She whispers, “My period . . .” and rebuttons her shorts before kissing my swollen lips again.
The pain is twice as bad as all the blood in my body rushes back upward. Not enough of it made it to my brain, however, to stop me from stepping back and asking, “So, d-d-do you wanna give me a blow job, then?”
I knew it was a dumb question the second it came out, and I wince from the stupidity, but I can’t take it back and I just can’t handle any more kissing. Rumor has it (Nutt’s brother, Bart) that when a girl’s on her period she’s more likely to throw down a bj, for some reason. And Bart’s (second-best) method to get a girl to give you one is to simply, “Ask for it.” Abby looks out over the railing at the last moments of dusk and takes a deep breath. She may be drinking in the romance and thinking about how nice it would be for me to get my first blow job up here . . . and maybe what technique she should use. She’s really thinking about it! This could be it . . . the best advice Bart has ever given. “Ask and ye shall receive!” She bites her lip, and I see tears welling up in her eyes. Dang it! My shoulders drop along with my face, spirit, and everything else.
In silence, she turns and walks down the stairs with heavy steps. I look down at the mulch-covered ground and think about throwing myself off. What a dumbass! I’m mortified at what I’ve just done, so I slide down to apologize. On accident, and out of pure instinctual habit, I squeal, “Whooo-hooo!” on the way down. I come in for a hundred-mile-an-hour landing, almost plowing into Abby, who’s just getting there herself. She’s shocked to see that I’ve beaten her down here, and surprised by how drunk I seem to have become. She blows past me, and I dizzily stumble toward her. “I-I-I’m sorry.”
“What are you sorry for, Carter?” she snaps back, and keeps going.
“Uh . . . you know . . . that I made you cry?”
“You’re not sorry you asked me to give you a blow job?” she seethes.
“Yeah, I-I-I’m sorry about that too.”
She stops walking like she’s thinking up something mean to say, so I beat her to the punch and dig myself in a little deeper. “You know, Bart told me to just shove your head toward my crotch, and you’d just start doin’ it. But I thought that because of the romantic setting, and me respecting you and all . . . like I do . . . that I could get by with the second-best technique.”
Her head twitches and she barks, “What?”
“Haven’t you ever heard, ‘it never hurts to ask’?”
She marches off, and I grab my bike to give chase. When I catch up, she barks, “I’m not ready for all that and . . . and . . . you are so freaking immature!”
“That’s the second time you’ve called me immature today.”
“Well, you are.”
This would be the perfect time to call her a bitch and assert myself as the alpha male, so in my own way, I do. “You’re the one who’s scared of a blow job!”
“So?” she asks defiantly.
I’m sure tonight or tomorrow I’ll come up with a brilliant comeback to that question, but for now I just keep walking beside her and stewing.
She starts crying and then sobs, “Do you know how that makes me feel when you ask me something like that?”
I’m sure this is a trick question that I’m supposed to just think about, but I answer anyway. And I’m still trying to be a dick when I say, “Like my girlfriend, maybe?! Cuz that’s what girlfriends do! I like hangin’ out with you, but you’re also really hot, and I don’t want to just talk all the time.”
“We were kissing—what’s wrong with that? Why do you have to push?”
“I’m a guy, we push! And in case you aren’t aware, this black-and-blue ball of bruise where my face used to be . . . friggin’ hurts when you smash into it!”
She finally seems to get how jacked up I am and asks, “Why didn’t you just say that?”
“I thought I did . . . by asking you to focus on other . . . uninjured areas!”
Logic! I said it with a mix of sass and hurt feelings. I’m the man! And she doesn’t have any snappy comebacks either! She keeps walking in silence, though, until we reach the park’s back gate. She finally stops and turns to me with tears streaming down her cheeks.
She looks pitiful when she says, “Stop. Don’t walk with me anymore. I love you, Carter, but we just met too soon. We’re the wrong people for each other at this point in our lives.”
I have to laugh. “Oh my God! You’re so dramatic!”
“And you’re an immature asshole!” she bellows.
Dumbfoundedly, I ask, “Are you really breakin’ up with me here?”
She just turns and sadly walks through the gates.
“Really?!” I demand. “I sat through those friggin’
Twilight
movies for you!”
She turns and barks, “But you didn’t read the books like I asked you to!”
Unbelievable! She’s just out of sight when I throw my bike as far as I can (about six feet).
How’s that for mature, BI-ATCH?!
I wake up at the crack of ten fifteen a.m. the next day. I could barely get to sleep, but once I did, I went ahead and got nine and a half hours. Nevertheless, I’m rested, and I know what needs to be done. I’ve got to ride up to school and work out with my boys, and then immediately apologize to Abby. I throw on some shorts and a T-shirt, slam a protein shake, and tell my dad that I’ll be back in about an hour to help him with the stupid deck. He took the day off of his real job to work on this junk, so he’s fired up and tries to show me his drawings and explain why he’s strung this yellow string all over the backyard, but I tell him I’ve got to get moving.
It’s a perfect summer day. I’ve regained some of the feeling in my face, and I’ve got all of my lines memorized for the big audition—three days early! As soon as I knock out this apology, and Abby and I get back on track, this summer is going to be kicking ass!
Rolling into the parking lot, I see my boys’ bikes locked up to various trees and signposts. Nick Brock’s truck is parked next to the CRX, but my eye goes to the black Ferrari sitting in the back of the lot. It’s beautiful and must be brand-new, because it has thirty-day tags. I bet they’re getting personalized license plates made like 2FAST4U or RCKTMAN! Who the hell got a Ferrari? If my football coach owns this baby, I may have to write a letter to someone, because he’s overpaid! After gawking at it for a while, I lock up and am headed into the weight room when I hear the beat of a familiar song pumping inside the gymnasium. It’s “Get Up Offa That Thing,” by James Brown, and it’s been stuck in my head for weeks because Abby’s been working out a dance number to it. She’s all stressed about it because it’s her first chance to choreograph anything for the drill team. She’s obviously the best dancer on the squad, and the older girls are pissed off about it, so they’re making her audition this routine to see if she’s got what it takes.
The gym door is propped open, so I slip inside. The drill team is facing the opposite direction, and they don’t notice me. The number’s going really well. I’m nodding to the beat and taking in the sights of a plus-sized dance troupe getting funky. They clap (almost in unison) and stomp a few times before swiveling their hips and leaping into a line. The girls touch the gym floor and slowly rise back up like a tsunami wave of purple sateen. Abby shimmies her boobs around, and they run toward half court. This must be the big finish. But I may see a problem. Two girls are headed for the same tape mark on the floor and they don’t spot each other until it’s too late . . . yep, problem . . .
SMACK
!
They crash into each other, hard, before taking out a folding-chair prop and crashing to the hardwood dramatically.
I fight off the laughter because Abby seems disappointed and the music has faded out.
I think about clapping, but don’t want them to think that I’m making fun, when I hear Nutt’s voice boom from behind, “Who ordered a hot dog?!”
The entire drill team glances over their shoulders as a pair of hands slam into my hips, and I instantly regret two things at once:
A) Not tying the drawstring on my shorts.
B) Not taking the time to put on underwear this morning.
In a flash, my pants are around my ankles and my cheeks are as red as fire trucks . . . both sets! In front of me, the girls squeal with prude horror, and behind me, my boys howl with laughter as I stumble around, flapping in the breeze and frantically yanking my shorts back up.
I decide to put off the apology and chase my boys out the doors and around the parking lot, yelling, “Assholes!”
I stop chasing them after a few minutes when I see the awesome car again and gasp, “Yo, who’s Ferrari?”
Bag tells me, “It’s that writer who came to school last year.”
“C. B. Down?” I ask.
“Yeah, he’s in there workin’ out with Bart and Nick Brock,” EJ explains, just before I punch Nutt in the chest, and everyone groans their admiration.
Bag smiles mischievously and says, “Hey, Carter, do you need anything?”
I know he’s messing with me, but I’m not sure what he’s getting at, so I play along. “Nooo, why?”
Hormone chimes in. “You’re sure we can’t get you somethin’?”
I just stare at them until EJ yells, “You don’t want a blow job this morning?!”
Son of a bitch! I punch Nutt in the chest again.
“OW!” he squeals. “It’s not my fault you and Abby broke up!”
“Who the hell told you that?”
Doc explains, “EJ’s bitch is here, and she was just yappin’ about it.”
EJ throws up his hands and protests, “Dude!?”
I shake my head in disgust. Why would Abby tell Nicky anything? I’m sure that she didn’t mean for her to blab it to everyone, but still.
Still rubbing his boob like a bitch, Nutt continues, “Do not apologize to her, Carter! Bart says that she’s just testing to see if you’re a punk. If you grovel, she owns you, but if you man up and never speak to her again, you’ll be hittin’ it in a week.”
I look around the group to see if what he said makes sense to anyone else. They all seem to be in agreement, so I decide to hold off on the apology, and we head into the weight room.
The old box fans are blowing hot air, and hard rock is blasting through the old speakers. The pool doesn’t open until tomorrow, so everyone is here. The fine-ass Merrian Pool lifeguards are in here toning up for the big day. Bag’s sister, Pam, and her gorgeous friend Jemma are wearing very short shorts and doing leg presses, so Nutt and I are getting warmed up next to the leg press today. He’s bent over, squinting between his legs and hoping to catch a peek, but I can’t stop gawking at C. B. Down doing pull-ups. You wouldn’t think a writer would need to be in very good shape, but nobody told this guy. He grunts and snarls as he yanks his chin above the bar over and over again. His tattoos are bulging and glistening under the florescent lights.
I’m getting a drink of water when he walks up behind me and gasps, “S’up, Carter.”
I turn in shock and mutter, “Hey, Mr. D-Down. I-I-I really enjoyed your book!”
He says thanks and gets a drink as I yammer on like a junior-high-school girl. “I mean, it was miserable, you know, but it’s fun to read because it’s not happening to me, you know? The script isn’t nearly as good, though, you know?”
Of course he doesn’t know—he wrote it! Shut up!
He looks like he’s going to rip my head off, but he doesn’t. He nods and replies, “Yeah, that’s what you get when you work with a committee. Try to please too many people, you wind up not pleasing anyone.”
My favorite writer just shared something deeply personal with me, so I brilliantly point to the tattoo on his shoulder and ask, “D-D-Did that hurt?”
He continues, “I still believe that the heart of my story is in that script, and with the right actors, it’s gonna be great.”
Suspiciously, I ask, “You sold out to the Kidz Channel, right?”
His jaw flexes and the hawk tattooed on his neck cocks its beak at me in anger. “I didn’t sell out to anybody, man. Kidz Channel is just one of the investors. . . . The higher your budget, the more freedom you have to—”
My face hurts from embarrassed contortion as I interrupt him, “No man . . . I uh, I’m not trying to put you down, I just saw the Ferrari out there, and . . . I think it’s badass . . . I’m just not great at conversation.”
He asks what happened to my face, and I explain the whole wreck and how gearing up to audition for his film is partly to blame for my wounds. He likes the cuts and bruises. He thinks they give me more “edge.” He also tells me how much he liked my portrayal of Sky Masterson in
Guys and Dolls
and how he saw the show in London and preferred what I did over a professional actor! I finally stop grinning like an idiot when he asks if Abby and I are coming to the audition together.
“Yeah, no, we’re fighting right now, because—”
His laughter interrupts me. “Oh yeah, your rocket-ship question? I heard about that.”
Dang it! I try to change the subject. “You know, I’ve already got the audition scene memorized.”
He takes a deep breath and nods a few times. He pulls at his beard and asks a fitness question. “Are you warmed up?”
I nod and he asks, “You wanna do some CrossFit?”
What am I gonna do, say no? But for those of you who don’t know, if someone asks if “you wanna do some CrossFit,” DON’T do it . . . it’s awful! Within five minutes I’m ready to puke. As far as I can tell, it’s this fitness program designed by the devil himself. It strings together a bunch of different exercises that all seem easy, but when you combine them, in order, it’s like a painful-death simulator. You try to get your heart as close to exploding without actually allowing it the relief of combustion. It’s a tantric heart attack. I’m lifting the same weight as Nick Brock and Paul Skelton, a.k.a. the Skeleton . . . This is not right! I’ve done more push-ups in twenty minutes than I’ve done in my whole life. C. B. is a madman.
He’s totally exhausted from doing power cleans when I hear him snarl, “Sell out . . .” and then he does two more. I was doing push-ups at the time (go figure) and looking around for a trash can to vomit into when he said it, so I did five more and went immediately into squats . . . just trying to look busy.
As I’m hobbling across the parking lot to see if Abby has finished practice, C. B. walks up behind me and gasps, “Nice work, man. Hey, I invited those lifeguard girls and a few of your friends to have lunch with me—do you want to join?”
“Why?”
He laughs at me for a second, then says, “Well, I guess I didn’t have many friends when I lived here, and I never had any money to do anything nice for anyone, so I want to try to be the cool guy around here for a change.”
I shrug and say, “Makes sense to me.” The next thing I know I’m shutting the door/wing of a Ferrari and flying down Merrian Lane. I’m trying to read the tattooed letters on his knuckles. He’s talking about the movie or the auditions. The left hand says S-T-A-Y, for sure, but he keeps using the right one to shift gears and gesture as he talks about “concentration” or something. We rip into the Chipotle parking lot, and he’s laughing at something. I’m pretty sure his right hand just says F-O-C-U . . . but that doesn’t make any sense.
C. B. interjects with his deep gravely voice. “Stay focused.”
“Huh?” I ask. Dang it, I’ve known him for less than an hour, and he’s already figured out that I’m a space case.
“‘Stay Focused.’ That’s what’s tattooed on my fists,” he says, showing me the letters printed on his knuckles. I’m still looking at the F-O-C-U when he laughs and says, “It’s a joke. You get it?”
“You didn’t have the ‘focus’ to finish the whole thing?”
He nods before turning the Ferrari off, and puts his pointer finger sideways under his nose. He’s got another tattoo of an old-timey mustache on the side of it.
I start laughing. “You’re crazy, dude.”
He agrees. “I thought you’d like that.”
The doors rotate up, and we climb out.
C. B. leans against the car and says, “Hey, for the audition . . . it’s great that you memorized the lines, but I don’t want you to get locked into that script.”
I glance around in hopes that someone will see me hanging out with this dude. We close the doors and he continues, “I really want you to keep it loose and show these producer dickheads how great you are. Just bring that chemistry you and Abby brought to
Guys and Dolls
. It’s electric and raw, and the camera is going to eat it up. These Kidz Channel guys just have to see it and feel it . . . so they’ll get off my ass about casting Hilary Idaho and Zac-Michael Wienus.”
I try to make him feel better. “They were pretty good in
Cheer! The Musical
.”
He seems even more agitated when he says, “That’s the exact comparison I don’t want.”
“At least they haven’t turned your story into a musical.”
He squeezes his face with his hands and adds, “I just heard this morning that they’re trying to write songs.”
“What could they possibly sing about? Your book is one of the most depressing things ever written.”
He nods his thanks and explains how in the novel, Chris has dreams about his family and Maggie, so they want to delve into a happy place for a while and add these singing fantasy sequences.
I think that sounds ridiculous, but what the hell do I know, so I try to keep it positive. “It could work.”
It takes a few more minutes for Nick Brock, Bart, Skeleton, Pam and her friends Jemma and Yasmine, plus my boys (EJ, Doc, Nutt, Bag, Hormone, Levi, J-Low), this d-bag Andre, and ten other dudes to show up and get out of their overstuffed cars. We strut into the restaurant, still dripping with CrossFit sweat. We order the crap out of the menu because C. B. is buying. Massive amounts of food cover seven tables. I ordered guacamole and chips with my tacos for the first time ever, because my dad “will not pay three goddamn dollars for some chips that they should give you for free!” and C. B. will. We have the whole restaurant to ourselves because we’re so obnoxious and stinky. Either that, or everyone else eating lunch on a hot Monday afternoon really wants to sit on the patio. I’ve never had so much fun eating, and these chips are worth the money! C. B. is the coolest adult I’ve ever been around. If anyone tries to talk about his movie, he changes the subject and tells a joke or he asks us a question, and it seems like he’s really interested in the answer, like we’re not just a bunch of smelly, dumbass kids who don’t have Ferraris. I didn’t expect the writer of such a depressing book to be so entertaining.
I wish all high school parties went down at Chipotle!