Mixtape for the End of the World

by Andrew J Brandt

  “Oh, so you’re gonna judge me for gravestones and my taste in music? Wow.” Her tone was playful, almost flirtatious.

  Derrick just grinned and shrugged. “No judgement here.”

  Haley took another sip from her water. “Did you make any new friends today?”

  “I think so,” he said. “You, of course. And a couple of other guys in choir. And then this kid, AJ. He wore the same t-shirt that I did.” He noticed that her face went blank, her eyes wide, when he mentioned AJ’s name. “What?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Well, look, I’m not going to tell you who you can or can’t be friends with. I mean, he’s never been weird to me or anything, but…” she trailed off.

  “What?” Derrick asked. “What is it?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just a rumor, but I don’t want it to affect you.”

  “Well, tell me,” he said, turning toward her.

  “Okay, but just, don’t, like, be weird about it or anything. I don’t even know that it’s true.”

  Derrick’s heart was racing. What could be so bad?

  “It’s just, a lot of people say that he’s gay,” Haley finally said.

  “Really?” Derrick asked, bemused at the idea. “I didn’t pick up on that at all.” But then, he thought about it, the way AJ had run up to him after school, inviting him to walk to school together in the morning. That didn’t necessarily mean that he was gay, though.

  “Like I said, it’s just a rumor. And I’m not saying that people would say the same thing about you, but I just don’t want to give anyone a reason to label you or start rumors about you like that too. You just moved here,” she said.

  “Well, I’m definitely not gay,” he said. He wanted to say, because I have a huge crush on you, but he kept the thought to himself.

  “Good,” Haley said.

  Derrick thought about that one-word answer, hung on it. Did that mean that she was glad that he was into girls? Into her? Before he could think about it too hard, she stood up.

  “Alright,” Haley said, holding her hand out. Derrick took it in his own and she heaved him up on his feet. “Let’s go over that forehand swing before we call it a night.”

  ♪ ♪ ♪

  Derrick got home, walked up the stairs of the elevated porch when Doug pulled up at the same time. His tie loose around his neck and the top button undone on his shirt, he looked like he’d had a long day. He balanced a couple of pizza boxes on one hand.

  “Do you need help?” Derrick asked.

  “Hey, kid,” he said, coming from the car. ““There’s a twelve pack of Dr. Pepper in the front seat if you can grab that. How was your day of school?”

  “It was pretty good,” Derrick said.

  Behind them, Dee had the door open already. “He just got back from the tennis courts with a young lady from school,” she said.

  Derrick’s cheeks went flush and he mumbled something about it not being a big deal. “She’s teaching me how to play tennis so I can try out for the team,” he said, his head low to hide his embarrassment.

  Doug’s eyes lit up and he squeezed Derrick’s shoulder. “That’s how it starts, you know. First you’re learning tennis and then she’s your prom date.” He winked.

  Derrick just shook his head. “It’s not like that.” But he definitely wished it was. “We’re just friends.”

  They had dinner together at the kitchen bar—the dining room table was apparently decoration only. This was one aspect of their life together that Derrick found odd, but appreciated it. When it was just their mom and Cassandra and himself, they never had dinner together like this, sitting down and talking about their day. It felt like another life entirely, but he liked it. It made Doug’s house feel more like home.

  Derrick grabbed another slice of pizza from the box. “Hey Doug,” he said. “Was your dad really the chief too?”

  “He sure was,” Doug said, wiping pepperoni grease from his mouth with a paper towel. “For forty years.”

  “When did he die?” Derrick asked.

  Cassandra shot Derrick a look, but he ignored it.

  “About five years ago. I was a young officer at the time. Had no business being made Chief, but here we are. Who knows—if none of that ever happened, we wouldn’t be here all together now. Sometimes life gives you curveballs but then you discover that it’s just meant to be.” Doug took another bite from his pizza and smiled. “So, tell us about your new girlfriend.”

  After receiving a good ribbing from them all for having a “girlfriend,” Derrick went to his room to play guitar and settle in for the night. He didn’t tell his family about AJ. It was irrational, he knew, but he already wondered and worried about what they’d say if the rumors were true about him.

  He didn’t want it to bother him, but it did. Back in Clearwater, he was called all kinds of names for being in choir and theatre. Maybe then, he surmised, that’s where the rumors about AJ came from. Teenagers had a way of labelling the outsiders as weird or homo. He couldn’t count the times he’d been shoved against a locker and called a faggot for wearing a band’s t-shirt.

  As he went to bed, he thought about that. He thought about wanting to remake himself in Mount Vernon, to forge ahead and leave his old school in the past. But he also wondered if AJ was just the victim of those same kind of rumors and meanness.

  6

  ♪ Eve 6 – Inside Out ♪

  DERRICK WALKED UP to the corner of Sixteenth and found AJ waiting for him, leaning against the metal pole that held the green street signs.

  “Hey man!” AJ said. “Check this out.” He swung his backpack around and, unzipping the main compartment, dug around in the internals. After a few moments, he pulled out three cassette tapes. “I made copies of my favorites for you. I thought about just doing a mixtape, but there’s something about an entire album, you know? It’s meant to be listened as a whole.”

  Derrick took the tapes and looked them over. The sleeves were written in AJ’s scraggly handwriting, but he’d taken care to write the names of the bands and the albums as well as the song names on the back.

  “Wow,” Derrick said. “This is really cool.” He looked over one of the tapes. It was labelled “My Own Prison” by Creed. “I think I’ve heard of these guys,” Derrick said. He’d heard one of their songs played on the radio in recent months.

  “This is their first album. Their new one comes out at the end of next month, so I thought you should give this one a listen before it does,” he said. “And then this one,” he pointed at the second in the stack, “is the newest from Collective Soul.” It was labelled “Dosage.” The third, AJ explained, was a classic. “It’s not really rock, but still pretty awesome. And their guitarist makes some of the craziest sounds I’ve ever heard.” It was labelled “U2 - Achtung Baby.”

  His mom had introduced him to U2 when he was younger, but Derrick thought of them as an 80’s band, not really new or cool. It was music she would listen to while cleaning the house.

  “Thank you,” Derrick said, putting the copied cassettes in the front panel of his backpack. “I’ll give them all a listen tonight.” He appreciated the gesture, and he genuinely looked forward to listening to the tapes, but in the back of his mind, he wondered if this was AJ flirting with him. He pushed the thought away. They were friends, and even if AJ was gay, it wasn’t that big a deal. They both enjoyed the same music and Derrick liked having a friend who he could talk with about this stuff.

  “What did you do last night?” AJ asked.

  “I went to the park with my next door neighbor, Haley. She’s teaching me how to play tennis so I can join the tennis team,” Derrick said as they started walking toward school.

  “Haley Swanson?” AJ asked incredulously. “The captain of the tennis team?”

  “Yeah, why? Is there something wrong with her?”

  “Not at all!” AJ exclaimed. “Dude, you are so lucky. You get to live next door to the hottest girl in school. I’m going to have to come over to
your place as often as possible!” AJ held out his hand for a high five, and Derrick slapped his palm with his own.

  Derrick asked, “You really think she’s that pretty?”

  “Dude, absolutely. She’s been my crush for forever,” he said.

  “Why don’t you ask her out?” Derrick asked.

  “No way, man,” AJ said. “I’d get laughed out of the room. She doesn’t even take a second glance at me. I don’t think I’m her type. She’s into jocks, you know?”

  “But she’s your type, right?” Derrick asked.

  “Yeah, of course,” AJ said. “I mean, just look at her.” Then, he stopped walking. “Wait. What have you heard?” His face went slack and deflated.

  Derrick shook his head, “No, man, nothing bad, I just…” he trailed off, but AJ seemingly already knew.

  “This school, man,” he said, his head low.

  “No, it’s not a big deal. And obviously, you’re not, you know…” Derrick trailed off.

  “Yeah, I know I’m not gay,” AJ said defensively. “But no matter what I do or whatever, it’s like a tag I can’t get rid of. Girls won’t even look at me because everyone says it about me. Who told you?”

  Derrick gulped. “Haley, last night. At the park. She told me that I shouldn’t hang out with you because other people would talk about me like that. But, whatever. I don’t give a shit what other people say. I think you’re cool. And even if you were gay, I’d still think you’re cool.”

  “Well thanks man. But still, that sucks. I wish she didn’t think that about me,” AJ said.

  “I mean, she said it was just a rumor. I don’t think she believes it,” Derrick reasoned. “Why do people think you’re gay, anyway? That doesn’t make sense. It’s not like you wear dresses or makeup.”

  AJ shrugged. “It started a couple of years ago. In middle school. It’s stupid.”

  “Man,” Derrick said, seeing the sadness on his new friend’s face. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault,” AJ said. “And, really, it’s kind of sweet that Haley was trying to look out for you like that.”

  “Sweet? I should be able to hang out with whoever I want. That’s one thing I hate about high school. You have to be somebody. Fit in some box. You’re either a jock or a nerd or a stoner. You can’t just be...you,” Derrick said.

  AJ nodded. “I like that. Just be you. And screw whoever tries to say differently.”

  “Yeah man,” Derrick agreed. They continued to walk on the sidewalks through the neighborhood, and stood at the stop sign in front of the crosswalk that led to the school. “So what started the rumor?”

  “The gay rumor?” AJ asked as they crossed.

  “Yeah. How did that even start?”

  AJ exhaled. “It’s really embarrassing, man.”

  “It’s okay. I won’t judge. We’re cool,” Derrick said.

  “Okay. But you have to promise not to laugh,” AJ said.

  “Okay,” Derrick said. “No laughing.”

  “Promise it.”

  Derrick crossed his heart. “Promise.”

  “Okay.” AJ paused. “Do you remember the band Hanson?”

  ♪ ♪ ♪

  He had promised not to laugh, though after AJ had finished the story, Derrick couldn’t help it. It was probably the funniest—yet definitely the most embarrassing—story he’d ever heard.

  AJ lightly punched him in the arm. “You said you wouldn’t laugh!”

  Derrick apologized for laughing and as the bell rang, they parted for their first classes.

  In Coach Vargas’s class, he found Haley and sat next to her.

  “Hey!” she said. “How are you feeling today?”

  “A little sore to be honest,” he said, rubbing the muscles under his left shoulder. “I’m not used to swinging a tennis racquet.”

  “More practice and you’ll get better. Tryouts for the team are this Friday,” she said. “Right after school.”

  “I’ll be there,” he said.

  Coach Vargas walked in and cut their conversation short.

  “Alright, ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “As I take roll, I want you to come get one of these.” He held up a stack of papers. “These are the Y2K guidelines and preparation materials from the school district.”

  There was a sudden murmur throughout the class.

  “Quiet, quiet,” the teacher said. “It’s nothing to get crazy about. Just protocols.”

  One of the last students to get called, Derrick went up to pick up his paper. The packet was several pages with information on how the school system would be updating computer systems due to the Y2K “bug.” He’d read all of it before, and had heard about it on television. According to the information, all the computers running on a two-digit timestamp would cease to work after December 31 because of the bug.

  Haley leaned into him. “Can you believe this?” she whispered.

  “It seems pretty stupid to me,” Derrick said.

  He continued to read over the pages, flipping through them. There was emergency information on school shutdowns and where to go if the power to the city got shut down. Derrick folded the pages and shoved them in his notebook.

  He’d just moved to this town, was making friends, and the last thing he wanted to think about was it all coming to an end because of some stupid computer programmers.

  ♪ ♪ ♪

  After Biology class, he went to his English class and he saw AJ already there, hovering over a spiral notebook, writing furiously. Derrick sat next to him. AJ never looked up. Derrick whispered, “So you really thought Taylor Hanson was a girl?”

  AJ’s head shot up with a wild look in his eye, his hand a fist around the yellow pencil. “I swear to God, if you mention it again, I’m going to stab you in the face with this pencil.”

  Derrick laughed again. “What are you writing?” he asked.

  “I just had a song idea pop in my head and wanted to get the words down before I forgot about them,” AJ said.

  “I didn’t know you wrote songs,” Derrick said, trying to peek at the page. AJ held his arm in front of the notebook.

  “Yeah, man. Just some stuff I like to work on.” He closed the notebook. “Also, I forgot to ask you this morning. I know it’s pretty far, but would you walk down to Sherman Music with me after school today? I need to get some new guitar strings.”

  “Wait, are you serious?” Derrick asked, suddenly excited.

  AJ slumped in his chair. “Like I said, it’s pretty far, so I don’t blame you if you don’t want to—”

  Derrick cut him off, “No, yeah, that sounds awesome. But, you play guitar too?”

  “Yeah, man. Wait, do you?” AJ bolted back up.

  “Yeah!”

  “Dude!”

  As the other students started filling in the classroom, Derrick and AJ excitedly talked about their guitars, how long they’d been playing (two years for AJ, just over a year for Derrick) and everything else they could get out of their mouths. This excited dump of information and new commonality was cut short when one of the guys in class, a large jock named Ty Anderson sat down behind them.

  “Did you find yourself a new boyfriend, Gay-Jay?” he asked. “Hey new kid, I’d be careful hanging out with this homo.”

  AJ’s face went red and Derrick was about to speak up when someone else behind them beat him to it.

  “You know, for someone who showers naked with other guys every morning, you’re awfully homophobic.” The girl who said it was dressed in all black, with hair that fell to her shoulders to match.

  “Nobody asked you, Rebecca,” Ty retorted.

  “Why don’t you go sit with the rest of your cavemen friends?” she shot back.

  “What are you going to do if I don't? Cast a spell on me?”

  “Maybe.”

  The jock and the goth girl held a death stare on each other before Ty eventually gathered his books and took a seat across the room with a group of other jocks. He bumped AJ’s desk as he did,
causing the notebook that he was writing in fall to the ground. It plopped open and Derrick could see it was full of writings and ramblings.

  “What a jackass,” AJ said under his breath. He picked up the notebook and sat it back on his desk.

  Derrick turned back toward the girl sitting behind them. “Thanks,” he said.

  “You’re welcome, new kid,” she replied. She smiled, her face bright and gorgeous despite the lack of color.

  “Would you really cast a spell on him?” Derrick asked.

  “He’s too much of a pussy to find out,” Rebecca said.

  “Rebecca here is our resident Wiccan,” AJ said. “Which means she worships trees or something.”

  “How many times have I told you that I don’t worship trees?” she asked, rolling her eyes.

  AJ laughed, the anger in his face subsiding.

  Derrick couldn’t help but steal another glance at Rebecca, and she smiled at him when he did. She was attractive, but different. Not classically gorgeous like Haley, but unique. Plus, she had wit and authenticity. He liked that.

  The tardy bell rang and Mrs. Rogers started her lesson. Derrick leaned over and whispered to AJ. “I’ll meet you at the crosswalk after school.”

  The rest of the day would go incredibly slowly, because all he could think about was finally going to the guitar shop on Main Street.

  7

  ♪ Silverchair – Tomorrow ♪

  “WHY DIDN’T YOU tell me you play guitar?” Derrick asked as he and AJ walked toward Main Street. From the school, it was about a mile and a half walk to Sherman Music and the entire way, they talked about nothing but music.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” AJ said. “This is awesome! I finally have someone I can jam with!”

  “I don’t know. It never came up,” Derrick said. “But I’m glad it did!”

  The walk to the music shop took them through the residential neighborhoods, past the large houses that got smaller as they approached Main Street. From behind them, a loud whoop of a siren went off, and both Derrick and AJ turned around.