Chapter three, the chapter you've all been waiting for! Maybe. Depending on who you are. I'm a little insecure about this chapter, but uh, there's not much I can do about that. School is awesome but I'm expecting it to pick up so I can't promise anything about my update schedule. Lastly, I hope you enjoy reading this chapter as much as I did writing it!

Fuckface Academy's show was at a club downtown, not too spectacular or too shabby of a venue. An archaic wooden sign was flapping over the entrance with the name of the place, Patio Lobo, displayed proud as a flag. The walls were wood panel and peeling in a stylistic manner, windows on the front too dark and unwashed to see through. The door was meshed and had a metallic doorknob cool to the touch with peeling white paint shoved off to one side. Patio Lobo stood as an independent building but was sandwiched between two strips of shops containing overpriced boutiques, thrift stores, and music stores with 50-cent records on tables out front, the standard downtown array of businesses. It was overall a dingy hipster scumbag deal, exactly the type of place you'd expect a local grunge band to play a show in. Toki was not unimpressed but was wholly underwhelmed, and he did not have high hopes for the interior of Patio Lobo, though he was kind of looking forward to hearing the band.

They weren't allowed in for the next half-hour and they were missing Murderface, who was supposed to arrive with Dick but go home with them. They loitered, standing on the sidewalk outside the music store with the 50 cent records, Nathan thumbing through the bins and Pickles twitching at his side, a cigarette hanging off his bottom lip. Toki people watched with his hands in the pockets of his cargo shorts, kicking at the ground with the toe of his shoe. Pickles was drumming out a disjointed beat against his thighs with the palms of his hands, Nathan muttering to himself about the lame selection; no death metal, just glam and hair shit. Pickles stopped drumming and leaned his body over to examine the records. He attempted to defend the genres and did not succeed, Nathan dismissing every word rolling off of Pickles's lips. Pickles sighed and sucked on the end of his cigarette, pointing away from Nathan as he exhaled.

Toki turned around and walked over to the bins. He possessed a significantly larger music taste than Nathan, though probably not as broad as Pickles's, and he found plenty of records he wanted to buy. There were albums worth far more than fifty cents nestled in with the Barbara Streisand shit you would expect to see (even if Toki did sort of like Barbara Streisand; listening to Somewhere was always an enjoyable experience). Shockingly, his parents didn't have a record player or any other relatively modern inventions besides the large television in their living room and the appliances in their kitchen. He leafed through the records with his tongue between his teeth, trying not to collapse into himself with rage and boredom as the emotions swelled and swirled inside of him. He felt dizzy, like he stood up too fast and all the blood had rushed to his head, blinding him. He bit down on his tongue and curled his fingers around a record belonging to some band he never heard of—it looked like a late 80's, early 90's all girls group. He scratched at the record's cover, his short fingernails scraping over the band's logo, anything to distract himself from the feral growl gurgling in his throat.

"Dood," Pickles said, dropping his cigarette to the ground and rubbing it into the sidewalk with the heel of his shoe, "open your mind. Broaden your horizons." This brought Toki back from his haze; he stood up and took his hands from the records, giving his attention to Pickles. Pickles was not looking at the records anymore—he pirated all of his music, a fan of anything and everything illegal—but was leaning against the wall beside them, one foot propped up against the brick, his arms crossed over his chest and his bottom lip between his teeth. Pickles looked—well, Pickles looked badass, the type of guy you wouldn't fuck with. It was something in the narrowness of his eyes and his double eyebrow piercing, Toki decided, that gave Pickles that menacing look. Toki could only desire to possess something similar.

Nathan rolled his eyes and peeled them away from the bins, towards Pickles. "Fuck that," he said simply, not caring to elaborate. He returned his attention to the records, grumbling and groaning and sounding like storm clouds collecting on the horizons he was supposed to broaden. Toki grinned, just a bit, because he knew that if Pickles wanted to see a band that exclusively preformed Gregorian covers of Linkin Park songs—which would be the type of band Pickles would want to see—Nathan would be by his side in the crowd, no matter what. He would probably lower, but he would be there. Toki wished he had a relationship like that, but he couldn't think of anybody with whom he would willingly go to a concert he knew he wouldn't like, though he supposed that wasn't quite the point. The point was that despite the grumblings and the idiosyncrasies, Nathan and Pickles had a relationship that Toki coveted. He would never voice his jealousy out loud, but it was there, sitting at the top of his throat, and it was all he could do to swallow it down.

Pickles sighed and pulled a pack of cigarettes out, slid another between his lips. "Man, these guys better be good," he said, flicking a knock-off Zippo lighter open and huddling around the flame. He lit his cigarette with much fanfare, snapping the lighter shut with his thumb and a flourish when he was finished before slipping it into his pocket again and resuming his previous stance. "I don't trust Murderface's tastes, you know."

"Nobody does," Nathan said, pulling a record from the bin. He turned to Toki and showed him the cover; a Norwegian band, obscure, Elver av Ejakulere. The name meant something to the effect of "rivers of ejaculate." Toki snorted and shook his head when Nathan asked, "Do you know these guys?"

"Just 'cause he's Norwegian doesn't mean he knows everything about the place," Pickles said, more to himself than to Nathan. He patted his thighs in the rhythm of an elaborate drum beat, the slap of hard skin hitting tight denim filling the air for some time. Toki moved his sights to the streets and thrust his hands into his pockets once more, staring at the pavement, a cracked gray victim of negligence. There was a small weed burbling up from the sidewalk to his right and he found it kind of pathetic, this attempt at nature in such a desperately urbanized place and he was feeling pretty pathetic in general by now. They'd been out here for maybe fifteen minutes and in that time more people had shown up, collecting in front of the other strip of stores. They were all artsy types that were looking for a cheap show and something with obscurity to hold over their friends' heads or genuine grunge fans clad in ripped jeans and baggy shirts, their faces screwed up in scowls or engaging in pleasant conversation with their cohorts. Everybody was one half of a pair, everybody had a place, but Toki was teetering on the edge of the sidewalk with nobody at his side. When he was out normally, at a show or whatever, the barrage of feelings didn't hit him like this. Usually he felt fine, the sadness overtaking him when he got home, instead of enveloping him in public. Usually. Normally. Not today. Today, he was inexplicably lonely for reasons he could not explain.

Behind Toki Nathan and Pickles were arguing again, once more over glam rock, Pickles saying repeatedly that there was more music than just metal and Nathan was an ignoramus. He was speaking fast and his voice escalated in accented shrillness, so the word "ignoramus" made Nathan laugh hard; the fight was over. Toki wasn't looking but the awkward silence that replaced the bickering was palpable, tensions still high and joining the humidity in the air. It was still hot for October and Toki's hairline was sweating; he wiped at it. He wished he had a cell phone, or a wristwatch, or a fucking pocket watch, but he didn't. His pockets were empty. He spun around to Pickles and asked the time.

Pickles took his cell phone out to check; Toki tried not to furrow his brow. "'Bout twenty minutes to show time," Pickles said, eyes still on the screen and thumbs moving, presumably texting somebody. "Murderface says he's gonna be here in—hey, Murderface. And Dick."

Indeed, Murderface and Dick Knubbler had arrived side-by-side. They'd come from Toki's right, in the direction of the other set of stores, which sat on a corner. Murderface was wearing an ill-fitting leather jacket, looking ridiculous in the heat and for the venue, but Murderface was always looking ridiculous. He had his cell phone out and eyes in the direction of it, grunting at Pickles's greeting. Dick Knubbler had on an army jacket buttoned up to his neck and pink-tinted sunglasses; his hair looked like it hadn't been washed for a week. He had a bottle of diet soda in his hand and did not say hello to Pickles until after he took an overly long drink, wiping his upper lip with the back of his hand when he was finished. "Hey," Dick said, drawing out the word in his whiny voice. His mouth opened wide when he talked; he had surprisingly nice teeth, probably artificially whitened.

Nathan walked away from the record bins and to Pickles's side, crossing his arms over his chest. Toki turned so that he was looking fully at Murderface and Knubbler and standing between Nathan and Knubbler but on the outskirts of the foursome. He smiled at the new arrivals, tilting his head. "Hey, guys!"

"Hey," Murderface said, sliding his phone into an inner pocket of his jacket and bothering to speak this time. He looked to his side, at the Patio Lobo sign. "Pretty schweet place, huh?" His jacket hadn't set right when he disrupted it, one side bunched up over his jeans, and he grabbed the front and flicked his hands in a greaser fashion to fix it as he spoke.

"I guess," Nathan said, gracing the conversation with his words as well. Pickles looked at Nathan like he was about to scold him but seemed to changed his mind at the last minute, switching to a smile and returning his attention to Dick and Murderface. He was fidgeting, his lips twitching lightly.

"Dick here'sch gonna get usch in for free, too," Murderface continued, as if he hadn't been talking about this all week. "He knowsch the owner."

"It's true, I do," Dick said. Toki could tell that Dick thought this made him seem impressive, though it really didn't. Apart from being Murderface's only other friend, Dick Knubbler was a source of gossip for Nathan and Pickles. Toki had only met the guy a few time, since he and Murderface tended to hang out independently from the group, like Nathan, Pickles, Charles and Abigail—again, something the others had that Toki didn't unless he counted Rockzo, which he did not—but Toki felt like he had the guy's whole life story. It wasn't that Nathan and Pickles actively disliked Dick; it was that he was, well, a spectacularly weird person. He had dropped out of high school in the tenth grade after setting his lab partner's hair on fire, which was officially an accident but suspicious nonetheless. His parents had kicked him out and he spent a couple of years selling drugs, which is how he met Murderface, and he remained their number one supplier. He had mostly moved on from the drugs now and was trying to become a music producer. He was about eighteen and lived in some scummy apartment downtown with another guy, John Twinkletits, who was creepy in a whole different way. Toki had only met Dick's roommate once, at one of the few parties he'd ever attended, and was glad that that was the extent of his time spent with John Twinkletits. As far as Dick went, Toki liked him well enough. He didn't really know him, but he felt fondly towards anybody who could get him into a show for free.

"Do you know anything about these guys?" That was Pickles, determined to keep the conversation going. He had stopped drumming his thighs and had his arms at his sides. Murderface produced a bag of chocolate-coated candy from somewhere and popped them in his mouth as if they were pills; Dick was still working on that diet soda. He extended a hand towards Murderface without looking and Murderface begrudgingly shook some candy from the bag onto his open hand. Knubbler chased his soda with the handful of candy, smiling just the slightest bit.

"Hmm? Yeah, yeah," He said, after he'd swallowed. He exaggerated his vowels a lot when he talked and it distracted Toki, taking him out of what Dick was saying. "They're a quaint little band from about a town over. Lead guitarist's supposed to be really good. They say he carries the band."

"Who says?" Nathan asked. He jerked his head to get a piece of hair out of his face and stared openly at the bag of candy Murderface had. Murderface sure as sin wasn't going to share his food with anybody else, not after getting mooched off by one person; pure pain sparkled in Nathan's eyes. Toki could tell Murderface was getting off on this, eating the candy with a giant, smug grin and elaborate movements.

"Just—they, I don't know," Dick said. He drank some more soda. "How's school?"

"It sucks," Nathan and Pickles said simultaneously. Pickles did the thing like he wanted to look at Nathan again, his lips jerking. "You're so fucking smart for getting out," Nathan continued. He didn't say it like a compliment, more of a general statement.

"School is just so oppressive," Dick said. He bent down and placed the bottle of soda, now half-drank, by his foot on the ground. When he bent back up he straightened out his jacket and flicked his head back in a similar fashion to how Nathan had done it previously, like a horse trying to get rid of a fly. He combed through his hair with his fingers, getting the part back in order.
"Sure," Nathan said. He still had his arms crossed, one leg sticking out, his figure hulking above them all. "I just thought, you know. That it fuckin' sucks."

"I think it'sch gay," Murderface announced through a mouthful of chewed candy. Toki wrinkled his nose in disgust automatically; he had the same problem with talking with his mouth full and it bothered him when other people did it particularly. Murderface of course had no such shame, smacking his food and talking with his mouth wide open.

"I know you do, hon," Dick said, placing a hand on Murderface's shoulder. Dick was the type of person who always called other people hon and placed his hand on their shoulder,no matter what their relationship was. Murderface grunted and swatted Dick's hand away. Dick, unaffected, swung his arm down to his side. He retrieved his bottle of soda and sipped from it.

"What've you been up to, Dick?" Pickles said, making an attempt to draw the conversation back into something feasible. He was still smoking, trying to blow the smoke away from the group, but the wind was blowing in their direction. Toki felt his efforts to be futile; he'd inhaled so much first and secondhand smoke in his lifetime that twenty minutes of Pickles chain-smoking couldn't make the slightest of a difference, and he figured the others to be in similar positions. "Workin' with any bands?"

Dick shook his head. "The scene's kind of dead right now," he said. "That's why I'm here, to see if these guys are any good, you know? Maybe they're looking for a producer. Like I said, I hear great things about their lead guitarist."

"That's pretty cool," Pickles said. He stood on his tiptoes to look over Dick's shoulder, at the crowd of people. "There's a good amount of people here, yeah."

Dick made a noise of agreement.

The crowd swelled throughout the remainder of the twenty minutes. Murderface and Dick walked over to the records, which were new and exciting to them and old news to Toki, Pickles, and Nathan. Nathan sulked to himself, moving into the shadows against the wall of the record store, and Pickles joined Dick and Murderface regardless, offering snobbish opinions that tended to contrast Dick's own snobbish opinions. Murderface chewed his candy noisily and happily until the entire bag had vanished into his cavernous mouth, and then tried to join Pickles's and Dick's conversation, offering uniformed thoughts on various bands. Toki watched as more people flocked around Patio Lobo; it looked like they'd fill the place pretty well, if not to the brim. He wondered if he could get a mosh pit going. The crowd looked adequate, nubile physiques in scant clothing that had the room to move a body in, and he was in the sort of mood that made for good moshing. The more he thought about it the more he really wanted to get a mosh pit going, the urge itching beneath his limbs.

After a while the meshed door swung open and a bouncer appeared, shuffling people in. Dick gave their tickets and the guy nodded at him; they were some of the first people inside. Toki could tell that Dick thought that made him hot shit. He puffed his chest up and was talking loud and boisterous about nothing in particular in the direction of no one in particular. Pickles was humoring him with half-hearted responses, Murderface with grunts. Nathan and Toki were silent, though Toki was busy taking the place in, while Nathan was most likely still sulking.

Patio Lobo was set up with a stage at one end and a bar with tables shoved in a cramped amount of space towards the other, a bunch of room for standing and hopefully moshing in between. The décor was done in browns, peeling posters plastered to the walls, and there were an abundant amount of lighting fixtures embedded in the ceiling. On the stage was the band's equipment, all of the instruments black, surrounded by cheap amps piled on top of each other. One instrument certainly stood out above the others: a shining black-and-white guitar towards Toki's right, set apart from the rest. Their logo was painted over the drums, a sloppy job, the A of Academy an anarchy symbol with a half-open circle. The stage was pretty well-lit but nobody was on it, the band presumably behind the curtains. The tables towards the back were round and wooden and a bartender, a young man with a stud earring in one ear and a close-cut hairstyle, was cleaning a glass, looking bored by it all. As Toki expected, he was not impressed with the interior, but he was not particularly disappointed. Patio Lobo had a good vibe and lot of potential for an enjoyable night and Toki was beginning to get pumped up, eager for a mosh pit and noisy music fogging his mind. His previous frustrations dissipated and he was looking forward to losing himself and walking out half-deaf, yelling cheerfully throughout the event. The excitement he'd been feeling all week was teeming, spilling over, and he could hardly stomach the wait.

Toki and the rest walked towards the front of the stage, a few feet back. People closed in around them. Toki felt sort of buzzed, as the atmosphere of Patio Lobo felt sort of buzzed. It was good; everything was good; everything was going to be good. There was only a few minutes gap between the crowd and the band appearing on stage, all walking in at around the same time but not in a particularly coordinated fashion.

The drummer took his seat and Toki could feel Pickles, a true percussionist, stiffening as he judged him. The drummer was a tall guy with frizzy blond hair tied back in a ponytail; he was shirtless and had angel wings tattooed across his chest, writing Toki couldn't read in between them. He looked in his late teens, early twenties at most, and had the generally glazed look of a guy who did a lot of weed. Pickles murmured something to Nathan, definitely a ruling on the drummer, and Nathan chuckled in a low, rumbling way. One guy, completely average in every aspect except for his hugely gauged and plugged ears, went over to the guitar to Toki's left and slung the strap around his neck. Judging by the state of the guitar, Toki guessed that he wasn't the lead; the guy fumbled with the instrument just a little as he was putting it on, like he was new to it. Another guy, short with dark hair and wearing a shirt with an elaborate depiction of the inner anatomy of a human being's torso across the front, took the bass from the side and approached the microphone. He was a little sweaty already and smiling a little. His eyes were wide and gave him an earnest, enthusiastic look, but Toki could tell he was nervous.

"A basschist who'sch alchso a vocalischt?" Murderface said, overly loud; the guy heard him and gave him a look.

"Well, it's not unheard of," Dick said, more to Murderface than to anybody else.

Toki barely heard what Dick was saying despite the fact he was standing right next to him, as Toki's attention was drawn to the lead guitarist. He appeared to be the youngest in the band, judging by his lithe, youthful frame and absolutely angelic face, the type of guy Toki was jealous of for aesthetics alone. He had come onto the stage just the shortest amount of time after everybody else and looked far more calm, definitely more comfortable, as he strode to his designated position. Even from where Toki was standing he could tell that he had good hands for the guitar: long and lean fingers, veins strengthened and visible from years of playing, and he slung the strap of his instrument over his head with ease. Naturally, he had picked up the gleaming black-and-white guitar to Toki's right, and he looked so natural that Toki knew his mind was going to be blown before the guy played a single note. Unlike the rest of the band, who were dressed in blacks and grays and in the case of their drummer, green cargo pants, this guy was decked in all white: tight white jeans and an oversized, holey white shirt, the front of it tucked into his jeans so he could display his belt buckle: the flag of Sweden. He was truly a marvel, such an astonishing sight that Toki's mouth went dry and his palms began to sweat, his heart thumping loud and hard inside of his chest.

"Goddamn," Dick said, and they all knew he was talking about the lead guitarist.

The bassist-slash-vocalist tapped the microphone with his fingers a few times; the noise resonated throughout the club. He leaned his head down. "Hey," he said. He had a normal voice, not one that sounded like it would make for unique vocals. Sometimes that could be a good sign, though, Toki supposed, and he wasn't about to make assumptions before the band even began playing. "You guys excited?"

The crowd cheered back, shouts and hollers filling the air; a few people whistled, Dick one of them.

The bassist smiled a little and did something with his hands, like he wasn't sure what to actually do with them. "Well, I'm Mark Skively, that's George Desford—" he gestured back to the rhythm guitarist, and then to the drummer—"Ritchie Ledbury—" and lastly the lead guitarist—"and Skwisgaar Skwigelf. We're Fuckface Academy, so prepared to have your face fucked," he said, and he laughed a little, but the sound was obscured by the whooping of the crowd.

Of course, the bassist wasn't done talking. "So the first song we're gonna play is something we literally just cooked up, like, three hours ago," he said, smiling. He had a toothy grin and pronounced canines. "It's called, uh, it's called Trichodesmium Flatwoods, and we have no fuckin' idea what that means." He waited for the crowd to die down before saying, "So this is our never-before-heard, exclusive song, just for you guys," and beginning to play. Toki had hardly noticed that he was cheering until he was one of the last ones, and then he stopped, his face reddening.

Trichodesmium Flatwoods—Toki had no fuckin' idea what that meant, either—began with a low bass surging in, then picked up with the drums, then the rhythm guitar laying down a simple riff. The build-up until the lead guitar and the vocals came in lasted maybe twenty seconds, all of the music clashing together in dissonance, nothing truly fitting together; the individual instruments sounded like they were playing parts of different songs, or solos at the same time. For twenty seconds Toki hated the band, as Toki hated music that was just noise without a purpose, but then the lead guitar came in on a grinding, preposterously fast and outrageously complicated line of sound, trailed by the vocals. Toki's eyes were fixated to the lead guitar's hands—he was playing with a pick, faster than Toki had ever seen, the whiteness of his skin blurring. It sounded like he was improvising, just merely practicing against the backdrop of whatever the fuck his band was doing, and it was beautiful, it was just so beautiful. The lyrics to the song—the bassist-slash-vocalist did indeed have an average range, one that could be enhanced by vocals and the music but was really not—were simple, rather insipid: we spit on the face of life, we dance on the grave of death, stuck in between, we are undefined, repeated three times in a row.

Dick swore under his breath, a steady stream of cock shit damn fuck, over and over, but Toki could barely hear him. All he could hear was the lead guitar. The song raged on rather repetitively for about a minute but then the bassist-slash-vocalist backed off from the mic, the rhythm stopped altogether, and the drums slowed. The lead guitarist stepped up towards the front of the stage and began to play a solo, a screeching stream of orgasmic guitar for forty-five seconds. He remained composed throughout the whole thing, his body curved in towards the guitar and face cast down on his hands, which is where Toki's gaze was at anyway. When he backed off and the drums picked back up and the rhythm reentered and the bassist-slash-vocalist stepped up and howled out "Trichodesmium flatwoods, fuck yeah," in a surely mispronounced manner, Toki felt legitimately saddened.

At the end of their first song the drummer tossed his drumsticks up in the air and caught them before swinging them into a final clang against the syllables. The lead guitarist did nothing, the rhythm retreated back into himself, and the bassist-slash-vocalist flicked his hair—he had fringe that extended past his right eye—and took the mic in his hands again. "You guys like that?" The crowd cheered back—what else would a crowd do?—and the guy smiled his canine smile. He had an easily readable face, emotions there for all to see, and Toki could tell that he was happy, that he was in the zone. "All right, the next one is called Ex-Knife, and it's about this chick I used to fuck in high school."

Toki couldn't lie—the band sucked. The vocals and the rhythm guitar were barely above average, the bass was dreadful, and the drums were okay. The drummer and the front man had enthusiasm, really put their heart into it, and were both sweaty at the end of song three—which was their classic "Fuck Love, Let's Fuck"—but the rhythm was listless and barely moved at all, just stood there biting his bottom lip and playing the guitar. The lead guitarist didn't move that much either, but he didn't have to, just standing there and playing was impressive enough. In a band there was always one guy with more spirit than the rest, who danced and twisted around almost a little too much, and that was definitely the front man, wailing as he played the bass. Toki got a mosh pit going by the fourth song—their other classic, "Bite Me Baby"—and was feeling really fucking good. Nathan was motionless but Pickles was into it, cheering at the appropriate times and rocking in place to the beat of the drums. Dick stared in open-mouthed amazement at the lead guitarist, ogling him like a piece of meat, and Murderface was looking around the room, bored. Toki moshed throughout most of their set, except for when the bassist-slash-vocalist was talking—and that guy sure was a talker, asking for audience feedback and making lame jokes between every song—and Toki's plain white shirt was practically translucent with sweat, his shorts falling off of his hips, his feet aching. But he was feeling really, really fucking good.

There was a small interlude as the band members wiped themselves off and fixed their amps, which had been experiencing problems around the seventh song ("Addled Intercourse") and Toki elbowed his way through the crowd to get back to his friends. His hair was plastered to his forehead and he was panting but he was feeling drunk, wishing he was. Dick went off to get them drinks, which really just meant bottles of water, and Toki couldn't stop smiling. He approached Pickles, butting in between a quiet conversation between Pickles and Nathan.

"Holy shit," was all Toki said, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand.

Pickles smiled at Toki in a way that looked like he should be tilting his head downwards, though he had to tilt it up since he was shorter than Toki and all. "You like them?" He asked, in a demeaning way.

"Fuck no," Toki said, laughing. "They suck! It's just a good show."

Nathan, who had been standing by Pickles's side with his arms crossed over his chest, mumbled something incoherent to the three-quarters-deaf Toki but apparently decipherable by Pickles, who shoved at him.

"How's the moshing?" Pickles asked, yelling over the randy hum of the crowd. Pickles wasn't one for moshing; he had a slight stature and bruised easily, wasn't aggressive enough to really get into the groove of things. He hung back at shows, enjoyed the music and not the crowd like Toki did.

"Awesome!" Toki shouted. He didn't mean to say it at the top of his voice, but he couldn't hear himself if he didn't.

Murderface, who had been doing something with his phone, looked up. "Eh? Aweschome?" Murderface wasn't one for moshing either; he had the opposite problem of Pickles, possessing too large of a build, and the physical exertion wore him out too easily. If Murderface liked a band he would get into the music, but if he didn't he would spend the whole time on his phone, looking around, wandering off, and just being rude. "How the pissch could anything at thisch schitty schow be aweschome?"

"You're the one who fucking insisted on us coming," Nathan said, glaring at Murderface. "It's your fault this band sucks."

"The lead guitar's pretty good, though," Pickles mused, tapping his chin. "Best I've heard in a long time, actually."

"Yeah," Toki said. He wheezed, his chest hurting, coming down from the high, but he could hear the band repositioning themselves behind him and could see Dick approaching with their drinks. The crowd was closing in around them, getting restless in the break in the music, which was admittedly too long. Toki was starting to feel suffocated by the other people and restless himself; he wanted the band to resume playing so he could resume moshing and shake away the claustrophobia.

"Whatever," Murderface mumbled. He put his phone away and accepted a bottle of water from Dick, chugging it.

Toki took his own water and drank half of it before handing it back to Dick and walking over to where the mosh pit was reforming. The band was gearing up to play again, the bassist-slash-vocalist positively radiating with fervor, the drummer doing tricks with his sticks, the rhythm brooding off by himself, and the lead guitarist standing coolly. Though there wasn't a spotlight, the attention was definitely on the lead guitar. Toki was struck by the urge to make eye contact and smile at him but decided against it, instead beginning to grind to the beat of the drums as they hammered out the intro their next song, "Illegal, Trusty, Damn."

The band played a total of fifteen songs averaging two and a half minutes each with some downtime in between that they spent bullshitting with the audience, generally having a good time. The show lasted about an hour and a half, ending at nine o'clock at night, and Toki was feeling light by the time it was over, his head in a different place than his body, felt as if he was floating as opposed to walking. Half the crowd filed out when the band said goodnight and began to disassemble their set. The other half stayed and gravitated towards the back, towards the tables and the drinks, and that's where Toki and the rest of his group went. Dick got them a table and they got a round of drinks with their fake I.D.'s, except for Nathan, who drank from a Coke with a sour expression. He was their designated driver, of course, and despite the fact that he'd get doubly drunk at home, he was still sore over the fact.

"What a show," Pickles said, swirling his whiskey around in his cup. "What a band." He laughed at the last part and the rest of the group joined in.

"They fuckin' schucked, Dick!" Murderface spat, pushing his hands on the edge of the table and rotating to say this in Dick's direction. Murderface scowled when everybody else howled, their laughter from what Pickles had said only escalating.

"Yeah, but the lead guitar," Dick said, whistling. "Holy Christ. If I could get my hands on that."

Toki looked over his shoulder, his hands wrapped around some fruity concoction that was actually pretty tasty, at the stage. The bassist-slash-vocalist was not on it, but in the area in front of it, talking with a gaggle of girls who clearly wanted his dick. The rhythm was doing most of the work, the drummer and the lead guitar having a conversation towards the back of the stage, though the lead guitarist didn't seem that involved in what the drummer was saying. The lead guitarist kept looking off to the side and his body was in a different direction than the drummer; he didn't even give him the pleasure of making eye contact. "Yeah," Toki said softly enough that he wasn't heard over the sound of high spirits. "Their lead guitar."

They drank through a few rounds, Toki not drinking as much as the others, killing time before they had to go home. Nathan's curfew was not officially set any actual time, though his parents preferred him home by the time the sun was up, and that was extended to the rest of them by default (except for Dick, who had no curfew.) Toki wanted to smoke and thus restrained from getting too drunk, just enough to add onto how fucking good he'd been feeling all night, and he was still feeling pretty fucking good. He laughed at practically everything people were saying—he was a giggly drunk—long and loud, resulting in snorting fits that dissolved into hiccupping and thumping his fists on the table. Dick had his chest puffed up again and kept talking about how this show was his idea and he got them in for free and everybody should be sucking his cock and worshipping at his feet; Murderface was whacking Dick on the back and agreeing with every word that came out of his mouth. Pickles spent more time trying to lighten Nathan up, who was in an utterly foul mood. "Your face is gonna get stuck that way," Pickles said, pushing the words through his snickers, since Nathan's face was stuck in such a heavy scowl that he looked practically cartoonish.

When the band had all of their equipment broken down and stored away they walked over to the tables and were hailed as celebrities, girls hanging off of them and guys trying to chat them up. The rhythm guitarist was getting flagged by chicks—Toki had no idea why, for there was truly nothing special about the guy—and the bassist seemed to have already picked out a few girls, entertaining them at a table. The drummer found a horde of guys that all looked like him and were talking to them at a table towards the back. The lead guitarist had shot straight for the bar and ordered something that looked like pure alcohol and began to wander around, sipping at his clear drink. Dick flagged him down, and to Toki's surprise the guy—Skwisgaar Skwigelf, Toki remembered—pulled a chair up, rotated it around, and sat on it, overlapping his arms on the edge of the chair and straddling the back with his skinny thighs. He sat directly across from Toki.

"Ja?" He said. His voice dripped with an accent and he spoke in a lazy, drawling style. "What's you wants?" His English was absolutely terrible, and in their uninhibited state, Toki's friends exchanged befuddled glances. They hadn't heard him speak on stage, and his vernacular came as sort of a shock. Toki was too busy trying not to stare, instead directing his gaze towards the table, wondering if he was sitting at pressboard or real wood. He decided it was pressboard after a few seconds, and then he just stared at the patterns. He was intimidated, feeling small—Skwisgaar Skwigelf was the type of guy that had that effect on him, like Pickles but times infinity, where the feeling of wanting to be them would start to slip away and instead Toki would just feel, well, small.

"You were so fucking good," Dick said, slapping Skwisgaar Skwigelf on the back. Skwisgaar Skwigelf grimaced. Having already a slurred style of speaking, Dick sounded ridiculous when drunk off his ass. Toki had respect for Skwisgaar Skwigelf for staying. "I'm a producer. I could do good things for you and your band."

"It ams not my band," Skwisgaar Skwigelf said, almost reflexively, and he sounded bitter. "It ams Mark's, you ams havings to talks to him if you ams wantings to gets anywhere."

Dick screwed his face up as he tried to work out what Skwisgaar had said. When it hit him, he unscrewed his face and announced, "It should be your band. You're amazing."

The flattery made Skwisgaar smile. "Ja," he said. It wasn't a question; it was an agreement. Skwisgaar Skwigelf was amazing and Skwisgaar Skwigelf knew it. It was evident in the way he carried himself, haughtily with proper posture, in the way that he spoke at his own pace, and the way that he wore an amused expression constantly. This was what Toki had found out in the minute amount of time he had been acquainted with Skwisgaar Skwigelf, at least.

"Let me buy you some drinks," Dick said, waving his arm through the air in a wide, sweeping manner. A waitress that had appeared after the show was over came to their table, and she looked like a waitress who had to deal with nothing but drunken men during her shift, like she wanted to break a beer bottle over her head and drink the shards. "Stay, talk."

"Ja, okay," Skwisgaar said. He was indulging them; it was obvious, as if he had nothing better to be doing and might as well amuse himself. Dick indeed bought Skwisgaar some more drinks, throwing garbled words at the waitress, and Skwisgaar stayed, and Toki was surprised by this indeed.

"So where're you from?" Dick asked when Skwisgaar was sucking down his second drink, straight vodka. He didn't seem drunk in the slightest; Toki gathered that he could hold his liquor pretty well. The conversation had splintered to something between just Dick and Skwisgaar, everybody else watching on in amazement. Toki had already deduced that Skwisgaar spoke with a Swedish accent and judging by the belt buckle was probably Swedish, but he wasn't about to leap into this conversation and he doubted that any of his friends knew what the flag of Sweden looked like, so he kept his mouth shut.

"Sweden," Skwisgaar said, and the pride in his voice was apparent. He shook his glass around a little before he drank from it, bobbing happily. "I comes here maybe seven months ago. I leaves Sweden, and I keeps buying plane tickets, and it boughts me here."

"That is fucking fascinating!" Dick said, and he thumped Skwisgaar on the back again; he didn't grimace this time. "That is a story you could really sell." He was speaking like he had experience in management and production, which he did not, unless half-assing his roommate's band counted. Toki supposed that it could, but not in the sense that Dick wanted it too.

"I subpose," Skwisgaar said. He did the thing where he shook from his glass before drinking from it again, and this time he tipped his head back, his Adam's apple exposed and dipping while he drank. Perhaps he was beginning to get a little bit tipsy, or maybe he acted like this all the time; Toki had no idea. He wanted to find out, though.

"How do you like it here?" Pickles chimed in at this point. He sounded hesitant but friendly enough that you couldn't reasonably pick up on it, swirling the whiskey in his glass around. Pickles had one hand under the table and one on his glass and he was sitting farther away from Nathan and closer to Toki than he normally did. Pickles was a friendly drunk and he was smiling brazenly, his lips threatening to split his face in two.

"It ams okays," Skwisgaar said. "It ams nothings in compariskon with Sweden, dough."

Toki couldn't help it; he was raised in Norway, and even though Norway held terrible memories, he loved his country, and Skwisgaar just looked so goddamn self-righteous as he spoke about Sweden, and so he proclaimed, "Norway is better!" After saying it, he fought the urge to clamp his hands over his mouth and dissolve into the floor.

Skwisgaar looked directly at Toki—the eye contact was making Toki quiver and now he was fighting the urge to yelp and dive beneath the table—and raised a single eyebrow. "Reallys?" He asked, smirking.

The demeaning attitude was beginning to wear thin on Toki, intimidation and awe replaced with a sense of annoyance. "Really," he responded, glaring and hissing the word between his teeth.

"What ams so great about Norways?" Skwisgaar asked, staring at Toki in a blatantly challenging manner, one eyebrow raised.

"Everything," Toki said, staring back just as equally hard. The rest of the table had gone silent, watching their back-and-forth, though the din of the club was hanging behind their heads as background music. Toki was losing the sense of being small, growing inside, getting riled up again, but he was a little too intoxicated to justify how Norway might be better than Sweden. He grappled for an answer, his mouth flapping open and shit stupidly, and frustration coated his body as he finally let his forehead fall to the table. The pressboard hurt when he hit it. He felt ultimately stupid for more reasons than just being unable to defend Norway.

"Well," Skwisgaar said, drawing out his words. Toki could hear the thick smugness in his voice, thick as smog, and Toki's cheeks were hot pressed against that pressboard. "I cans assures you dat Norway is dildos." Toki raised his head just enough to watch Skwisgaar; Skwisgaar shot the rest of his vodka back after he said this, finally lowering that goddamn eyebrow. Dick immediately ordered him another drink, desperate for Skwisgaar to stay.

"Heh, dildos," Pickles said, chuckling. "That's a good one."

Skwisgaar somehow managed to lean back, basking in the glow of the admiration of the table, which was plain to see and tangible. Dick stared at Skwisgaar like he was a god incarnate, like he was his own personal savior. Murderface tried to look like he didn't give a fuck but he clearly did, sneaking glances at Skwisgaar when he thought the others weren't looking. Pickles, good-natured as always, behaved in his good-natured way, and even Nathan wasn't completely moody anymore. Toki couldn't see why—Skwisgaar was getting on his last nerve for inexplicable reasons. He couldn't really explain why, except that he didn't like guys that were full of themselves, or that dismissed others' thoughts so easily, or that thought they were the ultimate shit, even when they sort of were. He had to admit that Skwisgaar was pretty fucking cool. Fuck. He didn't know. Clearly, he was too intoxicated to be making proper judgments at this hour.

"Where'd you learn to play guitar like that?" Dick asked, trying to ease the conversation away from Toki and Skwisgaar, who were still locked in a staring contest. Toki had learned not to blink from his childhood; Skwisgaar seemed to have been born without the need to. The contest did give Toki and excuse to observe Skwisgaar more closely; he had very blue eyes and long, fine eyelashes, almost transparent but glittering, since he was a blond, his hair rolling down past his shoulders and towards his midsection. He was blond in a yellowish way, unlike the drummer who was blond in a brownish way, and Toki didn't know if Skwisgaar's hair was naturally that nice or if he cared for it particularly well. He wondered what it smelled like, and he thought that if he knew then he would find the answer to his question. Skwisgaar did look like the type of guy that took superb care of himself and his body; his skin was smooth and somehow the smoothness managed to accent his face, his high cheekbones, the cut of his jaw. What Toki had initially thought was confirmed during their little contest—Skwisgaar was an aesthetic spectacle and Toki had lost whether he wanted to be him or to just look at him along the way.

Skwisgaar shrugged and didn't break away from Toki's gaze. "I just did," he said. "I ams a natural." His eyes flashed as he spoke; Toki felt hot beneath his shirt, when he had been feeling sort of cold, the dampness of the material from his sweat catching up with his now motionless state.

"Fuck yeah, you are," Nathan said. "What? He was pretty good," he continued, after Pickles shot him an incredulous look.

"How hard could playing grunge be," Toki muttered, though he knew it was a stupid thing to say. He was looking off towards the side now, not wanting to look at Skwisgaar despite the fact that he really wanted to look at Skwisgaar, and he could hear his scoff in response to Toki's comment.

"As if you could does any betters," Skwisgaar said. Toki darted his eyes to get another look at him—he was doing the stupid eyebrow thing again and hadn't broken his share of the staring. At this point, Toki was too busy feeling idiotic over how stunned and impressed he'd been with Skwisgaar at first, when he was just a figure on stage without a personality. Off stage he was an asshole, and Toki shouldn't have been so impressed with an asshole. He didn't like assholes; assholes were, well, assholes. He tried not to associate with them and the problem was that apart from how much Skwisgaar was irritating him at the moment, he had a nagging fear that Skwisgaar would realize how lame they were—Toki's lameness spoke for itself, Pickles was okay, Nathan had a sort of pathetic life, so did Murderface, and Dick's life was really pathetic—and leave, never to be seen again. Toki didn't want that, he wanted Skwisgaar to remain at their table, and he wanted to look at Skwisgaar and talk to him forever, and he couldn't explain that, so instead he averted his eyes and glared at the table.

"Boys," Dick said and he cleared his throat, like the rest of the table were children and he was this amazing adult, although nobody knew how old Skwisgaar was, "be civil, now."

Skwisgaar paused in his actions for a second, like he was considering Dick's words. "Okays," he said, after some thought. "Ams you from Norway?" He asked, still looking exclusively at Toki. Toki dared to reestablish eye contact, and he was afraid that if he kept it for too long he would literally combust.

"Yes," Toki said, though his response was clipped, terse. His jaw was tight and his hands were sweaty and he was aware of how loud the rest of the club was; people were carrying on conversations gleefully around them, like Toki's world wasn't about to collapse into itself, and inwardly he was blaming this on how drunk he was. The place still had good vibes and this added to his intoxication.

"You speaks pretty good Enklish," Skwisgaar said conversationally. He had placed a single elbow on the chair edge and rested his hand in it, taking little drinks from his vodka. His lips curled in an odd way when he spoke, exposing his teeth, which were nice like Dick's but not in an artificially whitened way. Unlike his personality, as far as appearance went, Skwisgaar could do no wrong.

Toki shrugged. He was beginning to feel placated by Skwisgaar's presence and that had the opposite effect of making him feel not at ease in Skwisgaar's presence and he didn't know what the fuck was going on with his feelings so he tried to shove his way through them and have a normal conversation. "I moved here when I was ten. I had a lot of time to learn. Not like you, apparently."

Skwisgaar shrugged. "I talks it good enough to understands, ja? There ams no need to wastes my time." The tone of his voice had changed; it was lazy again, but not in a bad way, and all aggression— or maybe that wasn't the right word for it, but Toki couldn't come up with a better one — had evaporated from it. He was looking only at Toki, not even responding to Dick's attempts at speaking, and Toki couldn't explain why that was making him mad. He was still working on just saying fuck-all to these pesky emotions; he would deal with them later.

"I like languages," Toki said. He said it with caution; he was still uncertain of Skwisgaar in general, and the things he was making him feel, and he wasn't having much luck with the repression ideal. He opened his mouth to elaborate on his statement—he liked languages because he couldn't speak at home, because he was fascinated with the ways other spoke, because expression through words was just another thing other people had that he didn't, and he had had ample time to learn English because he didn't have anything else to do in his free time—but he realized that maybe that wasn't something you said to people you just met, so he shut it again.

"Dat's nice," Skwisgaar said, and maybe it had the slightest bit of a condescending tone, but that put Toki at ease more than the conversational one had. He fought the urge to sigh in relief and listened to the rest of what Skwisgaar had to say. "I likes guitar."

Toki snorted. "Dat's obvious," he said, and he reddened a little when he realized that he had adopted Skwisgaar's pronunciation of his t's. He blamed it on the fact that Swedish and Norwegian accents were similar, and he had struggled with his own t's when he had first started learning English. Luckily, it was subtle enough that nobody else had noticed, and being red-faced was just a side-effect of being intoxicated. He doubted anybody else would've cared if they weren't wrapped up in their own conversations—Dick and Murderface were speaking with their foreheads almost together and Pickles had spun on his chair to face Nathan—but Toki cared.

"Ams it?" Skwisgaar said, and he smiled. It was a genuine smile, not a condescending one, and Toki returned it without meaning to.

"Well, you're so good at it," Toki said, and he had to translate the words to Norwegian and back again before he could say them, which was something that did not happen often. He blamed Skwisgaar and his butchering of the English language for making Toki forget how to properly speak. "You wouldn't be that good if you hated it."

"Dat's true," Skwisgaar said. He curved his upper body around; Toki heard his back stretch. Toki wondered if standing on stage like that would cause soreness, wondered how Skwisgaar remedied it. He was about to ask, but Skwisgaar wasn't finished speaking, and Skwisgaar didn't seem like the type of person you would willingly interrupt. "Why does you comes to dis show?"

"Well," Toki said, and he had to think back to remember why he had actually come to this show, because now he wanted to say to witness your godly guitar skills and that wasn't the right answer, "Dick got us in for free." He gestured to Dick; he wasn't sure if he and Skwisgaar had exchanged formal introductions yet.

"Did you likes it?" Skwisgaar quirked his eyebrow again. Toki wished he would stop doing that.

"Um," Toki said. He racked his brain for an appropriate response that would not be too offensive or too flattering and came up short.

Skwisgaar laughed, and it was a pleasant sound, though a little awkward. He sounded like he didn't laugh often, or at all, the sound of his laughter rusty and his mouth unaccustomed to the motions. Toki found it sort of endearing, wanted to make him laugh more so he could iron out all the kinks in it and perfect it, because there shouldn't be anything about Skwisgaar that wasn't perfect. "Dis band sucks," Skwisgaar said when he stopped laughing. "But we ams playingks another show, next Saturday, at a festivitivals, in dis area. You shoulds comes." Toki registered with some embarrassment that Skwisgaar had not stopped holding eye contact with him, was speaking to him, was inviting him, and not the rest.

Toki opened his mouth to answer Skwisgaar, but Dick found the gap in conversation as an opportunity to leap in. "We would love to come!" He exclaimed, clapping Murderface and Skwisgaar on the shoulders both at once. "And you should really think about my offer."

"I will talks to Mark about it," Skwisgaar said, and then he stood up and stretched. Toki gaped at him while he did so; Skwisgaar was thin, in an appealing way, his limbs lean. Skwisgaar closed his eyes while he stretched, reaching his arms up over his head, and he was quite tall, taller than Nathan even. When he came down Toki averted his eyes before Skwisgaar could open his own and catch Toki staring, because Toki had the feeling that Skwisgaar would look at him in a way like he knew something, and that would make Toki feel uncomfortable. Skwisgaar straightened out his clothes, tucking his shirt behind his belt buckle and readjusting it, and then he spun the chair around so it fit snugly against the table in the proper manner. "Well, I ams goingks to finds a slut to fucks," he said, and this was met with a chorus of approving hoots around the table, though Toki remained quiet. His silence went unnoticed in the congratulatory, approving uproar. Toki could not explain why this made incredibly angry feelings rise in him, but it did, and it was scary, and he had no idea how he was going to deal about anything in the moment.

Skwisgaar walked away, towards the group of girls Mark had already picked out, and Toki watched him go with narrow eyes. Skwisgaar would have absolutely no problem finding a slut to fuck; Toki doubted there was a girl in the bar who didn't want him. Toki was feeling jealous, but he wasn't quite sure of what or who he was jealous of, and he was too drunk to figure it out but not drunk enough that he would forget it. He didn't want to get any drunker; he wanted to get high, he decided.

"What a guy," Dick said, sighing. He fiddled with his sunglasses, setting them right on his nose. He was leaning back and almost fanning himself, overwhelmed by how impressed he was by Skwisgaar. "What a guy."

"Let's get out of here," Toki said, standing up. Skwisgaar had taken a seat at the other table and Toki did not want to watch him woo a woman or whatever. "I want to get high," he said, for needless explanation afterwards.

"Fine by me," Nathan grunted, and they were off. Dick paid for everybody and Toki thought the tab had to be high, but they didn't say anything. They stumbled out of the club, the walk from the table to the door feeling twice as long as it did coming in, and Dick winked at the bouncer on the way out.

They drove Dick home; though he had taken his car and parked downtown, he lived close enough that he could walk and retrieve it in the morning. Dick lived in the shittiest of the shitty apartments, on the seventh floor. Toki had only been there once, at the party where he met John Twinkletits, and he wouldn't mind if he never went inside again. Dick walked straight into the entrance like he was tackling a red carpet entrance, but he tripped over his feet when he was a few inches away from the door and Murderface burst into uproarious laughter. Murderface's ludicrous laugh was contagious and Toki returned to that feeling of feeling really fucking good as they drove home. Nathan lived in the middle of town, about fifteen minutes from Dick's apartments, and being near ten o'clock on Saturday night traffic was thick. The atmosphere in the car was jovial, affecting even the temperamental Nathan, and he didn't suffer as badly from road rage as he would've if they hadn't just attended a fucking awesome show by a fucking terrible band and met a pretty cool guy.

Nathan pulled in front of his house, parking his truck behind his mother's soccer mom SUV, and they spilled out of the doors. Pickles fell, landing in the dirt between sidewalk and road, and Nathan clutched at his stomach, shaking with how hilarious this was, before proffering a hand to help Pickles up. Murderface called them fags but that didn't mean anything so they all went into Nathan's house. His parents were sitting in the living room watching the news—some car crash on some bridge covered live—and Nathan said hello to them before Toki and the rest entered the kitchen. They were being brash, making a lot of noise without meaning, slamming cabinets and rifling for snacks. Toki found some taffy on the counter and chewed on that; Pickles stuck a frozen pizza in the oven; Murderface grabbed a container of frosting from the pantry; Nathan fished out leftovers from dinner, which had been homemade fried chicken, and bit off the skin from a leg. Pickles sat on the counter by the stove while he waited for his pizza to cook; Toki hopped up on the one on the other side of the stove. Nathan remained standing, propping the refrigerator open with his foot for easier access to food, and Murderface sat at the kitchen table, scooping vanilla icing out with a spoon.

They stayed in those positions while Pickles's pizza cooked and bullshitted about school, life, the car crash that was on the bridge, everybody on edge in a pleasant way from the show and the night. Nathan's parents went to bed shortly thereafter, walking through the kitchen to get to their room, and they shook their heads in a fond sort of way at the group of boys sprawled out over their kitchen. Toki's heart was bursting with the amount of which he felt like he belonged here, in a scene taken directly from somebody else's better life, and he thought that the only thing missing was just one more companion. Nathan and Pickles had each other, which left Toki and Murderface, but Murderface had Dick and Toki didn't want Murderface anyway. The hollow ache wasn't as strong as it had been in times past, and although he felt like he was missing something he still felt so amazing, so right, and so lost to these aforementioned feelings that he jumped when Pickles jumped down to retrieve his pizza from the oven

Toki had finished his taffy and had grabbed for a bag of corn chips, eating them without salsa. Murderface had made his way through half of the icing and pushed it off to the side, spoon still sticking out of the can. Pickles took his pizza out of the oven—it was one of the huge kinds meant to serve a whole family—and carried it with him as he started to walk towards the stairs. Nathan took a jar of salsa from the refrigerator and nodded to Toki as an indication to bring the chips up, and Toki did, and then they were on the stairs, everybody quiet in concentration so they wouldn't trip and spill their food.

Pickles placed the pizza on Nathan's computer desk and went immediately to his bedside table, where Nathan's stash of weed was. He rolled a blunt and took a hit immediately, sighing hard, then handed it down to Toki; Toki had taken his usual place under the windowsill. Everybody got the food they wanted and formed a square, Toki and Pickles under the windowsill and Murderface and Nathan across from them respectively. Nathan had retrieved a bottle of booze from his closet and was drinking straight from it; Murderface had gotten shitfaced at the club and was still reeling from that. Toki and Pickles smoked, passing the blunt back and forth, until Toki felt he was high enough. Pickles, who never seemed to reach that limit, never stopped smoking.

"Scho we're going nescht weekend, right?" Murderface asked, dipping a chip into the jar of salsa, loading the poor thing with as much as it could take. He got salsa all over his chin as he placed the chip inside of his mouth, and he stuck his tongue out to lick it all up.

"Fuck, I mean, do you guys want to?" This was Nathan. He was sitting Indian-style with the booze between his thighs, looking above Pickles and through the window at the night sky.

"If I don't got anything better to do," Pickles said, shrugging, at the same time Toki said, "Fuck yes." Toki's response garnered stares from his friends; he shrugged. "It was a good show," he said, as way of explanation. It had been—despite the shitty band, it had been a wonderful time, and Toki would like to experience it again. He jumped at any opportunity to get out of the house as well. Besides, he kind of wanted to see Skwisgaar again, and he felt like if he went to the festival Skwisgaar would talk to him.

"How about that Skwisgaar, huh?" Pickles said, and Toki startled, thinking Pickles had somehow read his mind. "What a guitar playin' douchebag," Pickles continued. He was sitting with his legs folded beneath him, following the conversation with his eyes.

"Fucking great guitar player," Nathan said. He turned his head down towards the liquor in his lap and picked it up, unscrewed the cap. "Fucking horrible person."

"I'd kill myschelf if I wasch hisch bandmate," Murderface said, nodding his head. "No queschtion. Juscht—" and he made a motion, drawing his finger across his neck, like he was slicing his own throat open.

"Never met such an arrogant douchebag in my life," Pickles said. "Dick was all over him, though. He's probably jackin' himself off to the memory of his riffs." The group chortled; Toki joined in, mostly because it was true. "Seriously though," Pickles said when the collective laughter had died down, eyes wide.

Murderface leaned over to get another chip; he was the only one still eating. "Dick lovesch guysch like that," he said. "He schayschs that they're alwaysch lookin' for a way to get bigger, so they're more open to producersch."

Pickles nodded up and down several times, his dreads bouncing against his shoulders. "I'm just sayin', he was a douchebag." He crossed his arms over his chest, the joint burning on the tray between Pickles and Toki, and made a noise in this throat indicating that that was his final conclusion.

"I'll drink to that," Nathan said, and he did.

Toki was silent throughout the discussion about Skwisgaar, which made Pickles look over at him, his pupils blown, poke in him the side and say, "He was speakin' only to you, wasn't he? Toki here must be lovesick, eh?" This was met with a chorus of laughter that Toki did not join in on He wouldn't contemplate something as absurd as that in his current state—he would wait to dissect what had occurred that night at a later date and try to enjoy himself in the present moment. He decided that he was not, in fact, high enough, and he snatched the blunt from Pickles's hand.

They fucked around in Nathan's room for a few hours, Nathan blasting his favorite music so he could "rewire their brains after that Fuckface Academy shit," Toki and Pickles attempting to play a game of Go Fish, and Murderface taking his pocketknife out of his jacket and turning the blade over in his hands, admiring it. Toki and Pickles eventually got sick of Go Fish and found a box that contained everything necessary for Checkers and then some in Nathan's closet, and they tried to play that for all of five minutes before they ended up trying to stack the pieces on top of each other in a black-and-red tower of plastic chips. Nathan's music, however, was sending hefty vibrations through the floor and their attempts were foiled, their tower tumbling down. They rolled over onto their backs and laughed, Pickles wheezing and Toki hiccupping, until Pickles somehow managed to fall asleep. By this time it was one in the morning and Murderface had already passed out, snoring and propped on his side with his back to the wall opposite Nathan's bed, his leather jacket laying over him like a blanket and his arms wrapped around his pocket knife like it was a teddy bear. Nathan stripped and put on a pair of gray pajamas before lumbering into his bed, where he passed out almost immediately. Toki stayed on his back, lying near the computer desk—Pickles had been on the opposite side of the checkers board and had curled into a ball in his sleep, in the corner between Nathan's bedside table and the wall.

Toki was the last one to fall asleep that night, lying on the floor of Nathan's bedroom and staring at the ceiling while listening to the rest of the room snore. He counted the cracks in the ceiling through the darkness of the room before his eyes began to droop and his body began to drift and he could not fight it anymore. He muttered to himself, "Dat's nice," in a fond voice of a fond memory, and fell asleep before he could realize what he had just said.