
    "Yeah, I guess so," Hudson said, "but it looks like we got a little while. Let's keep on keepin' on."
    They wandered westward, ignoring the trails that led in and out of the clearing to the north and south. "I've never liked paths," Hudson said. "They're always all sorts of shit going on, everywhere, and you just might miss something dope and unique if stay on those things."
    Saul didn't know why, but Hudson's words at that moment struck him as much more than a hiker's insight. He thought about directions in life, about possible routes that he could take everyday. He thought about the possibility of his future, and where the footprints that he left today would eventually lead him, not only physically, but mentally and spiritually. God, that's so curious. Society today...there aren't too many original outlets. I mean, there have been so, many, people, that have already lived and died, and they've all already traveled their own paths. Potential careers, potential places...it seems like, wherever you go, you're probably just following a map that someone has already drawn up. Like it's a fuckin' road trip or something. I mean, shit, people strive nowadays to be, bankers and investors, lawyers...where can you possibly innovate, in these fuckin' predetermined fields? Why would everybody want to follow down these trails, anyway? I guess society sort of forces people into behavioral patterns, forces them to cut down their unique shape into a block that will fit inside a block-shaped hole. That's fuckin' bullsh...
    "Saul?" Deacon said, adjusting his head to look into Saul's eyes. "You alright, man?" It appeared that they had walked a ways away from the clearing and stopped altogether; he had stopped with them too, but he hadn't realized it. They now stood in the wake of a colossal tree...each branch was of mammoth proportions, and it was covered in various places with patches of moss and mushrooms. Just being in the presence of the tree made Saul feel like his wisdom was nowhere near where it had the eventual potential to be.
    "Yeah, I'm fine man. I was just on some 'next' shit, you know? I got crazy philosophical for a minute."
    "Awesome. We'll have to talk about it sometime soon," Hudson said. "Anyway, as I was saying, this is exactly what I mean. We woulda never stumbled upon this shit were we to have taken that trail."
    "Yeah...." Saul responded, somewhat methodically, but thoughtfully.
    "Check out all this shit, man. All this nature around us makes me feel all, tribal, and shit, you know?" Deacon said, nodding his head.
    "Yeah, fully." Hudson ran his fingers along a thick patch of jade-colored moss. "I was thinking; how dope would it have been to have lived with the Indians? Everything so, spiritual, everything so...inextricably intertwined, with everything else. I think that perspective has so much wisdom in it...that gets overlooked completely in our industrial world. The world that we build around ourselves."
    "Yeah, talk about perpetuating cycles, huh?" Deacon's face evidenced a moment of introspection.
    "........."
    "I just had a great idea," Hudson said, "for this video game, where you're an Indian." Saul nodded, and Deacon looked at the both of them skeptically. "Wait, wait, D, allow me to elaborate. So, this game would have tons of different elements to it. First off, you would have to hunt for your food, Oregon-trail style. Except this time, you're an Indian, with a bow, and about fifteen more years of video game graphics technology than 'Oregon Trail' ever had. So, we could make hunting, like, Rainbow Six-style. It would be first person, and you would be hunting deer and buffalo, things like that, to sustain yourself and your village."
    "You could hide in the grass," Saul offered.
    "Yes! You could hide in the grass. Or the trees, as the case might be. You'd have full freedom, and be able to do shit like climb the trees. Okay, so there's that aspect of the game, which would rule. You would also have to go on spiritual quests an' shit. You could gather a few friends in your tribe, and go on mystical journeys....where you battle packs of wolves with nothing but sticks; shit like that, to accomplish some greater cosmic alignment."
    "If you got hurt," Saul began, "you could go into the forest, and collect herbs, to make into a healing salve; but you'd have to get the right ones, and there would be a grip of different plants."
    "Word," Hudson and Deacon said simultaneously. They looked at each other and laughed.
    "As another part of the game, you'd have to trade in markets with other villagers, and with other cultures, to get shit that you needed. There would be a huge social web to integrate into." Saul's eyes were lit up in imagination. "There could be a battle, too, where Colonial dudes with guns try to invade your land. That has the potential to be pretty epic."
    "And to top it all off," Hudson said excitedly, "there would be spirits in every aspect of it; you could invoke them to use magical powers, but only if your karma or whatever was aligned with their will. Wow."
    "How come this game has never been made?" Deacon posed.
    "Maybe we're the first ones to think of it?" Saul said, shakily unsure.
    "No.....no way. That just doesn't seem viable, does it? I mean, okay, we wax about pretty innovative stuff frequently...take the fruit vending machine, for example. That's an amazing idea, but I'm sure that there's some fault to it...something that we've definitely overlooked that casts the whole idea into ruins."
    "I guess we'll never know until we try an' put some of 'em into practice, yuh?" Deacon took a look at the sky, deeply inhaling the musk that the growing static electricity riddled throughout the air. He lifted the side of his shirt to inspect his pager. "Yeah, we should get going. Not only is this weather about to drop, but it's getting' up on time."
    As they trekked back to the duster, the wind began to push its way violently through the labyrinth of trees. Leaves were pulled into the drafts almost magnetically, swirling in fluid motions that carved their paths around the trunks. As Saul watched, he shoveled his hands deep into his pockets, rolling his shoulders forward to offer less surface for the wind to connect with. The rain began to fall, but the multi-layer pine canopy above shielded them. After a short walk across the open meadow, they came to the overlook and hopped into the car. Their now-saturated clothes clung to their bodies, an unconsciously uncomfortable sensation amidst the wave of loose-fitting fashion.

Chapter 11

    Walking back up to the school, Saul took note of the impressions that the falling rain left with him. He could barely hear his footsteps along the pavement; a resonation of thousands of small, perpetual splashes hung throughout the space around him. The scent in the air was musty, like copper pennies held too long in the warmth of a closed hand; alert and crisp like the electricity that he imagined must have been prying its way through the dark clouds. Heat came off of the concrete in thin wisps, hydrophobically corkscrewing around the cold drops of rain. He closed his eyes, feeling a light drizzle brush past his eyelashes, and hypothesized about a hyper-sensitivity that would allow him to better know the orchestra of thermo-dynamics that surrounded him.
    Entering into the sanctuary of the cafeteria provided no immediate relief; the thin layer of rain that clung to his body had to embrace the dryness and heat before his saturated limbs would get wind of it. As they walked to a distant table their shoes left liquid footprints, which gradually rearranged themselves into ambiguous puddles of muddy water. To grab the attention of their friends at the table, Deacon burst into a series of sporadically abrupt shuffles, sending loud squeaks down the length of the room. Heads turned quizzically, but none of the intended.
    "What up, crew?" Hudson said as they approached the table.
    "Oh shit, my man Hudson in the house," Joel responded. "We're just chillin'. How you cats doin?"
    "Alright." Deacon shook his arms and head, sending flurries of water from his sleeves and hair. "It is raining as fuck outside."
    "How was lunch?"
    "Delicious," Saul said distractedly. "Hey, tell me something. If there were a vending machine over there," he said, pointing to the realm of the vending machines, "that sold fruit....would you guys buy from it?"
    "Fruit?"
    "Yeah, fruit."
    Joel stared vaguely in the direction of the machines for a moment. "Yeah...yeah, I think I would. I mean, it would depend on whether or not it looked good...but I think so. That's a good idea."
    Saul looked back at Hudson and nodded once. "A-booyah."
    Sitting down, Saul, Deacon, and Hudson chatted with the table, four people in all, about most everyday bullshit. They talked about school, and what utter crap it was. They talked about music, and what utter crap most of it was, and how people, in general, were morons because of the worthless music that they ignorantly promoted as chart-topping. They talked about bitches, and what utter crap most of them spit, but how they still couldn't live a single day without seeing one. It was fantastic.
    After a short lull in the conversation, Deacon turned his head to Saul. "Hey, its been awhile since we had a good laugh session, don't you think?"
    "Oh shit, I'd almost forgotten. It's been far too long, I'd say." Saul turned to the others. "Hey guys.....laugh session?"
    Eyes lit up. "Yeaah, dude. How long has it been since we had one of those?" Travis said, occupying the far end of the table.
    "Too long," Joel chimed. "Maybe not since the start of the year...good call on that."
    Saul nodded to Deacon. "Word."
    With barely the time to blink in recognition, Hudson caught Saul's face out of the corner of his eyes and turned. He watched a small smile slowly creep up to the corners of his mouth; watched them curving mischievously upwards. Saul tensely tightened his lips together in mock restraint and opened his eyes wide, scanning over the gazes of the others. Scattered, short reports of laughter issued from his nostrils, which quickly exploded into full-out, maniacal hysterics. Starting with Hudson, the others at the table joined in one by one, like dominoes falling to the consequence of the initial touch. At first, the echoes down the wide corridor sounded somewhat forced, but they were soon replaced by a more genuine-sounding, thunderous murmur as the mere survival of their pointless hilarity set in.
    Saul couldn't explain how or why it was intensely funny to watch people laugh, only that it was infectious. The seven at the table laughed to the point of tears, fueling themselves off the energy of the others in a blissful and potentially eternal cycle. Travis's laugh was especially unique, and Saul found it to be a gear in the machine that could pick up slack for any possible deficit. Looking shakily for a moment to the left of Joel's tottering head, he saw almost everyone in the cafeteria quizzically staring back at their table, some of them laughing themselves. He pointed his finger toward them in a fleeting moment of self-control, prompting the others to turn their heads as his hysterics mushroomed once again.
    The populous stares of the other students were too much too take, and they were raised to a new pitch as Joel fell backwards off the bench. Saul looked at Deacon and pointed at his wrist, indicating a desire to know the time; Deacon looked at his pager, then held up three quaking fingers in return. Pulling his hood over his head, Deacon nestled his head in his arms, muffled laughs escaping from the sides. As they slowly wound down they held their chests, heaving heavily and steadily as sighs and exhausted laughs flooded the air. Saul rubbed his stomach; his warm hands offered at least some comfort on his aching muscles.
    "Hoooo....well, Deke, how long...did we...go for?" Saul wheezed rhythmically.
    "Four an' a half minutes; a new record!" Deacon raised his hands triumphantly into the air, fists clenched.
    "I wouldn'ta made it if it weren't for this silly fuck," Joel said, pointing towards Travis. "That was the funniest laugh I've ever seen. Did you see this kid? He looked all intense; teeth bared and eyes wide. You rule, dude."
    "I aim to please," Travis laughed, looking pained.
    "I can't believe how uptight all these fuckin' kids are," Hudson said, looking back into the café. "I would'a been laughin' my ass off if I had witnessed that shit. That was hilarious to like, biblical proportions."
    "It was epic like Homer," Saul sighed, smiling. He hated to look up at the clock again.

Chapter 12

    As Saul walked back along the usual route to his house, he reveled in the post-rain atmosphere of the west side. It was a bit chilly for his taste; when he had to stop at lights to wait for the little, white crosswalk signal, he slightly shivered as the cold gnawed on his skin. It wasn't bad, however, and he was barely distracted from his excitement. Oh man, it's Friday...it seems like this week has lasted forever. Now I get to chill out for a bit, then cook dinner, then rock Lindsey's possibly-existing party. I hope that turns out to be fun. Ah well, it's nice to have a full plate of shit to do. When it doesn't involve school or work, that is.
    As Saul crested the large hill overlooking his house he thought back to seventh period, and how worthless it had been. He cursed himself for not taking geography earlier in his high-school career. All the teacher ever did was assign menial little map-making projects, as if that was supposed to solidify conceptions of time and place, and it frustrated the hell out of him. God, am I back in middle school or something? I wish the teacher would arrange some other options for grading, so I don't feel like I'm taking a class in coloring book theory. Earlier he had appreciated the fresh rain on the grass; it hadn't occurred to him to be wary of it. Tumbling down the hillside, he luckily landed in a large patch of still-soft grass.
    "Mothafucka...." Saul muttered, wincing. Upon opening his eyes, he was confronted with a small plant. He looked at it with malice, imagining it to be similar to the dew-covered plant that he surely slipped on atop the hill. As he watched it, his breath wisped out toward the plant, subtly forcing a few drops of rainwater into one larger bead in the center of a leaf. As it started to make its way downward, its weight gradually torqued the leaf more and more, until it was hanging upon the bent edge. It wavered twice, then dropped to the ground. Its release whipped the length of the leaf upward, spraying forth a mist of water into Saul's eyes.

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