Chapter 4. Thoughts of an old Friend
Max, Mocha and PJ left the Bean Scene a few minutes later. The two boys expected to find their friend smoking outside but to their surprise, he was nowhere to be seen. The girl on the other hand was not surprised. But, of course, she knew a lot more than they did and if she was in Bobbies situation, she wouldn't stay either. The three walked during silence and when they came to Mocha's apartment they said 'goodnight' and went separate ways.
After a short walk PJ suddenly broke the silence.
"I've been thinking about what Bobby said," he started and looked to the stars above.
"Hm? Which part? The babbling nonsense or the stuttering mumbo-jumbo?" he shook his head and laughed tiredly. PJ laughed too.
"No I mean about Roxanne. You two were perfect together, I mean…"
"Dude, don't go there!" Max held his hands up like a shield against his big fiend. "It's an ended chapter and we were kids!"
PJ laughed at Max's panicking features and patted his back friendly. "That's how it usually sounds like…" he said mockingly and blinked at his best friend.
"We broke up, end of story!" Max said angrily and shook PJ's hand off of his back.
"Geez, I'm just teasing you, man," the bigger student said defensively.
"Well don't. It's an 'of limit-subject'." And with that the two friends left the topic and reached their dorm.
They entered the room, only to realize that Bobby was already there and apparently fast asleep. Max and PJ undressed in silence and went to bed without further fuzz. They had a big test tomorrow and even though they weren't as mature as you could ask of a college student, they actually took care of their studies. At least to a certain point.
Bobby lay quiet and listened to his friend's calm breathes. When they had come through the door he had pretended to be asleep. He had no interest in answering any questions tonight and he knew they would've forgotten about his weird…well weirder… behavior in the morning. He smiled at this. That's what he liked about Max and PJ; they were simple. If you did something wrong or strange it would be forgiven and forgotten in a day.
But there was one person that wasn't simple, nor would forget so easily and Bobby sighed when he realized he certainly had to deal with her lectures in a not so far future.
The morning came and woke Max with a heavy autumn rain. He stumbled out of bed and got dressed before trying to bring some life into his heavily sleeping friends.
"PJ, come on! We're getting late for the exam," he yawned and slammed one of his shoes against the big students bottom.
"What exam?" Bobby asked sleepily and buried his head deeper into the pillow.
"You know the math exam we've been knowing about for five weeks?" Max said, now rather irritated because of his slow friends. PJ slowly started to climb down from his bed.
"Don't tell me you forgot, Mr. Z," he said and headed for the bathroom.
"Of coooourse I didn't," Bobby smiled and reached for his shades with a sigh. The truth was that he had not even been listening to the lecture where they had been told about the exam. And math… well, math wasn't his strongest subject. But, he thought, it'll go as it goes.
At long last, Max finally managed to get his sleepy friends out the door and off to the exam.
"There will be no talking, no smoke-pauses and defiantly no cheating on my test!" Mr. Handersson said while handing out tests to the nervous students.
"Aye, aye sir, man!" Bobby saluted the teacher and smiled widely. Handersson slammed a paper down on the desk in front of the redhead.
"And no funny business, Mr. Zimmeruski! And take of those glasses," he roared as he watched the offended boy taking of his shades. The teacher eyed Bobbies red eyes suspiciously.
"You should get more sleep before a test," he finally stated and left to hand out the rest of the papers.
The exam started and Bobby looked at the paper with questions in front of him. Did people actually have to know this stuff? What's wrong with a regular calculator? He sighed and scribbled down his name and sat the rest of the test studying everything in the room, but his test.
Max had studied, really studied, this time and to his surprise the test was not as hard as he had thought. He answered question after question and when he looked at the big watch on the wall in front of him he realized that half of the time had already went by. He eyed the room and saw that Bobby was sitting and staring up at the roof. Max shook his head and turned to his own test again.
Suddenly something caught his eyes and he had to turn to look. A girl had risen from her seat to hand in her test. Max knew her only a little. Her name was Anna Downswell and she was a few years older than him. It wasn't her in particular that had caught his attention. It was her hair. Usually she bore it in a long braid down her back, but know it hung lose. The fiery red curls went down her body all the way to her waist and it glimmered in the light from the fluorescent lamps. It reminded Max so much about Roxa.. No! He pushed the annoying thought away and tried to focus on the test. One hour later he handed it in and went to wait for PJ.
Outside the classroom he found Bobby sitting with a coke in his hand. He looked like he had just lost a big amount of money. Max sat down beside him, making the other teen twitch in surprise.
"How did it go?" Max asked and leaned back at the hard wall.
"Well, you can't expect a big genius like me to answer those silly questions. Bobby Z has much more important things to think about," Bobby said and grinned widely. Max laughed and raised an eyebrow.
"Like reflecting over the structure of the ceiling?" he asked.
"Precisely!" the redhead confirmed and took another sip of his coke.
In time PJ also joined them and they went outside. The sun was now shining brightly and even though it was in the end of October, the air was warm. A sudden melody caught through the friends' admiration of the weather.
"Sorry. Got to take this," PJ excused and picked up his phone. "Hello, my little croissant," he answered in the phone. Max looked at Bobby and made a look like he was about to puke. The redhead laughed hysterically.
"It was Mocha," PJ declared when he finally hung up.
"Oh really? Who would've known?" Max said in played surprise. PJ rolled his eyes.
"She wondered if we want to join her for lunch. She's at the cafeteria."
"Sure, I just need to go get my wallet," Max said and ran off.
"I uh… I'm not hungry…" Bobby started and went back into the building, leaving PJ to wait for Max alone. He was in no mood to meet the poet today, or any other day for that matter.
Where was that damn wallet? Max looked through every corner, under his bed and even in PJ's bed. It was nowhere. He dragged out a drawer from the bureau and started searching it frenetically. He twitched as a pair of jeans landed on the floor with a loud rattling. Max went to shake out the content of the jeans' pockets on the floor. His wallet landed with a dull thud, opened up and emptied itself over the floor.
"Great…" Max muttered and sat down to pick up all the coins that rolled around like they were possessed. His gaze darted something red lying under the open wallet. He picked it up carefully.
A brown eyed, red haired girl smiled up at him from a school photography. He sat down on top of the bed and stroke the photo with his thumb. He had forgotten he still had that in his wallet. A sudden sadness took a hold of his heart.
"What happened to us?" he asked the picture silently. But he already knew the answer. He had been too immature, that was where the problem lay.
Before the school ball, they had had a fight about… well, Max couldn't even remember what. It had ended with him storming out from her house, refusing to go the ball with her. And she did what any other seventeen-year-old girl would have done in her situation to not be seen as an unwanted wallflower; she said yes when someone else asked her out.
But Max had gone anyway, without telling her.
As he sat there on the bed, the same anger and shame he felt then when he saw her dancing with another guy came over him. He had made a scene. Jesus, he had called her a 'cheater' in front of the whole school. He blushed slightly at the memory. The breakup a few days later had been a fact.
He didn't want to think about Roxanne. The time with her was now history and, as he had told PJ, they were just kids at that time. And yet he had loved her. He knew it deep inside and maybe… (He stroke the photo again.) Maybe he still did love her.
They were older now. Maybe things would turn out better, if he just gave it one more chance. He threw himself on top of the bed.
"You're not seriously considering this, are you Maxie?" he asked himself. But he was and when he walked off to join his friends at the cafeteria he had reached a decision.
Author's note
FINALLY! Here I am with a new chapter and I'm so sorry for the wait. I've been busy in school and had a terrible writers block. But here you go and I'm hoping to finish chapter 5 today as well.
And I know; short chapter is short. I just wanted to give you one from Max's point of view and as you probably already guessed Bobby screwed up big time by talking about Roxanne…
Random notes
-The exam: I'm not sure if America has tests like this in the middle of the term or so. I'm a student myself at an university so I just took inspiration from how it is here in Sweden.
-Mr. Handersson and Anna Downswell: Just people I invented to make the story go along. They will probably never be seen again.