I feel really bad about this but I can't keep an update schedule, I'm sorry. I will try to update at least once a month, but I can't guarantee anything. School starts up next week and that'll eat a lot of my time, so. Anyway. Translating Metalocalypse to a high school setting is fun! But after this chapter it'll stop looking like I'm stealing plot lines from the show.
Monday opened with Toki sitting in his first period Chemistry class. His assigned seat was at a table towards the back of the classroom, in the middle row and to the left of his lab partner, a boy named Leonard Rockstein. Toki and his lab partner sat behind the duo of Nathan and Pickles, who were currently not speaking to each other, chairs scooted as far apart as possible and bodies turned in opposite directions. Leonard Rockstein—who preferred to go by the ridiculous moniker of "Dr. Rockzo"—was babbling on to Toki about something, but Toki was not paying attention to him, instead looking at Nathan and Pickles. Nathan was holding a conversation with a girl to his left, her shrill laughter ringing in Toki's ears whenever Nathan made a (lame) joke; Pickles was staring ahead at the back of the boy he sat behind, arms crossed and letting out long exhalations accompanied by exaggerated heaving motions of his chest every ten seconds or so. Toki had no idea what was going on between the two of them, as when he came into class this morning and took his seat, Nathan and Pickles were behaving in exactly this fussy manner and had refuted his attempts to make conversation with the both, or either, of them. Their state of upset worried Toki, but he apparently wasn't going to get anywhere with either of them while they were in each other's company, so he would have to wait until next period to interrogate Murderface and see if he knew anything. If Murderface didn't, and Toki doubted he would, then he would approach Pickles about the rift in fourth period Algebra II. Toki did not look forward to either confrontation, nor did he expect them to go well, but he was curious, eager to find out what had happened and why his friends were feuding, so he would simply have to deal.
Dr. Rockzo snapped his fingers in front of Toki's face, causing Toki to jump in his seat, startled. "What?" He asked, turning to face the other boy. Dr. Rockzo was a sight: he had bushy hair that he wore long and dyed various colors throughout the school year (currently a bleached blond; Toki assumed it was in preparation for the next neon hue) and was clad in skinny jeans tight enough and in obnoxious enough colors that they should be left solely to preteen girls. His bulbous nose was rubbed raw and red from his overuse of cocaine; he sniffed and swatted at it periodically. He had crazy eyes and tanned skin, looked thirty years old at the tender age of fifteen. Toki suspected it was from the drug use.
"Dr. Rockzo was just saying that he thinks that Dr. Rockzo and Toki should hang out together this k-k-weekend," Dr. Rockzo said. He had an irritating voice, kind of what nails would sound like if they could talk. Toki also suspected that Dr. Rockzo was suffering from some sort Tourette's syndrome, most likely because of the drug use. Toki suspected a lot of things about Dr. Rockzo with basis in his drug use, actually, enough to make him narrow his eyes at the other boy and twist his mouth in suspicion.
"I can't," Toki said. He stared down at the floor by Dr. Rockzo's feet, wondering where he got his platform boots from; they looked authentic. Toki was genuinely sad that he couldn't hang out with Dr. Rockzo, he liked him well enough to consider him a friend, but his parents would definitely not approve of Leonard Rockstein. Toki would be severely punished for weeks if they knew he spoke to Dr. Rockzo on a regular basis, much less wanted to spend time with him outside of school. Dr. Rockzo could be the poster boy the type of heathens his parents' church despised: loud and lovely in his appreciation of hard music and hard drugs, Satan's influence visible in every nook and cranny of his being. Toki supposed the same could be said for him, but as far as he knew, Dr. Rockzo never had any reason to hide.
"And why k-k-not?" Dr. Rockzo put a hand on his hip and somehow managed to strike a sassy, dubious pose, despite the fact that he was sitting down.
Toki grappled for an excuse. He felt that he had exhausted the fact that his parents didn't let him do anything, always feeling guilty when he used it, as if Dr. Rockzo wouldn't believe him. He then remembered that he had the concert this weekend, was going to see Fuckface Academy, and brightened with the thought. "I promised Murderface that I'd go to a concert with him."
"Oh, okay," Dr. Rockzo said, turning around. He wasn't upset, at least not as far as Toki could tell. Dr. Rockzo had a generally pleasant demeanor, one of the reasons why Toki liked him in comparison to his angst-laden friends. Case in point: Dr. Rockzo chatting away merrily while Nathan and Pickles actively ignored each other in front of him.
Toki reached down to his backpack and fished a pen to fiddle with out of the front pocket. Dr. Rockzo had other friends in this class, a group of kids who also dressed like they belonged to the 80's hair metal scene and drew their fashion inspiration from circus clowns. He found them with ease, rising from his chair and strutting over to a girl who wore her hair in huge periwinkle puffballs. Toki was left to entertain himself as Nathan was engaged with that girl and Pickles was too pissed to speak. He played with the pen, clicking the top, twirling it around his fingers, and spinning it on the table until the bell rang. Dr. Rockzo returned to the seat beside him and Nathan turned from the conversation he had to face the front of the classroom where their teacher was sitting behind his desk, typing something on the computer.
"Oh," their teacher said, looking up at his students. "I'll be with you in a minute." Their teacher was an elderly man, small and balding, the type with tenure that didn't actually want to teach anymore. At the beginning of the year some jock, one of Nathan's football buddies, had started a betting pool on when Mr. Marshall would die. Toki couldn't place a bet since he had no money, but he wouldn't have anyway. He felt the idea to be mean. Nathan betted sometime in the next five years; Pickles took a gamble and gave an exact date and cause of death, March 27th and heart attack; Murderface had declared betting gay.
After a minute or two Mr. Marshall rose from his seat. He cleared his throat and walked around the front of his desk to just in front of the first lab table in the center aisle, Toki's aisle. "As you see on the board," he began, sweeping his arm behind him to gesture to a whiteboard crammed with tiny handwriting in purple dry-erase marker, "we'll be going over the properties of these chemicals." He sounded bored and Toki forgave him; Toki was bored too.
Mr. Marshall lectured for half of the class, dull voice soldiering on through the dull material. He was accompanied by a PowerPoint of pictures and diagrams. Toki placed his head in his hand and let his mind wander. He could see that in front of him Pickles was scrolling through something on his phone, hand hidden beneath the edge of the table, and Nathan had his head down, sleeping. Beside him, Dr. Rockzo was texting one of his friends in the class; the two of them kept sneaking grins at each other. Mr. Marshall was either oblivious or didn't care what his students did, both attributes that Toki liked his teachers to possess. When Mr. Marshall reached the end of his lecture he let out a little sigh, happy to be finished with it himself, and passed out a worksheet. Pickles would normally prod Nathan awake at this time, stick a pen in his side with a smile, but Toki felt that he had to do it today. He ripped a blank piece of paper from his notebook, crumpled it into a tight sphere, and threw it at Nathan's head. Nathan stirred and moved his head around like an awakened giant, confused for a second. The person seated in front of him placed the worksheets, recently passed back, on his table. Nathan set his off to the side and turned around to give Toki his and Dr. Rockzo's, expression blank. Pickles was left to snatch his worksheet from in front of Nathan while he wasn't looking.
"You're welcome," Toki said.
Nathan muttered something unintelligible in response. Toki resisted the urge to let out a sigh.
They weren't supposed to work together on Mr. Marshall's assignments but Dr. Rockzo pestered him for the answers anyway. Toki gave them, not sure if they were correct and not particularly caring. He worked fast, bullshitting most of the answers, because if he didn't finish by the end of class he'd have to do it for homework and he didn't want that. He wouldn't have anything to do at home besides homework (and chores), but he still didn't want a heap to plow through. It was the principal of the thing.
In front of him, Pickles was scribbling furiously on his paper, glaring at the lines asking for responses like they had personally insulted him. Nathan had put his head down again, drooling on the corner of his worksheet. Toki watched as Pickles shot a glance to Nathan and his worksheet, face screwed up in inner debate, eyebrows curved in a pathetically sad manner. Pickles would sometimes take Nathan's assignments while he was sleeping and do them for him and Toki could see that Pickles wanted to do that now, but he guessed Pickles restrained himself, as he huffed and went back to his own work.
Chemistry passed by uneventfully. Toki finished his worksheet five minutes before the bell rang; the only good thing in his so far terrible day. He collected his things and placed his backpack on the lab table, waiting. He had just lifted a piece of his hair in front of his face to examine it, possibly for split ends, when Dr. Rockzo poked him in his upper arm with the eraser end of his pencil.
"Rockzo's real k-k-sorry that we can't hang out this weekend," Rockzo said. He was sincere, eyebrows raised. Rockzo wore heavy make-up, heavier than some of the girls, and Toki found his eyes drawn to his incredibly thick eyeliner. Rockzo was clownish and Toki found it charming, though everybody else he talked to hated Rockzo with a passion, calling him every name in the book and throwing insults at his back. Toki had admiration for Rockzo: the boy took it all in stride and continued to strut in his ridiculous clothes with his equally ridiculous posse. They were proud, and though they were brash and oftentimes obnoxious, Toki had respect for them, envied the way they lived their lives without barriers.
"Me too," Toki said, because he was sorry that they couldn't hang out.
The bell rang shortly thereafter. Toki slung his backpack over his shoulders and adjusted it as he walked. He was the first out of class and he made his way through the halls unbothered to his next one, English, where he deposited his backpack on the floor by his desk and slid himself in. He was one of the first students to arrive to the class, only a girl that Toki didn't really know occupying another desk. His English class was small and cluttered, which Toki did not appreciate. Small spaces made him antsy.
He read the quote on the board, "Don't laugh at a youth for his affectations; he is only trying on one face after another to find his own.—Logan Pearsall Smith" over and over again, finding it oddly cryptic, to pass the time until Murderface arrived from his first period Physical Education class. Toki had knocked his physical education credit requirement out freshman year, not wanting to have to deal with it in the future, but Murderface had done logic backflips that convinced him that he should take it sophomore year. None of Murderface's other friends were taking the class, and he had gym first period, making him sweat and stink for the rest of the day. The logic backflips had involved something about getting laid (sophomore girls were the easiest to impress with athletics, apparently, though "athletic" was the last word one would apply to Murderface, except for perhaps "handsome" or "pleasant") and he contradicted himself early on by repulsing everybody around him with his after-gym stench. It wasn't a smart decision, but Murderface wasn't a smart guy.
Murderface bustled in, looking a not-so-hot mess with his hair disheveled and clothes wrinkled from dressing out. He was panting and red-faced, bringing the smell of unfiltered body odor to the desk beside Toki. Toki was used to it by now, the smell just a stronger concentration of Murderface's natural fragrance, and turned to look at him.
"Hey, Murderface," he said. He played with one of the gaping holes in the knees of his jeans, rubbing the flap of denim and feeling the crevice of his kneecap.
"Hello, Toki," Murderface breathed out. The girl that sat in front of him turned around to give him a disgusted look, offended by his very existence; Murderface returned a lecherous smile. "Yeah, schweetheart?"
"Do you know what's up with Nathan and Pickle?" He asked Murderface, halfway to prevent conflict with the girl, who had stuck up her nose and was muttering under her breath to her friend in the seat beside her.
Though Murderface's head was bobbing with his effort to breathe, his expression changed itself instantly. His eyebrows shot up, eyes widening, and he grinned, exposing the gap between his two front teeth. "No, what isch?"
"I don't know, that's why I was asking you," Toki sighed. "They were not speaking to each other last period, in Chemistry."
Murderface shrugged. "I haven't scheen them schince Dick picked me up at Nathan'sch housche Schunday, and they scheemed fine then. Don't worry about it, Toki, it'sch probably juscht a lover'sch schpat, as they schay."
Toki did worry about it, however, and the worry grew as he trudged through English class. Nathan and Pickles not speaking to each other would cause a problem with his plans for this weekend, and that was a selfish reason to worry about something, but it was the one most prominent in his mind. Nathan never went to a show without Pickles and vice-versa, the two musically inseparable, and if Nathan couldn't go then Toki would lose his parents acting as Toki's advocates to his own parents. Murderface would get mad at him, irrationally, though he'd probably still go to the concert with Dick, and Toki would be left alone to stew in his self-pity as he worked all day Saturday at whatever inane things his father wanted him to do. Worse was the idea of being able to go to the show and Nathan taking Pickles along in a silent, premade agreement. Pickles would show up at Nathan's house, ringing the doorbell before crossing his arms over his chest and casting his head to the side, grumbling a greeting when Nathan's mother answered the door. Pickles would be distant, mumbling a response when necessary, and Nathan would be completely silent. Pickles would still ride shotgun and clog the truck with an awkward atmosphere. They wouldn't speak to each other, or anybody at the show, or on the way home, would either get too drunk or not drunk at all, and the whole thing would turn into a huge mess. That was all Toki could think about through English—not the symbolism in the book they were reading as he was supposed to, but on the idea that Pickles and Nathan could disrupt his plans. Murderface's misogynistic jokes—their teacher was a woman around her mid-thirties—couldn't even get Toki to stop obsessing about the idea that he would not be allowed to attend the Fuckface Academy show. It felt universally important to him for reasons he wasn't quite sure of, drastically and cosmically necessary, like he would combust if he didn't see them.
Worry was practically walking beside him on his way to his third period 3D Art class, a heavy burden sprouting from his chest like a conjoined twin. Today they were painting sculptures they had made last week, having sufficiently cooled down over the weekend, and Toki tried very hard to focus on his. He had sculpted a miniature battle axe and was extremely proud of it. 3D Art was his best class and he loved it, his teacher complimenting him constantly and other students staring in envy at his incredible ability to work with his hands, and he really didn't want to fuck this battle axe up. He painted in small, careful strokes because he was nervous and his mind was elsewhere. He accomplished barely anything in the class period. He would have to paint more quickly next time, which would leave more room for error, and he was not having a good day, not at all. The worry that had begun in his chest had climbed its way out, was now as real and three-dimensional as the battle axe that he was turning over in his hands, was sitting beside him and pestering him. The teacher called for the students to return their work to the spot in the back of the class and he did so, cradling his sculpture in his hands because it honestly felt like his baby. He bit his bottom lip until the bell rang, bouncing his leg up and down in anticipation, and threw his backpack over his shoulder as soon as he heard the first tinny note.
The art studio was in a different building then his math class and he dashed through the courtyard in a hurry, the unbuttoned shirt he was wearing over a t-shirt billowing behind him as his backpack fell off his shoulders. He always arrived with enough time to spare and wasn't worried about being late, but he needed to talk to Pickles as soon as possible. He collided with a kid that he recognized from his church, a short, mousy fellow with a curved nose and shouted an apology over his shoulder. The kid sneered at him, raising a claw-like hand in his direction, but Toki didn't have time to focus on this kid's particular brand of weirdness, not today. He met a traffic backlog on the stairs, apathetic teenagers that were clearly too cool for school moving at the slowest pace possible, and he was beginning to feel murderous with annoyance. By the time he reached his math class he was ready to tear somebody's head off by the top of their mouth and throw it like a javelin, watch brain matter and blood splatter against and roll down a wall. He festered in this feeling, the fantasy delighting him in a perverse way he tried to push down.
Pickles was already in the room, body splayed across his chair, languid. His elbow was resting on what was Toki's desk, legs outstretched in the aisle, and he was speaking halfheartedly to somebody across from him. Pickles didn't pay any attention to Toki as Toki stepped over Pickles's legs, and he only paused in his conversation to turn around and look at Toki when Toki sat down and budged Pickles's elbow to get it off his desk. Sometime between first and fourth period Pickles must've lit up—probably skipped one of his classes to go get high, either by himself or with that group of guys he kept talking about forming a band with that were as equally into drugs as he was—because his eyes were red and lidded. He was calm in comparison to first period, smiling a little as Toki slid his elbow off the desk.
"What's up?" he asked. Toki had not yet decided if the fact that Pickles drugged himself up was going to be beneficial or unhelpful. He would be more agreeable, placated, but this could serve as a deterrent to the topic of conversation Toki wanted to discuss. Pickles was known to make exquisite promises while intoxicated, would guarantee you the world and stars as far as the eye could see, that he would not follow up on once sober. Toki trusted Pickles, but not fully in this state. Toki would approach the situation with caution.
"I should be asking you that!" Toki's voice slid into a higher pitch. He found it hard to be mad at a drugged-up Pickles, who was too cool of a guy to ever really get mad at, but the memory of a pissed Pickles lingered in his mind. He could get mad at a pissed Pickles, and so he focused on the image of Pickles hunched over and scribbling at a million miles a minute with fury furled up in his body, feline in his anger.
"Yeah?" Pickles asked. He put his elbow back on Toki's desk and rested his head in his hand, looked up at Toki through his eyelashes. He was still smiling lightly, looking complacent and out of it.
"Yeah!" Toki curled his fingers into his palms. He was growing angry quickly, but it wasn't at Pickles as much as was at his life, at himself. Nathan and Pickles didn't fight much, or at all, and he was concerned for his friends and their friendship, but he was mostly concerned for himself. His motives were not unselfish; he was not driven by the pureness of his heart. He was driven by the desire to be able to attend the fucking Fuckface Academy concert this weekend.
"Then ask, dood." Pickles smirked some variant of a smirk, but he was too stoned to move his face that much, and batted his eyelashes at Toki. Toki had no idea what Pickles was trying to accomplish with his actions, but Pickles probably didn't know, either.
Toki sighed and put his hands on his thighs to push off and arch his back. His muscles were hurting from a combination of yesterday's labor and stress. His back crackled and popped, pleasing Toki. "Why are you and Nathan mad with each other?" He asked, still stretching. The question wasn't quite what he was going for, but he had troubles articulating his thoughts in his basic level of English and Pickles couldn't speak Norwegian.
"Oh," Pickles said. His face fell and he let out a long, loose breath as he looked down at Toki's desk, eyelids drooping. "That."
Unfortunately for Toki, the bell rang before Pickles could elaborate and their math teacher—an excited young lady with a great enthusiasm for the subject—sprang from her seat and into action. Toki knew he wouldn't be able to talk to Pickles at all in this class period, not with their teacher babbling on about formulas and variables for forty minutes nonstop. He had feared that this would happen. He did have lunch after this class and would be able to walk to the cafeteria with Pickles and interview him then, but first he spent the forty minutes of Algebra II wanting to either die or kill somebody. His thoughts flickered back to the head-as-a-javelin fantasy. His teacher finished within a minute of the bell ringing and he scrambled to write down their assignment, twenty problems on natural logarithms, which was guaranteed to be a lot of calculator work and therefore a quick assignment. Of course he was given a light load of homework on a day where he was too agitated to properly enjoy it. When the bell rang he pushed his things haphazardly into his backpack and poked Pickles in the back, as Pickles had fallen asleep sometime during the lesson and was snoring softly.
"Come on, Pickle," Toki said, poking Pickles repeatedly as Pickles raised his head, "we have to go to lunch." Toki was already standing, one hand denting Pickles's back and the other holding the strap of his backpack. He needed to adjust them so that they wouldn't slip when he walked, but he couldn't do that when he was standing with his backpack on, and would probably forget by the next time he sat down. He thought of asking Pickles to remind him, but Pickles would also forget, especially in the haze of his highness.
"'Kay," Pickles said. He moved out of his chair lazily, stretching and yawning. Pickles didn't bring anything to this class, his nap a seemingly premade decision. He walked in front of Toki and Toki trailed behind him, willing Pickles to move faster, but Pickles did not. Toki stared at Pickles's dreadlocks in fascination. They were quite well-kept as far as dreadlocks went, extending neatly down his back and bouncing as he walked.
Toki was able to get beside Pickles when they left the classroom and started walking in the direction of the lunchroom. Toki, Pickles, Nathan and Murderface all had the same lunch period, something Toki normally considered a blessing, but today he thought of it as a curse. Pickles wasn't moving to initiate conversation, head lolling around to stare at things that caught his interest without any social consciousness.
"So," Toki said when they were about halfway to the cafeteria, "you and Nathan?" He was wringing his hands, a nervous habit. His backpack slipped down his shoulders again.
"Oh, that," Pickles said again, rotating his head to face Toki. He was walking at a leisurely pace; Toki had to physically slow himself down to match Pickles. It was odd to Toki to look down at Pickles while speaking to him. Toki had been the shortest one in the group until recently, when he went through a growth spurt and sprang up four inches taller almost overnight. He was even with Murderface but shorter than Nathan, who was a giant in comparison.
"Do you want to tell me about it?" Toki asked. He stuck his tongue between his teeth, another nervous habit. He was apprehensive, felt like Pickles had grabbed handfuls of his nerve endings and was shaking them.
Pickles thought for a moment. "Yeah, sure, alright." He shoved his hands into his pockets and scratched at his thighs. Toki could tell he was itching to smoke something. Pickles had been suspended for a week when he was caught smoking outside of the gates of school a half-hour before school started during the first half of freshman year, a mistake he swore he'd never make again.
Toki exhaled, relief wracking his body like he'd just breathed out the breath he'd been holding since he was born. He stopped wringing his hands and he bought them to his armpits, where they tightened on his backpack straps. He looked at Pickles with anticipation.
"He told me that he's gonna ask Abigail out," Pickles said. He scowled and sucked his bottom lip in between his teeth. His Wisconsin accent picked up a mechanical whininess when he was stoned, exaggerating the sentence in an almost humorous manner. Toki had to resist the urge to laugh.
"Is that all?" They were almost to the cafeteria now; they didn't have time for a long story. Toki wasn't worried if that was the extent of the feud; fighting over a girl was something that could be easily settled by the girl herself and Toki doubted that Abigail would want to date Nathan. She wasn't the type of girl that was usually into guys like Nathan, as far as Toki knew. The news was draining, liberating, and Toki felt all the nasty little feelings that had been residing in his chest beginning to slide down and out.
"No," Pickles muttered, bottom lip still in his mouth. He let it loose and continued speaking. "He told me he hooked up with her at this party we went to, on Saturday."
"Oh," Toki said. His initial reaction was that of jealousy—Murderface, Nathan, and Pickles had all gone to a party on Saturday. Toki was not able to go because his parents had ordered a new bedframe and he spent all day assembling it just for them to decide they didn't even want it and to return it. When that subsided, his old pals nervousness and worry crept back into their crevices in his chest. Adding sex into rifts was never a good idea, and here he was, faced with the idea that Pickles's and Nathan's legendary best friendship was being put to the test by a silly, inconsequential female and the attraction they spurred in men.
"Yeah," Pickles said, scowling hard. He was practically shaking. "Like the fucker didn't know I'm in love with her." He drummed his fingers against his thighs and spat on the ground. "Shit," he muttered, "I'm gonna have to take a smoke break after lunch."
"Well, Pickle," Toki began, feeling awkward and thankful that the door to the cafeteria was in sight, just a mere twenty feet ahead, "do you think Abigail would go out with him?"
Pickles groaned. "I dunno, Toki," he said. "Women, they're mysterious. And my God, what a woman she is."
Toki did not have any advice to offer. Relationships were foreign to him, just another thing that other people had and he didn't. He wasn't allowed to date until he was of marrying age and he had never even made any form of romantic contact with a girl. Not that any girl was interested in him. As far as he could tell, everybody thought he was weird. He hoped with all of his might that Nathan and Pickles would be able to reach an agreement by themselves and that he could watch this fight from the sidelines until it was over, which he wished would be soon. At least by this weekend.
They reached the cafeteria and Toki held the door open for Pickles. They split ways then; Toki went to their usual table, where Nathan and Murderface were already sitting, while Pickles went to buy some food. Toki was not allowed to buy food at school, which for some reason existed independently outside of the fact he wasn't allowed to have money on him.
He took a seat opposite Nathan, who had his hands wrapped around a hamburger, and to the right of Murderface, who had a fat sandwich squeezed between his grubby paws.
"Hey guys," Toki said. He shed his backpack and placed it by his feet. He pulled a bottle of water and a granola bar from the side pocket, uncapped the water bottle and unwrapped the granola bar. He had run out of the fun flavors, like chocolate chip and s'mores too soon, and was faced with raisin. He suspected his parents were fucking around with his food again, which they used to do a lot more when he was younger, before they needed his strength to provide for them. But when he was little, they used to like to do this thing where they fed him in tiny portions for a week or two, and then forced him to eat a feast (usually after church), inevitably making him sick. It was one of their longer punishments, pulled out if he'd done something really bad, like if he hadn't gotten enough wood or fish for the winter.
"Hey, Toki," Murderface said through a mouthful of sandwich. Food crumbs dotted his face and dribbled down his shirt, an unappealing sight. Toki averted his eyes to Nathan.
Nathan grunted an unenthusiastic hello. He looked pissed still, heavy brow furrowed and body hunched. Toki figured it would be best to leave him alone and took a bite of his granola bar. He hated raisin.
Pickles did not sit with them at lunch, which Toki found both shockingly unusual and unsurprising. Pickles instead sat with his druggie friends across the cafeteria. Nathan looked over at them a few times during lunch but did nothing else except eat and sulk the whole time. Pickles was laughing and taking in a large amount of food, but he looked off to Toki, depressed even. Toki talked to Murderface during lunch and made plans to go to the skatepark on Thursday; Toki would tell his parents that he had to stay after school in the library to study for his English test on Friday. It would buy him a few hours of free time.
After lunch Toki had German by himself. He conjugated verbs lethargically, depressed by the lack of developments in Nathan and Pickles's dispute. He really wanted them to work things out and figured that the issue would come to a head after Nathan asked Abigail out. He had all three of the other guys in his next class, World History, and he might be able to talk to Nathan then. He probably wouldn't be able to, though, as Pickles's presence would push Nathan into silence.
He was right. Sixth period was tense and no matter how hard Murderface and Toki tried to lift the pressure, Nathan and Pickles brooded in front of them. The teacher droned on about the French revolution and Robespierre and his usurpation by execution by his own people and Toki stared at the back of Pickles's head and his well-kept dreads. He was concerned for their friendship, sure, but he was mostly concerned for himself. His parents' oppression put an end to anything he might ever want to do; including being able to provide transportation to events that he wanted to attend without relying on Nathan and his old truck, and the idea that a petty problem would put an end to his plans caused rage to boil inside of him. He had let himself be excited about the concert; he should've known better. He was stupid, dreaming insipid dreams, and as much as the thought spilled acid down his throat, his parents were right. He would never do anything with his life, never amount to anything, never, never, never, and he dreamt of their heads under the guillotine. Then he felt bad about that, shame blooming throughout his body, and he lowered his forehead to the desk for the rest of class.
"I'm getting real schick of thisch," Murderface said as Toki walked with him out of the classroom when the period was over. Nathan and Pickles had bolted, running into each other and sending deathly glares before exiting in a hurry. Murderface's last class of the day, Spanish, was near Toki's, Home Ec, so they walked in that direction together.
"Me too," Toki said, nodding. "Do you know why they're mad with each other?"
"No, why?" Murderface shoved a small freshman girl out of his way as he said this through gritted teeth. The girl fell down; Murderface chuckled. The girl struggled to pick herself up, but Murderface had lost interest in her by now, instead looking ahead and down the hall.
"Nathan is going to ask Abigail out," Toki said.
"Abigail, asch in Charlesch'sch friend Abigail? The Abigail Picklesch hasch a masschive boner for?"
Toki nodded in response. His backpack slid down his shoulders again; he told himself inwardly that he was going to tighten the straps as soon as he got to Home Ec, no exceptions.
Murderface snorted. "Sche'sch not going to schay yesch, he schouldn't waschte hisch time."
Toki shrugged and groaned. "I just want to go to the Fuckface Academy concert this weekend," he said. "If Nathan and Pickles are still mad at each other…"
"They'll work it out," Murderface said. "They're too in love with each other to schtay mad."
Toki laughed hard enough to garner stares. He wiped away small tears at the corner of his eyes as he said goodbye to Murderface and entered his Home Ec class, still giggling to himself. It was funny because it was true. He forgot to tighten the straps of his backpack when he sat down.
Monday closed with Toki lying in his bed, on his stomach, at the premature time of 8:30. His heated face was pressed into his pillow, the cold underside that he had flipped over. He felt raw, was raw, his scratchy blanket rubbing against his bare skin. He was sleeping in just his boxers tonight; it was too hot for proper pajamas, and he'd been too upset to even think about pulling on a pair of pants or a shirt when he had stumbled into his room.
He had fucked up the first chore he had attempted to do, which was dust the antique cabinet. He'd broken something from Norway, a cheap and hideous glass statuette. He had suspicions that these ugly glass knickknacks that looked out of place with the family heirlooms were placed as a test for him, and it was a test he had failed as the thing, a translucent starfish, tumbled out of his hands and broke against the tiled floor of his kitchen. Glass had gotten everywhere, tiny shards rolling under the cabinet and speckling the ground around his feet. He had had to pick them all up by hand while his father watched, still and silent as the glass statuettes lined up in the cabinet. He had pointed to a spot on the kitchen table where Toki was to put the glass pieces when he collected them, and Toki had to swallow back dreading bile. He had known that he would be robbed of lunch and probably dinner when the starfish fell, but he hadn't the slightest clue about what would happen with the glass. He collected the pieces in his palm and deposited them on the table; it took him four trips to get it all.
His father had sighed, a long, rattling exhalation like the wind rubbing the branches of dead trees together. He gestured for Toki to remove his shirt, which he did, thinking about his father's favorite: the whip. Then his father took him by the shoulders and turned him around; Toki was surprised by how strong his father seemed, the brittle hands with the long fingers feeling sturdy on his shoulders. His father had forced him to bend down with a hand on the base of his neck. Toki had been bent at a slight angle in the kitchen, a few feet away from the sink and the window above it. His father had walked to the window and shut the curtains.
When he returned from the window, his father had selected the largest piece of glass and drew it across his back in the pattern of a cross. He drug it through the scarred mess Toki's back had become, the motions steady and precise, never varying. He had finished by slicing through his skin perpendicular to the vertical line he'd drawn, just under Toki's shoulder blades. When his father had finished he stood, placed the bloody glass on the table, and he had said, "Boy, you need God more than anyone else," in hoarse Norwegian. He had picked Toki's shirt up, had handed it to him and had gestured to the glass on the table, indicating Toki should clean it up the proper way now. Toki had had to scrub the table down, since there was blood on it now.
It had been a shallow cut but it had bled, staining the back of his shirt, and he finished his chores as his back bled against his clothes. He wasn't in the mood to do anything but eat his dinner (which he was allowed to, though he'd been denied lunch) and take a shower after he finished cleaning the house and so he neglected his homework and went to lie in bed. He'd done a bad thing by getting the bandages out of his parents' bathroom to wrap his back in while they were watching television downstairs, and if they discovered missing bandages he was surely going to be punished more, which he wasn't looking forward to. In his bed he sighed against the pillow. His back wasn't stinging or bleeding, but all he could think of was what he'd seen in the bathroom mirror as he bandaged his skin: a pink cross on his back that his father had drawn in a way across his scars, too shallow to join them, but memorable enough to preside in his mind forever. Such was the nature of his life.
In Tuesday and Wednesday, Toki found more of the same. His parents hadn't noticed their missing bandages and Toki took extra care through the rest of his chores, dodging further punishment. He couldn't afford to screw up his chances to see Fuckface Academy, though those weren't looking too good. Nathan and Pickles weren't speaking to each other and Nathan had not yet asked Abigail out; there was no resolution to their rift. Pickles was grumpy even when he smoked, which was a new thing that Toki didn't like, and he sat in school quietly fuming. The problem was beginning to look a lot more serious than Toki had previously thought, like there was more than just Abigail bugging Pickles, but Toki wasn't about to pry into that. He bided his time with Murderface, who was trying to act like Pickles and Nathan weren't bothering him but Toki could tell they were. Murderface got weird about people fighting sometimes.
There was hope on Thursday.
Pickles was late to first period. Rockzo and the girl Nathan spoke to were absent that day. Thus, Nathan and Toki were left alone in their quadrant for a few minutes. Nathan turned around in his chair and sat with his arms on top of the edge and legs straddling the back, chin resting on his folded arms, eyes boring into Toki's. Toki was uncomfortable, but he was also curious, so he let Nathan speak.
"I'm going to ask Abigail out today," he announced. He did not seem too happy about it. "I think it's right since I fucked her at the party." He was scowling more than usual and he lowered his eyes to the floor when he finished his sentence instead of looking at Toki directly.
Toki gulped and nodded. There was not enough time left in the week for things to be made right, he had decided. Doom and gloom and dread and unhappiness hung above him, black clouds gathering on the horizon, and all he could do was sit and wait for the storm. "Do you really think that?" The question was a weak attempt and he knew it; he knew Nathan was sure and Pickles was sure and he knew everything sucked.
"Yeah," Nathan said. "I mean, nobody else does, but I do. Charles told me that she was pretty drunk and she says she couldn't consent or whatever, but I still think it's, like, the right thing to do." He spoke the longest sentence Toki had ever heard him speak without using a curse word, even when they met as scrawny, miniature sixth graders, and it was the single scariest thing that had happened all week.
"What about Pickle?" Toki tugged at the collar of his shirt and pushed his tongue around in his mouth.
"What about Pickles? He didn't have a chance with her anyway." Nathan scoffed and casted his head off to the side. Not the side where Pickles would sit, but the other side, towards the part of the classroom lined with lab supplies. He rested his cheek on his arms, hair falling over the edge of the chair.
"It's not nice." Toki knew it was futile, but he couldn't stop talking. Maybe Nathan would realize what was going on before he tried to ask her out; maybe Pickles would suddenly lose interest in her; maybe Abigail would decide to move to China. Each option was as likely as the others.
"Fuck being nice. I'm asking her out after school." And with that, Nathan picked his body up and turned himself around.
Toki breathed out through his nose. His chest hurt. He thought of the pink cross on his back, already fading, definitely not going to scar. He thought about guillotines and javelins and blood and gore and death and splashing his face with the chemicals they worked with in the lab today, chugging down his test tubes like a can of mediocre beer, wiping his mouth and waiting for death to wrap its arms around him. He wasn't feeling suicidal, though, often felt murderous if he was going to apply a death-causing adjective to himself, and when class ended, he had caused no harm nor good to the world.
When Toki told Murderface about what Nathan was going to do, as they were sitting in second period English and Murderface was breathing hard from the exertion of Physical Education, Murderface asked Toki, "Are you going to tell Picklesch?"
"Tell Pickle?" Toki's eyes widened and he bent backwards in his seat. The thought had not occurred to him. Pickles already knew that Nathan was going to ask her out, but he didn't know a time or a place, and Toki didn't feel like providing him with enough information to hire a hit man or embarrass himself by showing up. Toki forced a groan back down his throat just thinking of what could possibly go wrong if he told Pickles, like the situation wasn't already as wrong as it could be. "No. No, I am not going to tell Pickle."
"That'sch a good idea," Murderface said, placing his hands beside his head and reclining. "I don't know what Picklesch would do if he knew."
However, Toki didn't get a chance to not tell Pickles. When he walked into his fourth period, he could tell Pickles knew. Toki could feel the sheer fury rising off of him from where he stood in the doorway. He approached Pickles like one would approach a wild cat, took his seat and put his backpack on the ground in slow motion. He crunched his body up and slid lower in his seat, anticipating Pickles's explosion.
Pronouncing Pickles as pissed would have been an understatement. He turned around in his seat in a way that reminded Toki of the little girl rotating her head in the Exorcist, slow and wide-eyed, absolutely insane. Pickles snarled, bared his teeth, and lunged at Toki like he was going to wrap his hands around Toki's neck. He stopped himself before he could do it, chest rising and falling as he struggled to keep himself calm. He sounded like a steam whistle, puffing hard. His face was a red color that was daring to match his hair, his eyes narrowed, nose scrunched. Frightening—Pickles was frightening.
"Douchebag," Pickles said. Toki wasn't sure who Pickles was talking about and wasn't going to ask him. Pickles breathed for a while, and then elaborated. "Charles told me, yeah, right before I came in here. Can't believe Nathan, my best friend, my fucking buddy, is doing this to me."
"Well—" Toki wanted to say something like, he feels bad about it, or it's just a girl, Jesus Christ get over yourselves, but nothing formed and he let his sentence drop off.
"What a betrayal," Pickles continued. He adjusted himself so he was sitting sideways in his desk, feet in front of him. He rubbed his hands on his knees and looked down at the floor. His face was beginning to unfurl itself, muscles relaxing. "What a motherfucking betrayal."
Toki continued to say nothing; he wasn't quite sure that Pickles was talking to him or just talking to himself with the excuse of Toki being there.
"You know, I'm mad as fuck, mad as balls mad, I'm pissed, Toki. But I—I just can't believe it. She ain't even his type, you know that?" Pickles lifted his head and exhaled. Toki actually watched for the smoke to slip out between Pickles's lips, but obviously there would be none. Toki thought there should be, though. Pickles appeared to be completely sober. "He likes whores, he likes metal chick whores. Abigail is—she's classy, she's a classy as fuck chick. He shouldn't want her." His shoulders drew up as his hands clasped around his knees for a few seconds before he loosened his hands and let his shoulders drop, defeated.
Toki sighed. This was tedious. He was grateful when the bell rang and his teacher began her daily ramblings on the subject of Algebra II, as it meant that Pickles dropped his head on his desk and didn't come up for air until the end of class. Toki doodled in his notebook under the disguise of taking notes; he drew a wildcat with dreadlocks pouncing on a panther. Toki had taken 2D Art freshman year and he wasn't as good at drawing as he was at sculpting, but he was objectively okay, and soon he'd drawn out a whole scene. He inked tall trees hiding a sun and casting shade, a grotesque white tiger lurking near the edge of the page and half-hidden by branches. He placed a small cat sitting with its tail in front of the mouth of the forest, watching the wildcat and the panther and looking as worried as a cat could be. He spent the rest of the day polishing the doodle-turned-drawing: lunch was tense as always with the absence of Pickles, History was tense as always with the presence of Pickles, German and Home Ec were boring and lonely. By the time the final bell rang he'd taken his emotions out on a piece of notebook paper, his friends-turned-felines immortalized in black ink, and signed his name in illegible cursive at the bottom before packing up his things and heading to the busses.
There was a fifteen minute window between school ending and the busses leaving that Toki normally spent with his friends, sitting to the right of the front steps of the school on the sidewalk. He would occasionally catch a ride home from Nathan, but Nathan's truck took sixteen minutes to get to his house while his bus took thirty-one, so he preferred the bus most days. This week he's been spending the excess time with Murderface just outside the busses, leaning over the railing that separated the school from the parking lot and listening as Murderface griped and complained about whatever was aggravating him that day. Pickles had spent the week with his druggie friends and Nathan had been leaving directly after school. Today Toki was supposed to meet Murderface by their usual spot, by the front steps, and they were going to go to the skatepark via walking; it wasn't too far from the school. Home Ec was located on the second floor of the same building the art studio was in, so he would have to traverse the courtyard to get to the front of the school.
In the courtyard he found commotion. Standing directly in the middle, surrounded by a crowd of amused students, and engaged in an embarrassingly public shouting match was no other than Nathan and Abigail. Abigail wasn't doing the shouting but standing with her arms crossed, blushing and body language indicating that she'd rather be anywhere else. Charles was behind her, hand gripped on Pickles's shoulder, forehead creased. Murderface was behind Nathan and holding his head in his hands—even Murderface was mortified. As Toki came closer to the scene he realized that Murderface and the others had every right to be ashamed, as Nathan was making a gargantuan fool out of himself.
"But you—" He shouted. He was leaning into the conversation, back curved and body moving with every syllable of every word. His eyebrows were upturned, mouth hanging open. He looked pathetic, a saddened hulk, like an ancient god of the sea who was about to unleash a rainstorm in their depression.
"Nathan, please, don't, not here," Abigail said through gritted teeth. She pinched the bridge of her nose. She was tapping her foot and looked ridiculously professional in comparison. She dressed for school like one would dress to go to work: chaste skirts and blouses, low heals. She was like Charles in that manner, who always wore button-down shirt and either fashionable khaki shorts or slacks with either immaculate topsiders or shiny loafers. Toki often wondered why Nathan and Pickles hung around them; though he knew they enjoyed death metal, they were also in fierce competition for the top spot in the junior class, Charles occupying it at the moment.
"But—" Nathan was at a loss for words. Toki was standing beside Murderface now and he shot him a questioning look that Murderface couldn't see anyway. Toki had gathered the gist of the situation, it was apparent: Nathan had asked Abigail out and things were not going well.
Charles moved like he wanted to stand beside Abigail and come to her defense, but he was preoccupied with Pickles, who was spazzing out. Toki couldn't identify any one emotion on Pickles, the other boy simply going haywire with information. His limbs were flailing and he was sputtering, forming words halfway before they died on his tongue and new ones came through. Toki was shocked that Pickles wasn't foaming at the mouth. The mob around Nathan and Abigail and their drama was thinning, teenagers coming to the realization that this wasn't as entertaining so much as it was pitiful, and within another minute there was only Toki, his friends, Charles and Abigail left.
Nathan hadn't given up; he was still trying to articulate something. His eyes were stretched enough to be able to see the pink underneath, his hands reaching out to grab at the air, hair in his face. His back was quaking with the effort of speaking and of the brutal emotional toll wracking his body. "You—you let me—"
"Nathan, she was drunk," Charles said finally, both hands on Pickles now; he had moved him around so that he stood in front of him.
"It didn't mean anything," Abigail added, letting her arms drop loose and making little encouraging motions with her arms. "I'm sorry, but I just don't feel the way you, um, do, I guess."
Nathan floundered, flabbergasted, and eventually let loose himself, shoulders drooping. Murderface and Toki rushed to him out of instinct, though they didn't have the slightest clue as to what they were supposed to do in this situation. Pickles had gone still beneath Charles's hands and Charles released them, walking calmly to Abigail and collecting her. They exited quietly while Nathan stared at the ground, stunned. Pickles imitated Nathan, though his eyes were on his friend and not the floor.
"You—you okay, Buddy?" Murderface asked, extending an arm to pat Nathan on the back. He sent a look to Toki asking for help; Toki raised his eyebrows shrugged.
"No," Nathan choked out. He opened his mouth several times to say something else, but couldn't find anything and just shut up. He jerked Murderface's arm off of him and sauntered off in the distance, towards the student parking lot. Pickles followed Nathan with his gaze, body curved in indecision, obviously debating on whether or not to run after Nathan or to go home. Since Pickles strode off in the direction of the busses and not the student parking lot, Toki guessed he decided to go home. As Pickles walked past Murderface and Toki, who were still standing dumfounded in the middle of the courtyard, he muttered "Douchebag," but once again Toki wasn't sure who Pickles was talking about or who Pickles was talking to.
Toki and Murderface gawked at each other for a handful of seconds. Toki had predicted this outcome; Nathan had as much of a chance with Abigail as he did of graduating head of the class, or even graduating at all. He hadn't, however, expected something so public and utterly humiliating for every party involved. This would replace the old gossip, which was that somebody had knocked somebody else's mother up (and though that had been proven false a month ago, people were still talking about it) and for the next week-to-whenever-somebody-trumps-it-with-something-else there would be jokes and talk amongst their (and possibly Charles's and Abigail's) class. Toki supposed he didn't expect anything less of the occasionally-buffoonish Nathan.
"Scho…schkatepark?" Murderface asked, eyes begging Toki with every ounce of his being to get the fuck out of this school.
"Skatepark," Toki said, nodding.
They walked to Murderface's locker, where he had stored a skateboard for Toki. Murderface didn't skate but he had a board, a Christmas present from a few years back, which was a cheap piece of shit like everything else Murderface owned, but Toki wasn't about to complain. He skateboarded instead of walking with Murderface beside him, going on about something that had happened in his Spanish class that had really pissed him off. Neither of them were about to discuss what had happened back there; it had been an otherworldly, ethereal experience, and Toki felt that if he were to talk about it the thing would gain sentience and attack his face or something. Murderface tended to avoid emotional situations that made him uncomfortable.
Murderface hung out on the edge of the park, near the fence with the druggies and drunks, while Toki actually skated. He'd been introduced to it in seventh grade by a temporary friend, a big fan of professional boarding, though Toki had no interest in that. Toki didn't care about tricks or doing this for the rest of his life; he just liked the way he felt when he was going too fast down the pipes, watching his shirt billow behind him and hearing the air whistling past his ears and deafening him. The other guys used this as a place to get drugs and hang out with those who did drugs—the skatepark was, for some reason, the center of drug-related activity in this town—so everybody won when Toki wanted to go. The skatepark was one of their usual haunts.
He rode the half-pipe up and down for a lengthy amount of time, not interested in doing anything else for the day. It cleared his head considerably and he was sweating by the time he finished, flicking his board up with his foot and carrying it over to Murderface, who was slumped against a fence with a can of soda he'd bought from a vending machine in his hand. Toki folded himself down beside Murderface and attempted to get his hair back in place; he'd forgotten to bring something to tie it up with and it was plastered over his face and sticking out everywhere. Murderface handed him a bottle of water from his other side and Toki drank, watching the other people in the skatepark do what they did as he sat beside Murderface. He had about half an hour before they had to catch the city bus that would lead him back near his house, where they would part ways.
"We have to talk about it," Toki said when he finished drinking his water, wiping his lip with the back of his hand. "Nathan and Pickle."
"Nathan'sch schuch an idiot," Murderface snorted. He drank from his soda; his foot twitched. Murderface had been sitting in the heat for a while and it seemed that his conversation partners had wandered off. Murderface would sometimes complain about getting bored at times like this, but other times he would enjoy it, the quietness in the sweltering heat. Murderface was like Toki in that he never really wanted to go home, a characteristic they also shared with Pickles. The reluctance to return was a thing that had bought them together; they would waste time with each other just to avoid wasting time at their houses. Nathan couldn't join in on that, but he could offer a location to dawdle in and his form of sympathy.
Toki nodded. "I hope we can still go to the show on Saturday."
Murderface snorted again and ran his fingers through his hair. Like Toki, Murderface's hair was a mess, frizzy and uncooperative. "I'm schtill going," he said.. "Whether it'sch with you fagsch or not. I have Dick."
Toki sighed and felt a tug of envy in his stomach, which was weird. He was generally jealous of Nathan and Pickles, but he tended to pity Murderface more than wish he was Murderface, though now he'd trade anything in the world to be able to have the freedom that Murderface possessed. He'd once said that his grandparent's didn't give a fuck about what he did as long as he didn't get arrested or more importantly, knock a girl up. Thinking about it just pissed Toki off and so he drank from his water to distract himself and watched a particularly good skater, some kid who couldn't be older than thirteen and who was wearing skinny jeans, take the whole course in a fluid motion.
After a few minutes Toki got up to skate again, to pass the time if nothing else. He did the handrail and ended up skidding, landing on his ass towards the end while his board went off in another direction. He was done with skating after that and motioned to Murderface to leave the park. He walked with Murderface in silence, bizarrely angry at everything in the world, to the bus stop. They sat on the bench and waited for the bus. The asphalt on the road was wavering with heat, it was that intense and thick around them, humidity weighing them down. It was truly inexplicably hot, even for October in Florida.
"I can't believe it's so hot," Toki said. He was rolling the skateboard back and forth with his feet on the ground, watching it for some cheap amusement. "It's never like this in Norway."
"Here we go with the Norway schit again," Murderface said. He closed his eyes and sighed. "Why don't you go back there if you liked it so much?" Murderface was sitting like he always did; legs spread wide and unaccountably, head tipped back on the edge of the bench in a way that looked like it hurt. He was playing with a splinter to his left, trying to rip it out.
Toki didn't bother responding to that and instead said, "Heat makes people crazy, I think that's what's happening." He continued to lazily slide the board back and forth, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees and head between his fists. Cars passed by in front of him, the sound of wheels on the road comforting.
Murderface shrugged, eyes still closed and head still tipped back. "Everybody'sch schtupid, thisch schit happensch anyway."
Toki thought for a moment. "I guess that's true."
"They won't schtay mad for long, don't worry," Murderface said, cracking his eyes open. "We'll get to go to the schow, you'll schee."
The bus came a few minutes later and they boarded it; Murderface paid for Toki. They sat towards the front. It was about four in the afternoon and there weren't many people on board, but those that were tended to be weird, the type of people that take the bus in the mid-afternoon. The ride to the stop near Toki's house took about twenty minutes, and Murderface spent it texting somebody while Toki stared out the window. Murderface was acting peculiar, but that was unsurprising, because everybody was acting peculiar. Toki wondered if he'd been acting peculiar; he didn't have the self-awareness to tell. The conundrum was too much for him, and so his thoughts switched to how much he didn't want to do his homework and the fact that he probably wouldn't. When the bus came to a stop Toki put the skateboard on Murderface's lap and stepped over his legs; Murderface grunted, which doubled as an acknowledgement of the skateboard and a goodbye.
"See you tomorrow," Toki said, and then he walked down the steps. The stop was on a busy street, the one that his neighborhood hid behind. He had about ten minutes of walking to look forward to in the heat, which was a shame, as he'd just been feeling cool from the weak air conditioning on the bus. He tried to make the walk last as long as possible, going slow, but the repetition of the architecture and landscaping of his neighborhood was boring him out of his mind and he started to walk faster on instinct. It was closer to five now, just before the time where all his suburban neighbors would arrive home from work. There were some children playing in some yards, but they ignored Toki and Toki ignored them.
"Today sucked," he announced to nobody in particular when he was about halfway to his house. He stuck his hands in the pockets of his shorts and then took them back out again; it was very fucking hot. He knew that when he'd get home he'd have to clean the kitchen and the bathrooms, then cut the branches and leaves of the tree in the backyard down, then tend to the garden, which was always his last chore. He'd have to forget about doing his homework, a decision he had already made, though he wouldn't be able to think straight in the heat, and his parents would surely not turn the air conditioning on while he was cleaning the bathrooms. By the time he opened the door to his house all he could think about was taking a shower and going to bed, the only things he looked forward to anymore.
He didn't know what he was going to find when he opened the door to Chemistry. A quick scan of the classroom revealed everything to be normal: it was at halfway capacity and Mr. Marshall wasn't in the room, Rockzo was seated at the table, his hair dyed a neon orange color, and Nathan and Pickles were both present and appeared to be engaged in conversation. Still, Toki took his seat feeling uneasy, like everything around him was too good to be true.
"K-k-k-hello," Dr. Rockzo said to Toki, smiling. "I do cocaine," he added.
"I know, Rockzo," Toki said absently. He was blatantly staring at Nathan and Pickles. They had their chairs titled towards each other; Pickles was resting his elbow on the table and his head in his hand while Nathan was staring at his (own) lap. They appeared to be talking about what type of fuel Nathan used in his truck, which Toki doubted was the original topic of conversation, and though their response to each other were clipped and their facial muscles tight, they were both smiling a little. It was pleasant to see.
Toki wished he could say he was curious about how they had reunited, but he wasn't. He cared about their friendship, but only to the extent of which it affected him, and if they were in each other's good graces then that was good enough for him. They did lab work during Chemistry and Nathan almost spilled some dangerous chemical on himself, which was enough to make Pickles burst out laughing, though Nathan earned a tired lecture about safety from Mr. Marshall; he received lectures of that nature often. When Mr. Marshall's back was turned Nathan flipped him off and Pickles sniggered into his hands, snapping his lab goggles against his face when Nathan glared at him. Nathan cracked a smile; Toki felt hopeful.
Pickles always cleaned up when they did labs in class for Nathan, just like Toki always cleaned up for Rockzo. Toki felt like a housewife, the apron tied around his waist to protect his clothing and gloves on his hands. He had pushed his goggles up on his head when they finished the lab; Pickles was still wearing his. They washed their equipment side-by-side at the sinks. Wash wasn't the right word so much as rinse, no soap or sponges, just lab equipment held under the tap. Toki was uncertain about this; his chores at home had taught him that a lot of chemical was needed to erase germs.
"So is everything okay with Nathan?" Toki asked. He truly felt like a housewife.
"I guess," Pickles said. He looked at Toki, still holding a metal tray under a stream of water. "Don't worry about it."
Liberated, Toki didn't worry about it, or talk about it, except to update Murderface in English class before the test, which went okay; Toki suspected he would receive a C. Today the quote on the board read "Life is short, even for those who live a long time, and we must live for the few who know and appreciate us, who judge and absolve us, and for whom we have the same affection and indulgence. The rest I look upon as a mere crowd, lively or sad, loyal or corrupt, from whom there is nothing to be expected but fleeting emotions, either pleasant or unpleasant, which leave no trace behind them. We ought to hate very rarely, as it is too fatiguing; remain indifferent to a great deal, forgive often, and never forget.—Sarah Bernhardt." Toki and Murderface snickered at it, dismissed it as sappy bullshit, but behind his front Toki liked the quote, understood what Sarah Bernhardt was getting at, no matter how lame it might be. The phrases we must live for the few who know and appreciate us and a mere crowd stuck in his head for the rest of his day.
In 3D Art, his battle axe was almost finished, and he was certain that he would be done with it by the deadline, which was the end of class. All he had left to do was coat it with a finish, which he got to working on quickly. He hoped his teacher would appreciate the dried blood stains he had painted on it; he was trying to go for an antique effect, something a Viking had used many times and loved with all of his Viking heart. It hadn't been his best paint job, but it wasn't his worst, and he was feeling optimistic about the grade he would get. 3D Art kept his G.P.A. afloat. His teacher smiled at him when he gave it to her fifteen minutes before class ended; he was the first one done.
"I like the blood," she said. His teacher was an elderly woman with wispy, curly hair that she wore pulled back in a loose bun, tendrils framing her face. Toki felt a grandmotherly sort of affection towards her; he beamed when she approved of the blood. She was kind of a metal old chick.
In fourth period Pickles was in a benevolent mood, though agitated that he couldn't sleep through the class; they had a test. The test was difficult and the way Toki felt about it existed in stark contrast to the confidence he'd been feeling about his battle axe. When he placed his paper on the pile on his teacher's desk he was certain that he'd failed it, and he didn't really give a fuck. His parents didn't care about his grades; oddly, they just cared that he went to school every day, even when he was ill. Pickles was the first one done and was able to fit in a small nap, head on his desk and becoming nothing but a pile of red dreads.
"That test was hard," Toki muttered as they walked to lunch.
Pickles shrugged. "I don't know, I thought it was kind of easy." Toki knew this wasn't a lie; Pickles was a genuinely good student, could be one of the better ones in the class if he actually put effort into his work. He was smarter than people thought, and that was something that Toki liked about Pickles, his intelligence and the fact that he wasn't a stuck-up bitch about it. Pickles was noble in his apathy.
Pickles sat with them at lunch, next to Nathan and across from Murderface and Toki. Toki had another raisin granola bar; his mother hadn't been shopping recently. Fridays were pizza days and so the others were eating pizza, which was actually pretty good as far as school food went. Nathan had gotten four pieces, spending a ludicrous amount of money on lunch, and gave Toki the half with the curst of one.
"Thanks," Toki said, through a mouthful of pizza. He swallowed his bite and went to take another one, but Nathan's sharing of his pizza reminded him of something. "We're still going to see Fuckface Academy tomorrow, right?"
"Mmmph," Nathan said around the food in his mouth.
Toki took this as a yes. "Then can your parents call mine tonight?"
Nathan nodded; Toki took another bite of his pizza.
Lunch ended too soon, a feeling that Toki had felt often before this week but had forgotten in the midst of uncomfortable lunches spent without Pickles. It was bittersweet, wishing for more time and being happy that at least he had the want for more time with his friends. Toki actually remembered to tighten the straps of his backpack before walking to German and encountered no trouble with the pesky things for the rest of the day.
World History before the rift was easily Toki's favorite class. Not because he cared about history, because he didn't, but because the other three had it with him. They sat in the back of the classroom, Toki's desk bumping the wall. Their teacher was one of those that everybody liked but they couldn't stand, and it was fun to rile him up. Murderface asked graphic questions about the executions they used during the French revolution, specifically about quartering, drawing it out in gruesome detail until the rest of the class was green around their gills. Nathan, Pickles, and Toki were shrieking with laughter when Murderface finished his dialogue with the exclamation, "I juscht want to know the proper hischtory." Their teacher couldn't argue with a student's earnest curiosity, after all, and nobody doubted that Murderface wanted to know more about horrific murders.
Thus, Toki was in good spirits by the time he arrived home. Nathan drove him and the rest; he, Murderface, and Pickles were going to see a movie and harass people at the cinema and adjacent mall. Toki wished he could join them, but if he was going to the show the next day he knew he couldn't. He walked to his house feeling dejected regardless, longing for what other people had and he didn't, like always.
Friday had double the chores, which made sense to his parents but not to Toki. He felt that by this time in the week he deserved a break. Instead he unloaded firewood from his father's car, a ridiculous amount for autumn in Florida lying on a sheet in the trunk, and piled it in the backyard against the house, by the grill. His father went out for more after Toki finished that, which meant that he had to sweep every floor in the house twice in the meantime. He didn't understand why twice, but he was never going to ask for clarification. When his father returned Toki unloaded and piled more wood, and by then it was almost dinnertime. Around five-thirty the phone had rung; Toki hoped with all of his might that it had been Nathan's mother to talk to his. He had exited the house before he heard his own mother speak, so he couldn't be sure.
His arms and lower back were aching with strain and overuse by the time he finished the second pile of wood. The sun had set and dinner was in the process of being served. He changed his clothes to something appropriate for dinner, discarding the sweaty, torn up rags he'd been wearing to perform his chores in and putting on an ensemble that resembled more his church clothes. He took his seat at the table and took a drink of water from his glass, served from the tap with no ice. Toki had read somewhere that that was supposed to be healthy for your metabolism, which he doubted his parents knew.
He was thinking about the fact that he'd have to tend to the garden in the dark when his father put his hands on the table and stopped eating, drawing Toki's attention. He smacked his lips and then he spoke three words in gruff Norwegian, Toki's three favorite little words: "You may go."