07-Joe

After eating they hopped in his car and drove back to school, but really Joe felt like he was just gliding along. They walked through the parking lot and then inside, both of them wearing easy smiles, walking coolly, unconcerned. Joe marveled at how everything that had bothered him earlier had completely vanished. It was quite magical.

“Just two more classes standing in between us and the weekend, man,” Joe said. “My afternoon normally blows, but I should be able to ride it out fairly easily now. I feel gazooted like shit.”

“What class you got next?” Mike asked him.

“Uhhh…chemistry.”

“Anyone cool in there?”

“Yeah. Alana Herrera. I got her to talk to.”

“Nice. She’s unreal, man. Cool as hell.”

“I know. How does someone make their own trance album? I just can’t even fathom doing something like that. Where do you even start, you know?”

“Yep. She’s a bad girl. Speaking of Alana.”

They saw her approaching from down the hall. She had a very small frame, her short, dyed-blond hair in a pixie cut, and she wore a thin shirt and utterly massive jeans. She grinned widely at the sight of them.

“What’s up, dudes?”

“Hey, Alana,” Mike said.

She slapped a palm to Mike, and then acted like she would slap another one to Joe, but she pulled it away and instead punched him playfully in the stomach.

“Damn, you guys are baked! Lunch time smoke-down?” she inquired.

“Is it that obvious?” Joe asked.

“Hell yeah, I could see it from all the way down the hall.”

“For real?”

“The instant I laid eyes on you guys there was no doubt in my mind.”

“Hey, Alana, take care of this guy, all right?” Mike asked. “Make sure he doesn’t light himself on fire with a fuckin’…Bunsen burner or some shit.”

She laughed, and then scooted past them into the class. Both guys watched her.

“Dude, have you noticed how she’s kind of secretly hot?” Joe asked, his face contemplative.

“Shiiit, ain’t no secret.” Mike replied. “You just now noticing?”

“Nah, but it’s like in a totally different way, you know? Like, with Katherine, most people just haven’t yet realized she’s hot, whereas with Alana, it’s like she’s purposefully masking her hotness.”

“Go on.”

“I’m sayin,’ man…she always wears those giant jeans, so you can’t ever see her legs. It’s like she doesn’t even have any. She just floats around, like some kind of alien.”

Mike laughed. “Yeah, she levitates.”

“For real, yo. Check this out, though. I saw her after her lacrosse game not long ago—after she kicked some ass, too—and she had on some shorty-shorts. Damn, why she always hiding that, yo?”

“She don’t be carin,’ that’s why,” Mike said. “Check her out, man. Those jeans. The wifebeater she’s got on. The visor. She does what she wants, and she don’t give a fuck.”

“You think she really does like girls?” Joe asked.

Mike shrugged. “Maybe.”

“Damn, now she’s even hotter. Wasn’t she dating some senior last year, though?”

“Marcus…whatever the hell his last name is?”

“Yeah. What’s he doing now? They still go out?”

“Hell if I know.”

The hallway began to clear, as the bell was about to ring. “All right, man,” Joe said. “I’ll catch you later. Thanks for the smoke.”

Mike nodded. “Peace.”

The bell rang as Joe took his seat, all the while Alana grinning unabashedly at his stoned manner. He laughed also, still coasting, still in a freefall. Then the teacher began lecturing.

Some thirty minutes later, the teacher was droning on about balancing chemical equations. It was actually something Joe was not half bad at, but any serious attempt to pay attention then was a bit farfetched.

Finally, the teacher ventured to the far side of the room, giving Joe a window of opportunity.

“Psst! Alana…”

She looked up at him.

“Antwann’s party tonight? You going, right?”

“C’mon, Joe, you think I’m gonna miss that?”

“All right, that’s what I like to hear.”

The teacher looked in their direction for a moment, sensing the conversation, as they both quieted.

“It’s gonna be madness this weekend at Antwann’s,” she whispered a bit later.

“Madness indeed.”

“I think everyone’s ready to seriously get down.”

Joe grinned.

“You gonna be my drinking buddy tonight, Joe?”

“Sure. I’ll be there after work. Nine-ish.”

“Okay. I might be drunk by then, though.”

Joe laughed, and this time the teacher glared at the two of them.

Class zipped by rapidly enough after that, and before he knew it he was again coasting through the halls toward his last class of the day. He sat down with a glazed, grinning expression, but he couldn’t make it all the way through. As class progressed, he felt himself crashing hard—his stoned glaze gradually metamorphosed first into pure exhaustion, and then, as before, anxiety. By the time the bell was about to ring, Juanita had pretty much taken over again, as though she could cut through his stoned fatigue like a knife. Joe paced down the hall, trying to tell himself he wasn’t looking for her. But, he knew he actually was.

He strode into the concourse and noticed some kind of commotion right away. It was clear something had happened, and a large group had gathered as a result. Naturally, Joe moved toward them. He saw Coach West on the outside of the group looking perturbed and exasperated, and a lot of other people walking around, some of them wearing a grin, and others just laughing outright.

Joe cut through the group eagerly, knowing this had to have something to do with someone he knew, and sure enough, he finally saw Raza in the middle of it. Joe took a big step back, in surprise—Raza’s face was blasted with flour. It was caked all over him, his clothes, his skin, his hair.

“Dude, what happened?” Joe yelled.

Before he could even reply, Trey turned around, and Liz did too. Their long hair was similarly blasted with flour, and both of them looked like ghosts, with their powdery-white skin and wide eyes. They all had on the exact same overwhelmed expression.

“You guys okay?” Joe yelled again.

Trey was already in mid-story, and he didn’t stop. “I was sitting in the back. I wasn’t wearing my seat belt yet. I didn’t even have time to put it on. I was like…I don’t know, looking down at my shoe or something, and I didn’t even see the car pull out in front of us. After the impact, I was practically in Liz’s lap, in shotgun, my head all down in the leg well.”

“Who was it? Who hit who?” Joe asked.

“Some old dude.”

“He barely spoke English,” Liz added.

“Everyone was okay, though?”

“Yeah.”

“No! That’s not true.” Raza turned around slowly, his eyes wide.

“Raza? You okay, man?”

“Say something!”

“Raza?”

Little puffs of flour hovered around him when he finally spoke. “My babies…my babies are dead!”

That was all it took. Joe about died. He couldn’t hold it in anymore. It slayed him, badly. He needed it, too. Everyone around him was similarly laughing, even celebrating like it was some kind of victory. It felt like that, for Joe. This changed everything somehow. He vaguely recalled exchanging high-fives with those around him, even with some kids he didn’t even know.

He wanted to talk to Raza and Trey more, but he couldn’t. They were whisked away rapidly by Coach West and a few administrators. Liz was too. So, he left the concourse and walked out into the parking lot. It was flooded with students.

Some kind of madness overcame Joe then. Without even consciously deciding to, he began desperately searching for Katherine Lisi. It was like this flour baby incident, and its sheer hilarity, had galvanized him. It became his absolute mission to find her. Fitting, that it was the eleventh hour to do so—he’d had all week and a thousand opportunities to talk to her, but…Joe typically did wait until the last minute to do things.

It was the peak of exodus, and Joe could only do so much against what was a tidal wave of dispersing kids, all of them marching out and away toward their cars and buses. He tried anyway, walking the grounds and the parking lot dutifully, searching and scanning. But, of course, of course, the one time he was actively looking for her, running around like a madman, she was absolutely nowhere to be found. It felt like a crushing defeat.

Eventually he gave up and climbed into his car. He immediately rolled down the windows, letting out the intense heat, sweat already forming on his brow. His face was gloomy as he started the car.

“Fuck!” he yelled, all by his lonesome.

He pulled out of the parking spot. Before turning out onto the street, he keenly spotted Ed Lugo sitting in his car, which was some hilariously old and dilapidated ride. Some kid was in shotgun, and he looked young—a freshman, or sophomore at the most. Joe was one hundred percent sure there was a business transaction going on there, and it vaguely tickled him. He’d sat there once too, not so long ago. It had been a different car, with a different drug dealer, but it may well have been the same. The cycle repeats. It was like a rite of passage.

Joe hit the gas and raced down the street. He blasted the music painfully loud, as though to drown out his thoughts. At a red light, a mom in a minivan glared at him from the next lane over. In response, he actually did turn the music down, but by such a miniscule amount she probably didn’t even notice he did anything at all.