It seemed like Monday mornings were the hardest of all of the mornings to wake up, if you know what I mean. I’m telling you this because I remembered having wet hair on the bus on the following Monday morning, the weekend after I had seen Bob at the hospital and the rest of us NSR’s at McCollum Park.
I overheard a couple of football players on the back of the bus talking about some weirdo that was walking down Main Street on Saturday wearing a Halloween costume. I suppose I could have walked to the back of the bus and tried to explain to those guys that a guy our age was sitting in a hospital room, pumping his body full of poisons and hoping to kill his cancerous leukemia cells. Then hoping that the good cells could take over once the process was done - which was how Bob had explained it to me. But I really didn’t think that those dudes would have seen things my way, no matter what I would have said. So I kept my mouth shut. I really didn’t need to hear myself talk; at least not about that kind of thing.
I got off the bus and headed straight to the hip hop hallway but nobody was there that day. That sort of sucked to be honest with you. I couldn’t wait to trip off my weekend to all of the break boys at my school. But that’s Monday mornings for ya. Plus, I was really hoping to run into Devon that morning or find someone who knew what had happened to him that night of the school dance. Maybe I was just hoping to gloat, but I really did wonder what had happened to him.
Finally by lunch time I saw Devon sitting at the “black table,” where I sometimes sat on occasion, when Fred was sitting with his soccer buddies or Gloria and Gary were in one of their moods to talk about their “real significant others.” They got all private when they talked about their love life.
I grabbed my Fried Chicken, mashed potatoes, and green beans through the lunch line and headed over towards Devon. This dude Darnell had flagged me down to come over and sit with Devon and him - even though that was already my plan, anyway.
Darnell said, “Sit right here in between Devon and me and make us into an Oreo!”
I wasted no time and asked Devon, “What happened to you on Wednesday night? I thought we were going to have a break battle my man?”
Devon went into this big story, “My mom works 2 jobs and by the time she got home from work it was too late for her to take me to the dance.” Devon shook his head in chagrin and added, “I heard you were busting out with some nutcrackers at the dance?”
I nodded smugly.
Devon continued, “Damn man, I heard you threw ‘em down pretty good too, I’ve gotta get me some of those no handed windmills.”
It was like freakin’ night and day, from the last time I had talked to him. There was no more bellicose banter coming from Devon’s mouth whatsoever about how he could out break me. I suppose I could have gotten all cocky with him, but I kept quiet, just the same. I already knew that I could out break him. Plus, we were friends too.
However, I did keep smiling smugly and nodding like a cocksure Mo Fo and I think he knew it too. I could tell by the sideways glances that he had given me once in a while that he knew I was quietly gloating. But I kept on doing it anyway. It almost felt as good as shooting my mouth off to be honest with you. Sometimes silence is the best thing you can say.
The rest of the table went back in line once the smell of fresh baked chocolate chip cookies had beckoned them. You could smell them all throughout the cafeteria while they baked in the oven, practically every day at that time. Devon and I remained at the table, as we always did. We were both slow eaters. I told him, “My crew, the Neighborhood Street Rockers and I are going up to Suburbanite Rink on Friday.
Then on Saturday, there’s this other rink that some of the cats in my crew (Miguel and Giovanni) just told me about last night on the phone, it’s called, Chicagoland Rink but really it’s in the suburbs, but I guess a lot of people from the burbs and Chicago hang out there. It is supposed to be swarming with B-Boys, B-Girls, and people that listen to the mixes; you know, hip cats like us. Our crew is trying to drum up a break crew battle and supposedly it’s “the place to be” for that sort of thing. Either way we are going up there to get on down with breakin’. If you want to come up there, you can,” I said without gloating, as to make a truce.
Devon told me that he already had plans and such. So I left it alone. But I really felt like calling him a chicken, just for the fun of it, not even in the bellicose way that he had called me one, but I left it alone. I wasn’t sure if he would have found it funny or not.
After lunch period I passed by Donnie Blacklung and Seth Coughman’s locker, when they spotted me, Coughman said in a stoneruos voice, “Hey Phil are you going to do some break dancing?”
He was always asking me that whenever he saw me and then he’d laugh, but come to think of it, he was always laughing about something. I think it had something to do with the 420.
Then, while Coughman was practically inside of his opened locker, I watched him surreptitiously pull a clear plastic bag out of the inside pocket of his jean jacket; inside the bag was a small bottle with gold-ish liquid, some of the liquid had leaked out of the bottle and into the bag. Seth put the bag to his mouth and sucked the excess liquid off of the bag. I naively asked him, “What is that?”
Seth spelled, “B – O – Z.”
“What’s Boz?” I asked, sort of loudly.
Then in a yelling whisper voice Seth said, “Booze dude!”
“Ohh Booze,” I said while whispering back to him. Then I thought about how fitting it was that someone bringing booze to school in the middle of the day would misspell the word. I hate mispelt words.
Donnie Blacklung leaned over to me and asked with a big smile, “Hey Phil did you bring your asthma inhaler with you to school today?” I could tell by his tone that he was more or less busting my chops, but I didn’t care. You see, he asked me that almost every day, ever since I had told those guys that I couldn’t smoke pot with them on account of my asthma.
“Yep, I’ve got my asthma inhaler with me,” I said with a requited smile.
“Cool man, then we can walk over to the wreck today after school and Seth and I can get you stoned dude, your inhaler will save you,” he said derisively.
I stiffened my neck and said, “No way dude that crap tastes like ass! I don’t want to put ass in my mouth Duuude!”
Seth jumped in and said, “Nah man, this stuff is good skunk bud, and it tastes sweet.”
I raised my voice, adrenalized my brow, and said, “Dude do you like the taste of ass? You want to put ass in your mouth DUDE?” I smirked and continued my good natured taunting, which was making them laugh too, “You two are going to share the taste of ass together – how sweet.” The more I zinged ‘em the more they just kept laughing like the stoners that they were.
That’s what I liked about those guys too. They could dish it out, but they could also take it. I patted them both on their backs, smiled, and said, “Enjoy smoking that ass – later.”
As I was walking away though, Donnie yelled out, “Go do some break dancing dude!” I could hear them both laughing at me in those high pitched smokers cough cackles that they had always had.
Even though, they had just said it to mock me, I did it anyway. The hallway was clear; I had room, we were in one of the wider hallways, so I obliged them. I dove into seven or eight windmills into a backspin and then I sprung to my feet and walked away like a bad ass. I heard Blacklung laugh and say, “Whoa dude that was cool!”
I yelled back, “That’s how I get my high!”
The rest of the school week Donnie and Seth kept calling me, “Break dancing Phil” and I would remind them, every time, that I was Phil K Swift the Funky Groove King.” It had become our thing.
Friday after school I was sitting on the bus by myself because Witty Dee had skipped the bus and walked over to his girlfriend Muffy’s house. I usually sat with him on the way home, so for a change, my bus ride home was quiet.
On the way home while looking out of the bus window, I spotted this very nerdy looking guy on the corner, just about to enter the crosswalk. He was holding hands with this hot chick that was without a doubt, way out of his league. The dude had no fashion sense, heck he was even sort of homely – if you asked me, and he had this weird angle to his face. He had his arm around the girl, and she really seemed to be interested in him too, she even leaned in and kissed him a couple of times while they waited for the “walk” signal. Talk about opposites attracting.
This made me start to look around the bus to see if there were any other “yin and yang” or just straight up “opposite couples” on our bus. Check this shiznit out, I noticed 2 other couples that sort of fit into that “opposites attract” category. They were the couples that had been together for most of the school year and everybody knew about them. You know the type - It’s a guy and a girl; you see them together in between every class period in the hallways at school, holding hands, giving each other googly eyes and kissy faces – and they were always together; being all lovey-dovey – enough to make you puke.
As I took a closer look at these “items” that were on my bus that day, I realized something. What started to stand out to me was that the girls in those couples were pretty, cute, nice looking, and all of that shiznit, BUT THE GUYS in those couples were straight up goofy looking emmer effers. You could tell that when the girls in those “opposite couples” got older that they would get prettier. However, the guys in those “opposite couples” were going to remain nerdy and ugly looking dudes.
Then it occurred to me that I have seen some older “opposites attract couples” about town or wherever – and they were married. For example, I know there is one of these hot chick -ugly guy couples at my church. And another that lived across the way from us when I was a kid. And another ugly dude-hot chick couple that owned a coffee shop together, but the point is: they are out there.
While I sat on the bus alone, I wondered: why is that hot older girl with that ugly, dumpy, geeky looking guy? – And I’m not talking about the geeky looking dudes that are loaded with cash! That’s a no brainer, I’m talking about the hot chick with the ugly dude and the dude is driving in a beater car. Then it hit me, I think I had figured it out. They had probably met in high school before “the hottie” was old enough to realize that she was going to be a hottie and before said hottie was old enough to realize that her high school beau was going to grow up to be a Fugly dork.
Well anyway, that’s what I thought about on the bus ride home to my crib while checking out these hot chicks with their dorky boyfriends. Get the hottie when you’re young, before she gets old enough to realize you’re really an ugly geek is the moral to that story. So if you’re pretty sure you’re going to look gross as eff when you’re older, then hurry the eff up and get one now.
If you don’t get your girlfriend while you’re young, it’s okay. The good news is that for every gross looking guy out there, there is an equally as gross looking girl out there too. So in the worst case scenario you will get yourself an equally as gross looking mate - you have that to look forward to if you look gross. Yep, that’s what I’m here to do; make you feel better – You’re welcome!