Up In Smoke

         I was the last one to leave my class on Friday.

         As I made way for the building’s big, old, oaken doors, I turned and gave my professor a wave of the hand. She smiled. She was a nice woman—old and withered with age, but she had a real good spirit. I smiled back. “Take it easy, Mrs. H.” She nodded. “ Why, you too, Colin. Have a very good weekend.” I was always saying little things to Mrs. H. She was the kind of teacher you could joke around with. Some students were a little taken back by her age. I loved it. Sure, she was a few generations behind as far as our sayings and all, but she was way cooler than most women her age—hell, most women her age were confined to fucking wheelchairs in retirement homes.
         Mrs. Hiensburg still had her wits. Sure, she could be a little tiresome every now and then with those damn long, hour-long speeches about European fiscal policies and the like, but it was her job for crying out loud, and in all seriousness, was it really possible to make European 18th century history interesting? Something told me the answer was no.
         Anyway, as I exited the building, I made my way slowly down the concrete walkway that led to the ground. It was about 4:30 in the afternoon, and hot as hell. There was no sun for some reason, but the humidity had to have been 100%, and I felt sticky and grimy—probably the way a condom would feel after you blew a big one. I looked around as I went. Other students were rushing to and fro, some in a hurry to get back to their dorms and start the weekend, others in a hurry to get to their last class of the day.
         I chuckled. I should’ve been in a hurry. After all, I wasn’t done. Well, not technically. I still had another class. My Organic Chem. was in a huge lecture hall and would be starting in just shy of 15 minutes. So I guess I should’ve been in a hurry. But I wasn’t.
         I had decided to skip it, anyway. This wasn’t anything new. I always skipped it. Since it was in a huge lecture hall, the professor could never tell who the hell showed up. It was perfect that way. I could barely remember the last time I had gone. It tickled me to think about it. People took the class so seriously. They literally worried themselves brittle, up late nights, feverishly scribbling out molecular designs in last-ditch efforts to cram for tests. It was funny, really. I couldn’t understand the big fuss. People always said, “God, it’s sooo hard!” or “Damn, I don’t understand anything in this textbook!”
         This all came as a surprise to me. First and foremost, it was amusing, but secondly, it was overly surprising. I really couldn’t get it. Organic Chem just seemed so easy to me. People would always ask me how I did it, how I could just waltz in there without studying or worrying, and ace the tests. I didn’t really know how, is what I told them. I mean, it was too hard to explain it. I just understood it, I guess. Science and math had always been easy for me. They were almost like second nature.
         I made my way down one of the long cobblestone pathways that led to the far side of the academic quad. As I walked, I became aware of the relative desolation of the area. It seemed like just minutes ago the place had been buzzing with people. Now, however, there was hardly a soul in sight. Friday afternoons were weird like that. One second it was like Wall Street during peak hour, the next second you were standing in a ghost town.
         Back behind the English and Philosophy building there was this really nice patio. It had these reclined, cushioned seats and these long, cherry wood benches. I never really knew if it was for students to use or for the faculty, but nobody seemed to notice or care when I went there. Anyway, I made my way past one of the farthest seats from the building and headed for this large, kind of antediluvian-looking weeping willow. The whole patio in the back was surrounded by a silvery, iron fence. Obviously it wasn’t made of real silver—no way the Dean would approve funds for such an expenditure—but it looked real nice, and if you didn’t take the time to inspect it, you almost believed it was the real deal.
         The large weeping willow was nestled right at the corner of the fence, and its drooping arms fell over in such a perfect way that if you stood inside of them, nobody—not a soul—could see you from the outside. I shot a quick glance around, just to make sure nobody was about, and then I ducked and headed inside, inside to my private “sanctuary”.
         Once inside the “sanctuary”, I leaned myself against the wide trunk, and reached into the pockets of my jeans. I pulled my fainted, red lighter from my left pocket. From my right pocket I pulled my favorite, and bestest friend—Bartholomew. I had named my piece Bartholomew because it seemed like the ideal name. It was kind of outlandish, quasi-intelligent, and just a little clandestine. I liked it. Something about it really spoke to me, I guess. Who knew. Anyway, I pulled out the piece, dropped the lighter to the ground for a second, and then withdrew my plastic bag.
         I inspected the bag inquisitively as if this was the first time I had seen it (and it was the first time I had seen it…well, the first time in 6 hours, that was). I still had about an eighth or so of weed left. Fortunately for me, there were still some real nice, dank nugs in there, and I loaded them rather quickly, giving them a gentle push as I filled the bowl.
         When the bowl was nice and stacked, I gave the lighter a flick, sucked the bad boy hard, and released the shooter. Bartholomew was a friendly bastard, he was. He hit real hard, kind of like poppin’ a jalapeno, and you could watch the smoke go straight to your lungs. He had a lot of swirling, multicolored designs. They snaked back and forth along the glass-blown body, and they’d trip you out every now and then, but for the most part, they were just there to look damn cool. The best part was, the designs didn’t obstruct the view of the chamber. You could watch the smoke go straight to your lungs. You could fuckin watch that shit. I loved watching that shit. Fuckin watching that shit. Man, I loved that fuckin shit.
         I took another hit. Fuck, I loved to watch those embers. The way they floated and burned. You could feel them. And not just in the way that you feel an object or a body in the physical world—no, no, fuck that. You could feel, feel them. Like metaphysically, metabolically, whatever the fuck you wanted to call it. You fuckin felt it, and you knew, you fuckin knew.
         Nobody else knew. Other people fuckin judged you. People judged fuckin everybody. They thought they were goddamn, fuckin demigods. You’d see them walking around, all haughty, all bullshit and no filter. There was only so much of that shit you could take. Sooner or later, you just had to blaze. You had to fuckin blaze. And that’s what I did. I fuckin blazed.
         I felt my heart drumming in my chest as my senses let go. It was like pulling bubble wrap over your whole world. You saw things and knew them, but you didn’t just know them, knowthem. You knew them. I’d look at people—I’m fuckin looking at you, that’s right—and they’d kinda just give me a stare. But they knew I knew. They knew I fuckin knew. And I bet it ate them up. I bet it just tore a hole through their fuckin whole paradigm of existence. Because it was all a fuckin microcosm, anyway.
         There was something moving around me. The wind was sailing like droves of bats. whoosh whoosh. I laughed. God, I fuckin laughed. That shit was crazy. How could the wind make that sound? Honestly, though? I wondered if the wind was controlled by some massive dude—I bet the birds knew. Fuck, being a bird had to be so temporal, so fuckin just outright, downright, right, right, cerebral.
         I looked down, but the bowl was already empty. How many bowls is that, junior? “Well, pappi, I’d say your boy Colin is outright blazed, I’d reckon. That’s what I’d reckon.” I gave myself a slap. I always did that when I blazed. I always fuckin talked to my self. It was pervasive—the fuckin plague, if you will. God, was it strong. The dude hadn’t lied. $85 for an eighth was fuckin outright, downright, right, right, bloody, fuckin right, expensive. But it was chronic. “Why it’s chronic, young bloke, don’t squander your mind. It’s that crazy kush—turn your brain to sludge and mush.”
         I looked up suddenly. I was no longer in the patio or under the tree or behind the Philosophy building or even in that fuckin district. My feet had seemingly carried me to the entrance of the central campus building. It was this great structure, this behemoth structure, this great, behemoth structure. It was so behemoth. I couldn’t even explain it if I tried. Some structures were great and behemoth, but a structure greatly behemoth? How about behemothly great? “That is a quandary, young squire, rogue, you. A quandary, indeed.”
         I took a deep breath. I entered the glass, automatic doors. Bodies moved by. They glided, light streaking, sounds intertwining. I heard the words of my favorite rap song, that song about hoes and bitches. Ahh…what was the name of it? Fuckin song. It was in my mind, playing over everything else. God, was I hungry. Munchie, munchie, time for a lunchie.
         When I came to the woman who took your card to enter the cafeteria, I came to a stop. Where the fuck had I put my card. The woman was damn near, goggling at me. She kept staring at me. She was staring right in my eyes. I bet she was wondering why I had such glassy, bloodshot eyes. Oh, sorry, miss cafeteria lady, I was born with enlarged pupils. I’m weak to sunlight. And then I started laughing.
         I kept thinking about that woman staring. She had such an ugly face. God, was her face just a portrait of shit in a toilet. I was laughing so damn hard. I couldn’t help it. There was noise behind me, people waiting in line, people getting pissed, but I just kept laughing. Eventually I squeezed a breath. It stopped suddenly, and I forced my voice out of my mouth.
         ”Lost my card…” The woman stared. “Young man, you need that card to ent—“Never mind,” I blurted. I had found it. “Here it is.” I handed the I.D. identifying slide thing to her. She gave it a swipe and handed it back. I saw her following me with her eyes as I entered the cafeteria.
         Never seen somebody not born with a physical deformity?. I sat down at the nearest table. Bitches fuck hoes, hoes fuck bitches, but I be damn if niggas ever git down with snitches… That fuckin rap song was in my mind. It was like trying to catch a snowflake or something. You can’t. It was there. Everything else was just a cacophony, a symphony, a background, playground, base-ground operation.
         Damn, there were so many too. So many of those translucent bodies. Moving, scheming, drawing their plans, doing whatever the fuck those fuckers did. Fleeting like the blue moons, peripheral, ephemeral, yet so definite, so pellucid, so fuckin—and I meant it with all granted and due respect—but so fuckin iniquitous. The masses were iniquitous. Fuckin, downright, outright, all-inclusive, fuckin iniquitous. “Screw you all, you goddamn, mephitic denizens of strife.” God, I loved talking the talk when I was blazed. Nobody could talk the talk better than me when I was blazed. “Don’t expect the Heimlich maneuver when you choke on your own petty, self-righteous falsehoods. Fuckin sluts of society…”
          “Excuse me?” a voice said. It was high-pitched, kind of shrill. I had no idea where it was coming from. I stared downward, at my plate of lasagna and string beans, and my warming glass of milk. When the fuck had I gotten milk? When the fuck, for that matter, had I gotten any food? Man, was I blazed.
         I caught glimpse of my roommate at the other end of the cafeteria. He was leaving with some girl. My roommate was jacked. Just a tower of muscle and sinew. Star quarterback, sophomore sensation, lady-swooner, absolute, downright, outright, fuckin stud. Jack Kalvin was his name. He was leaving with this girl. I focused my mind. I was blazed, but when I focused, I mean “really focused”—fuck I could do anything when I really focused. I could bust out an Organic Chem. Lab in 20 minutes when I focused. I could extrapolate algorithms like you wouldn’t believe when I focused. I could fuckin plunk out a 2360 on the SAT when I focused. Fuck, when I focused…
         Her name was Maria Cancelieri. The rundown: Sorority sister. Junior. Leading goal scorer for the Soccer Team. Deans List third year running. But, more importantly. She had a body like you wouldn’t believe. And you wouldn’t fuckin believe. Believe me. She was wearing this real tight white blouse, with the top three buttons undone. You could see her nice, round breasts, real taut against the shirt, and the way the cafeteria lights played on her flesh—it really gave her cleavage this shadowy, deep crevasse look. Her blouse ended short, and she had this sexy, flat little tummy. She was obviously in great shape, and she loved to show it off. She had a piercing too. Right in her belly button. Piercings made some girls look slutty and foul, but not Maria. Damn, Maria looked good. It almost made her sophisticated. Well, kinda.
         The best part was her skirt, though. It was one of those faded, blue denim types. It was a miniskirt—awfully mini, in fact—and it had this rustic and leather belt. There was a belt buckle on the belt, and it was a nice shiny, copper tone. There was really no need for the belt or the buckle, but they seemed to add something. They were erotic, almost. Goddamn, absolutely beautiful. And they complemented her lightly tanned legs nicely. Very nicely, actually.
         I stared at Maria for a while as she walked out of the cafeteria with my roommate. She had her smooth, black hair snuggled against his big, broad shoulders. He had this grin on his face, and he was whispering things to her. No doubt charming the hell out of her. God, was he a fuckin pimp. Downright pimp.
         When they were out of sight, I sat back in my chair and took in the sounds. I let the stimuli float in, kind of ebb and fall, if you will. Conversations and mid-piece sentences brushed my ears. So what, I’m going to the party regardless… Nah, man, I’m pretty tired. I’ll be takin it easy toni… And then the guy says…no, no, get this! He says, “I’m more of a man than you’ll ever be.” And so I say, I say….
         I gazed downward at my meal again. I was starving, but for some reason I couldn’t get myself to eat the lasagna. I mean, it was downright nasty. It resembled somebody’s bowel movement gone awry. No way I was going to put that into my stomach. No way. What I really wanted was a cold cut. One of those Italian ones. A nice 12-inch sub, decked out with genoa salami, capocolla, prosciuttini, mortadella, provolone, lettuce, tomato, onions, oil, vinegar—the whole deal. Downright, Godfather style. The thought of it was making me salivate like a fuckin Pavlovian dog. Damn, did it sound delicious.
         And then I got an idea. I actually knew a place. This real quaint Italian-owned joint. I had been there before a couple times. It was great, absolutely brilliant. The food was the best in the world—I swore when you walked in there it was like stepping into freakin Sicily itself. The only problem was, it was kind of a ways away. I would need a car, but I didn’t have one. And then I smiled.
         My roommate had a car. I’d borrow his. He had a nice one too. His father was some big-time CEO. The old man had bought his son a Mercedes SLK. It was an incredible vehicle. So much horsepower, so much sleekness. Thinking about it nearly gave me a boner. For some reason, my roommate was cool about it though. He always let me borrow it. Always. He was a good guy, I guess. Kind of a dim bulb as far as academics were concerned, but when it came to girls and being classy, my roommie did it better than anybody.
         I took the long way back to my dorm. I meandered through the Sycamore trees and trimmed bushes. I loved soaking in the environment like that, and I could hear the crickets chirping the whole way through. The sun had kind of appeared out of nowhere, but it had appeared too late. It was already sinking into the horizon, stretching its last, dying tendrils out over the sky. They swooped and splayed violet and a deep, golden orange. It was so surreal, so beautiful. I only wished I wasn’t the only one that noticed it. People missed out on these things—all the time. Everybody was too rushed. Everybody had to be somewhere. Everybody had something better to get to. Nobody ever took the time anymore to just enjoy life. Damn, did that make me mad.
         I entered my dorm building sometime later and made my way to the large, wooden door that denoted my room. It was #111. Kind of a strange coincidence, I guess. I started to push my keys into the lock, but then I realized that it was unlocked, and so I simply turned the knob, and walked in.
         We lived in a pretty nice space. The door led into the common room, and to the right and left, our own, private bedrooms branched off away from the central area. It was a big living space for just two people, which was nice. I took a breath. And then my eyes were scanning the floor.
         There were clothes scattered across the carpet. Some were right at the foot of the door, others were farther from the entrance, but they all inevitably led in a winding path toward Jack’s bedroom. I recognized the blue-collared shirt as being the one my roommate had been wearing earlier in the cafeteria. I also recognized the white khaki pants as his; they were tumbled in a pile, unheeded and unwanted. And right next to the khakis, unmistakable to any man’s eye, was the white blouse that belonged to none other than Maria Cancelieri. Her denim miniskirt was also discarded a few feet away, belt buckle and all, along with a pair of socks, some sandals, and Jack’s loafers.
         A separate heap of clothes was resting right at the foot of my roommate’s bedroom door. My roommate’s plaid boxers were there, and curled around them, like a remnant of snake skin, I could discern a brazier, and lace panties—no doubt belonging to Maria.
         My eyes stared at the door of his bedroom for a moment, and then, almost abruptly, the sounds began to emanate. Though the door was firmly closed, the noise coming from within was hardly, if at all, muted. Our beds were made of cheap, spring mattresses, and as I stood there, staring at my roommate’s bedroom door, I could hear the awkward clang and cling of those good, ol’ springy coils. There were voices too. Well, technically not voices. More like…suppressed cries.
         Maria’s utterances carried a distinctive squeal to them, coming high-pitch and sharp, sometimes fused with quick breaths and heaves, other times muddled out by my roommates deep and guttural groans. Hearing my roommate having intercourse should’ve alarmed me, or at least made me embarrassed, but, in fact, it did neither.
         I was so used to it by now. It was almost expected to come home on weekends, finding Jack with some girl. Sometimes I would walk in, catch them hooking up on the couch of our common room, but usually by the time I got in, they were already on to the final stage, gettin down and dirty in the bedroom.
         I walked into my room and shut the door. I had a small T.V. on my dresser, and I plopped onto my bed, giving my shoes a kick to the floor. Even as I found the controller and switched the television on, I could still hear the sounds coming from the other side of the common room:
          “Oh, baby… yes… oh, god, yes!” “Fuck, yea…shit, that’s it…come on… right there… right there…
         I sighed. This would get old real quick. I could tolerate hearing the mattress squeaking and the bedposts hitting the wall, but anything more than that was just plain overkill. Especially when I actually had to hear each and every goddamn word they were saying. Couldn’t they just keep it down, for god’s sake? I mean, jesus, was it really that great? Did she really have to let the whole world know how much she loved getting fucked?
         Then again, this wasn’t just any old schmuck in a bucket who was giving it to her. This was the one and only, the prized and prolific—the prodigal roommate, Jack “The Swooner” Kalvin. It wasn’t like I was jealous of him. Sure, he practically got any girl he wanted, but for some reason it didn’t bother me. No, no…it wasn’t jealousy at all. Nope, it was more anger than anything else. That’s right. Downright, stinkin anger. It pissed me off that he could do what he did. But more than that, it pissed me off that so many girls were willing to do it with him.
         I remembered speaking to some girl about it once. Her name was Claire Deins. For the longest time she had been in my classes, and a lot of times we would chat and stuff, about anything really—the weather, projects, campus happenings, anything—but one day she kind of really opened up to me. She was this great, smart, attractive girl. She had this really bright, auburn hair—just so rare—and she always wore these little, sapphire earrings that kind of stood out against her soft, rosy complexion. She also loved to wear pink capris, and they always looked good on her too.
         Anyway, one day she really opened up to me. We got on the topic of relationships, and she kind of blurted out that she was seeing my roommate. I was definitely taken aback (I had no idea at the time), but after a few moments it kind of sunk in, and I asked her how it was going. I asked her if they went to movies, ate out, went to ballgames, whatever. She got real quite when I said that, and she told me that it “wasn’t like that”. I asked her what she meant.
         Here was this great girl, with an easygoing personality, a nice smile, and then she was telling me that, “Oh, Colin, we only really meet up when it’s for sex.” I couldn’t believe it. How could she do that? As it turned out, she wasn’t the only one. There were plenty more like her. Great girls, seemingly good morals, the kind of chicks you thought would want the normal, traditional, date-and-dine kind of relationship. But nope. Nope, not at all.
         Half of these girls barely every spoke a word to Jack. As it turned out, the only time they really opened their mouths in his presence was when he had his pants unzipped, his boxers open, and his dick hanging out, waiting for a slurpie. How girls could lie on their backs and spread their legs for this guy—it was something that puzzled me to this day. I’d seen my share of page-long equations, chemistry and physics labs seemingly written in foreign code, but this….this proved to be the most befuddling of all.
         It pissed me off more than anything. But what about Jack’s personality, I’d ask them. I know he’s charming and all, but the guy is a fuckin dunce. The only reason he got in to the school was because he could throw a fuckin football. Most girls seemed to acknowledge that he was short on brains, but, as one of his former flings put it, “his physical endowments well make up for it.” I had inquired further, and the girl merely laughed, saying that “size did matter” and that Jack had “12 inches of stiff, hard evidence to prove it.”
         I shook my head. Girls were just as superficial and as shallow as guys. Hell, they wanted us to think that they were a step above, fuckin angels for Christ sakes, but I was beginning to realize that they were no more sublime than the rest of us.
         Suddenly, I was wrenched from my thoughts. The raucous from Jack’s room had come to an end. Man, it was going to be awkward, but this was my only chance. Getting up from my bed, I opened the door and headed to the closed door of my roommate’s room. I was just going to ask him for his keys, that was all. They had to be done by now. How long could they go?
         My intent was to quickly ask for his keys and be out of there, but as I pushed open the door and stepped inside, my body froze in its place. I gazed straight ahead, at the bed. His white sheets were all on the floor and in disarray.
         Maria was buck-naked on the mattress. She was spread wide-eagle, with her open thighs forming an upside down V, and her chest tilted back slightly. Her head was pressed against a pillow, but her tits stood right up in the air, engorged and all, bigger and rounder than I could’ve ever imagined. Jack was rocking back and forth wordlessly between her legs. Unfortunately, I could see everything; his dick was like a fuckin nuclear missile, all hard and shiny, stretching out her pussy like she was about to give birth to a fuckin walrus or something. God, was it big. I felt gay just seeing it, but I couldn’t deny what I saw. 12 inches was probably actually an understatement.
         Anyway, I just kind of stood there, staring back at Maria’s naked body. I felt weird as hell doing it, but something inside me wouldn’t budge. Neither of them noticed me yet—they were beginning to go at it again—and I kept thinking about what I was seeing. I had never seen her like this. She was all curves and valleys, nothing but jaunting hips, big tits, all wet and moist, her hair all tangled and out of sorts, her make-up run-off, her diaphragm doing this whole expand-and-contract number, making it almost look like the damn girl was about to hyperventilate right before my eyes. God, I was getting hard just staring at her. Not 12 inches hard, mind you, but hard nonetheless.
         Eventually, Maria happened to look my way. She did it kinda mindlessly, but when she saw me, her face got all twisted, and she had this look of utmost disgust. She gave Jack a real hard nudge to the shoulder, and he whipped his head back to see me. “Colin, what in the hell are you do—
         “I need to borrow your keys, where are they?” I said, fast as I could. He gave me this real menacing glare, and then he just turned back to face Maria. “On top the T.V. in the common room,” he groaned, and he gave this mighty thrust, making Maria whimper like a newborn tot. I swallowed with a nod. Good god, I could’ve just grabbed them without ever going in his room. Man, I felt like an idiot. “Thanks,” I croaked, and I made my way swiftly for the door. I could hear the bed shaking behind me, and Jack’s voice came again, this time all shaky and uneven. “Close…—“Yea, baby, that’s it”—…the…—“Oh Jack!”—…door…”
         I closed the door like he said and grabbed the keys. There was a small container of pills atop the television set as well. The label read Painkillers—probably for Jack’s constant bruising on the football field. Either way, it didn’t really matter to me. It was time to get the fuck out of there.


         I returned sometime later, feeling rather satisfied, and in desperate need of some low-grade weed. I knew that I had a Ziploc bag in my room somewhere, nothing real expensive, about $40 an eighth, and so I walked rather quickly as I approached the building. The sub had been exactly what I needed. It was delicious, probably the greatest damn thing I had ever tasted. Those freakin Italians knew how to make a meal. Damn, did they know.
         My door was unlocked, so I opened it. I expected to see Jack lying back on the couch with nothing but his boxers and a bag of Lays potato chips (his self-proclaimed “post-sex snack”), but instead I found only Jack, sitting silently on the edge of the couch, alone in the room, lights out, his eyes fixed to the television screen.
         I gave him a quick glance over. Something was weird about him. His face was all loose and slack, and his eyes had this almost-glazed, unseeing quality. Suddenly, I realized what it was. I walked over to him. “Jack, did you jus—“I’m sorry, Colin,” he murmured.
         He continued staring at the T.V., but his words were directed to me. “I’m sorry, Colin,” he repeated. “I’m sorry, Colin.” He blinked. “Colin, I’m sorry.” I looked at him. “Jack, how much did you sm—“A lot, Colin,” he said softly. “A lot, Colin.” He was nodding his head rather gingerly now, like some old bird confined to a wheelchair in a psychiatric ward. “How did you know how to use it?” I asked. Jack’s shoulders gave a meek shrug. “I’ve seen you, Colin.” Finally he looked away from the T.V., and up at me.
         ”I’m not that stupid, Colin,” he said. “I’ve seen you. I’ve seen you, Colin. I’ve seen you, Colin.” He stared right at my chin, and I got a good glimpse of his eyes. They were bloodshot as hell. He must’ve really ripped some big ones. I gave him a pat. “I’m impressed, bud. This is the first time, eh?” He shrugged his shoulders.
         I smiled. “Jack, this is your first time, right?” Again, he merely shrugged his shoulders. A lot of people didn’t get blazed their first time, but Jack surely was. Then again, most people got blazed out of their minds when they used my bong. First timers or seasoned veterans, my bong practically guaranteed a great blaze.
         I kept staring at him. God, was he funny as hell to look at. All that muscle was all loose and lax now. It looked so odd. “Why?” I asked eventually, after a period of silence. He gave a nod and looked back at the T.V. “I’m not that stupid, Colin, man,” he mumbled. “I’m not that stupid, man. I’m not, Colin.” He began to rub his nose. “I’m not stupid, Colin. I’m not you, but I’m not stupid.” I gave a consenting nod. “Ok, buddy, I understand that, but why try weed all of a sudden? You’ve never smoked before. Why now? Why tonight?”
         He shrugged his shoulders. “I wanted to try it.” He continued to rub his nose. “Before it’s too late, Colin.” His voice started to fade. “Before it’s too late…too late…too laaaaateee….”
          “Am I stupid to you, Colin?” He turned to look at me. I merely stared back. “Am I stupid to you, Colin? I am, aren’t I, Colin? I am, aren’t I? Stupid? I am, am I?” I shook my head. Where the hell was this coming from? “Nah, man, you’re cool. You get so many ladies, man. So many ladi—
          “Fuck ladies,” he mumbled. “Fuck ’em all,” he said. “Maria’s the only one I ever really wanted. I’d rather be you, Colin.” He smiled. A goofy, lopsided smile. “I’d rather be you, Colin. I would. I really would. I’ll tell ya truth, Colin. Let me tell ya the truth.” I nodded. “Give me the truth, man.” He smiled, and gave his index finger a wave in the air, as if he was conjuring some form of magical spell.
          “You’re goin places, man,” he said. “You. You, Colin Andrew Michaels. You… You are going places.” I continued to give a consenting nod. Man, was he blazed. Did he even know what he was saying? I guessed not. “Wanna know why, you’re goin to a place, Colin Andrew Michaels? Wanna know why?” I chuckled. “Sure, Jack. Tell me why.”
         He tapped his head, and smiled. “You got this,” he said, touching his skull. “Brains. You got brains. More than anybody at this school.” He frowned then, and I saw his head fall downward, kind of in a limp hang. “I don’t have this,” he murmured. His finger fell from his head. “I don’t have what you have, Colin Andrew Michaels the fourth.” I wasn’t “the fourth”, but I kept my mouth shut.
          “I’m not going to the pros,” he mumbled. “Sports mean nothing.” He shook his head. “I’m not, Colin. I’m not going to the pros.” He gazed upward at me, his eyelids heavy, his eyes no more than thin slits. “People know my dad gets everything for me. People know that, Colin. People know that. People know that I don’t need to work when I graduate…if I graduate.” He sighed. “I want to work when I graduate. I want to work, Colin. I don’t want everything for free. It isn’t great like you think, Colin.”
          “I understand, man,” I said, trying my best to console him. He shook his head. “It’s OK, Colin. You don’t understand, but it’s OK. I know nothing is going to change, Colin. I know that. I don’t know a lot, Colin, but I know that. I know that, Colin. I do. I really, really do.”
         I continued staring at him. Suddenly I felt sorry. Suddenly I felt bad for all those thoughts I had, all those negative feelings I had harbored against him. Maybe he was right. Maybe I didn’t know. Just as he didn’t know what it was like for me, I didn’t know what it was like for him. It was such a simple concept, yet it seemed so profound to me, to hear it out loud, to hear my own inner thoughts finally validating it. Who knew what it was like? Who knew?
         Jack looked away from me then, and he slid back into the couch, his head resting against a cushion. “I just wanted you to know,” he said. “I just wanted you to know…. So that you would understand.” I looked at him. “So that I would understand what?” But he was silent. He wouldn’t say another word, no matter how much I badgered him for an explanation. He just sat there, limp as a rag doll, just as I had done many, many times before.



         I fell asleep that night with an ache in the pit of my stomach. I felt weird the whole time as I tried to drift into slumber, and eventually when I did, it was only after many hours and hours of tossing and turning. My sleep was plagued by weird dreams and thoughts, and there was nothing I could do to stop them. In one vision, I was running toward a girl, but she kept floating away as soon as I was close, every time floating away, gliding inches from my grasp, this innocent, ashen smile on her face. In others, it was just me and my roommate. We were just sitting on that stinky, beat-up couch in our common room. We would be laughing and talking about random stuff, and then my roommate would turn on the T.V. and we would start to watch shows and things. Every now and then he would turn to me and say, “You know, Colin, you really shouldn’t smoke marijuana. It really isn’t good for your body.” I would shrug and then I would say, “You know, Jack, you really shouldn’t fuck so many girls. It really isn’t good for your body.” And then we would both break out in laughter. Unrestrained, uninhibited laughter.
         None of it seemed to make any sense. None of it seemed to hold any connection to the waking world, to the reality that existed outside my quiet, misconstrued dreamtime existence.


         It wasn’t until later that morning, when I finally awoke, that all my visions and feelings meant something. It wasn’t until I awoke and walked into the common room; it wasn’t till then, that suddenly Jack’s ambiguous words from the night before made so much sense.
         It was approximately 11:53 when I woke that Saturday morning. And it was almost exactly 11:56—I’m sure of it—when I discovered the silent, lifeless body of my roommate sprawled across the couch we had shared for so long. An empty bottle of painkillers rested on the carpet beside the T.V.
         There was a note on the table beside the sofa, but I didn’t bother to read it. Suddenly, I knew what it said. I knew what Jack’s last, written words had conveyed. In his mind, his life was null. He had wanted change. As lucky a guy as he had seemed, as much fortune and good will that had seemed to come his way, after all that, he wasn’t happy.
         Nothing had ever made him happy. It had all been a ploy, a guise, an elaborate scheme to deceive those who thought they knew him. Maybe that’s why he had never had a true relationship with any girl. Maybe that’s why he had been the way he had, in it for nothing but the sex, uncaring for pleasantries, uncaring for getting to know people or getting to know the person inside them. This had been a plan of his for a while, it seemed. He had accomplished his life’s goals. Maria Cancelieri and smoking weed. That was it. That was all he had wanted from life. He had gotten one, and he had gotten the other.
         I shook my head. Here I was thinking that Jack was a fool, an idiot. Here I was believing that he really was stupid. But he wasn’t. As much as he claimed me to be some kind of genius, I never saw it coming. I never saw it. That so-called “idiot” had fooled even me.

         Before I called the police, I made a stop off in my room. I took the last of my weed, every last, dry nugget, and I blazed. I blazed like I had never blazed before. It was for Jack, I guess. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t. Either way, what was the difference? It was what I did, and it always had been. Nobody would understand my reasons why. Looked like ol’ Jack and I had a thing in common after all.