Andrew Smith - Winger

I love the way Hawthorne said things. I wished that I could also find “no better occupation than to look down into the garden” beneath my window, but I had, in such a short time, gotten myself so occupied with crap that I lay there convinced there was no way I would make it through my eleventh-grade year.

I opened my notebook and wrote a letter to Annie. Even if I never gave it to her, at least I felt like I could write down what I wished I could tell her. In true Ryan Dean West fashion, I drew a Venn diagram on the note, trying to explain to her something about myself, the little boy , hoping that maybe she would realize what I thought was so obvious about the people we deal with, who are all around us, everywhere and every day. And as soon as I’d written the first couple of sentences, I reread them and they sounded so pathetic and lost that I just tore the page from my notebook and threw it away.

I was so tired.

I climbed down from the bed, undressed, and turned off the light.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG with you?” Seanie said.

The light came on and I woke up.

My books were scattered around my head, and I was lying, face up, on top of the covers.

Seanie, JP, and Joey were standing just inside the door, dressed in their shirts and ties, like they had just come from dinner at the mess hall.

I propped myself up on my elbows and looked at them.

I rubbed my hair and sat up. My head nearly touched the ceiling, but not quite.

“I just needed to sleep,” I said. “What time is it?”

I looked at the clock. It was eight fifteen.

“Everyone was looking for you,” JP said. “You missed dinner.”

Yeah. I bet Casey Palmer was looking for me too.

“I wasn’t hungry.” But now that they mentioned it, I felt like I was starving.

“Well,” Seanie kind of whispered, glancing around, “we smuggled you some food, just in case you were.”

Taking food from the mess hall was a definite violation. But as far as rule breaking was concerned, having visitors from the regular dorms in O-Hall was probably just as bad.

Seanie placed a wadded napkin and a paper coffee cup on top of the Calculus book next to my pillow. “It’s a ham sandwich and some tomato soup.”

Now, that was awesome . It sounded so good.

“Thanks, Seanie,” I said. “And thanks for not wrapping it up in your printout from Casey’s MySite.”

JP laughed.

“Have you ever seen Casey’s MySite, Joey?” I asked.

Seanie had a sick and pissed-off expression on his face.

“No. Why?”

“Well, when you go home this weekend, look it up,” I said.

“Okay.”

Joey’s parents were ultrarich. They lived in San Mateo and flew him home every Friday after school. I saw how Seanie was looking at me, so I just fired him back a Ha-Ha-I-just-got-Joey-to-look-at-your-balls-so-write-a-haiku-about-that, fucker expression, if there is such a thing.

But whether or not there actually is such a look, Seanie and I just had an intense and wordless conversation about Japanese poetry, his balls, and our gay friend, Joey Cosentino.

“I got you something to drink,” Joey said.

I looked at him. Maybe I still had the balls/haiku expression on my face, so I guess Joey thought I didn’t trust his evening beverage selection.

“ Not beer,” he added, and smiled. He pulled a bottle of water and another of Gatorade from his school pack.

Now, that was a miracle. I was so thirsty, I opened the Gatorade and emptied the bottle without even taking a breath.

“Joey told everyone what happened,” JP said.

“Dude, you’re like a superhero, laying out Casey Palmer, sticking up for your fly half,” Seanie said.

“I wasn’t sticking up for Joey,” I said. “I was sticking up for me. I have to walk up and down that hill every day too. We can’t let them start off with crap like that on the first day of practice. So I just kind of closed my eyes and took him out. I was so pissed off about everything anyway, so I did something really stupid that I’m lucky didn’t end up with me being killed. Like we said in the locker room, I wanted to hit someone, and a game of touch rugby didn’t quite do it for me today.”

“How’s your nose?” Joey asked.

I hadn’t even thought about it since seeing that blood in the bottom of the shower stall. I took a bite of the sandwich—it tasted better than anything I could possibly imagine—then touched my nose.

“It’s not broken or nothing,” I said, inhaling. “I think. Just stuffed up. Man, thanks so much for the food. I think I actually feel normal again.”

But feeling normal meant I immediately thought about Annie, too.

“Did any of you guys see Annie tonight?”

“I talked to her,” JP said. “She is really pissed off at you, Ryan Dean.”

Maybe my head was still a little off, but I kind of got the feeling that JP was glad about Annie feeling that way.

“Dude, her being pissed just shows how much she cares about you,” Seanie said.

That sounded like something you’d tell your kid before giving him a spanking.

“I think she feels like you didn’t tell her the truth,” JP explained.

“I never had the chance to. I never had a minute to talk to her about it.” I guess I sounded pretty whiney.

Then the door pushed open. I expected it would be Chas coming in, and that he’d tell my friends to get the hell out, but it was Mr. Farrow. And he looked pissed, too, because he was going to be the one to tell them that.

“What are you two boys doing here?” he said. He fired a displeased look at me as I sat on my bunk, eating my dinner. I pulled the sheet over my legs. Mr. Farrow had a way of making me feel so uncomfortable.

JP said, “Ryan Dean was sick. We just brought him something to eat.”

Mr. Farrow took a step toward the bed and looked more closely at me, which, like I said, creeped me out because he was practically exhaling on my chest and I was only wearing boxers.

“Are you sick, Ryan Dean?”

“I’m feeling better now. I just woke up.”

“Maybe we should have the doctor take a look at you in the morning.”

“No. Really. I’m okay,” I said.

Then Farrow pulled a scrap of paper and a pen from his pocket and looked sternly at JP.

“You boys are obviously not new students. You know the rules,” he said. “What are your names?”

JP swallowed one time and answered, “John-Paul Tureau and Sean Flaherty.”

“Mr. Farrow, please don’t get them in trouble,” I said. “Really, they were just looking out for me.”

“Ryan Dean, sometimes when boys take it upon themselves to look out for one another, there are unpleasant consequences.”

Holy shit if that wasn’t the recap of my first day here. Then I thought, they must have picked him and Mrs. Singer to run this place because they’re like Satan’s minions or something.

And Mr. Farrow continued, “But, Mr. Tureau and Mr. Flaherty, I do appreciate your apparent concern for Ryan Dean. However, I expect you to leave immediately, and that you won’t do this again without asking me ahead of time.”

Then Farrow tucked his slip of paper back into his pocket and stepped out into the hallway, leaving my door standing open.

“Because we have plenty of room here in Opportunity Hall,” he added, then disappeared down the corridor in the direction of our common room.

“I guess that means we’re leaving,” Seanie said.

“Hey. Thanks, guys,” I said as Seanie and JP turned to go. Out in the hallway, Seanie swung around and flipped me a middle finger with a smile and a fuck-you-for-getting-Joey-to-look-at-my-balls expression on his face, if there is such a thing.