Friends Forever

A man attends his high school reunion only to find how much things have changed.

            It was supposed to be held at a function hall, somewhere nice and halfway ritzy. Two people dropped balls on that. Our class treasurer was in prison on numerous financial charges. His pyramid scheme never got more than two naïve college freshmen and he dipped into our high school class’s account. The money was lost, or no one bothered to recover the funds. Our class president told us that he might need to cancel the reunion. A herculean effort later and we managed to build a new warchest for our president to book a location.

            It was then explained that he was too busy over a gap semester to book a locale. That claim did not explain how he juggled volunteering, multiple AP classes, student government duties, sports, and more in high school to neglect calling at least one function hall. We thought that the Fifth Year Reunion was doomed. Not as if I cared.

            All seemed lost until our former high school principal came through. He knew where a spare room large enough to hold our reunion could be found. He offered the high school gym. Our class vice-president tried to find something else at the midnight hour. The best she did was to negotiate additional permission to use the gym and cafeteria.

I stood before the high school entrance. I hadn’t seen it in five years. I adjusted my clip-on. I needed something to play along with the semi-formal routine. Collared shirt a bit too tight went into pants a bit too loose. A final adjustment of my belt and I hoped that no one would care. Not like I should care about many of these people.

I pushed the door open and saw the same janitor from five years ago. I looked at my assembled peers. They were names and faces that I had already forgotten. Or were they the dates of my past classmates? I couldn’t care. They looked to be too shiny or too happy for my tastes. They did not listen to enough R.E.M or My Chemical Romance. Bad Taylor Swift was all they listened to. They’d make me listen to that garbage again.

The music was a slow hum so far, nothing energetic to get the night going. The tiles were cleaned, a fresh mat laid out, and old trophies shined. A long table laid with fruit punch and drinks. Being on school property precluded alcohol. I peered at the ceiling tiles and noticed fresh replacements. I examined the window curtains. They replaced them and took every memorable stain. I felt a twinge of tragedy seeing those puke green curtains gone.

“Hey!” A voice shouted.

I turned to find a jock, whose name long left me, but I remembered enough to remember to dislike him. Enough about five-years dead rivalries, I extended a hand.

He did not take it, “did you sign in?”

“Come again?” I asked.

“You’ve got to sign in.”

“Could you point me in the direction for that?”

He left without answering my question.

No one would care if I did not sign in, would they? Just to be on the safe side, I scanned the small lobby for anything that could be a sign-in table. Nothing apparent and I made my way to the cafeteria. The jock was nowhere in sight. Though the more that I thought about it, the more that I remembered he wasn’t a jock. He was a weirdly big guy with muscles attached.

            Above the main kitchen, the school colors of blue and overly bold orange watched over us. The grates to the main serving area were down with far less rust. The school must have replaced them. The number of other changes gave me hope though. Did a champion of the broken and damned arise in the intervening years?

            My eyes fell on a long table. Four people from my class manned laptops and registered guests. I headed to the shortest line. They moved with relative speed, but then again, it wasn’t our guidance counselors learning google sheets. I gave my name and was handed a class of 2014 Lapel and nametag of Lawrence Dunbar.

            I turned out of line and felt a hand on my shoulder, “yes?”

            “What’s up, idiot?”

            I grinned.

            “And I really mean idiot.”

            “Flavia, you’re alive!” I said.

            “Was I supposed to die, Lawrence?”

            I turned to face her, “no, of course not. But didn’t we have that old joke of ours?”

            “About all the meth? Well guess what, Lawrence, I grew up.”

            “Is that so?”

            “Yeah, I switched it to coke.”

            “As we all probably did at some point.”

            “Come, let’s get a seat somewhere, before all the degenerates grab them all.”

            I followed her lead. We found a table covered in a tacky blue plastic tablecloth instead of shiny, happy orange. Anyways, Flavia and I sat opposite one another. Despite the semi-formal mandate, she dressed in colorful t-shirt and pastel pants. Her sneakers were new red Chuck Taylors. In high school, she would have dressed for a black parade; now she would not look too out of place amongst shiny, happy people.

            “Done any drugs yourself?” She asked.

            I shook my head.

            “Shame, I wanted to trade dealer details.”

            “How high are the odds that you actually know a dealer?”

            “About as high as my most recent high.”

            “So about ten percent?”

            “Can’t say.”

            “Too bad we can’t get drunk tonight.”

            “It’s a damn shame, Lawrence. I almost wanted to vomit on these tables again.”

            “Serious question, what are you expecting from today?”

            “What are you expecting from today?” She asked.

            “I asked first.”

            “What are you expecting from today?”

            “A compelling argument against student loan forgiveness?”

            “Come again?”

            “I can’t wait to hear how fucked some people are by their student loans. It’s a miserable element of me. It’s an element of me regardless.”

            “Lawrence, I’m glad to see the nihilist in you is still very much alive.”

            “Sarcasm?”

            She grinned.

            “But the more I think about it, the more that I hope some people are fucked up.”

            “Trying to play up some badboy cred,” she leaned in, “what gal is your unlucky prey for tonight’s seduction attempt?”

            “Not any girls, just some of the snobby types. I hate a lot of people for a lot of reasons,” I said, “and I want to see a lot of these same people suffer.”

            “You’re a wonderful human being.”

            “Thank you.”

            “Want to grab something to drink?” She asked.

            I shook my head.

            “I wasn’t that interested myself.”

            I noticed the linoleum at our feet shined new. Was it a sign of better cleanliness or just mopping up for a big night? It could be a perception. Perhaps we grew out of jaded perceptions and the need for cynicism. If our principal graced us with his presence, I would be sure to slap him on the back and give him my compliments.

            “Doing anything tonight?” She asked.

            “No, and you?”

            “Possibly might be doing something.”

            “You know, Flavia, why talk about what we’ll do later tonight or what bars we’ll be blackout-drunk at around midnight. Let’s focus on what we’ll do with our next four hours at high school.”

            “So much fun to be had.”

            “Come on,” I said, “let’s focus on everyone we hated, the people that thought themselves better than us because they went to Fordham or Syracuse. I want to taste my just desserts.”

            “You can.”

            “You, you have no interest?”

            She shook her head.

            I paused.

            “Yeah.”

            “So why the change in course? Why the change in personality?”

            “Which part?”

            “Which part, I guess the old vengeful and spiteful part. The desire to find compelling arguments against loan forgiveness,” I said, “and I forgive you by the way if you feel guilty.”

            “No, no, I don’t feel guilty. I don’t feel too guilty.”

            “Sorry for dragging you this way.”

            She remained silent.

            “But why did you change?”

            “It’s easy to laugh and mock people from a great distance across a long sea of desks. You remember that, we remember that as we laughed,” she said, “but then we, or I, encountered the human side of our laughter.”

            “Okay?”

            “I know you don’t sound too convinced.”

            I shook my head.

            “My boyfriend is coming. He’s stuck at work.”

            “Good for you, good for your boyfriend to end up with someone like you, Flavia.”

            “Yeah, he’s handsome, but also kind and compassionate. He’s a full human being.”

            “And?”

            She stopped tapping her foot.

            “He broke down in tears once�"”

            “Fear of commitment?”

            “No, it’s not that. Don’t interrupt me, I have an important story to tell. He has huge debts and doesn’t want to drag me with him. I don’t care but he’s afraid for me.”

            “Tell him to man up,” I said, “and I can’t cry for him. Where did he go for college?”

            “Fordham.”

            I nodded and fell back in my seat.

            “It’s meanspirited to find those people and laugh in their faces,” she said, “now that I’ve seen stuff from the other side.”

            I said nothing. I leaned back, paying attention to the background music. It finished some Taylor Swift and then played a prerecorded ad for our DJ and how you could get your music played via Bluetooth. Then once it finished, the music became some bad rap music. I felt bad for hurting Flavia. There was a reason to come here and relive the good memories. Though they seemed fated, doomed to remain as good memories, nice pins on a mental map.

            “We’re still friends, Lawrence. Right?”

            “Sure, yes, of course we are.”

            She checked a text.

            “Is he coming?” I asked.

            “He’s coming.”

            “I can go if you’d like and give you two some space.”

            “No, that won’t be necessary. I want to introduce him to some of my friends. If we’ll marry, he’ll need to hear all of my backstory.”

            “If he asks about mine, don’t tell him about ninth grade,” I said, no one needs to know about ninth grade.”

            “No one needs to know about ninth grade.”

            “A question, Flavia.”

            “Yes?”

            “But do you feel guilty?”

            “Somewhat.”

            “Sorry, it’s my fault.”

            “You don’t need to beat yourself up about it.”

            “Flavia, tell you what, I want to go around and see if I can find anyone else.”

            She bid me goodbye. Was it a goodbye for now or forever? I couldn’t assure myself either way. I pushed away to pursue someone who I wouldn’t mind escaping to a bar with. The great problem was that most of my fellow attendees would not want to attend a black parade for the beaten and the damned. I made my way to the gym.

            As I made my way to the gym, the music gave way to Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Real music playing gave me a new spark as I traced the locations where I sweat myself to death. The chance nostalgia gave me a thick sea of goosebumps. I shouldn’t be happy to hear Kurt’s nostalgic ballad, yet I grinned like a ninth-grade moron. It was a shallow smile just the same.

Nirvana in the background echoed my heartbeats with drumbeats. Sweat followed Kurt’s roars. Someone would come along to say hello and explain how all of this came together, right? Right? No idealistic voice was coming to tell me lies and to pretend that every little thing would be all right. The gym’s lights were brighter than I remembered but goosebumps of emotion transformed to a chill.

Shiny happy people found joy tonight. Why couldn’t I? Maybe I was condemned to the cold that characterized all my years here. A look above revealed the same under painted rafters and a moldy basketball that we made legends about.

            I searched the DJ out. I found him and nodded greetings.

            “Do you have a request? It’s got to go through the Bluetooth,” he said.

            “No, it’s not that. I understand the rules,” I said.

            “Then what do you want?”

            “Could you tell me who requested the last song?”

            “What do you mean?”

            “I want to know who asked you play that Nirvana song.”

            “You want to know who played that trash?”

            I nodded.

            “It came through an app that I use for my music,” he looked down at his laptop, “some fool named bormann88.”

            “I don’t know anyone with that last name.”

            “Then you probably have good taste in music.”

            “I actually, I actually do have good tastes in music.”

            “Whatever.”

            I walked away. Stymied in my quest for companionship, I reasoned that Flavia and I could make up. She seemed sincere in her desire to introduce her boyfriend to previous friends. Perhaps I could nod along, try to laugh, and play along in the game. Once the party ended, I could visit my folks’ home and feel young again, sleep in the bed where I watched all my favorite AMVs and music videos and sing “I’m Not Okay” as my lullaby.

            I made my way to the cafeteria where it swelled with even more people. The center of mass concerted between the tables. The outskirts of the table sea were clear, and I edged the way to Flavia’s table.

            “Hey, Lawrence, come over here!” Someone shouted.

            At first, I didn’t believe it but then I turned and saw two old friends seated. I laughed and made my way over to them. Of all the people to not come, I expected Dietrich and Cooper to be high on that list. Dietrich dressed in the bare minimum for the required formality. His shirt was not tucked, and his top-button was undone. Cooper had a black tie and flawlessly buttoned shirt. I approached and saw that Dietrich wore old sneakers. Cooper had dress shoes on. Seeing them dressed up was a slight disappointment. Dietrich experimented with black eyeliner in ninth grade. Cooper followed after meeting him.

            “Gentlemen, I’m glad to see you both alive and here. If it wasn’t for the strict no-alcohol policy hoisted on us, I’d had drunk myself to death,” I said.

            They laughed.

            “Let me sit and then we can catch up.”

            “There is much to be said,” Dietrich said.

            I looked them over, curious about what we’d need to say to get a conversation started. After high school and a hatred for a shared system gone, we started to grow apart. Dietrich and I would message once a week. For a while that was the usual thing. A few semesters into college and the pattern fell apart. We kept in touch whenever we shared music tastes until we stopped. I couldn’t recall his profile picture or if he even had one. The more I thought, the more likely he did not. Dietrich reverted to the generic one long ago.

            Cooper never produced a melodramatic rant of his own worth remembering.

            “I’ll be the first to tell you that a great deal must be made up and told,” Dietrich said.

            “A conversation then.”

            “Well, make yourself comfortable first.”

            Cooper rolled up his shirt’s sleeves and a tattoo was visible on his forearm. I craned my neck, “a QR tattoo? That’s pretty cool.”

            “Links to my YouTube channel. Wanna try?” Cooper asked.

            “No thanks, but weren’t your adamantly opposed to fame?”

            “Fame? Who said anything about fame? This is tattoo is for the greater cause that I’m a member of.”

            “Epic.”

            “Speaking of epic things,” Cooper pulled out his phone, “let me play some music.”

            I perked my head up. The music started slow then it turned into the unmistakable beat of My Chemical Romance’s “Welcome to the Black Parade.” The melody apparent, I grinned like a b*****d. Dietrich pulled out an air guitar. Interesting, now I thought about. We probably only heard the song through s****y YouTube AMV or the iconic music video. Any good guitarist required a vocalist and I lip-synced along.

            “The two of you look like idiots playing around like that,” Cooper said.

            “As if we all didn’t jam like this?” Dietrich asked.

            “Not wrong.”

            “Gentlemen,” I said, “we must make sure to never let this sense of fraternity die. I fully regret not having spent more time with you guys after high school. We should never have grown apart.”

            “Reject modernity, defend tradition,” Cooper said.

            “Not here, not now,” Dietrich said.

            “Am I missing something?”

            “Certainly not,” Dietrich said, “Cooper is just being his usual boldly dumb self.”

            “Hey, that’s not fair to me.”

            “Hey, guess what? I don’t care. I’m going to play a song from my phone,” Dietrich said, “give me a second. Cooper, this is how you show off your power level.”

            I focused my ears as “Welcome to the Black Parade” faded out. A second’s delay and the drum beat from My Chemical Romance turned into some German music. The more I listened, the more I felt that it was not just German. It sounded Teutonic, aggressively German. It was no German technobeat or even a weird metal song. Was it a marching song? The drums made me think that. It sounded tragic but proud. Maybe it was dedicated to soldiers off to war.

            “Now, I believe we might do well to start discussing politics,” Dietrich said.

            “For president?” I asked, “Bernie Sanders of course.”

            “A major problem with Bernie is his economics.”

            “Never thought you’d find someone like Bernie too far left.”

            “It’s not that at all. Sanders is just capitalism in lipstick. It’s a pig in a dress and lipstick.”

            “Yeah, it’s still a pig,” Cooper said.

            I knew Cooper faded out for a reason.

            “Yes, the pig is always a pig. Sanders has no policy proposals to fell capitalism as he merely seeks to hasten the rotten husk’s breakdown. What we need is a corporatist takeover of the economy.”

            “Corporatist?”

            “It is an economic system, third position. There are only two genders but there are more than two economic systems.”

            I nodded.

            “And Sanders is no true socialist. Not if the word had meaning in the twentieth century. Sanders is best described as a veiled capitalist, a social democrat if we must be generous.”

            “Took a lot of political science, I see.”

            “Actually no, the liberals and boomer-tier conservative professors that I took failed to enrich me. Through libraries of digital or real life, I taught myself.”

            “That’s pretty cool actually. I always enjoyed how much of a free thinker you were. Part of the fun hanging out with you was your intelligence.”

            “Thank you, I mean it from the bottom of my heart, Lawrence.”

            “Got a question for you two, are either of you still formally emo?” I asked, “not a problem if you’re not. I am not but I’ve gotta say My Chemical Romance still gets me.”

            “Well, who wouldn’t jam along?” Dietrich asked.

            “Valid point.”

            “Nope, no longer emo at all,” Cooper said, “I’ve integrated myself into newer and better projects.”

            “Like your tattoo?”

            Cooper nodded.

            “Cannot say I am emo either. Though many of the same despairings about humanity remain,” Dietrich said, “the black eyeliner is gone, but the melancholia remains.”

            “I’m sorry to hear that.”

            “No, no, you are not complicit in my suffering.”

            Dietrich’s song ended. The last few notes took on a new melancholy.

            “Enough rotten eggs convince you to lose faith in the system. Maybe you are destined for greatness, just not happiness. Regardless, I am rambling, and people are losing faith,” Dietrich said.

            “What new system do you purpose?” I asked.

            Dietrich turned his gaze to Cooper.

            A second passed without any one of us three speaking.

            “Cooper, could I scan your tattoo?” I asked.

            “Absolutely.”

            I pulled out my phone and scanned his tattoo. As he said, it linked to his YouTube account.  It had seventy subscribers. In the Related Channels tab, FBIV was suggested. I clicked that, finding videos in Japanese, Spanish, Greek, Italian, and then I saw some Swastikas. The intent of that channel apparent, I raced back to Cooper’s channel. He had a few uploads. I clicked on the most viewed one: “Moomins but they quote the british union of fascists.” I opened the video and immediately muted it. The video took the beloved Scandinavian children’s show and presumably dubbed over it with fascist speeches.

            People found it good enough for eighty-seven views. A morbid curiosity forced me to read the description. In it, he claimed that google censored his genius. It did not occur to him that maybe it was an unpopular juxtaposition.

            “I see you gentlemen have embraced fascism. Both of you I have to conclude,” I said.

            “It was a difficult decision by every mean, do not believe that we are moral monsters,” Dietrich said.

            I feigned a smile. Then I wanted to laugh, something about the absurdity of the moment. Two kids that I grew up with and who sought to champion the broken and the damned. I knew Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Nazism. These guys delved deep into fascism if they found some British Blackshirt. How long had they been fascists? Was it a change before or after high school? When we cracked weird sex jokes or drew ugly caricatures, did they then think about Sieg Heils?

            “Did you like my channel?” Cooper asked.

            “It was, it was interesting.”

            “A lie, Lawrence?” Dietrich asked, “and I can’t judge if you’re unsure about this. It’s only natural that you’re upset.”

            “You know, you guys were my best friends here. You guys are my best friends from here.”

            “Were?”

            “I misspoke. Combining the Moomins with some fascist speech is a lot to take in.”

            “You should listen to Oswald Mosley,” Cooper said.

            “Who is he?”

            “He was the genius leader behind the British Union of Fascists,” Dietrich said, “a man that Britain sorely needs today.”

            “Yeah, especially when it comes to them,” Cooper said.

            “I don’t need to know who you’re talking about,” I said.

            “Please, Cooper,” Dietrich said, “not in public.”

            “Sorry.”

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. A bit of sweat crept down my left temple.

“If you’re worried, we won’t play the Horst Wessel Lied again,” Dietrich said.

“Could you translate that for me?”

“It needs no translation,” he said, “it’s the Nazi anthem.”

“You guys are f*****g insane. Where is your f*****g empathy?”

All eyes from the entire cafeteria fell on me. Like a scene far too similar from ninth grade, I tried to defuse all the attention with careful motion of my arms. It didn’t seem to have any effect, but nor did it in ninth grade.

            “Please calm down,” Dietrich said, “for your sake, and ours.”

            I had every intention to leave them, deadset to stop consorting with these clear Nazis. Yet I couldn’t. Not so long as they left these strange doubts in me. How many memories would put on a goosestep set to a Nazi marching song because of these two?

            “Thank you.”

            “So, how long has it been? Did you guys sneak in Holocaust Denial between Algebra and Computer Apps One?” I asked.

            “This National Socialism came in college.”

            I fell back in my chair.

            “How upset are you about this?”

            “Fucked up. We cracked damn dumb sex jokes at lunch,” I said, “and I can’t even tell myself they weren’t said without you two linking it all to Hitler. Just now, when we jammed to My Chemical Romance. I shouldn’t have come tonight.”

            “Once again, we were bluepilled here.”

            I took it to mean that they weren’t fascists in high school. At this point, I had no reasons to doubt them. Dietrich tried to get me to read Noam Chomsky during study once. I had no interest. Here I was, previously half unaware they existed anymore and engrossed in some discussion of Hitlerism. What separated us? Why did I remain somewhere left of center?

            “Playing the Horst Wessel Lied was in poor taste,” Dietrich said.

            “You’re sure?”

            He nodded.

            “Didn’t we give a presentation about our favorite movie scene in tenth grade English?”

            They nodded.

            “And what movie was it?”

            “Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator Speech,” Cooper said.

            “A literal parody of Hitler.”

            “Will you let me explain my path to National Socialism?” Dietrich asked, “I doubt that it will convert you to our views, but at least it will clear some confusion up.”

            “No, I’m not sure if,” I saw Flavia walk by with her boyfriend, “forget that, forget that. You guys, my friends. We’re friends, I owe it to you.”

            “Thank you.”

            “And I reserve every right to judge you, to even hate you two.”

            “Hatred is just. Every ideology has a desire to hate, even if they refuse to admit it.”

            I had many reasons to hate their beliefs.

            “It was a sinking feeling. I did not want to become a National Socialist, not by any stretch of imagination. Noam Chomsky was my idol; you might remember that.”

            I nodded.

            “It was as I realized how fucked this world was that I started to truly understand how necessary Hitler’s policies were.”

            “All of them?”

            “Perhaps not all of them,” Dietrich couldn’t look me in the eyes, “but certainly most of them.”

            “And you know which ones were needed,” Cooper said, “and even the lies.”

            “Not in public, not right now,” Dietrich said.

            “Cooper, it happened,” I said, “you know it happened. Twelfth grade history, we heard our classmates do presentations on how brutal it was.”

            “Lawrence, just give me an hour and I can outline how it’s mathematically impossible.”

            Dietrich placed his hand in front of Cooper.

            “Sorry, Dietrich.”

            “Just let me outline my path.”

            “Hey guys, before you start, I’ve got a question for Lawrence. Did you check my videos? I’m really proud of ‘reich me up inside.’” Cooper realized Dietrich glared at him, “hey, a man has got to grow his subscriber base.”

            “All for the cause of course,” I said.

            Cooper flashed his wormy smile.

            “For the briefest summary,” Dietrich said, “we are not normal and were raised to rejoice in that. The opposite’s true, in an organic society, everyone will find a place in life.”

            “Organic society?”

            “It sounds exactly what it is.”

            It was apparent that Dietrich would be the one lecturing. I would have no choice but to roll with the punches. My old Nazi friends were not about to pounce on me and brownshirt me into submission. Not yet, but they might goosestep me into misery. I could leave. What else was there to do here tonight? Find the people who didn’t talk to me when we took Biology together? I remained in the black parade and Flavia transcended it. We had nothing else to say.

With these two, we could spend the night together and then say nothing ever again.

“Allow me to put it this way, our modern liberal democratic society is the great cause of alienation for millions. Consider this school and how we grew disaffected from the alleged virtues given by this institution�"”

“We carved dicks and s****y emo song lyrics into wood here, not swastikas.”

            “Tell me, did you ever feel a transcendent aura of happiness here? I am not talking about the little pieces of joy here where we find some phallic imagery when we carved into a desk here but the radiance of standing up for a great cause of virtue.”

            “I didn’t need to.”

            “Lawrence, please comply and understand that I am attempting to have a sincere dialogue about National Socialism’s merits. It means a great deal for me to risk exposing myself. This is just to give my testimony so you may understand.”

            “Dietrich, this is Nazism we’re talking about. Millions died because of what Hitler and his ilk did in just six short years. Think about it, they killed millions in almost the same time we’ve left this place!”

            “The crimes are�"” Cooper said.

            “Not now, my friend, not now. There is a time for history and a time for philosophy and biography. Cooper, you understand which time is which, right?”

            Cooper nodded like the goblin eager to deny war crimes he was.

            “Where was I, Lawrence?”

            “The philosophy of Nazism is tied up with its history. Cooper’s right, there really is no separation of the two, old friend.”

            “If I am allowed to finish, you would come along to my points�"”

            “Do you think I give a damn?”

            They said nothing. Shiny, happy people blurred into faceless shapes. The music resumed its upbeat sounds. It seemed to garble together, and I was not quite sure what the difference between Taylor Swift or Ariana Grande was. To be honest, it truly did not matter. I was adamant that the current singer was neither of the two.

            “A novel contrast, if I must be honest,” Dietrich said, “that we shall be discussing National Socialism amidst the backdrop of Pharrell’s most famous song.”

            “Pharrell? Can’t say I’m familiar.”

            “Consider yourself quite lucky to have no need to indulge in his tunes. I shall like to note, Lawrence how that singular song has nearly half a billion views on YouTube. It says much about the modern alienation caused by capitalism.”

            “So, we’re back to socialism.”

            “National Socialism utilizes a form of socialism. Some socialist critiques are doubtlessly valid.”

            “What music do you like?” I asked, “still enjoy Evanescence, what about My Chemical Romance? I take it that you wouldn’t enjoy “Waiting on the Worms” by Pink Floyd today.”

            “We are no longer teenagers.”

            “I take it that you no longer scare the living s**t out of people.”

            Cooper laughed.

            “I guess teens we are no longer. Though I suppose some things still scare people shitless. Some of us here have that talent.”

            “Modern society makes us all cogs in the murder machine,” Dietrich said.

            “It doesn’t have to be like this,” I said, “no need for us to go back to 1933 when 2014 works better for everyone else on the planet.”

            “It is too late for the past, Lawrence.”

            “So it is.”

            “So, we may resume our dialogue, I realized that by creating an all-inclusive society, we created a shapeless one. As an organic society, we shall all fit in like a perfect jigsaw puzzle. Idealistic sounding and I fully admit that, but it is a far more robust theory of social integration than cobblering shapeless blobs together,” Dietrich said.

            I did not respond.

“An empirical and easy to observe problem with democracy is that outsider groups can hijack the process to their ends. The claim of liberals is that dictatorship distorts the will of the people in favor of an oligarchy. Tell me, how many times have the ruling class subverted democracy?”

            “Business interests have hijacked democracy plenty of times, Dietrich. Loads of people got damn stinking rich through the business of war as well. We both know that, we wanted to rally against it in high school!”

            “Of course, I remember that. I attend demonstrations against Middle Eastern wars now. My volk’s ethnic interests are not served through those conflicts.”

            “You keep some continuity in your old politics,” I said.

            “Those wars serve their interests actually,” Cooper said.

            “But for all the wrong, alleged reasons now.”

            “Rest assured, I do care for the American solider just as much as before,” Dietrich said, “so once I realized that democracy is corrupted, I sought to find means of reforming it. That turned to be a fruitless endeavor. So, a flavor of dictatorship seemed only natural; I read up on the Third Reich.”

            “You’re a marvelous person, Dietrich.”

            “Only then did I recognize the plotted degradation of our system. As if by design, certain issues are removed from the scope of democratic control so as to remove any hope of changing a failed system. A fundamental right to pornographic speech, can you believe that?”

            “A fundamental right to spread Nazism exists, so I can.”

            “You’ve kept your wits about you, Lawrence. I cannot say that you disappoint.”

            “Shame I can’t say the same about you, old friend.”

            “We are friends, not old friends,” Dietrich said.

            “The judicial system is loaded with people who snatch democratic control from the people. Why can the people not make laws to censor pornography or to determine if they wish to define marriage as between a man and woman? Democracy is an illusion used by a cabal of elites who wish to destroy our volk.”

            “Are you trying to say the gay marriage ruling is white genocide?” I asked.

            “No, just part of the plan. Go onto the internet and you can find scores, thousands of people dedicated to the most fringe and anti-white race ideas out there. And they are influencing public figures! They are promoted as saviors of our democracy when they in fact confirmed that I needed to oppose democracy at every turn.”

            “And so, you worship Adolf Hitler because of some rich Antifa girl with dyed hair was mean to you?”

            “She will accumulate power because of those that utilize democracy to pull strings for their master plot.”

            I sighed.

            “National Socialism will produce dictators invested in their people. Look at the Fuhrer, you can see his love for the Germanic people in his speeches. Dictatorship under a dedicated member of our volk will not result in the destruction that democracy tends toward.”

            “Want me to grab a textbook and flip to the sections about World War II? Would that convince you how brutal and ugly war can be?” I asked, “or are you going to yap about some internet wackjob?”

            “People like her are not the problem. She is the useful idiot of those who wish to enshackle us to international finance. Eventually, I realized that I had no choice but to conclude that globalist slavery was the plan all along, ever since the end of the Second World War.”

            “Dietrich, listen to yourself.”

            “I’ve had years to reflect on this.”

            “It’s not some vast conspiracy of white genocide or something or other. It’s progress, it’s about making the world better for everyone. Perhaps it has its zealots who speak too fast or demand too much but as a whole, we can make a better world.”

            “Better for who?”

            “Everyone, better for all humans.”

            “Do you actually identify with some united humanity from freaks to those who want you dead?”

            “And what do you want?”

            “You’re my friend.”

            “Were my friend. Tell me, ideology or me?”

            “I wish you’d join us.”

            “And if I don’t?”

            Neither answered. I tried to muster a smile. Neither grinned back. I extended a shaking hand out. It was closer to Cooper, but he did not take it. I lowered my arm and stood. Two seconds worth of looking at them, I was about to turn when Dietrich coughed. His arm extended for a shake. I dipped my head goodbye. Neither followed when I left the table. Around me, a shiny happy song did not end.