After the lunch incident the rest of the day pretty much got shot to hell. I wanted to just walk home, crawl into my sleeping bag and rot. But to keep up with the girlfriend front I hopped off the school bus everyday after school and went to her house until dinner time. And by "her house" I'm really saying the parking lot of the now abandon food mart, smoking pot. Wasting the homework hours of 3:00-5:30 every day getting shit faced. When I first started I thought it was the greatest thing in the fucking world. My parents bought the girlfriend angle, thought that it would be "good for me to get out more." They even INSISTED I go, unwittingly they were supporting me getting stoned! Haha yeah... but after weeks of this trite shit it became an old hat. FAST!

After having my sister think I'm the biggest asswipe on the planet my life was pretty much over. I had a feeling no matter how much weed I smoked I'd never completely erase the look I remember that sat upon her face. A hybrid of disturbance and repulsion. I sighed and extracted the dime baggie from my snot nose backpack I still carried around. I almost broke the zipper rushing through the backpack to look for the stash. I lifted up a few unused math books and found it. I forgot I hid it under. I needed a quick fix to get my mind out of my problems. I was mentally kicking my self in the nuts that I didn't pre-roll the dewbies. I usually did but today I got up too late and just honestly kind of forgot. Kimi's friend Z started dealing to me a few months ago. He had off the hook pot. I licked the zig-zag papers and started to roll. My joint looked as sloppy as a first-timers but it didn't matter at this point. This was good shit so it worked, period.

As old as this routine was it was probably again for the best I wasn't at home this time every day around my sister. This was when she was doing her smart girl homework. Ha, even though she'd joined a group of dummies who slept with nerds to do their homework for them, this was a part my sister never conformed to. She was smart, really smart. Back when we use to be best friends she still didn't want me to be her partner on any school project. She always knew I was screw up and would lower our grade. Still gives me a good laugh to think about though. I finally rolled up the joint and started to light it up. I took two hits instantly to start me up then the rest were slower tokes. I'm such an idiot, sitting on the yellow parking curb getting stoned because I can't go home. I just can't. I seriously piled myself neck deep in a pool of my own B.S.

Looking back through the window of the ran down food mart, I wish it was still open. I'm starting to get the munchies and would kill for a bag of Doritos's.

Just then through the glass I see a figure. It evens out to four figures. Tommy, Chuckie, Kimi and Dil get closer. Squinting I turn around back in my space to find them coming closer to me. I'm too gone right now to even think to blow out this joint and toss away the evidence. Guess it's time my secret is exposed.

"What are you doing here?" Tommy looks suspicious, though I have no idea of what. "I thought you were supposed to be at your girlfriends house?" OH SHIT! The lie. MY lie. Uhh umm...

Chuckie's ultra-sensitive nostrils flare and sniff the smoky fog of marijuana laced air. "Phil, you smoke?"

It didn't take his super sensory to detect, everyone could smell it. I looked up, my bloodshot eyes meeting with the clearness of Kimi's, Tommy's, Chuckie's and Dil's. "We broke up... last week."

I wish I hadn't smoked so much of this good stuff so I could focus. This is what they call two-toke. Two is all it takes but I went way beyond just two hits.

"Then why did you call mom and dad forty five minutes ago and say you were at your girlfriends house?"

My bloodshot eyes open instantly. Popping out of my head. A voice I instantly recognize. "Lil?" I sputter out her name. I jump straight up and start to fan the air, I even fan with the hand that holds the still lit joint. "Wha-What are you doing here?"

Her eyes disillusion as they boomerang back and forth between mine and the dewbie between my fingers. "Phillip... Is that marijuana?"

They all take a step closer. She is on a constant eye of the joint so I drop it. I can barely see which one of them looks the most shocked but I'm pretty sure I saw my sister shaking her head, sighing.

The silence between all 6 of us grows awkward. "Did you get that from Pam?"

Lil lifts her head up, making discovery eyes over toward Kimi, who just asked about Miss. Imaginary... "Pam?" My stomach tenses and I feel that same sickness from lunch reenter me. Now I'm grateful I didn't bust through that grocery store window to look for snack chips. "You told our family her name was Dena."

"Wait a minute. If you broke up last week with Pam... Or Dena. Why were you asking us today at lunch for a condom to have do it with her?"

Everyone is looking toward Tommy, who most likely just asked the best question to bust me on. I'm a dead man walking!

I don't even give a shit about Dena OR Pam right now. The only girl I have eyes for is Mary Jane. I look down to the ground and notice it's still alive with an orange fire burning at the tip.

I feel all 10 pupils following me, steadying on mine. Busting me. Only two of those eyes look identical to mine, only right now we have very different emotions in them. "So this is where you've been every day from three O' clock to five thirty? What's going on Phil?"

I try to slip into coolness. My cloak of lies that have been my alibi for the all these years. I just can't go on with this facade, it is coming to an end quickly and as hard as I try to grasp it in my hands it keeps slipping away, taunting me and threatening to expose me in front of all of my friends.

My heart is racing a marathon. I can feel it beat abnormally and pulsate against my rib cage. Then a van drives up and hitting me a direct blow to the same ribs. I feel like gagging but every breath i take to clear my head is filled with the lingering pot. I could either choke up or have my heart attack itself out of my chest and die in front of all these people right now. With my final breath I blurt out, loud and obnoxiously, to the point where it sounds more like I'm screaming and shouting rather than word spewage. "I never had a girlfriend! I made it all up. Are you people friggen happy now!"

I step over the lit joint and it goes out after I stampede away in the hysteria of my embarrassment. I never look back, not once. I just run and keep on running. I can imagine the shock in their eyes, the tension in their face, the opened mouths.

"I guess we better go after him-"

"No you guys... I'll go... He's my brother."