151 Days

by John Goode

  Kelly yelled “Fuck!” and threw his beer bottle across the room. Everyone froze as he charged upstairs and away from the party. Slowly everyone went back to being simply uncomfortable and not looking at each other. Kyle watched Brad follow Kelly out of the room and then asked Jennifer something. That was when it started to dawn on me.

  Kelly had the hots for Brad.

  I laughed to myself as the simplicity of the entire problem became apparent instantly. I liked Kyle, Kyle liked Brad, Kelly liked Brad, and God knows what Brad liked besides being scratched behind the ears. My entire focus was drawn to the stairs and what conversation was taking place up there.

  The music stopped, and the sound of one of the library nerds shouting “—but no way Hulk could take Loki if he was ready” practically echoed through the house. They couldn’t even come to a party and not discuss the uselessness that was comics. This was why people hated nerds and geeks. It was why I hated us.

  Kyle jumped up off the couch and asked, “Anyone have anything good on their iPod?” No one answered, of course, because no one acknowledged Kyle as anything more than a guy who was here because his boyfriend could hit a ball. “Seriously? No one has anything?”

  Sammy looked over at me and mouthed, “Your mashups.”

  I scowled at her and shook my head, but she nodded and practically threw my hand up. Kyle looked over at me, and I stammered a weak, “I have some mashups on mine.”

  “Sweet,” he said, grabbed my phone, and began pulling wires out of the CD player. I wish the skill with which he handled the equipment wasn’t impressive, but within thirty seconds he had my music coming out of the speakers.

  He nodded and smiled at me as he walked toward the library nerds.

  I could feel a tingle somewhere inside me from even that brief moment of acknowledgment, and in that second my anger was gone. “Did you make this?” one of the drama people asked me. “This is incredible,” another chimed in.

  Maybe I had been wrong. Maybe this night wasn’t going to be as bad as I thought it would.

  TYLER

  I ALMOST hit two other cars running red lights to get to the high school.

  A lot of thoughts were racing through my mind, but the first and foremost was that I was never fucking having kids. If this panic and absolute terror could be brought on by two teenage boys I had barely known a year, I could not imagine the day-to-day ordeal it would be to wonder if they were okay. Sheriff Rogers had two patrol cars in front of the school as we pulled up. One of the deputies was already putting up barricades to prevent people from getting any closer.

  Robbie said something to me as I jumped out of the car. My heart felt like it was going to explode, and I hadn’t sweated like this since the first day of practice in Orlando. My ears were doing that weird ringing thing that meant my blood pressure must be like a thousand points too high, and the edges of my vision were blurry. All were indications I was too old for my own good.

  “Stop!” Robbie yelled, getting in front of me. I paused, wondering how long he had been yelling at me. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  I cocked my head in confusion. “I’m going to go help.”

  “Help?” he asked. “Help who? Kyle and Brad?” I nodded and began to move around him, but he stopped me. “Did you gain superpowers at some point and didn’t tell me? Because last time I checked, there isn’t a thing you can do in there except get shot.”

  “They’re in danger!” I screamed, not sure why he wasn’t getting this.

  “And you are incapable of changing that right now,” he screamed back. Neither of us blinked as we tried to drill holes into each other with our eyes. “If you go in there, whoever has a gun will just shoot you. Is that what you want?”

  “Of course it isn’t, but I can’t just stand here and do nothing.”

  “No, that is in fact all we can do right now. See the big men in the dark shirts with guns? This is their job. If the whackjob in there who has a gun wants sporting goods, then it becomes your job, but right now all you can do is get hurt or die.”

  “So?” I asked him, fed up with the whole conversation.

  “So maybe this isn’t the time to go charging in to be a hero.”

  Something inside my brain just snapped. “I can’t watch someone die again!”

  I hadn’t known I was going to say it—fuck, I didn’t even know I had been thinking it. But there it was, big as life and twice as ugly.

  “Well, maybe I don’t want to lose anyone else,” he said back quietly.

  There were a few seconds before I said anything. “I thought you’d jump at the chance to see me die.” He gave me such a look that I knew instantly it had been the wrong thing to say.

  After a second he just sat down on the sidewalk; his entire demeanor was one of surrender. I sat down next to him. “What do you want me to say, Tyler? I can never forgive you for what you did, but as much as I hate to admit it, you are the last thing of Riley’s that is still here, and I can’t imagine losing you too.”

  Hesitantly I asked, “So you don’t hate me?”

  He quickly looked over at me. “No, I hate you with the fiery heat of a thousand suns, but I don’t want to see this town kill anyone else. I just can’t do that again.” Looking out across the street, he said, “I hate this town. I hate it more than anything in the world. What is it about Foster that just preys on people? It’s like a big, fucked-up shark, just slowly swimming in circles until it can find someone to pull under. I fucking hate it.” Angry tears fell from his eyes as he talked.

  I sighed and looked down at my shoes. “I miss him.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  Another squad car pulled up in front of the school, and I saw one of the deputies get out and pull a large box from the backseat. As soon as I saw it, I knew this was serious.

  “This is bad,” I told Robbie, nudging him and nodding toward the box, which was now being set up on the trunk of the sheriff’s car.

  He shrugged. “Not to sound all Brad Pitt, but what’s in the box?”

  Before I could answer, the sheriff pulled out a nasty-looking sniper rifle and began to attach a scope to it.

  “Oh” was all Robbie could manage as we watched him assemble the weapon.

  JEREMY

  THE LIBRARY nerds went outside and came back with binders of Magic cards. I’d never played the game, but I had seen it all over school; it was the geek equivalent of crack cocaine. Why Kyle would have them bring that crap in here was beyond me. Kelly’s pack of rabid jocks were still standing in the kitchen, trying to distance themselves from the rest of the unclean in case being a loser was contagious.

  So far, though, it was better than I thought it would be. No one had screamed at anyone yet, and my music seemed to be well received, so there was a kind of balance in the air. It was something that couldn’t last. Instead of being actual peace and acceptance, this was forced cohabitation, and it was just a matter of time before one of the monkeys went apeshit on one of the others.

  Brad came back downstairs and began talking to Jennifer. It was easy from afar to see why they’d gone out with each other. There was a sameness that the eye was drawn to and said, “They should be together.” It was the same program that made you think celebrities should only date other celebrities. Perfect people gravitated toward perfect people. Thinking about it, everybody gravitated toward perfect people.

  He was upset about something, and he was trying to explain it to Jennifer. When Kyle walked over, the three of them talked for a second, and then Kyle began to walk upstairs. Instantly I knew what was about to happen. Kyle was about to confront Kelly about his feelings. This was it—my chance to get them all back.

  I began to follow him and then stopped, realizing I couldn’t make the same mistake I’d made in Dallas. I needed proof this time. I needed something to get Kelly back with. My phone was still playing music, so there was no way for me to take it with me. Sammy was swaying to the music, drinking something next to me.

/>   “Can I borrow your phone?” I asked, wanting to run upstairs before I missed the explosion.

  “Sure, why?” she asked, handing her phone over to me.

  “Need to check in with my dad before he goes all psycho on me for being out.” It was a complete lie, but my dad was a big enough dick to make it believable. I took her phone and practically sprinted upstairs. I listened at two doors before I heard talking on the other side. With a skill that had been perfected over the years of not waking up a hung-over father, I turned the bedroom doorknob and slowly cracked the door open.

  Kyle’s voice became clear. “—about; this is what’s going to kill you. Even if you got what you wanted tonight, come tomorrow, how could you live with it?”

  Kelly began crying, and I tried not to jump up and down in glee. This was exactly what I needed. I stuck the phone in the crack of the door and began recording it. I’d have time to go over it in detail once I got home, but from what I could catch on the other side of the door, this was pure gold. I would destroy Kelly with this video. I was going to bring him and all his douche bag friends to their knees.

  As the conversation went on, I heard someone burst in downstairs, and it sounded like he was making trouble. Cursing under my breath, I pulled the phone away and dashed back downstairs before Kelly and Kyle came out and found me. I ducked into the kitchen and hid while Tony Wright made an ass of himself in the living room. I was about to join Sammy and the drama crew when I realized I had to give her phone back.

  Fuck, how did I get this video off without her knowing? I supposed I could e-mail it, but that would take time to upload, and I still wanted to get Sammy back for going against me. I looked over the icons and saw she had the YouTube app. Crossing my fingers, I opened it up, hoping she was still logged in. When I saw the account name BluehairedgirlinTx pop up along with her password, I knew I was going to kill two assholes with one bullet.

  I began to upload the footage to her account and then hit the home screen. The network icon was still spinning, meaning even though the phone looked normal, it was still uploading Kelly’s confession to the web. All I needed to do was get home, pull up Sammy’s account, grab the video, and edit the boring parts out. Once I had done that, it was a simple matter of posting it to Facebook and watching the world fall down around Kelly. The best part was if anyone tried to find out where the video had come from, it would lead them to Sammy, who deserved whatever crap she got as well.

  Kyle was right; this could be the most important party in all of Foster, Texas history.

  LINDA STILLENO

  I HAVE a problem.

  It’s a statement that has rolled around my brain more than once, and though it may seem like an incredibly obvious thing to you, for me it was just starting to seep in. Once again I had the closing shift at work and ended up going to the Rodeo Club with friends after, knowing that Kyle would already be asleep. As I am wont to do, I drank too much, took the party back to my house, drank some more, made a complete fool of myself, and then passed out just as the sun was coming up.

  There is little chance of me ever winning mother of the year.

  Growing up, I was never one of those girls who thought about being a mom. I didn’t like dolls all that much, and playing house seemed about as much fun as watching paint dry. I ran with a pretty wild crowd, and for a time I behaved like I was Peter Pan and never going to get old.

  And then I had Kyle.

  There are some people who will tell you having a child changes your world instantly, that the moment you stare into that baby’s eyes, the universe adjusts itself around you, and it becomes the center of everything. There are also people who will tell you that Bigfoot is real and that aliens took them far away and probed them intimately. I’m not saying that having a child doesn’t change you; nor am I saying there is absolutely no chance that something like Bigfoot exists out there. I’m just saying it sure in the fuck doesn’t happen the way those people described it.

  Kyle was a gift, no doubt, but I have spent the better portion of my life wondering if he would have been better off with someone else as his parent.

  At first I tried to do the whole “responsible mom” thing, but since the guy—notice I don’t say “father,” because I don’t feel like insulting fathers everywhere by lumping this asshole in with them—but since the guy who was partly responsible for Kyle wanted nothing to do with him nor me, I was forced to go it alone. My parents, who had moved to California once my father retired, offered to move back to help, but in what can only be temporary insanity I told them no, I could do it myself.

  That’s a mistake I don’t think I ever recovered from.

  Looking back on it now, I can see what I did to screw things up. I decided to be stupid and not ask for help, and the instant it got too hard, I used the excuse to climb back into a bottle or worse. Of course, the reason it was too hard was because I wouldn’t ask for help, but I was too fucked up to see the logic loop I had created. Instead, I would go through cycles, getting worse and worse, realize I was ruining Kyle’s life, try to get clean and sober, and then give up because it was too hard.

  That isn’t an excuse; that’s just how I got myself into this situation.

  The specific situation I’m talking about was me passed out while someone pounded on my door. At first I thought it was just a headache or possibly my pulse, but as I became more and more awake, I realized the sound was someone almost breaking down my door. Slowly I stumbled toward the noise. You can tell how zoned I was because I didn’t even check the living room to see if there was anything illegal left out, just in case it was a cop. My mind was nowhere near awake even as I opened the door.

  Gayle from the diner was standing there, looking four kinds of pissed.

  “Typical,” she practically spat at me as she pushed past into the house. “You know, I honestly gave thought that you might just be at work instead of hungover, still asleep. Against all odds I really did want to believe that, but I should have known.”

  I had no earthly idea what she was talking about, so I closed the door and asked in a quiet voice, “What are you doing here?”

  She had already walked away and into the kitchen. I heard the water from the sink turn on and tried to figure out what the hell was happening. Was she in there doing my dishes? I walked into the kitchen and was met head-on by a glass of water thrown in my face. Now I’m not sure what the protocol is when a crazy lady walks into your house and throws water in your face. Miss Manners never covered that when I was younger. I do know that if I had been awake, my reaction would have been different than half-asleep.

  “What the fuck did you do that for?” I screamed at her, wiping my face off.

  “Because you need to be sober and awake, and since the first part is impossible right now, I’ll settle for the second.” She brushed past me as she walked into the living room.

  My mind had finally woken up, and it was pretty pissed. I grabbed her hand as she walked past. She turned back to look at me, and the expression on her face made it pretty clear she did not like me at all. Since I had been awake all of about forty-five seconds before I was doused, the feeling was mutual.

  “What makes you think you can walk into my house and treat me like this?” I asked her, as ready as I had ever been to hitting an older woman.

  Instead of answering, she turned the TV on with her other hand. Rather than game shows or soap operas, it was showing local news. I saw half a dozen cop cars in front of Foster High, the words “Shooting at Local School” scrolled beneath the images. I felt my hand drop to my side as I stood there in shock. This could not be happening, not here. This was Foster. This place was safe… this wasn’t real.

  Gayle slapped my face, not hard, but enough to get my attention back.

  “Your son is in trouble, and he needs you. Get dressed now.” It was pretty clear from the tone in her voice she was going to wait for me.

  I opened my mouth to argue with her, to fight with her, to do something to defend my li
fe to this woman. Instead I saw the police push the news crew farther away from the school and knew this nightmare was real, and I was wasting time.

  I turned and ran back into my room.

  JEREMY

  IT WAS like watching a car crash in slow motion.

  Or better, it was like watching one of those YouTube clips where this hot, jock douche bag thinks he’s going to be all cool and grind down a stair rail but instead biffs it and nails himself in the balls. It was like that except the guy just kept falling and falling and falling. I grabbed the video from Sammy’s account, edited it down to the golden moments, looped it, and then uploaded it back to her account again. It was a simple matter to make a dummy Facebook account, link the video to Kelly’s wall, and wait.

  I didn’t have to wait long.

  It’s a well-known fact that sharks will consume their own in the middle of a feeding frenzy. The same is true for high school douche bags trying to be as popular as they can. I labeled the video “Who’s the fag now?” my very own cryptic clue to who I was, in the same manner that Joker left clues for Batman. Of course Kelly and his ilk weren’t detectives, so I was in no danger of being discovered.

  By noon it had become a thing.

  Kelly had removed it from his wall, but it made no difference. People just kept passing it around and linking it back. Each time, more and more people took the opportunity to remind Kelly of what a worthless human being he was. By the end of that weekend, it was pretty clear that Kelly’s life as he knew it was over. His so-called friends had thrown him overboard, since all he was now was social chum to the bottom-feeders waiting in the deep water. Tuesday, Kelly deactivated his Facebook account, but not before some guys spray-painted FAG across his truck and posted pics all over Instagram.

  It would have been painful if it wasn’t so fucking funny.