The Screwed-Up Life of Charlie the Second

by Drew Ferguson

  THIRD PERIOD: CHOIR

  FOURTH PERIOD: GYM (Actually, it’s a study hall until soccer’s over.)

  FIFTH PERIOD: LUNCH

  SIXTH PERIOD: LATIN IV (’Cuz First thinks I’ll be a lawyer—if I don’t end up in prison before spring semester.)

  SEVENTH AND EIGHTH PERIOD: ADVANCED PLACEMENT BIOLOGY

  NINTH PERIOD: PRE-CALCULUS

  It’s only a matter of time before I catch crap for being the only senior taking the bus, which I’ll be doing until I apologize to Dana or pass that damn driver’s test. I’d rather walk than tell her I’m sorry. But nobody noticed today. Everyone was too busy ooohhhing and aaahhhing about Rob Hunt driving to school in a black BMW. At South, crap like that’s important. The kids here practically demand your parents’ tax return to see if you’re worth talking to. Apparently, nobody told Rob there wasn’t a dress code, ’cuz he climbed out of the beemer wearing dark slacks, a white shirt (with cuff links even), and a tie. For a second, Mr. Fuller, one of the school deans, actually thought he was a student teacher.

  Anyhow, South’s the same as it ever was. All of the preps, jocks, and cheerleaders still sit in the Pit, a gigantic sunken atrium smack in the middle of the school. Last year, when my ancient civilizations/world history/Latin teacher, Mrs. Lardner, described the Hindu caste system, she drew a whackin’ big diagram of the Pit on the chalkboard. With Mrs. Lardner everything’s either “whackin’ big” or “cute little”—whackin’ big cathedrals, whackin’ big pyramids, cute little monks, cute little Earth goddesses. On her diagram, she marked the Brahmans (rich kids, varsity jocks, cheerleaders), the Vaishyas (JV jocks, kids whose parents owned retail stores, girls that put out and didn’t get pregnant), Shudras (stoners who sold cheap, band and choir geeks, the Vocation Ed and Home Ec types, the girls who put out and got pregnant), and the rest. We, the Untouchables, weren’t allowed near the Pit. We got the cafeteria.

  I ended up at a table with a few geeks from the academic team and the Guns & Ammo-reading ROTC psychos who were itching to go into Pakistan and kick Osama’s ass.

  Soccer practice was cool. Rob’s good—crazy good. He’ll take diving headshots, but he’ll pass if someone’s got a better opening. During one drill, Josh McCullough was getting covered too closely and he passed the ball, way too hard, across the field to Rob. The ball slammed Rob’s ribcage. Rob didn’t miss a beat and drew the ball into a juggle, rolling it thigh-to-thigh, then thigh-to-chest-to-thigh, before dancing it past a fullback for the goal. It was the only shot I missed.

  Rob’s not as big a jerk as I thought. We talked after he offered to drive me home—well, at least not about him frenching me on Friday, but that’s probably ’cuz I imagined the whole thing. I asked what classes he had and he blushed. Basically, he’s in remedial everything. He said the only things he didn’t have trouble with were soccer, singing, and playing the piano.

  I couldn’t help checking him out, especially since he didn’t shower or change with everyone else in the locker room, just took off his cleats and shin guards. He’s got really pale skin, like marble, and the veins on his hands and arms sort of pop out. I wanted to trace them with a finger. His hair was still damp, and there were dark circles of sweat in the armpits of his jersey. He smelled good. Slightly musky.

  I should start on my homework. We’re supposed to write a credo for creative writing tomorrow. Credo, Mrs. Bailey told the class, is Latin for “I believe.” Duh, excuse me, Latin IV here. I’ve also got pre-calc and a chapter to read for AP Bio. It’ll all have to wait. The little man’s knocking the Jockeys, and it looks like I’m going to have to take matters into my own hands.

  Tuesday, August 28

  The bus was late, which was okay, ’cuz it meant skipping this morning’s Rot-See Nazi discussion on whether the Chinese Air Force could destroy the U.S. Navy. Some clever prick’s already figured out the combo for the MasterLock on my locker. Whoever it is, he opened it and re-locked it so the dial faces the wrong way. Real cute. I spent, like, ten minutes twisting and cranking the lock around so I could work the combo upside down. By the time I got it unlocked, I only had two minutes to get to class. I chucked everything into my locker except for my creative writing folder and notebook. Excuse me, journal; writers keep journals, as Mrs. Bailey had to say nearly eight million times yesterday. I slammed my locker shut and practically skidded through Mrs. Bailey’s door as the bell rang, collapsing into the same seat I was in yesterday.

  Mrs. Bailey gawked at me from behind her big owl-eye glasses as I caught my breath.

  “Charles, what’s wrong?” she mewed like a half-drowned cat.

  If it weren’t for Mrs. Bailey, I wouldn’t have written “mewed like a half-drowned cat.” I would’ve stuck with “asked.” But Mrs. Bailey totally has a hard-on for similes and metaphors. During class today, she wouldn’t shut up about “the need for efficiency of language in our writing” and how Gustave Flaubert was so poor he couldn’t afford a thesaurus and he spent eight hours one day trying to get le mot juste, “the right word.” We were lucky, she said, that we could—no, should—use our thesauruses when writing. We’d save ourselves from Flaubert’s fate, which, according to Bailey, was getting arrested in Paris for stealing a loaf of bread. “Just like Les Mis,” gushed some girl in class. “Exactly; Flaubert was the model for Jean Valjean,” Mrs. Bailey said. She’s full of it. I’m pretty sure she’s an alky, too.

  “Charles, I mewed you a question. What’s wrong?”

  Hell if I knew. My fly wasn’t open—I checked—but the class was still staring at me.

  “Nothing’s wrong.”

  “Really?”

  She stepped closer to me. The smell of patchouli oil and cat piss steamed off her sweater and old-lady polyester fat pants. She was pulling one of those Wonder-Woman-lasso-of-truth mind jobs on me.

  “Would anyone care to tell Charles what’s wrong?”

  Twenty hands rocketed into the air, propelled by twenty sets of ass cheeks squirming in their chairs. Everyone ooohoooh-ooooohhh-ed to be called on.

  “Class, you don’t need my permission to find your voice,” Mrs. Bailey said, all Lane Bryant Buddha-like. “You must find your own voice.”

  Shannon actually scribbled that in her notebook.

  “Charles is in the same seat he was in yesterday,” Kim Green said, smirking. I wanted to ask her how many guys she’d had in her seat yesterday.

  “Exactly,” Mrs. Bailey said. “We can’t be truly inspired unless we let ourselves be surprised. Now, Charles, sit at my desk and I’ll sit here. Even the teacher can learn from the student. Now shoo, Charles.”

  I got up and went to her desk.

  “Class, take out your credos and we’ll begin sharing ourselves.”

  Kim’s gonna ace this class. She’s definitely nailed the sharing herself thing.

  We went around the room, reading our credos aloud. I believe in the power of love. I believe I can make the world a better place. I believe that I’m beautiful just the way I am. I believe that children are our future. I believe in the music of my soul. I believe in life’s simple wonders—a stranger’s smile, the fleeting solidness of a comet’s tail, the dangers of such closeness.

  I believed I was gonna be sick. My credo—at least the one I read in class—was just as crappy and just as Hallmark-plagiarized. It was something about me believing I was the captain of my fate. But while everybody read their stuff out loud, I added more to mine to keep from going nuts. When Mrs. Bailey said she was going to collect them—to experience, not to grade—I started crossing out what I’d written in class.

  That was a mistake. It just got her attention. She snatched my notebook and got this:

  I believe this assignment is totally retarded.

  I believe that Mrs. Bailey really needs to get electrolysis for her mustache.

  I believe my parents want to ruin my life.

  I believe I’m the only faggot at South—well, except for

  Bob Collins and Andy Moore, but who�
��d want to do Andy?

  I believe, some days at least, I’m not the geek everyone thinks I am.

  I believe Dana Flannigan hates me because she’s jealous and she really knows—deep down—Bink likes me more than he likes her and that pisses her off.

  I believe I’ll never be normal; I’ll always be a freak.

  “Some beliefs aren’t worth having,” Mrs. Bailey said, spitting her words in my ear. Her breath made my skin feel like it was melting.

  Soccer practice was okay. We’ve got an away-game against Woodstock on Friday. Not to sound cocky, but I think we’ll beat ’em. Their forwards start off strong, but don’t have any stamina and their fullbacks pretty much blow.

  Rob’s still not taking showers after practice. After I had mine, I asked if I could bum a ride, but he was meeting Shannon once she finished cheerleading practice. She’d volunteered to tutor him in history. Right. We ended up hanging out until Shannon showed up, and Rob dropped everything to follow her like a puppy. He even opened the passenger side door for her.

  I bet they’re still in his car somewhere right now, doing it. Him pinning her ass to the leather seats, all sweaty, with his shorts and jockstrap tangled at his ankles. Their shirts thrown to the backseat. His butt clenching as he mechanically pumps her.

  Okay, so I totally have a crush on him. But, hell, I’d’ve helped him with history. Magna Carta? 1215. The six wives of Henry VIII? Divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived. Charles II? Beheaded. An omen?

  Friday, August 31

  Since Dana was out sick today, Bink risked it and gave me a ride. He’s got really bright hazel eyes and a crooked mouth I’d kill to kiss straight. He was wearing a Never Mind the Bollocks Here’s the Sex Pistols T-shirt, canvas skateboard pants, and Vans sneakers with no socks. He’s got little sandy hairs at the top of his ankles.

  What is it with me and guys’ feet? Christ, I see a bare foot and my dick twitches like it’s a goldfish that’s jumped the bowl. I swear to God—and yeah, I know it’s way pervy—but I’d dry hump the bottom of Bink’s foot. Hell, I’d screw his armpit. Anything to get close. I need to stop. I blushed and the tops of my ears burned. Bink smiled. I pressed my head against the window and tried thinking of something other than what it’d be like to run my hands along Bink’s chest or, you know, really kiss him, tongue and everything. It was so bad that I had to cover my crotch when we got out of the station wagon.

  I’m not delusional or anything. I know Bink’s not gay. If he was, I’d probably be too dorky for him to go out with. Instead of me, he’d mess around with some hot punk rocker from Central High that he’d meet at a show at the VFW.

  There’s this unwritten rule at South that says if you want a guy to stick it up your butt, you have to transfer to Central. Bill Minor did, right after all those emergency room doctors supposedly pumped buckets of jizz from his stomach.

  Yeah, I’d jump Bink’s bones, but I’m not in love with him or anything. Not really. It’s just that I miss him, I guess. During our freshman and sophomore years—heck, even before that—it was us against everyone. It didn’t matter that Bink was better looking than other guys or smarter or better at most sports; since Bink’s family is Jewish and poor, in Crystal Lake, that’s about as unforgivable as molesting kids or voting democratic.

  One time in junior high, Kyle Weir started acting like a total fucking dick, saying how the Jews shouldn’t bitch about the Holocaust ’cuz Hitler gave ’em new clothes, free train rides, room and board, dental work, and indoor plumbing. I kept looking at Bink, but he just stood there and took it, like he wasn’t supposed to do anything. So I did. I took a swing at Weir, and Weir proceeded to use me like toilet paper—wiping my skinny ass all over Lundahl Junior High’s football field. If Bink hadn’t pulled Kyle off me and knocked two of Weir’s teeth through his bottom lip, I’d’ve ended up as fertilizer for the thirty-yard line.

  But now that Bink’s dating Dana, all that crap’s stopped. It’s like Bink got a lifeboat in Dana, and I got left behind to swab the decks of a sinking ship.

  Enough whining. Bink and I have study hall together, so it’s not like I’m never going to see him.

  The first football game of the year was tonight, so of course, South had to have a lame-ass pep rally this afternoon. It’s sad, but there are actually people in this school who think that if we hadn’t cancelled ninth period to show our support for the team, Cary Grove would’ve beaten us by seventy points instead of just forty-nine. The whole damn school, all fifteen hundred of us, filed into the main gym and parked ourselves in the bleachers while the marching band played a really crappy rendition of “Do Wah Diddy” ’cuz the band director, Mr. Locke, had seen Stripes and wanted to be like Bill Murray. I’d rather die than be a 37-year-old suburban high school teacher who thinks he’s cool.

  Somehow, Rob ended up behind me in the bleachers, his feet planted on both sides of me. If I’d leaned back, my head would’ve been in his crotch. The PA system kicked on and Yello’s crappy “Oh Yeah” thumped through the gym. The pommie squad waddled front and center and shook their cellulite and big hair around. They acted like everyone was supposed to think they were way hot, but they actually looked like a herd of poorly choreographed cows slowly dying of heat stroke. I cupped my hands to my mouth and booed.

  I wasn’t the only one. Other kids booed, too. Before any of the pommies burst into tears and the entire school had to go to some dumb, don’t-make-fun-of-fat-chicks sensitivity workshop, some guys from the football team ran out and joined the pommies. They were dressed like cheerleaders—bad makeup, Kleenex-stuffed bras, miniskirts showing hairy legs, and mops for wigs. The guys waved their poms around for a while, then they basically gave up and started feeling up each other’s fake tits. When the music stopped, the pommies raced underneath the basketball hoops as fast as their chubby little legs could carry ’em.

  I felt something warm and slick in my ear. I turned around. Rob was sucking his index finger.

  “Wet willy,” he said, taking his finger out of his mouth and smiling.

  “You’re such a retread,” I said, body checking his left leg. He mussed my hair.

  Principal Michael grabbed a microphone and made some dumb crack about “all the cute girls” at South this year. He talked about it being the best school year ever and how he knew the team’d win the big game tonight. Yeah, maybe if they let the pommies play instead. At least they were built for defense. He handed the microphone to Marshall, who was the football team manager/towel boy/dirty-jockstrap-picker-upper, and in a squeaky voice Steve introduced each member of the team—all of them now in their green-and-gold dress jerseys.

  The band tore into the school fight song with way too much enthusiasm. The cheerleaders did some routine. Our school mascot had a boxing match with someone dressed as the Cary Grove mascot—a Trojan—and an inflated condom wound up on the gym floor. Principal Michael took the microphone again, asking, sport by sport, for each of the fall teams to stand and be recognized. When he got to boys soccer, I tried standing, but Rob pushed me down by the shoulders.

  “Schmuck,” I said after he let me up. He left his hand on my shoulder. It felt nice. Like it belonged there.

  The pep rally ended, and I grabbed my soccer gear and headed for the bus.

  We creamed Woodstock seven-zip. After the game, I helped Coach Mueller drag the team’s stuff back to the locker room. Most of the guys had showered and changed, but I passed Rob sitting on the bench. Only his cleats were off.

  I slowly stripped out of my Umbros, still sore from a diving save I’d made, and hit the showers. The hot water felt good.

  “Shower up, Hunt,” Coach Mueller bellowed at Rob. “Nobody wants to smell you all the way back to South.”

  At first, I didn’t see Rob in the showers. I was too busy washing off the Vaseline I used on my eyebrows to keep the sweat from my eyes. But when I rinsed shampoo and soap-suds from my face, I saw him checking me out over his shoulder, almost staring. When I caught him
, Rob turned away. While he shampooed, I bent down to scrub the grass stains and dried mud from my knees. I peeked. He was bigger than me, thicker, too. I gulped. He started getting hard.

  “It just happens sometimes,” he said. He sounded embarrassed.

  “Me too.”

  Maybe it was crazy, but I let myself get stiff. I needed to know if he’d look. He did and my dick felt hot as a curling iron. I squeezed more liquid soap into my hands and lathered my chest and legs. Rob turned to rinse his back. He had a smooth, totally white bubble butt. As we toweled off, I noticed a bead of pre-come leaking from the head of Rob’s dick. I almost reached over to touch it. From the locker room’s entrance, Coach Mueller shouted that he was leaving with or without us. We dressed fast, ran to the bus, and found an empty seat in the back.

  We sat with our calves pressed together. His skin was warm and it felt good against mine. He’s got little black hairs down his legs that are like corn silk. I don’t even have peach fuzz. Rob rested a hand on the vinyl seat. I touched his fingers, barely, and he didn’t move away. I noticed he was still tenting his shorts. I wanted it to mean something, like he was into me, but I knew better. Hard-ons don’t have meaning. Guys’ll do anything when they’re horny. I mean, there’s a reason for all those jokes about farmers and sheep, right?

  When we got back to school, I asked Rob if he wanted to hang out. He said he had to go home and help with his mom, but we could hang out this weekend. He offered me a ride home, but I was nervous I’d make a move on him and he wouldn’t be cool with it. Rob fished a pen and some paper from his book bag and wrote down his number. I stuffed it into the back pocket of my shorts.