Quad Squad

by R. Barri Flowers

“WHAT HAPPENED????” Sabrina texted the group, but no one was texting back. They were all probably driving home with their moms and having to make conversation about how did the bonfire go, and they couldn’t answer. Sabrina had had a good time and she hadn’t even been high even though everyone had thought she had been, she had just been enjoying tripping on the water and the sand and the beauty of everything, and being able to realize that the world is a cool place without putting some shit in her body, unless you count a bunch of Lay’s potato chips and two pieces of that volleyball girl’s gross birthday cake, who still gets birthday cakes from Safeway? and like nine red cups of Sprite that she had to pee about twenty times in the skanky fake bathroom, but in the end it was all a really good day, except that when she was toward the end at the fire Maya had run up to Rachel crying, and Sabrina had thought that Maya had been hanging out with that new boy, but why was she crying?

  Andrea was the first one home. Her mom wanted to talk about some stupid college plan shit, supposedly they were going to get her an advisor to help with tutoring and also plan out the college essays and where to apply and all that shit and Andrea felt like, God, first of all I’m just trying to enjoy a Saturday night, I’ve been out all day, leave me alone, and second of all I’m in 9th grade why do I have to apply to colleges, and third of all, I don’t even know if I want to go to any stupid college, and fourth and most importantly of all, is Malik into me or not?

  Because he was being such a confusing asshole, and she needed to figure it out now, because if he thought that she was all about some 9th grade boy, the fact that he should know was that she could easily be going out with at least 5 10th grade guys that she personally knew of, so yeah.

  She texted, “ya details please,”

  Rachel finally texted in with, “We’re here for you, but It’s been kind of a long day, maybe we could just check in at school or something if you want to, Maya?”

  But Maya didn’t check in at all, and the other three were left to wonder through the evening and Sunday what the hell that had all been about.

  Mike didn’t talk to his dad on the drive home. His dad wanted to bond or something like that, asking all kinds of questions about the bonfire, actually it sounded like he was trying to figure out if people had been drinking and even though they had that wasn’t the point because Mike hadn’t, but most importantly because of what had happened.

  He was so sick with himself that he felt like he was going to puke. He didn’t sleep much that night and on Sunday he told his dad that he was sick and just stayed in bed all day feeling horrible, horrible, horrible. Every time he thought about it he felt so bad, and he had really liked her and he had thought that she had like him, well, obviously she had sort of, but then he had blown it, like choked like the Seahawks when Russell Wilson had been intercepted on the last play of the game, it was exactly like that, you’re going along and you think everything is working right and you’re about to score and win the Super Bowl and then you call the stupidest play of all time, and you lose.

  That was him, he had been trying to just be cool and then they had been kissing and stuff and why, why, why had he been so so gross, and pervie, and just gross? Like, he could just feel her hand, small but warm, on his knee and just, like -- he cringed, again, over and over, thinking about it, lying in his bed with the covers up to his chin and staring at the ceiling and thinking about how fucked up the world was. Because the Seahawks? If they had just not blown it, then everyone would have thought that it was great and everything and they would have been heroes, but they messed up and after that for like, months, for years, all anyone could say was how Pete Carroll had choked and called the wrong play and the Seahawks had fucked up and there was no going back. And everyone knew about it.

  People were posting all kinds of bonfire stuff to IG but Mike barely had the guts to look at it. When the pictures weren’t with Maya in them he could look but he wasn’t liking or tagging anyone, just lurking, and if she was in one then he had to scroll away because he felt so gross.

  Jerry and Tim and Cole and Mike had a group dm and Cole wrote, “Cool party,” and Tim said, “Nice,” and Jerry said, “You had fun Mike am I right?” and that was like, obviously about the fact that everyone had seen them walk away from the others at the fire and probably seen them, like, making out or whatever, but did they know what had happened? What he had done? Had she, like, told them? God, he hoped not.

  He texted, “good time,” and stayed at home sick on Monday, then again on Tuesday. On Tuesday night his dad said he would have to go to school on Wednesday or go to the doctor and Mike lay in bed trying to decide.

  They didn’t go to the DQ at lunch because between everyone having stuff to do at first break and Rachel having this one Monday off and a lot of catching up needing to happen they agreed to just hang just the four of them and talk, but they were all starving so they walked to the lame gas station minimart where the guy who worked there sold meth, everyone said, and got for lunch just Funyuns and hot nachos with fake cheese from the squirty thing and slurpees and ice cream.

  Maya had been dreading this so much but a part of her knew that she could only put it off for so long and she had been thinking about it all Sunday even though she had been majorly busy, her parents had forced her to go to her nana’s house for like ever, they had gotten home at eight and she still had homework and in the morning she had just rushed around like a usual Monday morning and tried not to think about it and didn’t say anything in PE, luckily he wasn’t even there today, but she kind of ignored the girls, even though she kind of wanted to ask them stuff but it was so embarrassing.

  They sat on the little wall next to the air pump thing at the gas station and Andrea chucked litter, the little circle lid from her drumstick ice cream, and Rachel picked it up and threw it away and everyone made fun of Rachel for being a goody-good and of Andrea for ruining the Earth, but then it was, like, impossible to avoid, so Maya just started.

  “So, Saturday night was weird,” she said.

  “What happened?” Sabrina asked. “I thought it was, like, a good time. I mean, for you. With, like …” she trailed off, wondering if she had messed something up.

  “With Mike,” Andrea said, kind of ignoring Sabrina, which made Rachel wonder for the millionth time what the deal was with Andrea and Sabrina and what it was all about. Andrea said, “Weren’t you and him making out?”

  “What was it like?” Rachel wanted to know, then got mad at herself because she had let her own curiosity jump in front of the fact that Maya obviously had had something weird happen.

  “Okay, so don’t think I’m weird?” Maya started. “But, like, yeah, you guys know me and Mike were like, talking and stuff at the party/”

  “Talking!” Andrea laughed. “I was going to go get you guys a condom.”

  “Oh, my God!” Sabrina said, but half laughing, “Can you not, Andrea?”

  Maya buried her face in her hands.

  Andrea said, “What? They were like, seriously…”

  “Oh, no, come on, don’t,” Rachel said, because she thought that Maya had maybe started crying again, but Maya was actually just freaking out at Andrea in a funny way.

  Maya said, “Oh, my God, Andrea, I’m so not going to say anything if you’re going to--”

  “Okay, okay!” Andrea said. “God! What a bunch of … just, go ahead!”

  “We were --”

  “Like you guys don’t know what a condom is,” Andrea said.

  “Just go ahead!” Rachel said.

  “Ignore her,” Sabrina said. She grabbed Andrea from behind and put her palm across Andrea’s mouth and even though all of them had kind of been wondering if maybe Andrea was mad at Sabrina or something, it was okay at least right now because Andrea just laughed and flicked Sabrina’s face with her ponytail and they broke away laughing.

  “Anyway!” Rachel announced, herding them back in.

  “Well, so,” Maya said. She waited a moment to see if Andrea
was going to jump in again, but she didn’t. “We kind of made out, I don’t know, it was kind of fun, honestly? It was totally fun. But then? So, I think I did something wrong? Or maybe let him, like, think something that he shouldn’t have thought?”

  The rest just listened, so there was no chance of backing out now.

  She said, “Well, so we were, like, kissing? You know? And then I put my hand on his knee, and then he like, grabbed my hand and put it on his thing,” she said, the last words coming out in a quick rush.

  “Ew!” Sabrina said.

  “Oh!” Rachel said. She rushed over to hug her. “Oh, my God, I’m so sorry!”

  Sabrina rushed over, too. Maya felt a little crushed but appreciated the thought.

  “I didn’t realize,” Rachel said, remembering hugging Maya at the bonfire.

  Andrea, who hadn’t come over to Maya, was shaking her head a bit with a smile. “Oh, Mike, Mike, Mikey. Was it tiny?” she asked, laughing. “How long were you looking for it?”

  “Oh, my God,” Sabrina said, but she was sort of laughing, too.

  “That’s not the point!” Rachel said, upset. “That’s, like, forced sex or something? Like rape but obviously not that. I mean, did he coerce you?”

  Everyone was suddenly staring at Rachel. She said, “What?”

  “I don’t know!” Maya said. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Rape?”

  “No,” Sabrina said, “Like, did he make you do it, or did you, like, want to?”

  Maya said, “No, I didn’t want to! How can you say that?”

  “Sorry, sorry,” Sabrina said.

  “I’m not a slut!” Maya said.

  “No, obviously,” Sabrina said.

  “Why not?” Andrea said. “Didn’t you want to see what it felt like?”

  “That’s not the point!” Rachel said.

  “How do you always know what the point is?” Andrea asked.

  “Oh, my God we have to start walking back but we need to talk about this,” Sabrina said.

  They started walking, but Maya said, “I don’t even know what the point is. The point is, it was weird, like I said. I mean, he didn’t hurt me or even, like, touch me anywhere?” But I wasn’t expecting that?”

  “I think it’s coercion,” Rachel said.

  “Okay, Ms. Feminist,” Andrea said, “Everybody gets it. What are you going to do, arrest him?”

  “No,” Maya said, “It’s not even like that. I mean, yeah, it happened, but I think I kind of led him on? Like I feel like I should have seen that coming? I mean, my hand was on his leg and everything, and I was totally kissing him.”

  “He’s such a perv,” Sabrina said. “Are you going to report him?”

  Rachel said, “It’s a violation of the school code for sure.”

  “Oh my God, are you people even listening?” Andrea demanded. “She doesn’t want to report him for shit. Do you?”

  “No, obviously not,” Maya said, grateful to Andrea, who just now was somehow proving that she was her very best and oldest friend and was the one who, even though she pretended to be all crude and everything, got her.

  “But he kind of forced you, is what we’re saying,” Sabrina said. “And you shouldn’t blame yourself for something he did.”

  “Right?” Rachel demanded.

  “I don’t know,” Maya said. “I don’t know.”

  “Back up to when you were kissing him,” Andrea said. “Was it hot?”

  “I mean, yeah?”

  “And then you had your hand on his knee and he was like, here, touch my dick? Is that basically it?”

  Maya blushed, a little surprised that after all of this she could still blush. “That’s basically it,” she confirmed.

  “Oh, my God, this is such not a big thing,” Andrea said, then laughed and said. “I’m not talking about his D.”

  “Oh, my God, can you not?” Sabrina said.

  “No, for serious!” Andrea said, done laughing for the moment. “They had a great time, they’re healthy young individuals, they made out, he thought, oh, hey, maybe she wants to touch my dick, and Maya, you were all, no, not really, dude. So what? Nobody died. What’s the big fucking deal? It’s like you’re all thinking he assaulted her or something. He’s just a dude, he wants someone to pet his pecker. What?”

  She had to stop and look angry, because the other three were cracking up at her phrase.

  “Jesus,” she said. “You people are so immature.”

  “What are you going to do?” Rachel asked. “I mean, are you going out with him?”

  “I don’t know,” Maya said thoughtfully. “I mean, maybe? He was super nice, too, I forgot to mention. Like, we liked each other, and then.”

  “If he asked you out again would you go?” Sabrina asked.

  “Maybe lay down some ground rules?” Rachel suggested.

  “No getting preggers,” Andrea said. “That’s a good one.”

  “You need to shut it,” Sabrina said.

  “God, you guys are so shocked at every little thing, like you don’t know that guys have dicks and they want girls to touch them. Oh, news flash.”

  Rachel thought, wait, is that what they want?

  Sabrina said, “Like you’re such an expert.”

  “I know!” Maya said.

  “She talks such a big game,” Sabrina said.

  “Okay, you know what?” Andrea said. “Maybe I’m not as experienced as some people I could mention? I could pretend I am, but I’m not. But I’m also not going to pretend that I don’t understand how basic human sex works.”

  Maya thought for a moment, then said, “I don’t know if I’d go out with him again. It’s not like we actually really went out in the first place?”

  Rachel said, “If he was a decent person he would have at least called or texted you or something.”

  “Nothing,” Maya said.

  “That’s some bullshit right there,” Andrea said.

  “Right?” Sabrina confirmed.

  They were about to split for their separate classroom destinations, but there was something left to say. They stood there for a moment, but none of them quite knew what it was. Something had changed. What Maya had done had put her in a different category, from which there would never be any going back in a girl’s life. None of the rest of them knew what to say about it.

  Maya said, “Thanks, people,” and they all hugged, in a surprisingly emotional way, until Andrea said, “Think I’ll go text Mike,” and they all ran off to class, laughing.