Part II: F**k You, A*****e! Year -4

Part II: F**k You, A*****e

Year -4

     It started just like every other day: I got up, went to school, and went to some classes. However, when I got to third period Social Studies, I noticed my teacher staring at the television with tears in her eyes. “What’s going on?” I asked, as the rest of the class gathered around. She points to a news report.

     “…If you’re just joining us, America has been attacked. The World Trade Center was destroyed earlier this morning, as well as a portion of the Pentagon. We are also receiving reports of a fourth plane crashing in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.”

     “Whoa, I didn’t think that was possible.”

     “Stills am thinks war is no more?” Johan said.

     “I don’t… I don’t understand.”

The television continued: “The first tower fell at 8:46 this morning, second at 9:03, third plane crash was at 9:37, and just moments ago, a fourth plane in Pennsylvania. President Bush was visiting an elementary school when he solemnly took the news. Reports speculate that Al-Queida, a radical Muslim extremist group led by Osama Bin Laden was behind the attacks. America may soon be at war with the Middle East, namely Afghanistan, very soon. President Bush has gone on record saying that America will not go without a fight. Troops may be mobilized anywhere from a few weeks to a few months…”

“I will definitely fight for country now. As soon as I am graduated, I ams leaves. My only regrets ams I cannot join earlier. Samson?” Johan says.

“No way, man. F**k that, this country ain’t worth dying over.” I said.

“You ams disappoint me.”

“Sorry, I just don’t feel like I should fight it, I don’t live in New York City, nobody I knew was on those planes, why should I care?”

“Because you am American. Your country was am attacked.”

“Oh well, it happened.”

“I am not even born in America and I will fight for her.”

“Well, that’s good for you.”

“No patriotism?”

“Look at history: these kinds of things happen. I’ll let you and the poor people do the fighting for me.”

“You ams disgusting. You am spoiled.”

“I’m rich, what do you want from me?”

“Money should not matter. Love for country ams what matter.” Leo, listening, jumps in.

“For the record, I’ll go to war with you, Johan.” He says.

“And why am that?”

“Free license to kill. It’s a no brainer, really. It’s a win-win. I can get paid to kill anybody I want as long as they’re the enemy and it’s all in the name of America. I can make killing my job.”

“Asides from sounding like serials killer, Leo ams wants to fight even though he am rich.”

“Fine. You guys can go have fun killing bad guys. I’m going to stick with my original plan of f*****g b*****s and getting money.” I said.

“You am shameful.”

“Eh, it might be over by the time we turn eighteen anyway, so why get your shorts in a knot?”

“You do not understand, do you? Even if it is over by then, the point am to want to stand up for country in first place. Even if war is over, and you do not join military, wanting to help destroy enemy am important. People died today, Samson. People who am live in same country as you and me. These am your people. You should want to help or at least care. Just because it does not affect you personally, does not mean you should not care.”

“Eh, whatever.”

“You is heartless, dude.” I gotta say, school that day was pretty awesome. Every class, we literally just sat there and watched the television all day. The teachers, mainly were focused on it, the rest of us just spent the day doing nothing but talk to each other until it was time to go home. It’s weird, you’d think on a day with a national tragedy that I’d have a bad day, but it was actually a pretty good day for me. The next day was a little worse, though. Johan refused to talk to me, Leo didn’t show up for school, and the girls called me a prick for what I said.

“How could you be such a dick?” Christy asked me.

“I don’t see the big deal. Yeah, we were attacked yesterday but I didn’t do it, it doesn’t affect me, so why should I do anything about it?”

“Ugh. God, can’t you think of anyone other than yourself?”

“Why should I? It’s not my problem.”

“No, it’s America’s problem and you’re an American. Therefore, it IS your problem.”

“And as a rich American, I’m going to make the poor people fight for me.”

“Wow, you’re such an a*****e.” She walked away from me. Between Johan ignoring me, and the girls mad, I was pretty pissed off. I was in the hallway when I ran into Sydd.

“Hey nutcse.”

“Leave me alone.” He says.

“Hell no, you’re mine until we graduate.”

“Why do you hate me so much?”

“Shut the f**k up.”

“No! Why?” He yells at me.

“I said shut the f**k up!” I yell back. I grab him by the hair and punch him in his stupid face.

“Stop!”

“Shut. The. F**k. Up.” I say in between punches. I grab his hair and slam his head into the locker. I toss him to the ground and kick him. I pick him up and start punching him in the stomach. I yell as I mercilessly beat the everloving s**t out of him. I opened the nearest loose locker and stuffed him inside. I spun the lock and went to the bathroom to wash the blood off my hands. My knuckles were pretty sore after that so I figured I’d just leave. I decided to go to Leo’s and find out why he didn’t go to school. I knocked on his door and he answered it.

“Yo, what’s good?” he asked me.

“Why weren’t you in school today?”

“Why aren’t you in school right now?”

“Touche.”

“I just didn’t feel like going.”

“I just wanted to leave.”

“Why?”

“Everyone was being a dick to me today.”

“Again, why?”

“Because of what I said yesterday.”

“You gotta admit that is kinda dick for you to say that.”

“You too?”

“Sorry, man.”

“Whatever. What do you wanna do?”

“Well, before you got here, I was shooting birds with my BB gun.”

“Sounds fun, I guess.” So I followed him to the backyard, and I got a few hits off, killed a couple of pigeons, but I suck. Leo on the other hand was pretty much an expert at it. He even got a few squirrels and s**t that were running around. “You’re pretty good at this.”

“Yeah, I shoot practically every day. I’m getting bored. C’mon.” We go back into the house and he empties his backpack. He brings it outside and picks up the two biggest, heaviest rocks he could find and sticks them in. “Oh, man. Together, they’re too heavy for me.”

“What are we going to do with them?”

“Have fun of course. Empty yours out.”

“Why?”

“So you can carry the other one, duh.”

“Uh, yeah. Sure.” I emptied my bookbag out and put the other rock in. I didn’t know what he was planning, but he packed his BB gun and a knife too. “What uh, what are we gonna do?”

“It’s that time of year where we f**k with the principal again. Besides, we got a slap on the wrist last time, so I’m pretty sure that’s all we’ll get this time.”

“Yeah, sure, why not? I love f*****g with him. Besides, our dads will get us out of it anyway.”

“Exactly, now let’s go.” So, we left his house and went back to the school. We creeped low in the parking lot, doing our best not to be seen. Leo pulls out the knife and when we reach the principal’s car, he stabs and rips three of them.

“Why three?”

“Insurance purposes.” He takes out his BB gun and shoots random tires of other cars in the parking lot from where we were. “Use your rock to smash his windshield.”

“What about yours?”

“Just do it.”

“Fine.” I hopped up on the hood and threw the rock as hard as I could, only cracking the windshield.

“Again, on the same spot. And hurry.” I picked up the rock and threw it and this time it went through. “Alright, let’s bail.” We run out of there and I follow him through an alternate route to his house. As we’re crossing the overpass, he stops, opens up his backpack, and tosses it over the edge without looking. I hear the sound of breaking glass and crashing metal. We continue towards his house and hang out there for the rest of the day. I was so surprised no one came after us. We were watching television.

“Why did you toss that other rock?”

“I just wanted to see what would happen.”

“What if someone died?”

“Oh well.”

“Oh well? You were just telling me I was a dick for not caring about the country and you might’ve killed someone for no reason.”

“Yeah, but there’s a difference.”

“How?”

“Those people killed on purpose. I didn’t mean to kill anyone, but if I did, oh well.”

“Dude, that’s so fucked up. Do you need like, help or something?”

“What do you mean?”

“Like, you need a shrink or something?”

“Nah, I’m fine.”

“You’re not going to kill me or our friends, are you?”

“Nah man, not unless you piss me off.”

“Haha ok.” Leo turns and looks at me with a straight face and doesn’t say anything and goes back to watching television. “Um…ok…” That freaked me out a little bit, I’m not even gonna lie. “It’s getting late, I gotta get home, but I’ll catch you in school tomorrow?” I get up and head towards the door. “Maybe we’ll get away with it and Mr. Mersky won’t figure out it was us.” I click my tongue and point at him as I leave. The next day, as I arrived at school, Mr. Mersky catches us in the entrance.

“Hello, boys. Step into my office, please.” We followed him. I assume you know why I called you two in here.”

“No sir.”

“Don’t play dumb with me. You damaged my car again.”

“Why would we do that?” Leo says.

“I don’t know, why would you?”

“Because we didn’t.”

“I have a feeling it was. Nine teachers reported finding BB’s in their tires.”

“So?”

“Do you know anybody with a BB gun?”

“No.”

“Do you own a BB gun?”

“No.”

“Do you have any idea at all who slashed my tires, threw a rock through my windshield and shot teachers’ tires?”

“That sounds awful.”

“I know it was you two, now fess up.” he says angrily. “You wrecked my car last year, and you did it again.”

“Do you have proof?”

“No, but I can find out from your fathers which one of you, or if it was both of you. I’m sure they can tell me which one of you has a BB gun.”

“Look, what if I gave you a name?”

“Oh yeah, who?”

“Rob Serfass. He’s a bad kid and I heard he’s been doing drugs lately, maybe he went crazy yesterday.”

“I have been hearing deviant behavior coming from him lately…” he rubs his chin. “Alright, you guys can go. God help you if you’re wrong or lying to me.” We left his office.

“Well played, my brother.” I said as I fist bumped him.

“Surprised you didn’t lay Sydd on the table too. I thought you hated him.”

“I do. I was gonna, but he let us leave. Why didn’t you?”

“Rob is mine, Sydd is yours.”

“Gotcha.” We go to homeroom. Maritza comes up to me.

“Oye, Samson.” She says in that cute Latin accent she has.

“What’s up, Maritza?”

“Listen, I wanna go to the back to school dance and I wanted to know if you’d go with me.”

“Oh yeah? As friends or what?”

“Actually, I like you so consider it a date, you lucky chico.”

“I’m the lucky one?”

“Um, yeah, duh.”

“Why am I the lucky one?”

“Um, because I’m hot, I’m Spanish, and I’m perfect in every way. Are you stupit or something? It should be pretty obvious.”

“Oh.”

“Unless of course you don’t want to, I’m sure Leo is equally worthy of my time.”

“No, no, I’ll go out with you.”

“Good.”

“Do you, uh wanna go on a couple dates or something before and after the dance, like an actual couple?”

“Before, sure. After, we’ll see.”

“Wanna start today?”

“Duh, there’s only two days until the dance, dipshit.”

“Ok, ok, jeez.” You know, I don’t really get her. Out of the three of them, she’s definitely the least attractive. She thinks she’s insanely hot, but she really isn’t. She’s good looking, don’t get me wrong, otherwise I wouldn’t have said yes, but she’s not really as hot as she thinks she is; she’s a butter face. You know what though, not bad for a first girlfriend, so there’s that. Lunch time was interesting, I can tell ya that. It seemed like we all paired up. Johan was with Christy, and Leo with Katarina. I shoulda held out, I probably could’ve gotten Kat or Chris. Oh well, I guess this means I can get her out of the way for one of the better girls when I’m older. “Hey guys, I’ll trade one of you.” Maritza slaps me across the face.

“A*****e!”

“Haha, relax, I was just kidding!”

“You better be.”

“I am.” I gave her a kiss on the cheek.

“You’re going to buy me something at the mall, right?”

“Uh, sure. Whatever.”

“And I want a dress to wear for the dance.”

“It’s only semi formal.”

“I don’t care, I want to look better than anyone else.”

“Um ok?”  That day of school was brutal. She had me do everything for her, she had me carry her books, get the door for her, get her lunch, clean up her tray, I felt like a slave. I’m kind of doubting whether or not I want this to continue. I’m not even seeing any action. No kisses, no hand holding, not even a b**b grab. Is this what having a girlfriend is like? I hope not. We have a football game today, so I hope they don’t take too long. So, we finished out our day and went to the mall after school. Apparently, all three girls share a brain, because we all ended up hanging out together at the mall, waiting for the girls to pick out their dresses. It was so boring. It’s a good thing I asked dad for extra money, because she picked what was probably the most expensive dress they had. My usual three hundred dollars wasn’t going to cut it. I noticed it was getting dangerously close to game time and we didn’t make warm ups. We got to the stadium in just the nick of time. “Don’t forget ladies, give us some good cheers tonight.”

“Anything for you guys.” Christy says.

“Yeah, what’s a team without their cheerleaders?” Katarina says.

“You’d better win tonight.” Maritza says with a slightly demented smile.

“Or what?” I ask.

“Or you’d be a loser! Duh! How stupit are you, Samson?”

“Jeez, sorry.”

“You’d better be.” She’s a real pain in my a*s. I’m going to win because I want to, not because she told me to.

“Fine, I’ll make sure I win.”

“Be sure you do.” I think I’m going to opt out of the continuation, this b***h definitely expects too much from me with nothing in return. I’ll just take her to the stupid dance, and that’ll be it. So, we run as few drills as we can before the game starts. We’re playing our rivals tonight, so the pressure is definitely on. We play a pretty solid game. It was close, but we ended up getting a two point conversion with a minute to go and wound up winning. After the game, the girls congratulated us and gave us smooches, which was totally unexpected. I guess it’s cause we’re dating them now. It kinda makes me rethink stopping the whole dating thing. I dunno, we’ll see how it goes. Tomorrow I’m taking her to the high school football game, so there’s that. My parents came up to us.

“Great job out there, son. We’re proud of you.” My dad said.

“Thanks, dad. Can we have some money to go out for dinner?”

“Sure, how much do you need?”

“How about a thousand?”

“A thousand?”

“Yeah, I wanna get the girls something nice.”

“Sure, no problem.” He gave me the money. So we had dinner, then to the mall where I bought everyone whatever they wanted. We all went home after.

The next day at lunch, the girls were cozying up on us like we were kings.

“You guys played an amazing game last night.” Christy says.

“Yeah, you looked amazing pummeling the other team, Leo.” Katarina says. The rest of the day was alright, we went to the high school football game after. Johan likes to watch so he can work on his own game. Leo and Kat were making out the whole time. Boy they’re taking this more seriously than we are. I’m still on the fence about continuing this thing we call a ‘relationship’. We took to walking around the track and holding hands with practically everyone else.

“Hey Maritza?”

“Que?”

“Can I get a kiss?”

“Do I have to?”

“Not if you don’t want to.”

“Ugh. Fine.” She gives me a quick peck on the cheek.

“That’s it?”

“The hell you expect from me?”

“Maybe a little more, like on the lips, like last night?”

“I only did that cause us girls agreed to do it if you guys won, that’s it.”

“But look at Kat and Leo.”

“So? That’s her choice. I was just going to kiss you. Look, we’re just dating for the dance. If it lasts longer than that, then sure I’ll kiss you. But Kat already told me they’re going out.”

“And we’re not?”

“We’re just getting acquainted for the dance.”

“Wow, ok.”

“I thought that’s what you knew you signed up for.”

“I thought we could do more than just hold hands.”

“I’ve never done this before.”

“Neither have I… we can’t try anything else out?”

“What did I just tell you?”

“Alright, fine. Whatever.” Then I noticed Sydd holding hands with some chick. I let go of Maritza’s hand and walk up behind him and shove him forward. “Hey b***h.”

“What do you want?” He asks.

“Aw, you’re going out with Alyson, huh? Hey Alyson, guess what? Your boyfriend over here is weak and crazy. Why don’t you go out with me? I’m strong, and I’m normal.” I showed her my massive pythons. The a*****e punched me in the face and knocked me over. Lucky shot. Then he starts clawing and punching me while I’m on the ground. He got removed by security and I got up.

“He kicked your a*s, boy.” Maritza says.

“No, he just got a lucky shot in.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“I gotta go to the bathroom.”

“Why?”

“Make sure he didn’t ruin my perfect face.” I go inside the stadium and find the bathroom. I look in the mirror and see a couple of scratches. Nothing serious, nothing I can’t cover up tomorrow. What a crazy dickhead. Now I have to wear makeup to look normal for the dance. He better not be there or I’ll make it hell for him. I left and rejoined Maritza. “He’s dead if he shows up tomorrow night.”

“Why you gotta pick on him, though?”

“I hate him.”

“But why?”

“I don’t know why… there’s just something about him… something in me wants to make him miserable.”

“But why him?”

“Cause he’s poor. And cause he’s crazy.”

“So are other kids in the school.”

“Yeah, but for some reason, I like picking on him the most.”

“More like the only kid you pick on.”

“Eh, so what?”

“He fought back though.”

“I would’ve knocked his a*s out if security hadn’t jumped in.”

“Looked like he had you pretty pinned down.”

“No, he was just all over my face.”

“Mmhmm, sure.” I was so pissed. She was under the impression I got my a*s kicked by that piece of s**t. I saw his girlfriend making googley eyes at him like he was some kind of hero or something. Whatever, the next night I picked up Maritza and my chauffeur took us to the school for the dance. You could easily tell who belonged to whatever social class they came from: kids like me were the best dressed, and the quality just went down from there. When we got there, the teacher made an announcement.

“Welcome to the annual Back to School dance. This year, however it will also be a memorial dance. We are accepting donations for the 9/11 relief fund, so whatever you can afford will be greatly appreciated. Have a fun, safe, clean dance.” She says.

Me and Maritza danced for a little bit and who should show up but that lowlife scumbag? “Don’t, just have fun with me, guapo.” Maritza says. I ignore him and continue to dance with her. When we got tired of dancing, we joined our friends at the table.

“So, did you guys give anything?” I asked.

“Ja, a hundred.” Johan says.

“Oh, you’re so generous, Johan. I gave fifty.” Christy says.

“Seventy” Maritza says.

“Twenty.” Katarina says.

“Nah.” Leo says.

“I thought about it.” I said.

“Ugh, this dance is so lame.” Christy says.

“Where’s your brother?” Leo asks me.

“Didn’t wanna come, said he had some project he’d rather work on.”

“I’m guessing that translates to ‘couldn’t find a date.’”

“Maybe. I’m going to the bathroom.” I got up and went. As I was leaving, crazy boy walks in. I grab him by the hair and slam his head against the wall until he slumps down. I leave and go back to the dance. We had a pretty good time, I guess. Before we left, I nicked a random bill from the jar. It was a twenty. Oh well, better than a dollar. As we’re leaving, I see Leo gets slapped by Katarina. “What happened?”

“This pervert tried grabbing my b**b.”

“I thought we were going out, baby.” Leo says.

“Yeah, but I didn’t say you could grab me.”

“Aw, come on. Let me grab a feel.” He moved in closer and she pushes him away.

“Stop!” She holds him back.

“F*****g prude.” He storms out.

“You alright, chica?” Maritza asks.

“Yeah, I’m fine. He just got really grabby.” Katarina says.

“You better not try stupit s**t like that to me.” She says to me.

“Alright, you know what? It’s not gonna work.” I tell her.

“Why? Cause I won’t give it up either?”

“No, because you’re too stuck up. You think your s**t don’t stink. I’m the best you could do and you still act like you were doing ME a favor. If this is how you’re going to be the whole time, I’m sorry but this is our last night as a couple.”

“Damn boy, you got some balls talking to me like that.”

“F**k you then.”

“Fine, whatever, puto.”

“See you Monday.”

“Whatever.” I leave the school and see Leo in the parking lot.

“Hey man.”

“Hey.” He says.

“Women, am I right?”

“Yeah man, I’m so pissed off, I wanna break something.”

“Well, we can’t really go anywhere, my chauffeur will be here in about five minutes.”

“So?”

“I was offering you a ride.”

“Oh, I don’t know, I think I’ll walk.”

“Fine.” Maritza comes out. “What do you want?”

“I’m sorry guapo, you’re right, I do expect too much…”

“Yeah well, too bad. You blew it.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I sighed. “You want a ride?”

“Si.”

“Alright.” The limo pulls up. “Get in.” So, we get in, and stop at her house.

“Despite the fight, I still had fun.”

“Yeah, so did I.” She leans over and gives me a kiss on the lips, and gets out of the car. D****t, girls know just how to push the right buttons, ya know? Anyway, I went to bed, and the next day, I just stayed home all day, didn’t feel like dealing with anyone. My brothers and sister were the only ones I hung out with, they’ve been bugging me to spend some time with them lately, so I did. Whatever.