Tests and Breasts

Disclaimer: In its use of intellectual property and characters belonging to NBC, Jake Kasdan, Judd Apatow, Paul Feig, Gabe Sachs, Jeff Judah, Mike White, J. Elvis Weinstein, et cetera, this work is intended to be transformative commentary on the original. No profit is being made from this work. Any similarities to other fanfiction stories are completely coincidental.

It had been several weeks, and I still hadn't told anyone about the incident that had occurred at Daniel's home involving Ken and I. He had agreed to remain silent on the matter, deciding that everyone was already concerned enough about my health as it was and as long as I was certain that I was not at risk for the time being we could keep it a secret. Ken had, however, made me promise that if I ever felt that way again I would either call the hospital or call him personally otherwise he would go straight to Daniel, and I had had no problems agreeing to that pact. Ken had been wonderful that night, talking me through how I was feeling and re-instilling logic in my head that gently allowed me to face reality once more. By the time Daniel had come home I was sleeping soundly in his bed, and he was none the wiser as to what had happened.

The entire friend group was still clueless, and I was glad that Ken had stuck to his promise as Nick, Daniel and I leaned against the lockers before the first bell of the morning. I didn't know what their reactions would have been like if they had known what had occurred about a month ago.

"Kim's in my shop class now," Nick was speaking, explaining to Daniel and I why our blonde friend had dropped out of our Algebra class. "She's not gonna tell her folks, but she said she couldn't deal with Kowcheski anymore."

"Amen to that," Daniel sighed, running a hand over his face just as the bell rang. "The man's a beast."

"Okay Mr. Desario, Ms. Welsh," Mr. Kowcheski suddenly interrupted our conversation from behind us, startling me in the process and beckoning us into the room. Luckily it didn't appear that he had heard our conversation. "Time for your favorite class."

Both Daniel and I pulled faces as we followed the balding man into the math classroom, cursing the subject in our heads. I could vaguely grasp the concept of most subjects at school, but math was an area that I struggled in severely. No amount of extra work or 'secret formulas' could help, and Kowcheski's attitude certainly wasn't assisting at all. The man was harsh, cruel and spiteful and always refused to give me extensions on homework, making Algebra one of the classes that always made me the most nauseous. Daniel knew this, which was why I was beyond grateful that he had retaken the course with me and was always willing to sit through the agonizing lessons alongside me.

"Come on people, simmer down – let's go," Kowcheski tried to control the noise level in the classroom as he situated himself, closing the door behind him. "This is my time, not yours – hey! Chatty Kathy! You sit on the furniture at home?"

Kathy Hertz, a leggy brunette with an attitude, glared towards Kowcheski before removing herself from the desk and placing herself onto her seat instead. She was well known amongst students for chewing loads of bubblegum and leaving it everywhere in the school, causing trouble amongst the staff who couldn't figure out who the culprit of the gum crisis was.

"Okay, a reminder about tomorrow's test," Mr. Kowcheski continued, clapping his hands together as he faced the class with a stern gaze. "It's tomorrow."

There was a collective groan before Daniel raised his hand. "Uh – Kowcheski?"

"Desario?" Kowcheski sighed. I had a feeling that he was getting tired of Daniel's constant interruptions in class, especially since he had been dealing with it for a long while now. Daniel had been his usual troublemaker self since he had been little and his work ethic wasn't getting any better, and I had a feeling that all of the teachers had clued into that a long time ago.

"Didn't we take a test last week?" My friend questioned our Algebra teacher, who raised his hands as if it was obvious.

"Your point?"

"Well," Daniel began to argue, and I could just tell from the tone of his voice that he was going to drag this out for as long as he could. "I just don't think you've taught us enough in the past week to give us another test."

The class laughed at this, making Kowcheski roll his eyes before he placed his hands on his hips and quieted the students down. I found myself smirking at the fact that it was indeed true that the teacher had handed out a test last week, and perhaps it was a little too soon to write another test considering the little knowledge we had accumulated in the last several days. Then again, I was extremely biased thanks to my low grade point average and lack of motivation.

"Okay people, in math, every week you build off of what you learned the week before," Kowcheski explained, then tried to make a simple analogy for the situation. "I mean, it's like a bus – if you keep missing the bus, you're never going to catch up."

"But, uh – I don't ride the bus," Daniel's tone was anything but serious despite his innocent facial expression. "Sir."

The class laughed again, but this time around I couldn't bring myself to smile at my friend's antics. Kowcheski was right; if you kept missing the bus you would be constantly chasing after it and struggling to catch up, forced to watch as all of the passengers rode the vehicle without a problem whilst you tried to use all of your energy to reach the car that just kept getting faster.

"Desario," Kowcheski addressed Daniel head on this time, clearly done with his joking mannerisms as his sarcastic tone of voice revealed. "Flunk another test...and you might have to come back here next year and ride the bus with me again."

Daniel was silent, but there were various immature choruses from the rest of the students as they laughed at their teacher's ridiculous tone. I momentarily speculated if my friend had reached the same conclusion that I had; perhaps now he realized that at one point or another, he needed to succeed with his grades or everything was going to fall apart for him. He had already been held back a year and flunked several classes, and he needed to realize that everything was based off of a good education. If you didn't get good grades in high school, you wouldn't get into a good college, or college at all, and then you wouldn't have access to a good profession, and from there you wouldn't have money. It just kept going – and everything started with knowledge, or as Kowcheski put it, 'riding the bus'.

My epiphany was abandoned when Kowcheski brought our attention to today's lesson, which happened to be advanced functions 101. I groaned and slumped my head down on my desk, acknowledging that it was easy to say that everything started from knowledge but the hard part was actually applying yourself to understand what the hell was going on in the classroom. This was my biggest struggle, besides the fact that high school was generally terrible for me. Friends didn't always help when I was vomiting into the trash bin every other class and my family hated me, not to mention the fact that I was mentally unstable, constantly being labeled a freak and there were several teachers who thought that my lifetime goal was to become a crackhead prostitute.

Needless to say, I didn't have much encouragement, and it was getting harder every day.

I looked over at Daniel beside me, safely concluding that he had already put the interaction with Kowcheski in the back of his mind as he was currently using his switchblade to carve something into his desk. Kowcheski's words rang through my head again as I regarded my friend silently, a concerned frown shaping my brows.

'You keep missing the bus…you're never gonna catch up.'

"I took twenty bucks from my mom, right? But she thought it was my brother – she completely went nuts on him! Hit him over the head with a spatula – I mean, it was hilarious."

It was my second period spare, and I was listening to Kim tell Lindsay about a ridiculous incident that had happened at her place last night. These types of stories were pretty common coming from Kim; she liked to make light of the sad incidents that happened in her home that caused her a lot of inner anger. Lindsay seemed less than impressed, but Nick and I were used to these sorts of tales and I found myself laughing along as I continued to smoke my second cigarette of the day. I had a bit of nausea resting in my stomach, so I hoped that the nicotine would soothe the feeling even though Nick had already notified me that I was rather pale. He and Kim were supposed to be in shop class, but were both clearly skipping. Daniel was also present on the patio, although I could sense that something was off with him as he smoked his own cigarette on a faraway picnic bench and decided to leave him in peace for the time being.

"Sounds like it," Lindsay retorted to Kim's story, clearly not knowing what else to say.

My blonde friend had told me about their chaotic dinner together and how the evening had gone exactly how she had predicted, and I found myself feeling rather sorry for Kim once more. Putting aside the feelings that were telling me to feel sorry for myself considering how much worse my own 'parents' were, I reminded myself that at least Kim's parents had expectations for her that she was constantly reminded of. Some days it was like a comedy routine at her place, but others it was a living nightmare where Kim had to call me crying at eight o'clock because her parents had once again insulted her grades.

Seeing that Lindsay was rather bored, Nick valiantly took his straw out of his pop and blew the liquid trapped inside of it straight onto Kim, who squawked in surprise.

"God, you bastard!" She cried, wiping off her shirt and visibly growing peeved. "Why'd you do that!? What are you, lit or something!? Jesus!"

"I'm sorry," Nick apologized in a tone that was anything but sincere, blowing off the whole incident. "Mellow out, alright?"

Kim scoffed and pushed his drink over, causing it to spill over Nick's pant leg so that his thigh was also covered in the sticky juice.

"There, how do you like it!?" She stood up and tried to clean her shirt off, only to groan in displeasure. "Now I gotta walk around all day with pop on my shirt, y'know!? Thanks a lot."

With those final words she was storming off, and before I got up and followed her I briefly wondered if Nick had done the horrid deed on purpose to get rid of her or to actually provide some entertainment for Lindsay. The brunette beside me was looking rather entertained, but instead of sitting around to listen to the two lovebirds flirt I decided to snuff out my cigarette and follow a rapidly disappearing Kim. It was important that I tried to stop her bad mood before it affected anyone else; I knew just how easily Kim's day could be afflicted by these sorts of silly events.

"Kim!" I called out to the girl as soon as I spotted her, approaching her at her locker. "Kim?"

"What do you want?" Kim flipped around in a huff, eyeing me with a hostility that almost made me take a step back and reconsider my decision to follow her.

"Nothing," I stood my ground and maintained neutrality, seeing that the best approach to healing her mood was to ignore what had just gone down. "We have economics together, remember?"

"Ugh," Kim stuck her tongue out in disgust and closed her locker door, clearing a path through a crowd of students so that we could get to our classroom. "Don't remind me."

It took five minutes for her to start ranting about Nick's behavior, and I was glad that she had chosen me to confide in. At least this way her negative mood wasn't affecting anyone else, as I was certain that I could handle it without letting it put a significant damper on my own mood. If it had been any other member of our group they would have put a shotgun to their chin by the time Kim started using swear words.

"He's such a fucking idiot sometimes," Kim plopped down in her seat as soon as we entered the economics classroom, taking advantage of the fact that the teacher hadn't arrived yet so that she could use the full capacity of her offensive language. "I swear he's gonna end up in prison or something 'cause he's such a tool. Just watch – he's gonna piss off the wrong person one day and wham! Ten year sentence."

I almost laughed at the faraway look in Kim's eyes, the picture of Nick in an orange jumpsuit trying to coax the prison guards into buying him a drum kit for his cellblock removing all thoughts of comforting my friend for a moment. It was true, considering Nick wanted to be a famous drummer and enjoyed taking drugs; he was technically taking the fast lane to failure. Unless, of course, he took initiative and decided to enroll in a drum lesson. Nick was very passionate, but lacked some basic skills required to become as famous as he wanted to be and didn't seem to realize the reality of his situation.

"Yeah," I spoke once I had regained control of my sense. "I could see that happening."

"Hey, could you get me a tissue?" Kim whined, once again glaring down at the wet spot on her shirt.

"Sure," I rose from my seat and ventured to the front of the classroom, grabbing a kleenex and returning it to my friend.

"Thanks," Kim grumbled and began to wipe her shirt furiously, not letting up until the teacher walked in and the lesson started.

I was proud to say that there was little to no nausea to be reported for the rest of the period, and even though the class had been somewhat confusing I had managed to grasp the major concept of the lesson. I had also managed to convince Kim to follow through with our plans with Nick this Friday, having wanted to smoke it up in his basement considering he had just purchased a new sound system. Even though she was still slightly put out by her sticky shirt, when she spotted Nick on the patio just as the lunch bell rang all she did was give him a playful punch. I smiled at the two getting along just fine and lit up a cigarette, ignoring Kim's annoyed grunt.

When Friday rolled around however, her reaction to me smoking was much different.

"Come on Kit-kat," She whined, squinting thanks to the sun shining brightly in the sky. "You've already had enough today, no?"

"Oh please," I rolled my eyes. "I've had like two. And I have a history test next period so take pity."

"Well," She huffed as I continued puffing away, plopping down beside me to file her nails. "Did you study?"

"A bit," I sighed, telling her the truth. "I'm still really worried, though."

Kim didn't say anything, instead continuing to file her nails somewhat indignantly. She didn't like talking about education – it made her defensive and bitter. She, like me, hated the fact that she didn't get good grades and that she couldn't carry on a simple conversation about current events. Nothing really interested her, and besides the fact that the school held ample opportunities for her, she never took heed of anything that was thrusted into her face. Clubs, sports teams and councils passed her by like utility poles on a highway, but I always had to remind myself that when judging Kim about her scholastic opportunities I was being hypocritical. I didn't take interest in many things either, but at least I was able to maintain a sixty plus average.

"Hey Kim, Katherine!" Lindsay emerged onto the patio with a small smile, interrupting my thoughts. "Where's Daniel?"

"I dunno," Kim answered as we both shrugged our shoulders. "Beats me."

"We have a disciplinary meeting after school," Lindsay looked a tad bit nervous as she revealed this, and both Kim and I grimaced.

"Ugh," I made a noise of disgust, remembering the last time I had a disciplinary meeting after helping Stroker cheat on a test. It had resulted in Mr. Rosso giving me three detentions and glares in the hallway for a good several weeks. "You nervous?"

"You know, don't worry about it," Kim jumped in to reassure the girl after she made a tiny sound of insecurity. "Daniel gets out of stuff like this all the time."

"I mean, I shouldn't be worried about it, right?" Lindsay's tone was hopeful as she straddled the bleacher next to us. "Kowcheski's a jerk. I mean he'll pass the test and then I'll tutor him, and he'll pass the class. I mean everything's gonna work out, right?"

Kim and I began to laugh, and I did a double take to make sure that Lindsay was being serious.

"I'm sorry," Kim tried to clarify with a smirk. "You think that you and Daniel are gonna be like, study buddies?"

"He wants to learn, and what about the next test?" Lindsay clearly didn't know Daniel well enough, so we tried to help her out and explain to her that Daniel wasn't exactly a person who tried very hard to do things the right way.

"He'll just get the answers from someone else," Kim pointed out sadly, holding out her filing stick as it if was obvious.

"He always does," I finished my friend's sentence before we were interrupted by the man in question himself.

Daniel came up behind Kim and surprised her by play fighting, not catching the way that Lindsay was staring at them dumbfoundedly. Truth be told I had thought that the brunette would have been able to catch onto Daniel's ways sooner – it was clear to me that this boy always chose the easy way out of things, and that was obvious based on his work ethic and even the way he solved day to day problems. Daniel didn't like complication; he wanted one sentence answers to large problems and didn't like hearing that he had to work hard in any scenario. This was an unfortunate trait sometimes and would undoubtedly mess him up later along the road, but I couldn't comment on it considering my own damaging problem solving skills.

"You ready to stick it to the man?" Daniel finally turned to Lindsay, grinning at the mention of of the meeting later on. "Partners in crime, gimme five."

Lindsay's face seemed to change, and I knew what was happening in her head – I had gone through the same thing when I first acknowledged Daniel's problems. Lindsay was realizing how he worked and how desperate and helpless he was to cling on to anyone who knew the answers not just for homework and tests but for problems that he didn't want to deal with. If he knew how to deal with a situation at hand he would, but if there was something that he couldn't get or that he had to work towards – by George would he avoid it with all his might. For a person who didn't like working, Daniel seemed to work very hard not to work.

"Hey, don't leave me hangin'," Daniel wiggled his hand once he realized that Lindsay wasn't giving in, but when she slowly but surely smacked her hand against his he grinned triumphantly. "Alright."

I merely considered this another loss on Daniel's side. In a way it could have been considered a victory – he had succeeded in getting Lindsay to help him cheat, they had gotten 'caught', and now all they had to do was deny, something that Daniel was excellent at. But Daniel didn't realize that he was being tricked out of something very valuable, which ended up being knowledge. Lindsay seemed to be the only one who realized this, and saw just as well as I that poor Daniel was stuck in an endless cycle of not understanding anything, finding someone to do it for him, and then starting the entire process over again because he hadn't understood the material in the first place.

To say the least, I was scared for him. I wasn't the brightest bulb in the set, but I understood that knowledge was power, and without knowledge you would end up with a crappy job and crappy lifestyle that didn't satisfy your needs. Either way, I hoped that Daniel would soon realize that he was stuck in a circle that only he could get himself out of and that unfortunately, was a task that he couldn't convince someone to do for him.

On that sad note the rest of the day passed by rather quickly with no more nausea to speak of and before I knew it I was dumping my books into my disheveled locker and shoving some homework into my bag before following Nick and Kim out to the parking lot. We slid into her old Gremlin that her Aunt had bought her awhile ago before she had overdosed on cocaine, and Nick reluctantly took the back seat as I slid into shotgun. We were on the road and making fast time to Nick's house, eager to relieve ourselves of the stress we had built up during the week. Daniel and Ken were going to be attending a concert later on in the evening and Lindsay had rejected our invitation of smoking, so we were on our own.

As soon as Kim was on open road she turned up the radio, and Van Halen flooded the speakers causing Nick to start drumming along in the back seat. He bashed away on thin air as Kim and I shared weary glances, but I was glad that the two were getting along again after Tuesday's incident with the pop. A bit of liquid on her shirt was something that I had hoped wouldn't leave Kim pissed at someone for a long period of time, but I had seen her hold grudges for much less so I wouldn't have been surprised if she was still miffed at our stoner friend.

"So Daniel and Lindsay got caught cheating, huh?" I asked to neither of the two in particular, most likely going to receive a response from Kim since Nick was now bashing his head along to the song on the radio as well as air drumming. "Is that why they had a disciplinary meeting?"

"Yeah," Kim sighed as we both shook our heads. "Apparently there was an 'anonymous note'."

"Bullshit," I laughed, snorting a bit as I wondered if Kowcheski had been the one to think of the silly idea. "Cops use that all the time, it's just a ploy."

"Daniel knows that," Kim pointed out, and I nodded hopefully.

"Yeah, he'll get out of it no problem," I was willing to bet that Daniel only needed to spent ten minutes with Kowcheski and Rosso before being let off the hook Scott free with no problem whatsoever. He had done it before a million times, so there was nothing stopping him from doing it again. "Like always."

"Hey, has he ever used that track one, two three thing around you?" Kim giggled, remembering Daniel's long guilt-tripping speech about how dichotomy effected a kids lifestyle and how sorting people into groups convinced him that he was a dumb child. He played a lot of teachers into thinking that he really did care about his grades, when instead he was making a reference to one of his favorite songs on the Zeppelin II album.

"Oh yeah," I laughed. "The stupid Zeppelin lemon song or something?"

"Hey!" Nick interrupted us, pointing his drumstick towards us in accusation before continuing on with his kooky musical antics. "Zeppelin isn't stupid!"

"Right," I continued, rolling my eyes at our friend in the backseat and debating whether or not Nick was already stoned or not. "Anyway, I was thinking of going to see the school play."

"What?!" Kim snorted, causing me to scoff in disbelief at the fact that the minute any of us mentioned anything to do with school involvement she was already against it.

"Yeah, come on!" I encouraged with a smile, somewhat teasingly. "We could go really baked! It could be fun!"

"Maybe - we'll see," Kim shook her head with a smile as she pulled into Nick's driveway, 'Spirit of the Radio' ending just in time before she shut off the engine.

As soon as we got to the basement, avoiding Nick's father on the way down, we began to roll joints. There were at least six on the table before we started to smoke them, two for each of us. It was our usual group routine and usually it consisted of several more people, but this was a special case. This meant more pot for us, so we happily kept rolling and smoking until Nick's stash had a good clump taken out of it.

"Okay, if we use any more I'm gonna run out!" Nick laughed, storing the rest of the drug underneath the couch in the same old box. "You guys are leeches with this stuff, I swear."

Kim blew some smoke out of her nose into my face, ignoring Nick's comment and making me recoil. I laughed and leaned back until I was fully lying on the floor, staring up at the stained ceiling that was Nick's basement.

"Okay - fine," I muttered, taking another hit from the joint that was resting loosely in between my fingers and coughing. "But we need some music."

"That," Nick grinned manically, rising up off of the couch with his drumsticks in tow. "I can do for you."

Naturally, Nick put on one of Rush's albums and made both Kim and I groan in disappointment. It wasn't that we didn't enjoy Rush, but Nick couldn't stop playing either them or Led Zeppelin on repeat until all of our friend group was tired of visiting his basement and listening to the same songs over and over again. I huffed in disappointment, but allowed him to climb onto his drum set with the lit spliff still hanging from his lips so that he could follow the beats of the drums on his own kit. He began to bash away, and I focused on trying to finish my joint as opposed to listening to his noises. I prayed that the effects of the drug came soon – I didn't think that I could tolerate much of Nick's musical adventures without being under the influence of something.

The high hit me quicker than I imagine it would have, and I alerted Nick and Kim of my state by beginning to laugh at the former's facial expression as he banged away on his drumset. Nick's pot seemed to make me happier than my own pot, which confused me because we purchased it from the same dealer, but for some reason my highs were always more enjoyable. Then again, I pondered as I took more hits and finished my first joint of the evening, it was possible that I was simply enjoying my highs more because I was surrounded by friends whenever I smoked Nick's pot.

Kim seemed to be having a great time as well – she had been giggling about something that Nick was doing on the drums, and was now rolling around on the floor howling with laughter. I began to laugh as well – finding her bliss captivating and infectious. Within minutes, even Nick had started to join in, his drumming falling out of tune and step with the song, abandoned because of his outrageous delight. Our peace of mind and euphoria lasted for the next half an hour, and once it started to die down we smoked some more.

Our attempts in keeping it alive succeeded, and we found the never-ending exhilarating felicity that we had become habituated to. All of our lives had something wrong with them one way or another, and we loved being able to laugh without any boundaries – without any restrictions or regulations. There weren't any guidelines like school or rules at home; there were no dreadful parents or distressing homework assignments to turn in; no hideous cheerleaders to ruin our fun. There was just Kim and Nick and I laughing like buffoons for hours upon hours until our guts were sore from clenching too hard.

At one point, we decided to put as much dry ice as possible into a bucket of hot water, and the effects were fascinating to our still influenced minds. We whooped and howled in amazement as the fog enveloped us, hugging each other in delight as we shrieked with laughter. The sheer feeling of delight and light headedness had me reeling and drunk with pleasure at the fact that in these very moments there were truly no worries in the world.

"You know," Kim smiled groggily at me while Nick was playing along to Freewill. "I really like you."

"Thanks, Kim!" I smiled and flopped halfway on top of her, making her squeal.

"Ow! You're on my boob!" She laughed, shoving me off.

"Oh, I was just about to tell you how much I liked you too!" We hugged each other and collapsed into a fit of snickers, and I found that I couldn't stop laughing. My ribs hurt and my cheeks felt like they were about to fall off – just thinking about laughing and watching Kim laugh made me laugh even harder. The delirium and optimism surrounding us was overwhelming. Our cheerfulness was corrupting.

There was no need for words, no need for an explanation or logic. Sense and comprehension were of no use in this environment. It was just pure fun; boisterous amusement. Joy stacked on top of joy. Laughter and elation combining into one. We didn't care that Nick's father hadn't come to check on us in over three hours; we didn't care that Daniel and Lindsay had been caught or that everyone at school thought we were freaks. All that mattered was that we were having the time of our lives in Nick Andopolis' basement.

Eventually, around 2 AM when Kim had fallen asleep on Nick's couch, I stumbled my way home after bidding my host goodbye. It wasn't too long of a walk from Nick's house to mine, so I was capable of finding it even in the state that I was in. I entered my house as silently as possible, praying that the creaky front door wasn't going to live up to its name tonight and that both my mother and my stepfather were both already passed out. Fortunately, I wasn't too loud, and even though I was as high as a kite I managed to get to my room without tripping over anything. I flopped down on my bed and didn't even bother to get changed, instead passing out as soon as my face hit the pillow.

Tonight had been a splendid, wonderful, joyous night, and I had to admit that I was glad to be alive.