Public Service Announcement

So, "Left Like Yesterday" is taking a hiatus as I finish a piece that has pretty much dominated my mind. I promise I'll come back to it.

Left Like Yesterday, Pt. 5

"Did I ever tell you the story of my friend Damien?"

"Is it going to make me feel like shit? Because I don't think I can take anymore, man."

"It might, I don't know."

"I'm not sure if I want to hear it then."

"Just give it a shot." Wes turns on the lights to the car. There is a sliver of blue on the horizon, as rays of orange seemingly blend into violets and blacks, and stars attack and punctuate the sky where the sun was once opaque in a blue sea.

I sigh as I stare at the profile of my reflection in the passenger seat window. "I don't really have much of a choice, do I?"

"What else do we have to do other than kill some time." I just snort my reply. Wes doesn't look at me, but I have the feeling that he's testing me somehow. "I met Damien when I was a freshman in high school. He was an orphan like me, that worked his way through the system."

"The system?"

"The foster system. Living from house to house. I was living at the last house I was to live at, in a nice neighborhood in Manhattan, and living with a decent family. When I mean a decent family, I mean these were good people. By this time, I was very jaded.:

"What do mean, jaded?"

"God, for someone who wasn't sure he wanted to hear this story, you sure do ask a lot of questions."

"Sorry."

"Don't worry. I was jaded. I just got done jumping from house to house with abusive fathers, drunks, mothers that adopted for the government payoffs, living on the edge in the Bronx, all that stuff. I had problems making friends at this new school where, to me, everyone had these perfect lives, with happy homes, with the multiple bedrooms, and the constantly paid electricity bill, and all that shit. I had this parents that were treating me like a human being, and in the back of my mind, in some sick form or fashion, I was wondering what their payoff was- what they were trying to gain. I couldn't trust them- or anyone for that matter.

"Anyway. Some of the teachers at school noticed my behavior, and having a copy of my record or something, I don't know really what, I got called into the counselor's office one day mid-way into my first semester. He sits me down, and does the whole, 'How are you liking the new school?' business, trying to be all nice, slowing segwaying into the, 'The reason I called into this office...' bit. So he tells me about this support group for teenagers that have run through the wringer, like I have. A 'Foster Care Group' he called it- he thought he was being witty. I didn't laugh. Of course, I rejected the idea at first. I told him I was fine, and that I didn't need help. He argued, said it wasn't about giving me help, but about helping me find friends. That helped a little in swaying me, but I didn't want to admit to that either."

"So how'd you end up going?"

"I didn't go at first. I left the office, and I said I'd think about it. Then, about a month and a half later, I was walking to class, and this guy was making fun of me, giving some shit, like a ignorant rich high school kid only would, about being an orphan, and I lost it. In the following fight, I broke his arm, and knocked out two of his teeth, and was almost sentenced to time in juvi. In the trial that I went to, because of course his parents wouldn't believe that their son would ever say 'Such mean things,' insisted that I go do some time. That same counselor, who now, I think about every day, he's a good man..."

"What's his name?"

"Mr. Corvino. Anyway, Mr. Corvino, went and spoke to the judge, and testified that I'm just a troubled foster kid in need of help. Litigation went on, and I don't know if was because I had a sympathetic judge, or if because I was only fourteen, but I ended up being scheduled to go to counseling once a week, and the support group that Mr. Corvino told me about earlier in the year."

"You got pretty lucky."

"Yeah, but not really. Do you really think that they were going to lock up a fourteen year old in New York for a high school fight?"

I could see his point. "Yeah, probably not."

He turns his head to me slightly, so he could keep his peripheral on the road, and smiles a bit, before he speaks again. "The support group was different that I expected it to be. I expected it to people like me, put through shitty homes, with ungrateful or abusive parents, but instead it was filled with these kids who had parents that had infertility problems, and raised them since they could remember, the only problem they really had was that they had no idea who their real parents were. While now I can respect that, seeing the trauma and anger that can lead to the world, back then, I resented every single one of them. Except Damien. Damien was the person leading the group. He just graduated college, from NYU, got a degree in sociology, and was social worker in the foster system. He was a foster kid himself. Everything I'm telling you now, I learned later. At first, I just thought he was like everyone else, so I guess at first, I hated him too. But, I learned to love him, just like everyone else- but it was him who to taught me to do so, I guess."

"Is that why you're telling me this story?"

"Maybe, but I don't think so."

"Then why are you telling me this story?"

"Just shut up and listen."

"Sorry."

"It's okay, just shut up. Damien, anyway, was like me. He jumped from house to house. Parents dying for the tax payoff, or the welfare check- shit like that. Alcoholic parents- not the silver spoon. Somehow, he survived though, went to college, and decided he wanted to help foster kids, do something to improve the system. He ran this group, and one thing he told me, later on in our friendship was that he was sad that they only people that had the courage to come to the support group were those that were raised in the house holds that really wanted the children for the aspect of raising them, not using them like Damien and myself- or myself until my last house. I should've resented myself for my last four years. Damien never even had one year in a house like I did in high school. They really were good people."

"Do you still talk to them?"

Wes holds his breath. His eyes close for a second. "No. I probably did one of the dumbest things of my life when I graduated high school."

"What did you do?"

"Don't worry about it," he said flatly. The muscles in his cheeks were clenched, and his face seemed to be flushed. I decided not to press on. We sat in silence, and finally, I turned to him, and was about to speak, ask him to go on with his story, but it was like he read my mind, and he just went on himself. "So, this support group, I sat week after week for about half a year, and I was counting down the days until I wouldn't have to come to it anymore..."

"How long were you supposed to go?"

"Half a year."

"So, you didn't say anything the whole time you were there?"

"Until the second to last week I was there. I was listening to this girl cry, telling a story about how she spent the night at one of her friend's house, and how she had to go back home because she 'Couldn't stand to watch the love' between her and her biological dad. And, this being God knows how many weeks of me listening to the same shit, I couldn't stand it. I was listening to Damien talk to her, asking her to express her feelings, you know, trying to be the good moderator, and finally I interrupted him. I went on this ill-reputed rambling of self- righteousness about how these people have it good, and they don't know what it means to 'work the foster system.' The beatings. Coming home to no electricity. Not having food. Living in the not so nice parts of the Bronx. All that shit. By the time I was done, I was almost in tears, out of breath, and almost everyone was staring at me with an open mouth, except for Damien, who just looked at me with a cold expression on his face, his arms crossed over his chest, leaning back into his chair. Until this point, they never heard me speak, and I just went off. I don't blame them, but at realizing what I just did, I ran the fuck out of the room.

"I ran out of the building, and outside to the curb of the street. I shivered in the cold air, and I felt lost in the only city I have ever been in- I never left New York, you see. But all I could do was stare around me in the afternoon bustle of Manhattan with the taxi's and people and snowfall. And then behind me, I feel a hand on my shoulder, and it's Damien, and he doesn't say anything, he just throws his head in one direction, indicating to follow him, and I was so beat at that moment. I gave in. We walk about ten minutes or so, and he turns me into a little, whole in the wall Noodle Bar. He asks me if I was hungry, not even giving me time to answer, as he pretty much shoved me inside and sat down. Sitting at the table, I got my first real good look at this person. I realized how enigmatic he was, in the way he spoke. The stories he told, and how good he was in making you forget about yourself, and how humble he was about himself, while at the same time he took over the situation. It was like his presence was the only star visible in a night sky. While it was so small, it was all you wanted to look at. He was good looking, groomed well, in a nice sweater, slacks, short hair cut, and brown eyes that looked right at you, and seemed to really only look at you honestly, not like they were trained to look at you in respect, because someone told him that's what he should do. He seemed to show a true interest in you, and you wanted to keep that interest. He'd tell these stories- crazy college parties, some insane ex-girlfriend, warning me 'high school, don't ever get into a relationship, because you'll think that it'll be the same when you get into college. But I promise you, something happens to women when they turn eighteen.' He said, 'I can't explain it, but they go fucking crazy. If you think you can't understand them now, just wait. I promise you that. Don't set any precedents.' I almost died laughing at that one. He tells me of bands he likes, and asks me about music I like. He tells me that you can learn almost everything about someone else in the art, and he meant all the art, that they like. He said, 'You'll know the dynamic and degree you'll get along with someone by the qualities you share and don't share with that person.' While I didn't understand that comment back then, almost everyday, it makes more sense to me.

"He told me to order whatever I wanted, and we both ended up eating some Vietnamese Pho. He showed me how to put together the soup and everything, how eat it with their weird little spoon and chopsticks. And then, out of nowhere, when we had a break from his amazing dialogue, and we're eating, and my spirits are high, and I have forgotten about the previous events, I notice him watching me with these very curious eyes. It stopped me dead in my tracks, you know? Finally, when the silence was unbearable, I asked him why he was looking at me, and he asked me why I went off like that. His specific words were, and I'll never forget them, 'Do you feel like you have a monopoly on misery?' he asked me. I told him my commiseration over the group and he told me I had no right for that polemic attack. I was shocked. I was beginning to storm out, when in a stern voice he told me to sit down. That's when he told me his life story. 'You and me are brothers,' he started. He described how he went from house to house, being beaten and abused. Mothers wanted that big government check. Drunken dads kicking his ass. It was sad. Straight out of a movie, and I could relate to almost every word, because he described the nuances that the movies will never capture.

"By the time he was done, I felt very close to him. It's like a bonding experience, that only two people that fought the same battle can have. And think he felt it, too. We sat in silence for a while, sipping on green tea, as he let me soak in what he just told me. Finally, I asked him, 'How come you don't get resentful to the silver spooned?' He said that he used too, and then he realized one day that they had their own battle. One day, after graduating high school, in college, he was talking to someone in college about his life, looking for that pity, and at the same time the gratification of making it through all the crap he made, when the person he was talking to started telling him of his life, and how his real father beat the ever living shit out of him, and how he could relate. That's when Damien had one of those 'aha!' moments, he said. He realized that he wasn't here to judge people's pain. But he can instead try to ease it. Show love, use his experience to ease others in pain. He was a good man. One of those people that would make you believe in God just by knowing him."

Wes stops for a second as rain starts to pour on the car. As I listened to him talk, I didn't realized how dark it got outside, and as the rain poured on the windshield, and the wipers rhythmically provided a circular procession of clarity, a river of white poured over my eyes as cars passed us by. Then, I don't know, something just didn't feel right. "What happened to Damien?" I asked.

Wes laughed quietly to himself and shook his slightly like he always does when he's being dramatic, but at the same time vulnerable. "I'm getting to that." He pauses again and lights a cigarette. He cracks the window slightly, and the smoke streams smoothly through the gap as small pellets of water land on the interior of the door. "Damien became my rock. While he had his slew of friends in college, he somehow found time to hang out with me. Sometimes, he even invited me to go out with his buddies. My sophomore and junior year, my life was more stable. I continued to go to the 'Foster Care Group' even without the court order, and was starting to make friends in school. I became more social, and Damien helped me with girlfriend's, and I went and saw him play with his band and he got me into bars. Everything was going well, until the summer before my senior of high school."

"What happened?"

"I'll tell you later."

"Why?"

"We're here."

I look out my window as Wes parked the car. The orange flag, that looked like a street cone, blew dramatically in the wind, and the bright lights stood out among the rain. "Emergency Room." The red cross next to it should have been an omen. The checkered teal and white striped lights that extended in either direction that lined the awing where the ambulances parked in their semi-circle drives, only seemed to draw me in, and make me hesitate more. I inhaled deep, and exhaled slowly. "Shit." That's all I could say.

"Are you ready?" Wes whispers.

I look at him. He's looking at me with soft eyes- his eyebrows up-tucked at the center, his mouth trying to smile in comfort, but failing- yet, I was comforted in the act. "Yeah, let's go."

It took us a moment to find my family. I didn't really know who to ask, and what to ask for. When I finally did find them, I didn't know if should've been relived or in despair. They waited in, well, a waiting room, my mother sitting on a block cushioned black chair, her elbows resting on her knees, which were clenched together in her black skirt, her eyes crushed in her palms. My father paced back and forth on the other side of the room, scratching under his chin, where stubble was growing, his red collared shirt wrinkled like he slept in it (which he most certainly did), and his jeans covered with paint, as if he rushed to get here and didn't look to see which pants he picked to wear (which, also, he most certainly did). My father was the first one to notice me. He stopped pacing and just looked at me. "Steven," he said mechanically.

My mother's head shot up like a rocket. Her eyes were red, and the space below them were black and shiny. She began to say something to me, but instead extended her palms outward to me, and her lips began to quiver. I walk over to her and clasp my hands in her. "Ma, you okay?" She tilts her head away from me, and I can tell she is crying. Her breathing is heavy and broken. "How is he?" I ask. "Ma?" When I realize she won't answer, I stand up, and walk over to my dad. "Hey," I say.

"Hello," he says soberly.

"How is he?"

"They don't know. He's still in surgery. The truck hit him pretty hard. Cracked his skull real good, broke some ribs, both legs. Shattered the left side of his face. Going to need reconstructive surgery." I almost marveled at how my father could speak about Todd like this with such little emotion. But I could see the thousand yard stare in his eyes. I could see the bottle waiting for him at home. I could see the vale of tears and the lonely pillow where he'll shed his grievance later. For now, he's going to do the only thing he can do- try to be the good father and keep everyone together. "They just don't know. Things aren't looking good, son. Just be prepared for the worst." As he said that, my mother burst into loudly into sobs.

I glance behind me, and I see Wes crouched by her whispering. I turn back to my father. "What happened?"

"Well, I don't really know. From what Candice tells me, she put Todd in a home, and Todd tried to run from it, and got hit by a truck. That's the plain and simple version."

My gut hit rock bottom. I felt nauseated as I began to think of the conversation my mother and I had over the summer. "She put him in a home?"

"Yeah. Decided it was time to move on. Not a terrible decision." He's whispering now, as we begin to walk away from my mother's hearing range. "How was she supposed to know he didn't want to go to a home?" I just nod my head slowly. I'm spinning. "Are you okay? You don't look so good." I don't say anything. "Of course you don't look good, you're brother's in ICU, what am I thinking." That's when I realize we're at the pop machine and my dad's pointing at it. "Want something to drink?" I shake my head no. "You know, something like this could've happened even without the home, I don't know why she's blaming herself," he says cracking open a Dr. Pepper and taking a sip. "In fact, I should've taken more responsibility in that boy's life, you know what I mean?"

"I don't think it's anyone's fault, pa."

"That's for damn sure. It's just one of those unfortunate things that happen, you know? If we can only get your mother to see that."

"How about you, are you okay?"

I look at him, and he's smiling. But, I see water build in his eyes. "I'm okay. I'm not great, but I'll make it. It's my son, too, you know? But, for now, all I can do is pray that God has mercy on either his life, or on my soul. One or the other. Whatever God chooses, will be what I have to accept."

"You don't actually believe that, do you?" I ask incredulously.

My father's brow gets tight as he looks to the ground. "Yes, I do," he says sternly as he brushes passed me. I watch his back as he walks towards my mother. I stare in disbelief for a moment before I walk over there too. Not in disbelief in my father's cold heartedness, that's just the way he is- his grieving process is very lonely. No, I've just never heard him ever display one intonation in a belief in a will of God. Furthermore, that will of God taking precedence over his.

We sat in that waiting room for a couple of hours or so. Every tick of the clock, I could sense the air grow thicker, the tension surmounting to the almost impossible, and I never knew doing nothing could be so tiring. I stared at the linoleum walls- grew a familiarity with them, with the other families that once laid their heads against the very same walls and wondered how their loved ones would make out. How this conquest of life or death bears such a burden and how long would they have to wait for a yes or no. I philosophized over the concept that since cognition, I knew I would die, and my family would die, and yet it still hurts. I flipped through magazines, looking a pictures, imagining myself as a movie star, traveling coast to coast, a slew of woman hoarding a small hallway for my autograph. I looked at my watch. Big block letters and numbers- "Oct. 15- 2:36 am." I watched a woman walk down the hallway slowly with another elderly woman, the younger woman with one arm around the elder's shoulders, and a hand pressed upon the other shoulder, giving her balance. I watched her as she whispered and smiled, trying to brink light to the bleak elder. I tried to find joy in this humanity, but in the end, everything kept me looking at the double plastic blue doors, with the yellow and black checkered stripe, and the sign saying, "No Unauthorized Access," waiting for a doctor with blood all over his scrubs to tell me my brother is dead.

Instead, a doctor came out in a clean white doctor's outfit, with pens lined neatly in the left breast pocket, a stethoscope around his neck, and he told us my brother is dead. Solemnly he approached us. Mr. and Mrs. Rosen? My mother's already beginning to cry again. I have some unfortunate news. My mother collapses to the ground. She's bawling. My father goes to his knees, wraps an arm around her, he's crying too, but softly, trying to console. The doctor follows as well. I stand a few feet away. I feel the walls close in on me. There are no words I can say to console your grievance. My mother sobs harder. I see Wes walk up to me. He tries to put his hand on my shoulder, but I push it away- I don't want to be touched. Sir, if you don't mind, I need you to come fill out some paperwork. My father nods. Wipes his eyes, looks at me for a few somber seconds, stands up, and follows the doctor down the hallway. My mother pushes herself up, walks to the chair where she was sitting, picks up her purse, walks to the elevator, hits the down button, and goes away. I still haven't moved. Everything has happened too fast. I still can't process it all. I hear Wes behind me. I don't understand what he's saying. I turn. I want to cry. I want to cry, but I can't. I want to say something. I want to break something. I want to hurt something. I want to hurt myself. I want to cry, but I can't. Do you want a cigarette? I just nod, and follow Wes down the elevator.

As we passed the front lobby, and went out the automatic doors, I see my mother's car drive off. The rain has died, but water falls from the roof, and the wind blows hard and stings our faces. The air is cool, and the clouds are beginning to part, showing a half moon, opaquely illuminating the sky. We sit on a bench, under the awing, the lights of the entrance making everything very bright where we were as compared to the parking lot, where soulless men and women walked out of the doors, and gingerly went home. Our seats are blessedly dry. It's late at night, and almost no one is about. I almost feel like Wes and I own this hospital. It is ours. Come in and you belong to me. I am a burning man, and you will become my victim.

Wes leaned back as he smoked, his arm outstretched along rise of the bench. I leaned forward, swaying with the wind, watching my cherry burn. "Will you finish your story now?" I ask him.

He leans forward and looks at me. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah. Please. I need anything but this."

He takes a long drag off of his cigarette, and flicks it away. "Where was I?"

I laugh a little. "Being dramatic."

He laughs. "Fuck you. The summer before my senior came, and everything was going well, but Damien started getting very sick, and we didn't know what it was. It's progression was very rapid. He started losing weight, coughing up blood- just nasty, nasty shit. And I got very worried, and so did the rest of his friends. So, he goes to a doctor, and it turns out that he has cancer. Well advanced, and it doesn't look like there's a chance of stopping it. To make the story short, he's fucked. He's going to die. At this point, I fall into a depression. Angry at God kind of shit. I wondered how a person can over and over have life handed to him on the worst side of the stick, and finally make it out, experience the nice side, and then, you know, be dealt the king of hearts. Hey, buddy, I'm glad you made it through the shit and succeeded, here's your reward, death. I got doubly angry at the 'assholes' [Wes does the actual apostrophe thing with his fingers] that make it out there with a silver spoon shoved right up their asses.

"I became very resentful. At everything. At life, at people, at school, at my foster family, even at Damien."

"Why?" I ask looking at him.

"Well," he says, reaching into his jacket pocket, pulling out his pack of smokes. He offers me one. I refuse. He lights one for himself, and continues. "Well, I don't really know. Maybe because subconsciously I felt like he was abandoning me. I don't know. It's hard, you know, when you're seventeen, jumped from home to home, and the first real friend, the first sense of family you have, dies in only a few years of you knowing them. I mean, this guy was my go to guy. If something happened, I called him up, and he'd talk me through it. If I needed help, he'd do it. If I needed money for a date, he'd lend it to me. You know, he played the big brother role I always wanted in life, and now, he's leaving me, and it's not like he's going on a trip, I mean, he's gone- forever. I think I was afraid. I didn't know what laid ahead of me. I didn't know what I'd do without him. Overall, I was being a selfish little prick.

"So I started pulling away from him. I started ignoring his phone calls. Or when he did call, I made excuses why we couldn't hang out. I told myself that I was preparing for the inevitable. I started drinking a lot, partying, sleeping around with girls at my high school. The funny thing is, people started liking me less. In the past, I never had a problem getting invited to parties, but that period of time, after a while, no one wanted me around. In the end, I was avoiding Damien, and everyone was avoiding me. I was miserable, and depressed. I even stopped going to the 'Foster Care Group' that I was even beginning to lead sometimes.

"Mind you, I didn't stop hanging out with him entirely. Just, it wasn't frequent. It was few and far between, and when we did hang out, it wasn't the same. We barely talked. We hung out at his apartment, because he didn't have the strength to go out after a while. We'd watch a movie, eat, and I'd go home. I don't know. It was odd.

"But then, one day, we were hanging out, and this was close to his death, a strange thing happened. Well, I don't know if it was 'strange,' per se, I just don't know what else to call it. We were eating dinner, at his place, and he tells me how much he enjoys hanging out with me. Instantly I make some off the cuff remark about how it can't be as fun as hanging out with his older friends. When I didn't get a response to this, I look up, and he's got this weird look on his face. Then, he tells me that ever since he's been sick, they don't hang out with him anymore. They say they're too busy, or something. Pretty much making excuses. He said I'm the only person that makes it up to his place. I almost dropped my fork. I broke down right there. I told him how sorry I was. How I lied to him about having shit to do, how I was scared and being selfish. How I just don't understand, and how it's not fair, blah blah blah. You know, I apologized for being an asshole. When I was done, he was smiling so big, and he tells me that it's going to be alright. Everything is cool, he says. And after I'm done crying, just sobbing to myself, he says, 'Funny. I'm the one dying, but you're the one that needs to be consoled.' We just started laughing.

"I hung out with him every day for the rest of his life from that day forward. And on his dying day, I sat next to him. He had no family, no one else there. No other friends. No one from the 'Foster Care Group.' No one except me. And I held his limp hand. His breathing soft. He was pale. So fucking pale." Wes pauses, and coughs awkwardly and looks away. He shakes his head vigorously, and then starts talking again, still looking away. "I'm crying my ass off, and the doctors have given up trying to get me to leave. He says to me, between short breaths, 'Wes, I don't want you to cry. I don't want you to think that God is taking me away from you. I don't want you to think that you've ever had anything ever taken away from you. No, you've only had them put in your life in the first place. If you can remember that, then you can really live your life, instead of just remembering what your life used to be. If you live in memories you're like a photograph, you can be beautiful, but that's all you are, something to look at. Become something useful. Use the privileges that God, or if you don't believe in God, life has put before you. Use them to benefit yourself, and moreover, don't forget that there are many that suffer worse than you and I will ever know, and there are those that will know no suffering, but in the end, remember that there is something to learn from everyone and everything, and there is something we can give to everyone and everything. I have been privileged to know you.' Those weren't his exact words... well, except that photograph part, I thought that was real poetic, so I kept it to memory. But, that was the gist of what he said to me. I'll never forget it."

He stopped right there and looked at me. His eyes were solemn and searching. I broke away from his gaze and looked at the ground. "You got another cigarette?" I ask, finally.

He sighs and leans forward also. "Yeah," he pulls a couple out of the pack from his pocket. He lights both of them at once, and hands one to me. "You know, maybe what Damien said to me held more depth and weight because of the way I lived my younger years, and because I knew the man, but I hope maybe you can see the parallels in what he said."

I shake my head as I blow out a drag. "I see what you're saying, man. It's just hard for me to... I don't know, react to anything right now."

"Don't react." I look up at him, searching his face. "Damien wouldn't want you to react. What he would want you to do, is to find your father and tell him it's okay to cry. It's okay to show that he's hurting. Damien would want you to go to your mother's house and hold her hand. Damien would want you to realize even though you can't cry now, you've already cried, and maybe you will later. What he'd want you to do is to maybe realize that you got to stop thinking so much about your pain and remember you're not the only person affected by Todd dying. Only when you do that, can you really appreciate what Todd did for you in your life, your parents life. Remember Todd. See how he's affecting everyone about you. Think about that." He taps his head. "Think about that. Why is Todd affecting your parents so? Because they loved him just like you. So remember him. Remember what he meant to you, and remember what he meant to your parents, and go to them instead of sitting out here with me smoking cigarettes." For a moment, I didn't know what to say. I just stared at him as he watched me. I'm sure he could see the change of emotions float about my face. Have I been so selfish this long?

I started to cry.

Left Like Yesterday, Pt. 4

The incident at the art show became almost a taboo among us. We were neither awkward upon seeing each other next, nor were we cautious, but we did maintain an air of common knowledge. All three of understood that some private matter should stay in the privy of those involved. While there was something horrid in that moment, a connection was made between us because of it. I think it was because of that incident that Alma and mine's friendship could become more intimate, which really, I believe was a conduit for their relationship to begin. It was only in their nature to be keen of each other, wary of letting them into the personal box of their lives, afraid of what might come out. Someone had to be there to mediate, and that someone was me.

I began showing up to Rendez-Vous Cafe on a regular basis and I would sit at whatever seat I could find, preferably upstairs in the smoking area, or outside if it was nice and not rainy, and wait for Alma to have a break to give me a break in between my studying. Really, I began to enjoy this routine, and it wasn't that much of a bother in a change in my life. Considering I lived on Hill and East University and Rendez-Vous was around the corner from Hill Street on South University, it was about a ten minute walk. I would free coffee, I would get out of the house, and a lot of pretty women liked to go and socialize. That's one thing I'll always love about this city, how active it is for a small town. How political everyone is. Everyone's always involved with some organization, or pleading about needing to help this nation in Africa, worrying about the current crisis in Sierra-Leone, wondering why the Republicans can't leave Clinton alone. It was every liberals dreamland, seriously. I wish I could've been here in the sixties to see the tanks and the declaration of the Peace Corps.

As for Wes and Alma- there was no Wes and Alma. At this point, it was Wes, Alma, and Steven. Or, it'd be Alma and me, or it'd be Wes and me, but the two of them together, alone, didn't come along until the semester ended and I moved home for the summer. What would generally happen is that I would be at Rendez-Vous studying, and Wes would walk in with his casual stride, glancing about the room as if he just showed up here on a whim, not expecting to see anyone, and upon seeing me, he'd take his hands out of his pockets, wave to me, walk over to me, in most cases taking a few moments to say hi to someone sitting there that he knew, and then sit down and start talking to me. I'd just have to put my books up because I knew there'd be no chance for me to continue studying once he's there. In most cases, he'd have a deck of cards with him, and we' play gin until Alma got off work, and we'd go somewhere, whether it'd be a bar for a beer, to someone's house to relax, or to a party on the weekend, it didn't matter. Of course, there would be some deviation to that order sometimes. Every once and while, Wes and I would be walking, and we'd show up to Alma's place, or Alma and I would be cruising in her car and pick Wes up and we'd drive out to the woods towards Saline, where we part the car and walk out to this brook we found that breaks through and creates a path to a little drop off where you can see a highway a little ways away. We'd sit there for hours and watch the sun set, or the snow fall, or the moon caress the backs of cars, and sometimes, we wouldn't say anything. Our cigarette smoke would intertwine with our breath, and inundated with the comfort of our small little gestures and our silent monosyllabic sentences, we would forget the pressures of the realities a few miles away. I remember one time we were out there, and Alma sketched the view. It was quite breath taking, the way the pen strokes somehow seemed to, in a casual quality, express the hushed existence that we were around. It showed that while everything moved with the wind, it all stayed the same. She asked what it should be called. I was stumped. Wes, without even thinking, said: "Call it, 'The Wind Whispers Through My Pen.'"

Alma just looked at the drawing, pulling it close to her face in the fading light. "That's kind of a long title, don't you think?"

"You don't have to use it," he responds monotonously, not moving a muscle (other than his mouth, of course).

She stares at it some more. "Fuck it," she says with some emphasis. "Where is it ever written that it has to be short?" Then, in very neat and precise handwriting, full of curves and accents, she writes in an empty space at the top of the drawing, at an angle, "The Wind Whispers Through My Pen." Then, in the bottom corner, with quick strokes, she signs it like a basketball star would sign an autograph. After a moment, she passes the pad and pen to Wes who just stares at it blankly. "Sign it," she says, waving it at him.

"Why?"

"You came up with the title. You deserve some credit."

Wes stared at her for a moment, evaluating the situation, I assume, before taking the pad and pen slowly and with some reservation. Right below Alma's signature, Wes signs, "WES '98" in large block letters, handing it back to her saying, "So we never forget how old we were."

"You think we'll know each other that long?" she responds. I tried looking at her so I could study her face. I wanted to see if she was smiling at Wes' comment, but it was too dark. All I could tell was that she was looking at the pad. Wes never responded. Instead, he pulled a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it.

That was a sweet moment between the two, and gradually they became more common. But, before they were together as a couple, that was the only one that happened in front of me. Usually, when the three of us were together, Wes and Alma were usually being childish and stupid and going at each other's throats. As time went, though, something change. One could sense that the generally hostility that once used to exist, that used to be the manifestation of the tension between the two, would be replaced with an almost good natured teasing. Now, half the time they argued, there would be a smile involved, and comments like, "I don't want to be offensive," and "I see what you're saying, but..." which never used to exist. Instead it'd just be, "hey, fuck that, you're wrong, you fucking asshole."

Soon, there was a comfortable arrangement between the three of us which allowed for us to be publicly together. It took a while, but it came to be. At first, honestly, sometimes, I became embarrassed to be around them. There arguments would escalate to the point where I could see people snickering at us openly. But, as the winter began to dwindle, and the heavy jackets faded away to thick cotton sweaters, the sun seemed to also melt the coldness between them.

The last night I would see the two of them together but not in a relationship was the night before I moved back to Detroit for the summer of 1998. This would be the first time since I went to college that I was moving back home for the summer, and I was sad for leaving but I was to intern in the North Oakland Medical Center in Bloomfield, which was something I needed to do before I graduated (which was the plan for me in August of '99). Anyway- remember my friend Tanya? Well, at that point, she lived in these really nice apartments at the outskirts of the town, on the top of the hill, where if you stood on her balcony, you had an impressive view of the city and roads. Well, she threw an "End of the School Year" party that night, and invited Wes and I, and of course, we went. She wanted to make it a theme party- something to the extent of Hawaii in Michigan. Everyone dressed in Hawaiian t-shirts, were "laid" (how do you spell those things, really?), and there were all sorts of beach decorations on the wall. The only thing out of place was the music. Of course there was rap music, mixed in with some Sublime (when I confronted her about the music, she said, "Well, I got Sublime in there, right?" I said, what's Sublime have to do with it, and she said it was reggae, silly! I didn't have the heart to correct her.) They served all sorts of mixed drinks made primarily of rum, and of course, some people brought over The Beast and Labat Blue so there'd be beer, but me, I enjoyed drinking whatever the hell I was drinking with the big umbrellas and coconut pieces and pineapple wedges.

Something changed the night of Alma's party when Wes was embarrassed badly by Alma. While he still had a crowd of people around him, and while he still was immensely popular, it was different now because of Alma standing there by his side. Now, people would watch Wes, become entranced with his wit and humor, staring at his hands conducting the crowd and their emotions, but no more did the bedroom eyes exist anymore. The girls were there, but now that Alma was there, even though there was nothing between them, the girls became wary. You could see it in their posture, how they shifted uncomfortably in their feet, how desperately they wanted to step closer to him, and how they wanted to look at all of him, but every time they caught themselves looking passed his eyes, you could see this quick glance at Alma, like she was a parent and they were a child breaking a rule. I don't know how it started. Maybe it was because of that night they expected them to be enemies and they turned out to be friends that made everyone curious as to the extent of their relationship, but it was something very subtle and took me a while to notice exactly what it was. I knew something was different at the first party we went to, but when I realized that those eyes faded away, I was amazed, especially for the fact that the only time Alma said anything would be one liners making fun of Wes, pretty brutally too for that matter, that Wes would generally just blow off and continue with his ramblings.

I could hear the insistent thumping of the music and laughing and loud talking of the party behind me through the glass sliding door that led through the balcony that separated Wes, Alma, and I as we smoked a cigarette after a long discourse by Wes finally came to an end. I was starting to buzz, and I'm sure Wes was too. Alma was drunk already. I could tell by the way she leaned into the railing, swaying back and forth in between Wes and I, not caring really what we thought.

"What do you think you're going to do back home?" Wes asked me.

"I don't know. Work. Hang out with my dad. See my old friends. I'll probably visit my mom, see my sister before she goes to Boston. See how Todd's doing."

"What do your parents do?" Alma asks, raising herself on the railing, leaning half her body over the edge, as to where her legs are swinging in the air behind her and she's looking at me from a free floating distance two stories above the ground.

"My father's a high school teacher."

"What's he teach?"

"He teaches sophomore chemistry."

"Was he your teacher?"

"No, he wasn't. The school wouldn't allow it."

"Are your parent's together?"

"No."

"Who'd you live with?"

"My father. My sister and my brother lived with my mom."

"What's she do?"

"She's one of those psychiatrists for rich people. A drug dealer." She laughed at that. "She's not a drug dealer, but you know what I mean."

"Your sister's going to Boston?"

"College."

"Harvard?"

Now I laughed. "Not likely. Boston College."

"That's still a good school."

"Yeah. I don't know how she got in."

"Asshole! Have more faith in your sister."

"You don't know her. I love her, but sometimes, I think my brother has a better chance in college that she does. She's a complete doofus."

Alma looks at me in confusion. Wes leans into her and mock whispers, "His brother is autistic."

Her eyes grow big, and for a second I think she was about to cry. Her hands raise to her face. "I'm sorry."

I turn around and lean on the railing with my elbows so I can look at the festivities inside. "For what? I'm not. He's just fine."

"I didn't know."

"And you didn't say anything about him. I did, so don't worry about it." I look at my empty cup. "I'm getting a drink."

I left because I wanted something more to drink and because I don't like it when Alma reaches this stage of her intoxication- her "sad" stage. Thankfully, this is her shortest stage, I've come to notice. At least, most of the time, it's her shortest stage. I push through the crowd to reach the kitchen, and as an exodus opens I have a clear line of sight to the fixed up bar where there should be pepper's and supplies to cook. Standing in the kitchen, mixing a drink, from the back, I see a body that could only be Tanya. I measure myself for a moment and conclude that I am with enough alcohol in me that I can use that as an excuse, so I walk up to her smoothly, wrap my free arm around her body and pull her to me and whisper in her ear: "Tanya, you look amazing tonight."

Her head looks up to see who it is, her eyebrows tight with anger until she realizes who it is. Upon realization who it is, her face becomes the cool, contained face that it always is, and her hand reaches up and grabs my chin. I'll be honest, at first, I get pretty excited, I didn't really think my plan was going to work out well- and, well, I was right. Tanya, with my chin in her hand, turns my face to the crowd, and with the other hand, points to the crowd. "Do you see that deliciously gorgeous black man right there?" she says with a little seduction in her voice.

I sigh and push myself away from her and place my hands on the counter and lean into my arms perusing the crowd until I see the only possible person she could be talking, who, I have to admit, was a very attractive man. "Yeah, I think so- the guy in the black collared shirt?"

"That's the one."

I turn around and mix a drink. "What about him?"

"What do you think about him?"

I lean on the counter as I take a sip of my drink. All I really know is that I put rum in my cup with an assortment of other stuff. Upon a first sip, I knew this drink was the one that was going to throw me over the edge. "What do I think about him?"

"Yeah."

"I don't know him."

Tanya's face slips into the most sly and vixen smile. "Neither do I," she says.

I laugh. "You're bad, you know that?" I know she loved that response because she laughed too as she walked away, saying, well, I've got business to attend to. I watched her walk up to this man, and I saw a master at her game. He was hooked at the hello. I shook my head as I walked back to the balcony. I had my hand on the handle, ready to slide the door open when I looked outside to see Wes looking at Alma, who was looking up at him talking. I saw this look on Wes' profile, a sort of glow- a smile I've never seen before that seemed so natural that I was surprised that it has been so alienated from me. I wasn't standing there long watching them, maybe a few seconds, but Alma must have sensed my presence, or seen my shadow because she turned around and looked at me, and with some voyeuristic shame, I quickly stepped back out to the balcony.

The rest of the evening goes without saying. We drank, talked, had a good time, and when Alma got to drunk to be social, we walked her home. After that, I walked with Wes to his house, and standing on the steps of his door he invites me in. "No, man. I have to wake up early," I say.

"I guess this is the last time I'll see you in a while," he says coming up to me giving me a hug.

I hug him back, sort of hitting his back, trying to make it seem more "manly." "Don't become all sloppy drunk emotional on me. You'll see me again."

"Yeah I know. Are you going to come back and visit?"

"Sure."

"Well, you be safe there. Give me a call."

"I will." And I watched my friend walk in his house. There was a strange feeling I had as I turned around and began walking to my apartment. It was a sense of growing up, like I was beginning to detach myself from this codependent relationship and becoming a man. At the same time, I knew I was going to miss him. I had mixed feelings of excitement and sadness with each step I took. Maybe it was the alcohol.

I stayed at my father's place over the summer, taking care of it while he visited his brother's family, which happened to house his aging senile mother, in Eugene, Oregon. He lived in Brush Park, and it was a nice house, so I was comfortable. He moved here shortly after my parents divorced when I was fifteen. My mother moved to a ritsy neighborhood in Bloomfield, and while it's way nicer over there, I have a special place in my heart for Midtown and the 313. The drive was considerable every day for work, but the benefit was that every so often, I could drop by my mother's house and grab a bite to eat. My mother would always be at work, and my sister Sandy would always be off with her friends, and whatever was her boyfriend of the week. The house generally was empty except for my brother Todd and the hired nurse to take care of him, but he didn't do much but sit around and watch TV and make sure Todd didn't burn the house down.

When I started working at the Med Center, I had this expectation that I would be involved in actual medical work- you know, get involved with stuff that would help me out in grad school. Instead, I was the errand boy. Steve, run this to Dr. So and So, do this, xerox this, fax this, call this patient, blah blah blah fucking blah. While I got to walk around and see the political, or better yet, internal structure of a hospital, in the end, I felt somewhat disheartened by the experience. I felt that some intellectual fantasy of my mine, where I would be thrown into the gauntlet of academia did not come true. I guess the big lesson I learned from my experience from the hospital was this- never make your expectations big because you fall harder.

The most trying part of that summer was dealing with my family. My family dynamic has never really been what I would consider smooth. My father is about as bipolar as they come, but refuses to see a therapist because he ex-wife is one. My younger sister is a whore (she was back then, I hate saying it, but that's how she dealt with life), and my brother is autistic. My mother is pretentious and thinks she knows everything about everything and constantly reminds us about how she "graduated suma cum laude from Harvard medical in psychiatry." Sometimes, I want to walk up to her, slap her, and say, "If you're so smart, then what made you think that you and my father were a match with your Harvard degree and his barely made it through Eastern Michigan to become a high school teacher," but she's my mother, and I don't believe in slapping women.

The problem was the divorce. To this day, they both still try to justify their actions to each other. And, the fact that I chose to live with my father has created a great deal of tension between my mother and me. I tried telling her, it has nothing to do with her, I think they're both equally fucked up, I just didn't want to leave Midtown. They both had their wrongs- my mother wanted to control everything and my father couldn't keep his dick in his pants. Of course, you'll probably thing that my father's infidelity is worse that my mother's trying to control everything, but it's not. I think my father slept around because my mother tried to control my father's dick. But that's a whole other issue. Regardless, they're human, and flawed. In the end, I chose to live with my father and my mother never forgave me for that I think. She gave me some grace on the resentment when I went to her undergraduate alma mater, U of M, but in the end, our relationship never really bloomed until the winter of '99.

That summer, we only had one period of extended time together and it was going away party for Sandy. I felt ridiculously out of place there, with Sandy and all her "girlfriends" and all the football players that are asking me about college because they're going to like Appalachian State on scholarship. Sandy had the most stereotypical group of friends ever. Ever. Of course, we bought them a keg, and mom was "watching" over the party, but really, me and my mother sat on lounge chairs in the shade of the lawn patio awing as the afternoon sun beat down on the backyard where everyone gathered sipping our Crown on the rocks just watching all these...kids, drinking in relative silence, smoking cigarettes.

Then, of course, my mother can't help saying something: "Why don't you come live with me for the summer?"

I don't even turn my head to look at her. I respond quickly, because I can. Because somewhere, in the back of my head, I was expecting this question- I was just counting down the time for this question to come out. "Because I like it there, ma. Come on."

"But it's so... dirty."

I move from my leaning into the back of my seat position to a rigid back posture facing her on the tip of my chair. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Don't talk to your mother like that. Just because you went to college, young man, doesn't means you can forget your formal education."

"And just because you moved out of the 313 doesn't mean you can forget you were born in Dearborn."

As I leaned back into a comfortable position in my chair again, I could see the quick frown form on her face. "But you have to admit," she says, leaning forward into the table between our two chairs, grabbing the tongs in the ice bucket and dropping two cubes in glass. "You have to admit, it's a good deal nicer here."

"Sure," I say, stifling a yawn. "Sure, it's a lot nicer, yeah. You've got your Starbucks and Border's and whatnot, but what's wrong with Downtown?"

"Nothing."

"Then why do you keep insisting on trying to get me to move here?"

"I just want what's the best for you."

I shake my head as I stand up. I give a soft, harsh laugh before I say, "I got to use the rest room. I'll be right back."

I was using the bathroom upstairs, the door wide open, when I sensed a presence standing in the doorway, and when I turned, in mid-piss, to see Todd standing there, I was scared shitless. "Jesus, Todd! I fucking hate when you do that." I zip myself up, wash my hands, and dry them on the towel by the sink as he watches me silently. No matter how many times I've been through this procedure in my life, I could never get used to it. "What? What is it? You need something?" Todd just turns around, and silently walks towards his room. "Fuck," I whisper as I walk down the stairs. It's not like my brother can't talk- he can, he just rarely does it. In fact, when he does, it sounds so awkward that sometimes we don't know what to do when he speaks. We'll just sit there in silence wondering if it really happened. He's not retarded and he knows, for the most part, what he's doing, he's just detached from reality, I guess. That's how someone explained it to me. I don't really get it much. And I know, I'm kind of an asshole to him, but it's hard to take care of someone so much, to love someone so much, and they don't say a fucking word of gratitude. I'll defend him to anyone, violently if I had to, but I just got frustrated, and I took it out on him. It was immature, and selfish, but I just didn't really understand the nature of it all.

When I arrived at the patio, I sat at the edge of my chair in silence for a moment. I could tell my mother knew I wanted to say something because she was watching me from the brim of her sunglasses. "What are you going to do about Todd?" I said.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean when you die."

"Well, it's pretty far from now."

"You can't take care of him forever."

"I'll put him in a home or something."

"Have you ever tried to ask him what he wants?"

"Do you really, honestly, think that he cares?"

"Yeah."

"Let me rephrase- do you really, honestly, think that he's going to answer that question? Better yet, understand it if I ask it of him?"

"I think he understands everything, but he chooses not to respond."

"So what makes you think he'll respond to that question?"

"I don't know. Still, don't you wonder about his future?"

"Of course I do, I'm his mother. I've been taking care of him for sixteen years, and everyday I have to think, 'Is today the day I'm going to get the phone call,' the call telling me that Todd burnt himself, or did something stupid? I'm constantly worried about him. If I have to, yes, I will keep him in my house until the day I die, or if it happens, until he dies."

I lean back into my chair as I light a cigarette. "I guess you know best."

"I hope I do. But please, I don't want to spend this day with my oldest son talking about these things. Tell me, how's that good looking friend of yours?"

"Wes?"

"Sure."

"Still stealing the cradle, ma?"

"Don't be crude."

"He's fine. We'll be graduating at the same time."

"Isn't he older."

"And slower."

"That's not nice."

"It explains how we're graduating at the same time."

My mother refills two cups of Crown before speaking again. "Have you thought about what you're going to do post graduation?"

"Med-school."

"Harvard?"

"Doubtful. University of Chicago is the goal. I have a good GPA, and I'm already preparing for the MCAT, so hopefully, with the right recommendations, I'll be in."

"Chicago's good."

"I know, ma. That's why I want to go there."

"Any back-ups?"

"Sure. But I'm being hopeful right now."

"That's good. Do you have a girlfriend?"

"No. Can't seem to nail one down."

"That's too bad."

"It's okay, ma."

"Well, just don't make me a grandmother before I'm fifty and I'm fine." And she leans back and doesn't say another word. Sometimes, I couldn't believe my mother.

During the whole summer, that was the only extended time I spent with my family. Sandy went off to Boston the next day, and I continued to work at the hospital. What I didn't realize was that my conversation with my mother about Todd would play a bigger role in our lives than I would realize. But that would come later. In late July, I visited Ann Arbor for a weekend, staying at Wes' place the whole time. It felt good as I drove into town, feeling that sense of relief as I saw that Red Roof Inn and that Big Boy's. The familiar sights and trees that marked the outskirts of the city somehow made it easier for me to breath, and the closer and closer I made it to campus, the more excited I felt, until I turned onto Washtenaw, and then I was soaring.

I showed up at Wes' around four in the afternoon. The sun stood high in the sky, and the heat was just barely bearable, but everything seemed a perfect fit. Wes sat on his patio, on that old, thrift store sofa with the blue petal flowers, wearing jeans and a wife-beater, smoking a cigarette and drinking a beer. As I pulled into his driveway, he didn't get up, but his face lighted up in a smile. With my duffle bag, I walked up the steps, and sat down right next to him on the sofa, where I saw Wes had his feet resting on a cooler. By the time I leaned back into the cushions, Wes already had a beer in his hand, and was handing one to me. "Welcome home, bud," was all he said. For the next two hours, we sat there in the sun talking about nothing. I told him about Sandy's party and my concerns with Todd, and so forth.

Then he just flat out said it. "Alma and I hooked up." My head swung to look at him so fast that I felt a sharp pain for a little while after. He had this large, almost ridiculous smile on his face. Then he started laughing. "Yeah, I know. I can't believe myself."

"No, I can believe it, I just didn't expect it so soon. When did it happen?"

"Just the other day, actually."

"What happened?"

"Well, after you left, we just started hanging out on our own. I'd go up to the coffee shop and she'd give me coffee and I'd read a book or something and at night we'd go to a bar or party or something. You know, it was pretty much the same thing as the three of us without you being there. That's the way that it always happened though, we never exchanged numbers or anything. I'd always go to her work, and we'd leave from there. And she'd never tell me if she was working, and I didn't go in all the time, it was kind of a random thing. So, the other day, I was walking through the Diag, and I bumped into her. We talked for a moment, and decided to grab a bite to eat. So, we get something to eat, and then she invites me to her to go with her to her friends house that night- you know, a bunch of people just hanging out. So I go, and I'm feeling all out of place, and Alma, who doesn't get all shit faced drunk, senses that or something, actually does something cool, and goes outside to smoke and tells me to go with her. You know what we ended up doing? We ended up walking to the arb. And for some reason, we walked through the arb all night, and I don't know, everything else is history. We ended up back in my place, and it just happened."

I don't say anything, and I can see the consternation on Wes' face because I know he wanted an immediate reaction from me. "You have her phone number now, right?" I ask finally.

"Shut up."

"That's good man. I'm happy for you."

"Yeah," he says softly, looking into his beer for a moment, before he gulps down the rest. Then he looks at his watch. "Speaking of which, throw your shit inside. We got to go meet her."

"Where at?"

"Rendez-Vous."

At the coffee shop, Alma immediately noticed us walking in, and while it was busy, she rushes to the side where the employees walk in to be behind the counter. Wes walks quickly up to her, and I follow right behind. She leans over the small door that separates them both, where it looks as if they were going to kiss, but I see her eyes look at me. "Have you told him yet?" she half mumbles to Wes.

"Yeah, he knows," he says as he grabs he face.

We were at the top of the world. The three of us. We were giants of our domain. No one could touch us, and even if they could, we'd just brush them off of our shoulders and not look back. Our shadows covered the dark secrets of our path and the road ahead seemed illuminated by the sun that warmed our face and our faith. These days were our days. These days were forever embraced in the loving arms of the catalogues of our histories. We were the trees that survived the fire.

Then October 14th, 1998 happened.

Left Like Yesterday, Pt. 3

If you live in the Midwest long enough, you begin to love the winters- or at least, I did. The clouds, the grey-ness of it all, it made sense to me. I began to crave it, need it. It didn't affect me in any particular way. It was just as if it was a sunny day. Happily, I would wrap myself up in jackets and jeans, and trudge down icy sidewalks, jumping over black snow piled upon the edges hoping not to fall. The sky would stay, as always, consistently opaque, greeting me with the somber quality of a father watching his child. Those days the sun came out, it was a phenomenon- a paradox of the whole idea of a Midwestern winter. It was like summer was trying to break through, when really the calm, quiet security that blankets the essence of the locale should be given its peaceful right by the drifting sleep of the clouds. Between the snow, the clouds, the biting wind, you either love it, or you hate it. I loved it. It made the life around me seem so much more crisp, clear.

The winter of 1998 was a winter of change. It was gradual, and the transformations led into spring and summer, and culminated into autumn, but during that whole winter, I can remember feeling something changed. Wes and Alma's relationship didn't blossom like his and mine did. In fact, their relationship was a long and arduous process that took some unnecessary tolls and turns that could have easily been avoided if either of the two could have admitted to being hard headed and loosened up a bit. At first, they never hung out by themselves- I had to be there.

The day after the Fleetwood, I decided to head up to Rendezvous to get a cup of coffee and just chat with her. I stood in line behind two people, but she saw me walk through the door where she gave me a quick smile a wave. I felt a little bit of warmth seep through my body and a tinge of pride when the two people in front of me turned around to see who she was waving at, and it was hard for me to combat the smile creeping upon my face. When I approached the counter, she places both her elbows on the glass, and props her face in her two palms. "What can I help you with?" she says with a little witticism.

"Just whatever your biggest coffee is. Black. To go."

"Sure." She turns around, grabs a paper cup, a plastic lid, and turns back to me. "The coffee selections are behind you on that counter." She points behind me towards a counter facing the front entrance by a window. I turn to look, when I turn back around, she's looking a me. "So, where's your little friend?"

"Wes?"

"Yeah."

"He's probably still sleeping."

"Oh. Little bit lazy, huh?"

"You can say that."

I was about to speak, to tell her I'll talk to her later when she all sudden asks me something I would never expect her to ask me. "Hey, would you come to the art fair with tonight?"

"Pardon?" I was a little bit in shock. I didn't know what to say really.

"Well, tonight's the last night I have to be there to give a speech, and well, honestly, I've been so bored there these past few nights because Stephanie stopped coming, so, I don't know, I thought it would be nice to have some company. So what do you say?"

"Um... yeah, sure."

That's how I ended up going to the art fair. Of course, Wes, he wasn't so keen on the idea. "What do you mean you're going to the art fair? Are you serious?" I hear him say over the phone.

I'm pressing the receiver against my shoulder and ear as I button up my shirt in front of the mirror, I listen to his breathing, heavy as he walks down the stairs (I can hear his feet on the wooden steps). "Yeah. She asked me to go. She said she was going to be lonely, wanted some company, and asked me to go. I said sure."

"You know this chick for one night and now she's asking you to be a gentleman chaperone." He does a mocking whistle here. "You're building quite a repertoire with this woman, you know that?"

"Shut up." I rest the phone on my shoulder as I quickly put some gel in my hair. "Hey. You should come."

"No way buddy," he says almost indignantly.

"Why not? I think she likes you."

Pause. "What do you mean?"

"Well. She asked about you today."

"She could've just been trying to be nice."

"I don't know. Maybe. We'll see. I still think you should."

"I don't think so. I don't know."

"Hey, well, either way, come or don't, I've got to go. I think you should come, but I got to go."

"Yeah, I'll talk to you later."

By the time I arrived at the Union, there was a large line, but following Alma's instructions, I walked right passed everyone, stepped right up to the man at the door, told him my name, and he let me right in. The art fair was in the ballroom in the back. There were sheets hanging down from the high ceiling walls, starting from the large windows up where the roof makes and almost cathedral appearance. Draped ahead of the white sheets are elegantly framed paintings of multiple variety. I found Alma stand close to the front standing in the corner in a white, one piece skirt, cut off at an angle above her knees. Her back was exposed in a gaping "v" and a string tied around her neck that connected to the front of the blouse that clung tightly to her body. I was happy I decided to wear a white collared shirt with white slacks myself because I felt we matched quite well. Alma stood there gazing nowhere but doing it with such propriety it looked only proper and purposeful, you really didn't want to get in her way. One arm was cradled around her chest, tucked into her other arm that was extended at the elbow holding a glass of white wine that was opaque with condensation. As I headed towards her, I passed by a steward holding a tray of glasses, picked myself up a glass, thinking that we would clink glasses as we met or something. When she saw me, her eyes lightened up, but she didn't smile or anything. Quickly she stepped in my direction. In fact, I was so shocked by the action, I stopped moving. When she arrived to where I was, she grabbed my hand, pulled me close to her and whispered, "I am so fucking bored- let's get fucking hammered and wreck havoc."

I pull my head back from her, and I'm half smiling, my face in a furrowed brow wondering if she's serious. She's got this look in her eyes that she might be so, with her eyebrows raised, and a twisted grin, exposing her perfectly formed teeth. This is Aphrodite on a warpath, I remember thinking at that moment. "Bottom's up," I say finally, and we do clink glass, but we don't chug. We take a casual sip and give a small laugh. We walk slowly for a while around the art fair, Alma's hand wrapped around the arm I offered to her to take as we walked. Every so often we would stop so she could talk to someone- sometimes a student, but mainly faculty and board members. She said that tonight supposed to be the big night and that most of the students already came, and this was mainly faculty and board members and that's why she dressed a bit more formal this night. We passed by her paintings and she would explain her inspirations behind some, explaining how she went through different phases in life as an artist and how she always knew that she wanted to be an artist ever since she was a kid and learned that she could draw. When I asked her what artistic phase she's on now, she said she's in a phase that she called her "nothingness" phase. She said that she wanted to learn to use as little color and outline and shading as possible to made a painting. So she took me to this picture of a face and she said that she made this whole picture with was taking the pen off of the page once. It was impressive. The lines were squiggly and looked liked they were made by a child, but at the same time, if one looked even closer, you could tell that there was deep precision in every mark, and when you stepped back you saw this perfect portrait of this face. She said that she wanted to highlight the fact that simplicity is just as important as complexity.

"What do you like to do?" she asked me at some point in the conversation.

"Me? Like what do you mean, 'like to do,' per se?"

"I mean as a hobby. Music, books? Whatever."

"I don't know. I love listening to music, but can't play a lick of it. Can't paint, I love to read, but I ain't no poet. I don't know. I played basketball for a while, but quit that when I realized that I sucked."

"There's got to be something that you like doing to pass your time."

"I don't know. I'm usually hanging out with people. That's how I pass my time."

"So you're a people person."

"Not really. I only really hang out with Wes and whoever he's with. Kind of pathetic, huh?"

"Why?"

"I don't get it?"

"Why do you only hang out with Wes?"

"That's a good question."

"You don't know, do you?"

"No. I don't. Not really. Maybe it's because he's loyal."

"How about girlfriends?"

"Don't want to talk about those."

"Bad experiences?"

"Yeah."

"Tell me about it."

I cock my head towards her. "Not much luck with the opposite sex."

"It seems like all the opposite sex wants is sex."

"Alma, no offense, but if you're figuring that out now, you are way fucking behind," I say, trying to make it seem less harsh by laughing.

"Shut up," she says, shifting her weight into my body. "You know what I mean. I'm just not really all about the one night stand."

Chuckle to myself, maybe a little forced. "God it kills me."

"What?"

"How alike you and Wes are."

"What?"

"He's not a one night stand person either."

"Really? He seems like the kind of guy that goes around and just sticks his dick in anything that moves."

"Right? And it's not like he doesn't have the chance to, it's just he doesn't want to. I mean, it doesn't mean he hasn't had any, but it's not like you haven't."

"Yeah, but that's college, right?" she sighs. "Let me ask you something."

"Shoot."

"Why are you trying to hook me and Wes up?"

You know how in movies you see someone ask another person a question and that question creates an adverse reaction like coughing or something like that? I always thought that was bullshit. But, drinking my wine, being asked that question, I started coughing. After my fit, and being asked, maybe in comedic earnestness if I was alright, I lied. "I'm not."

"Steven."

"What?" She just looks at me. "What?"

"Never mind."

"I just find it funny how similar you two are, that's all." Looking at her from the peripheral of my vision as we stood in front of a more abstract piece of hers, I watched her reaction. "It's a bit weird how our conversations end up being about it him, yeah?"

"You started it. You sure you're not in love with him?"

"Only on Tuesdays."

"Oh, well it's Sunday. So I guess you're safe."

"Yeah."

"You know, he is cute. And I'm sure that he's smart- but he's just so god damn pretentious it kills me."

"Nobody's perfect."

"There you go again, defending him."

"He's my friend."

"You're only friend."

"I thought you're my friend too"

"Nah. I'm just going to get drunk and get you drunk and then use you."

I shrug my shoulders. "I can handle that."

We stand there talking for a little while longer when finally Alma looks at her watch and tells me that she has to go to the podium and get ready to speak. As she leaves my side, I start just perusing my surroundings when I spot Wes staring at a painting of the Chicago skyline during a fire red sunset (Alma's home town). I walk up to him and tap him on the shoulder. He's got his arms crossed at his chest, one hand tightly gripping the art fair booklet, the other hand scratching the stubble on his chin. He wore a grey sweater and brown corduroys, his hair shagging down over his face. When I tapped him on the shoulder, he leans back to face me. "What do you think about this? I thought the sunset was a bad choice," he says matter-of-factly. The pretentious bastard.

"Jesus Christ. What the fuck are you wearing. You stick out like a sore thumb."

"It said informal attire."

"They didn't mean dress like you live under a bridge. And I thought you weren't coming."

"I was bored. Plus, I thought you could use the help. I didn't want her and her cronies eating you alive."

"Thank you so much for your faith, but I survived so far. How long have you been here?"

"About thirty minutes. I saw you and Alma standing there. You guys are so cute together."

"Is that jealously in your voice?"

"Fuck off." Suddenly, there is clapping as an elderly women stands upon the podium. "What's going on?" Wes asks.

"She's about to introduce Alma for her speech."

"Oh, right. So, what have you two been talking about?"

"Why you so curious?"

"Is it a big a fucking secret? I'm sorry, my bad. I was just starting conversation."

I sighed. In the background the woman spoke in a monotone voice. "We talked about art for a little bit and then..." people started clapping as I finished the sentence. "...we talked about you some."

"What?!" he yells over the clapping.

I wait for the clapping to stop, and I can hear Alma speaking. I continue to speak to Wes in hushed whispers, but this time we turn to face the front so at least we can look at Alma and pretend that we're paying attention. "We talked about you some."

"Oh yeah? Fucking dandy."

"She said she thought you were cute."

"Bullshit." At this point, someone turns around an "shh's" as to Wes so eloquently responds with pushing his shoulder and flicking him off.

"I'm serious."

I see Wes combat a smile in his slight pause. "Well, I mean- she's pretty cute too. And smart, but she's just so..."

"Pretentious."

His head turns to me like a rocket. His lips a shut tight as his eyes zero in on me. "Yeah, exactly. Pretentious."

"Been hearing that a bit lately."

"What's that mean?"

"Nothing."

We stand in silence and we hear Alma speak. "... society desires a need for a fluid evolution of culture. To maintain an interest in culture among the youth there must be a motivation among the people of my generation, and the generations to come to express their cultures by studying the arts and by participation of the arts. I cannot express my gratitude to this University for what they have..."

"You know," Wes begins, leaning in so he could whisper to me. "It's not like I dislike her or anything. It's just she's always giving me shit, and it gets on my nerves- you feel me?"

"Buddy, no offense, but I have the impression that you do the same to her."

"Like when?"

"Like at the Fleetwood."

"Whatever."

"No, not whatever. I don't know how either of you two don't get it. You're acting like children squabbling over who wants to be leader of the tree house or some shit and it doesn't make sense."

Now he turns his body all the way to me. "Fuck that!" he says pointing his finger. People turn to look at us.

"Keep your voice down!"

"Fuck that!" he says whispering.

"Seriously man. Give me one reason why this is so hard for you. I really am just baffled. I mean, I've never seen you act so stupid in my life. Just get your head out of your ass and ask her out." He didn't say anything. "Oops. Wasn't supposed to know that, was I? Quit being a fag and ask her out."

"Fuck you. And don't say that word."

"What word?"

"'Fag.' You know I hate that word."

"Okay. Whatever. Quit being a fucking... fuck and just... man, you know... this whole thing, I'm not even involved in it, it's only been one day, and already it's driving me insane. Fuckin' a."

Silence again. "... thank you to everyone who came and spent their time here. I hope you enjoy the rest of the evening. Please drink some wine, listen to the music. I'll be around..."

"You don't know what you're talking about," he says to me right before Alma finishes speaking. Everyone starts clapping, and he joins in. I just stare at him at first in disbelief. Finally, he notices me looking at him, and looks back at me, raises his eyebrows and cocks his head to the podium motioning for me to clap by lifting his hands up by his head. I start clapping slowly, shaking my head. Finally, as the clapping dies down and as Alma walks off the stage, the same women that introduced her makes some announcements about the wine and the finger snacks, but no one was really listening.

Alma walked towards us, swaying her hips in a very animated and over-dramatic fashion, holding her thin plume glass up her face in a mock elegant fashion. She stood before Wes and blatantly looked him up and down, and then in a pretty well impersonated French accent, "Wes, what do we owe the pleasure?" she said, drawing out the last syllable on "pleasure."

Wes stood there in shock. I squinted at her, watched as her eyes, not as lucid, missing that spark is usually there, that somewhat predatory light hazed over and I realized that Alma was getting drunk. She was serious about what she said earlier. I move to her and grab her arm. "Alma, are you drunk?" I asked in a hushed tone.

"Let go of my arm. You're fucking hurting me," she retorts. At least her voice still has that bite to it.

I let go of her arm. "Are you drunk?"

"Getting there."

"Fuck."

"What's the big deal?"

"What's the big deal?" For some reason, I felt like a parent dealing with little immature children. "There are faculty around."

"Who cares." She wiggles away from around me and walks towards Wes. All I could do was follow and pray nothing would happen. "We didn't think you were going to show up."

"Yeah, well, I couldn't leave my friend alone among these deviants," he responds quickly.

"Oh, so we're deviants."

Wes sighs deeply. "I was joking. I was bored at home, and I figured why the hell not."

"Well, don't do us a service."

"Are you always like this?"

"Ask your friend here."

"Yeah, I saw. You two look so cute together." He said with a smile.

"I just bet you wish you could be so lucky."

"Why are you always trying to argue with me?" Alma doesn't say anything to this. She just takes a sip of her wine, and stares at him. "Don't think too much of yourself, okay? It'll kill you."

"Guys, come on," I say. "If you guys keep doing this, I'm going to leave."

"Awesome, I'll have an excuse to go, too," Wes says scathingly. I've never heard him be so mean in my life. I think even Alma took it a bit personally.

"Steven, you can't leave," she says, placing a palm on my chest. "You, on the other, are free to go to hell, for that matter." She looks back at me, moving her tone of voice back to being gentle. "Don't go, I have to go to the ladies room."

We watch her walk away, staring at how the shadows streamline perfectly along the contours of her muscles. After she walks a distance away, Wes and I start talking at the same time. "No, you listen to me," I say pretty harshly.

"What. What is it?"

"Why can't you just try to get along with her?"

"Dude! She was a complete bitch to me just then. I tried to be nice."

"Yeah, I'll admit, that go to hell comment was harsh, but why don't you compliment her. Tell her something nice. Try to make her feel good instead of always trying to look so indifferent, on the outside? Don't you think that maybe things would go by easier?"

"Maybe."

"Maybe? No, I'm pretty sure I'm right on this one." I try to make my voice sound pleading. "Wes, you're the nicest guy I know. I don't know why you're being so mean to this girl. I mean, it's obvious that at least I'm becoming friends with her, so can you at least respect that fact that she's going to be in my life at least? Please? For me? You're making me want to stab myself in the heart." I end with a nervous laugh.

His stare is searching. I don't know what for, but I can tell he's looking for something. Finally, there's the predictable Wes dramatic sigh. "Okay, buddy. I'll try to be nicer to her. But for you. But I swear to God, there's only so much of bitchiness I can take."

"Thank you," I say shaking clasped hands at him like he responded to one of my prayers. "And, anyway, it's not like I'm really asking you to take on bitchiness. If she becomes to bitchy, why don't you try talking to her like an adult about it? Or just walk away, huh?"

Wes laughs and smiles and puts his hand and ruffles my hair. I hate it when he does that. But tall people have that advantage. "When did you become my voice of reason?"

"When you decided to stop having some." I look around the ballroom towards the door where the bathroom is to see if I could spot Alma. "Sure is taking a long time. Do you see a line?"

"No. Not really. You know women. Take forever to do anything."

"Better than showing up looking broke."

"Shut up."

"But seriously. It's taking a long time. Do you think we should look for her?"

"I don't..." Before Wes could even get his sentence out, there was the sound of shattering glass right behind us. Instantly, we turn around, and Alma is standing in front of that painting that I found Wes. I can't see her face, but her shoulders are shaking, and in the sudden silence of the room, as everyone watched her, I could begin to hear her sobbing. I was turning to Wes to tell him that I thought that Alma was crying, but I turned to find him already in a quick step headed in her direction. I followed passing by people, explaining to them that she wasn't feeling very good. Don't worry, everything is alright, yes. I was talking to some faculty member explaining that she didn't feel good, helping him pick up the broken glass to put into another glass and I watched Wes usher Alma away with his arms around her shoulders and he was whispering something in her ear. I almost drifted off watching this. There just seemed something surreal about it. Finally, I excused myself, grabbed my coat from the coat check, and caught up with Alma and Wes as they were exiting the Union door. When Wes saw me, he snapped at me, his brow furrowed, his lips tight, and he pointed at my jacket for me to give to her. He didn't stop speaking to Alma. "Yeah, it's a beautiful painting. You have an amazing talent. My biological mother was a painter, you know that?"

"Your biological mother?" she spoke between sobs.

"I'm an orphan. Grew up in the foster system." I walked a few feet behind them, and in the crisp wind, I fought to hear what they were saying.

"Was she a good painter?"

"I don't know. I only have one painting of hers that I've seen."

"Do you like it?"

"Now I do." He paused. "Now I do."

They walked in silence for a while with me a few feet behind. Alma leaned into Wes and he guided her with a sure and steady step. As I watched them, I marveled at how natural they looked- at how this appeared to be rehearsed. It was as if Alma was made to fit into Wes' protection, her head upon his shoulder, their hair fighting the wind together. I could see every so often under a street lamp, Wes' thumb stroking the blade of Alma's shoulder in soft comfort, and this didn't seem new, it didn't seem exciting. It just seemed to fit. We were close to Wes' house, when we turned a corner and Alma stopped, paused, and then ran for some bushes. I don't need to tell you what she was doing and I'll save you the gruesome details, but I'll continue with the other- the whole time that ordeal continued, Wes stood by her, making sure she didn't fall over. I didn't want to really bore you with the bohemian details, it's just, I don't know, I was moved. And if you could be moved too, by seeing human nature working beyond the violence, and the anger, and the hatred, and see working where everything else fails, that part that we sometimes forget about, but when we see, gives us hope, and no matter how god damn cheesy it seems, we smile inside, because we know that for a moment, at least just for a moment, all is right with the world. And nothing, nothing can take that away from us. No hatred, no violence, no oppression and acts of tyranny and terror will take away those moments of love and peace that we share. But only if we chose to really appreciate them for what they are.

When Alma was through, she sat on the curb of the street, and Wes sat right next to her on one side and me on the other. I handed her a cigarette and lit it for her, and for a moment, no one said anything. Finally, Alma spoke weakly. "I'm sorry."

I don't turn my head, I look out my peripheral to see if Wes was going to speak. When I realize that he wasn't, I figure I should. "You know, this is the second time you've ended up apologizing to me."

She laughs a clogged laugh. "Yeah, I know. But I really am. I don't know why I do stuff like that. I didn't mean for you guys... thank you." She turns to Wes. "Thank you." He doesn't say anything other than a slight nod of his head. "I think I should go home."

I wait to see if Wes says anything. "I'll walk you home."

"No, don't worry. I'll be fine." She hands me back my jacket. "Thank you, once again. I'll be seeing you around, I'm sure." And she turns around, and slowly begins to walk away.

I watch her walk for a while before I turn to Wes, who's sitting still on the curb, staring at the ground beneath his feet. There is a dead silence, and for some reason there is a staleness to the air, like we just witnessed something tragic, something that never needs to be spoken ever about ever again. "Are you alright?" I ask him.

He looks up at me quickly, looking surprised like as if woken from a dream or if I came from nowhere. Finally, he stands up, pushing up from the curb with his right hand releasing a heavy grunt. "I'm fine," he says with a weak smile. "I'm going home. Got an early class tomorrow. See you later, right?"

"Yeah, sure." And Wes walks away home. I've never seen him use school as an excuse to go home. Ever.

There was something important that in that night that didn't become manifested until years later. It was, in essence, the beginning of the tragedy that is Wes and Alma. For every tragedy, the heroes must have a tragic flaw. For Wes, it was his depression that he liked to hide. For Alma, was alcoholism, which started in college, but didn't become heavy until those post years. We all have tragic flaws. Mine is the desire to fix everybody. But, when it comes to Wes and Alma, their tragic flaws worked with each other. Wes became more depressed as Alma's alcoholism became worse, and Alma drank as Wes would become more depressed. Of course, this was only known to the people on the inside. On the outside, Wes and Alma started off as the king and queen of Ann Arbor. In the end, Alma was the Pandora's box that ruined it all. But for me, I felt for Alma. I don't blame Alma one bit- I don't blame her any more than I blame Wes.

Sadly, those good moments that I spoke about would fade into the shadows of tall mountains of tragedies that would blanket the minds of the people that used to love one another. That night at the art show, Alma opened herself to us, and Wes opened himself to her. I would say that I wish the night would've gone differently. I could say that I wish that Wes didn't come, or that Alma didn't get drunk, or this or that didn't happen. But, honestly, if that specific chain of events didn't happen, I don't think Alma and Wes would have happened. When I heard him disclose the information about his mother to her, I knew that did something to him. I knew why he sat on the curb, nervous and scared. I knew that when he said that his mother was a painter, shared that secret with her, he also shared another secret: that he loved her. And truth be told, I think she got the picture.

Left Like Yesterday, Pt. 2

Wes and mine's friendship grew pretty quickly. Maybe it was because we agreed on a certain hierarchy of relationships (this includes plutonic and romantic). On this hierarchy, first comes vanity, where two people must first be in sync when in comes to things like music, movies, books, television, what they like to do for fun, etc. Because of that, it was easy to explain why Wes and I were able to have such a quick building friendship. Both of us were caught up in the wave of the Portland-esque, new wave of Seattle west coast music scene screaming of Modest Mouse, Sebadoh, Built to Spill, Elliott Smith and Heatmiser, Soul Coughing, and mixed in there a touch of jazz with Charlie Park, Charles Mingus, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, and of course, Miles Davis. We both agreed that Kubrick's most important film was “Full Metal Jacket” and not “A Clockwork Orange,” even though we gave it its due credit, and we definitely believed that Speilberg was overrated.

By the summer of 1997, I turned twenty-one. It was my junior year, and it was my first year living by myself outside of the dorms. My efficiency was a remodeled basement to a house on the corner of Hill Street and East University. It was small, and when it snowed, the whole place froze up, but it did its job. I followed Wes to wherever he went, sometimes wondering how he gained knowledge to some of the parties that he did (like the ones in Chicago and Detroit, which is my hometown, which I would think I would know more of than him, but didn't), but in the end, I wasn't really surprised either. I started to watch my popularity rise around this period of time also- and while it was only due to proximity, I accepted it eagerly. I didn't mind girls coming up to me asking me to call her, even if in the end they were asking if “we” were going to come by “so and so's” party.

At the parties, of course, we'd all be in awe of him, as we sat back there listening to him talk, telling his stories, cracking jokes and bringing us in. I would stand next to him, and somehow, I would always be brought into the conversation. He would say something, and there I would be in it. Like he would ask me something, as if I had to corroborate what he just said. I didn't mind. I would nod my head, and take a sip of whatever I was drinking because he usually never gave me enough time to respond. He'd ask me, Steven, what's the name of that guy we met, or something like that, and before I could respond, off he'd continue with, it's not important. Then, you could see in the girls all around him- the bedroom eyes.

Now, I mentioned before how he seemed to go home alone more often than not- well, that's true. I mean, this guy could've gone home every night with a different girl, I swear to God. Yet, he had something holding him back. Call it morals, call it a fear, I'll never really know, but he never really cared to explain it to me, and I never really cared to ask. The best guess I could give was that in all the years I knew Wes, he was probably the most humanistic person I knew. Saying that, I feel that sometimes that he felt like he wanted something to the degree of love in everything that he did. You could see it in the way he talked to you, when he looked you in the eyes and smiled, or the way he played soccer, and if you feel, he'd pass the ball, turn around, and help you up, even if you're on the other team. Things like that I don't think are characteristically normal in other human beings, but to Wes, were a way of life. They weren't religious principles, they weren't even in a sense, I think to him moral. I think, to Wes, they just were what was needed to be done- to love everyone. Those bedroom eyes he wanted, he wanted someone special- someone to look at him and only at him in a special way. Not in some way that next weekend she'll be looking at some frat guy at another party. He never called any of these girls sluts or whores, he just said that he was looking for a particular type of girl. Me, if any of those girls just looked at me, I'd be all up on them, but I guess to Wes they were nothing new.

I'm not saying that Wes was celibate. While he was usually single, actually, always single until Alma, every once and a while, he'd meet a girl, and you'd know, Wes is going to fuck her. And I don't blame him for wanting to, because almost every single one of Wes' one night stands were girls that you would get into a car wreck over- you know, make you trail off in the middle of a sentence type of girls, the one in a million type. He was good at it too. I saw him pick up a girl and in the process of it, disclose these three pieces of information and get away with it: that he uses the same pair of jeans for like a month in row without washing them; will go three days without a shower all the time; and will reuse his underwear. Me, on the other hand, I seemed to be constantly rotating in and out one failed relationship after another. But then, Wes met Alma.

Wes didn't like her at first. I mean, he did. I'm pretty sure that he fell in love with her right off the bat, but I mean, in the stereotypical, chauvinistic type of way. She had this way about her, a sort of shy way that made you want to pay attention to her, but at the same time, you knew that behind walls, you knew who wore the pants. And she had this sense of humor, if that's what I should call it- she would just talk all of a sudden, a quick statement, and it would take you a second to process it, and you'd be halfway through your next statement before you realized exactly what she said, or exactly what the words she said meant- and you wouldn't be sure if you should stop and respond, or if you should go on saying what you're saying, but either way, you stammer because in your head, you're all like, damn, that was a bit harsh. It wasn't that she was mean, it was just that she could find the smallest inconsistency or flaw in anything. Anybody else would just not think about it, but Alma, it was like she was compelled to say something about it.

But we loved her anyway. Maybe it was because she was beautiful, in a stunning sort of way. Her father was Indian (dot, not feather), and her mother was Dominican, which I thought was the most amazing of pairings. She had this dark olive, brown skin with freckles around her pinup nose and cheeks that seemed to be perfectly rounded following her thick, curvy lips that spoke of words not made yet. Her body was picture perfect, and she flaunted it in the way that she dressed. Sometimes, it was overkill. I think some people took forever to really know what she looked like because they kept staring at her legs. I think I was one of them. I will tell you, I might've done the same for her tits, too. I know, I'm too much of a guy, but it's true. But she had that body- that movie star body with those lines, that when her shirt lifted up, you could see leading into the rim of her pants like a "v" where the vertex is a prize hiding from you- is that a sick way to describe your friend's girl? But here's the thing- if you think Tanya had some eyes, she didn't have shit compared to Alma. Alma had these grey eyes, that in some lights looked like they were infused with some sublime purple. I didn't know it was possible to be chameleon like that, but that was Alma- she was a different level of human. It was only natural that her and Wes hook up. They were of that class, of the beautiful people that had some brains. A rarity, and somewhat annoying at that, too, because you could never really measure up.

I heard of Alma before I ever met her, and doubtless, so did Wes. I'm sure, of course, in the same vain, Alma heard of, or saw, or heard Wes at a party. Alma's skills as an artist were becoming almost legendary around campus, and soon one could see originals hanging in coffee shops and independently owned bookstores all around campus centralized part of town. The most impressive part of Alma's skill was the incredible variety of her work, spreading from ranges of sketches made with a blue ball point pen, to colorful landscapes, to abstract portraits, to surrealism and so on. It was inevitable that the University would hear about Alma and do something about it. So many people were speaking about her, and with all this popular demand around her, they saw a money making opportunity and took it- even though, really, they didn't need it. From what I hear, Alma refused the University's offer at first (she was already there on scholarship), but then they told her that she would get at least two paintings on permanent display in one of the buildings, she consented (and it's true, you can go to the East Building and see them there by the elevators). In December of 1997, the University ran an "Excelled Student Achievement" program where they displayed Alma's work in the Student Union, and it profited. In fact, in did so well, that the University extended it a whole week. The opening day, it was so packed with people that the wine ran out before midnight.

Wes and I didn't originally intend on going. According to Wes, it would be "too fucking boring to waste a decently good Wednesday afternoon." Of course, the problem was, everyone else that we knew happened to be going there, but we decided to stick by our guns and be cool and not go. Now, mind you, this is before the internet became readily available, and so information wasn't as easy to come about as it is now. And while there were flyers probably on every single lamppost on campus, ask yourself, do you really pay attention to those? So, since we knew we weren't going to the art show, all we knew was that it was going to be on a Wednesday. We didn't take the care to pay attention to where and what time it was going to be, and so, as we walked around, passing time, pretending like we didn't care that we were bored out of our mind, wishing that we actually had some homework to do, we passed by the Union. All we see are a bunch of students huddled in the cold, lined up to walk inside. None of them are dressed in a suit or tie or anything, so we get curious to what's going on. See, to us, we thought an art gathering would be at the art gallery and would be formal, but apparently, as you know, it was at the union, and well, as you also know, because I told you already, Alma likes to flaunt her body, she asked that it be informal (but that it still serve wine). Wes and I don't really stand in line, really- instead, we stand in the sidewalk facing the large steps that rise up to the Gothic Union building, half mocking the people in line, half cocking our ears trying to see if we can hear anything to give away what's going on, but I think everyone was too cold to talk.

That's when we see a girl sitting on the far end of the Union, by the LS&A building, kind of hidden behind the large block column that makes a wall between the steps and the grassy alleyway, to where she could peep around the corner, but it was almost impossible to see her in the dimming light. At this point, it's almost twighlight, and as we approach her, I can tell that she's anxious about something as she keeps checking her watch as she smokes her cigarette. She was in the process of doing so when she notices Wes and me approaching her. I'm sure, at this moment, Wes puts of his charmer smile as he does his little quick step, kicking the back of his heel, bending his back a bit and pulls his hand out of his pockets and gives a humble wave like he's just casually passing by. It's one of his "moves." "Hey," he says loudly to her. She doesn't really do anything other than stare back at us. I would compare her to a deer in headlights, but she reminded me more of the hunter watching us, instead. I think even Wes was taken back. "What's going on here?" he continues to talk to her.

She stays silent for a little longer before slowly responding, a very silently, "That art show."

"Oh, that," says Wes, laughing the words.

"Yeah, that."

"How is it?"

"Well, it's an art show."

Wes laughed again. "I bet it's a blast."

The girl narrowed her eyes. "Yeah, well the keg got lost on the way there, so all we got is wine... but hey, I got to go." And then she leaves a stun Wes behind. I'm not going to play some writers trick on you and insult your intelligence by holding back and not telling you who that girl was. Even though Wes and I didn't know who it was, I'm sure by now, you could've guessed, or I hope you could've guessed, that was our first interaction with Alma.

As she walked away, Wes shook his head, and he half muttered the word, "Bitch!" He just stood there for a moment, his head hanging limply, eyes locked at some spot on the ground, and he bit his bottom lip as if in deep thought.

Then, in usual manner, as if he realized what he was doing, which I'm pretty sure is a self-conscious action on his part, he shakes his head and laughs to himself a bit and gives me a weird little look- one that I'm really familiar with. It was a little disconcerting to me to see his bedroom eyes in the dark looking at me. Of course, there's only one response I could've said, "What?" I throw at him, a bit harshly, almost as if I was asking him if he was noticing something that I didn't and it was annoying me that he wouldn't tell me.

"Nothing," he responds, still smiling, turning away, beginning to walk.

I catch up to him. "No, seriously. What is it?"

He stops walking. He opens his mouth and then shuts it quickly before opening it again to speak. I can tell that in a quick instant he redirected what he was going to say, and very purposefully (this was another skill of his that always amazed me). "It's nothing," he says, with a small chuckle. "I just hate bitches like that."

"Like what? Because she said a smart-ass remark and you didn't have time to respond to it? Come on, you do that all the time."

"You can tell. You know it's true. Girls like that- they're so into themselves. Stuck up. Look at me, ma. I went to an art show in college. I'm an intellectual in my shortcut skirt that I bought on your credit card and shit, I'm going to get all the boys..."

"Man, shut up."

"You know it's true."

"You're so quick to criticize everyone, you know that? Sometimes you're so bigoted, thinking you know everyone. I mean, I love you buddy, but you don't know her. You spoke to her for a matter of seconds, and now you're a Sigmund fucking Freud on her? Shut the fuck up."

"Whatever."

I hated being like this Wes, but sometimes, he needed it. Yeah, he'd get hurt, and silent and everything, but I could tell that he knew I had a point. So we'd walk a few moments in silence, and then, quickly, as if nothing happened, he'd suggest we go The Blind Pig and see if a band's playing a get a beer. That's how it went with Wes. You couldn't really hurt him because deep down inside of him, he already knew what he was. He already knew he was imperfect. He told me that he thinks about all the things that make him imperfect because he's so afraid to not be aware of them. He's not afraid to show them, he says, he's just afraid of not being aware of them. He says that everyone has character defects, it's what we do with them that made us human. So by me telling him all that, it was just me telling Wes something that probably did nothing more than make him reflect more on becoming more aware with his character defects. I don't really know the exact dependency he had on his knowledge of these defects, but I think it had something to do with letting him know who he really is among a crowd of people telling him who he should be. I guess that's what local celebrity does to you. Everyone wants you to be something, or thinks of you to be something, so what do you think of yourself? I guess this was his way to get a clear picture of himself, if that makes sense.

That Friday there was a party thrown at a Co-op that some friends of Alma's lived at. It was only natural that there would be a party thrown to celebrate this "occasion," and of course, it being the biggest party of the night, Wes was "obligated" to go it, which meant I went to it as well. This, though, happened to be one of those few times that we didn't show up at the same time to a party. I can't really remember why I showed up late (I think it had something to do with work), but I showed up around one in the morning. Walking in the house, I could tell that this was a successfully thrown party. I had to squeeze my way through to the keg, and being associated with Wes, I was able to get a beer quite quickly. Some shitty rap music played off the stereo loudly, and people chugged in competition, and stood everywhere- amongst each other in groups along the walls, on the stairs, guys trying to pick up girls, I looked for the group that was quite except for one guy. It took a while to find Wes, this being a particularly large house and I kept running into people I knew, including a cute little girl I figured it wouldn't hurt to see how drunk she was, which apparently wasn't enough for me yet, but eventually I found him. As I approached, I see him in full stride, beer in hand, sloshing out of that red plastic cup as he spoke, vigorously moving his arms, and with a quick glance over in my direction, as if he sensed my presence, he smiled and mentioned me over. "What's going on?" I say as I approach.

"Nothing," he responds. I look over at the crowd of people he's speaking to. I recognize a few, but overall, they're all just the usually blend of college students trying to look pretty and cute and hard and whatnot, really just either wanting to get laid, fucked up, or both. I wasn't overall really impressed. "Anyway," he begins again, as if my arrival didn't mean anything. "Music is, of itself great, because to create a revolution, you don't need talent, per se. You don't need a voice, or lyrics, or anything. Sometimes it's luck, but overall it's an impression. Whether in performance or in the way you look. Just in the same in acting. But in a different way. You have to look a part, and be able to play a part. But there might be a much more talented actor that can play that same part better, but loses it to Mr. pretty boy Ben Affleck for whatever reason. But they are still important because they spread art and the performance of art because in the end, they produce, in mass consumption the essence of human spirit, at least as Nietszche would contend, any philosophy majors?- right, the Apollonian and Dionysian impulses, the tragedy, in this form as music, produces, as I said before in, mass consumption great artist with talent, song writing ability like Elliott Smith. So bands like Green Day, who's talent is meager are important because yes, the keep the humanity of music alive because people connect at least on an intrinsic level, and produced on mass levels. That's why it is Dionysian, hedonistic, with a touch of Apollonian.

"Now art, just the pure art of sculpture and paintings, are just Apollonian. They are a different passion. You collect them, and they are prized but are spread by an external desire to keep the human alive- to perceive through a singular perspective, which is unlike literature, which I consider to be the ultimate art, but that's a different story. The beauty of art is that it takes talent and a collective desire to breed a calculus to where this talent can be manifested. You'll never hear, yeah, I just purchased a Pearl Jam. Why? While I consider Pearl Jam one of the greats of rock music, especially of the Seattle grunge era, the mass production of music doesn't allow the appreciation of Pearl Jam to be manifested on the very acute, and solitary perceptions of implicit calculus. What I mean is- everyone listens to music and takes it as it is. While a trained musician hears music differently than a non trained musician, the perception of sounds is the same, but different. That's why some people like some types of music and others not. That's obvious. But the ability to describe that, and to go into the essence of that, why and why not this song is better than the other does not require a trained calculus. You can say, this song is better because this drum line is tighter, and people can understand that. And then, there are some higher theoretical things, but overall, the beauty of music is that it is a medium that reaches people easily. Now art, everyone sees it, and all have the same viewing of what it is. If someone painted a dog, the dog is there. We all see. In a song, a trained musician might hear a flute where a someone else might not, but the beauty of the flute still persists. But in the calculus of art, the brush strokes, the lighting, the impressionisms..." At this point he pauses to look at me and smile. "... are what separate good art from bad art. And all you really require to have this ability to appreciate art is patience to view it in that specific science. Music, I feel must be practiced to achieve what I feel is a calculus that is only perceived by musicians. Everyone can have an ability to appreciate art esoterically though. But, to create great art, you have to appreciate the uniqueness of that art. The phenomenon of art is that it is created not for the masses, because it is something you must take time to appreciate and sit there and ponder about because there are singularities in everything about it. Music is for the masses because it can blend into life because it is the essence of the human. If you follow Nietzsche."

I think everyone was so caught up in this speech that we were all surprised when we heard a hushed female voice speak with quite a presence. "That's a wonderful idea- let's base all criticisms on a syphllitic philosopher that contradicted himself every other book he wrote. And I loved art references you used amongst your amazing acting and music references. Who did you say was a good artist? Disney? He was a modern Affleck and Green Day. Wonderful speech. Very well put together. Is that your dissertation?" When she was done, I could see Wes blush and his jaws clench as he searched for the source. He didn't need to search long as Alma, who of course we didn't know was Alma, but we knew as the girl we saw the other night, approached him from the outside of the circle. I expected some fema-nazi, but I had to look twice at her. I mean, she looked really good- short denim skirt, tight white shirt with matching denim jacket, hair cut short and sloping towards the back, a blond streak at the front that shagged over her eyes that contrasted auburn that matted the rest of her head. Now, remember how I told you that she was a pretty shy girl that didn't say much, overall? I mean, she spoke, just not in big groups, not often, and while I know I'm not giving off that impression right now, you have to know also, she was a very passionate women and some things could set her off wildly. Get it?

When Wes saw who it was, instantly I could see his demeanor change. A broad smile lightened his face, and I could tell that he thought he was about to enter an intellectual battle that he thought he was going to be the victor. I was a little more wary. "Well, look who it is," he says turning to me.

I back up waving my hands. "Don't bring me into this." There's some laughter at my comment. I was trying to be serious.

Alma glares at me. I extend my arms, palms upraised, holding my cup between the bridge of my thumb and index finger pleadingly. Then she turns back to Wes. "You seem to know a lot about art."

"Why're you getting so angry?" Wes asks, almost laughing.

"I just don't like it when little frat boys like yourself think you know a thing or two because you read a book in a freshman seminar, and now you can spout out some bullshit about how art reflects culture and so on."

"Excuse me, but I never really said anything bad, first off, and second it's just an opinion, and third, I don't see you contradicting anything I'm saying."

"I don't need to contradict anything you said. Everything you said was stupid. There are plenty of people out there that appreciate music on highly theoretical levels that don't play a fucking instrument."

"Like who?"

"A fucking conductor."

There were some "oh's" from the crowd on this one. Wes just rolls his eyes. "I'm pretty sure that most conductors played an instrument before they became one."

"How do you know that for sure? Do play an instrument? And for that matter, do you paint? I mean, where's your credibility? You state all this stuff about needing a 'certain calculus' of understanding- well, where's your calculus of understanding. Oh, wait, I'm sorry. That was in the sophomore seminar, huh? You should've taken that one, too." People laughed at that one. This was, arguably, one of the first times I ever saw Wes just blank. "I'm sorry, got nothing to say? Is the great Wes stumped?"

"Who are you?" Is all he said. I was laughing inside of my head that this girl already knew who this guy was. In one of the biggest universities in America, it's funny how small it is. "Who are you to judge me, huh? You don't even know me."

"Kind of knows how it feels, huh, buddy?" I say without thinking. Instantly, I regret it. I had my cup halfway to my mouth before I realized I said it, and I was already drinking before I realized that both Alma and Wes were staring at me.

"You're defending her?" Wes says.

There was no real backing down now. "No, I'm not." I'm stuttering everywhere, grasping for words, everything. "I'm just saying, you did the same thing to..." that's when I turned and asked her her name and she said Alma, "... you did the same thing... to... Alma..." Slowly, Wes and I turn to her. She's just looking back at us, no emotion in her face at all.

"Did you say your name was 'Alma?'" Wes says, squinting his eyes, speaking questionly and with a little surprise. She nods her head and makes a sound of conformation. "What the fuck." Wes mumbles. I'm laughing. "What are you laughing at?" He says to me harshly.

"This is great. This is really great. I love it. You want a beer? I'm getting a beer?" I point at him. Then at Alma. "You want a beer? No?" I couldn't stop laughing all the way to the keg. Wes just got told by the girl who this party is being thrown for in front of everyone. This is going to spread through campus quick. Not only that, I'm sure that at some point in the night, he made that speech so he could show his "knowledge" about art so he could get to meet Alma on good terms. It's Wes' ego getting in the way so he could get to look good for all the right people, and it backfired on him. I loved it, in a friendly kind of way.

I wasn't halfway to the keg when Wes caught up with me. "We've got to go," he says to me sternly.

I'm still almost laughing. "No man, we're staying."

"Come on! We got to go."

"Why?"

"Why?"

"Yeah, why?"

"You know why."

"No I don't." At this point, I'm in the process of filling my cup up with beer. When I was done, I reach out, grab Wes' cup and I fill his up and hand it to him. "Just relax there, bud. Where's the Wes charm?" He just glares at me. I take a drink and look at him from the brim of the cup. "Come on. Don't worry about it. The night's still young. And besides, what else are we going to do?" He hangs his head in defeat. "There you go." It's very rare when I took the lead in our relationship, but I have to honest, I kind of enjoyed it in a sadistic way.

I really wanted to see how the night would progress- that was my intention of it. I wanted to see how Wes would react to being in a situation that he was embarrassed- it was sort of a sick sociological experiment for me. Plus, I really enjoyed having control over Wes. I did not expect us to talk to Alma again, and I most certainly did not see us end up in a room with her and three of her friends as one of them played guitar and sang at four in the morning. I was pretty sure we were the only ones left still partying, and I have no idea how we ended up there. I know for a fact that we ended up in that room because I was talking to the person who lived in that room, a very cute little asian girl, and the party was dying, and she asked if I wanted to smoke. So of course, I said yes. I didn't know that this happened to be Alma's old roommate, and the specific person in the house throwing the party (I also didn't know she was a lesbian until I met her girlfriend in the room rolling the joint).

At this point, Wes already quit smoking pot. He said that it fogged his mind- but of course, alcoholic drinking was okay. Me, I was gradually giving it up, so I skipped the rotation several times, considering I got pretty blazed after just a few hits. We had a pretty good time, sitting there listening to the guy on the guitar, singing along to his songs, when we really should've just listened to him- he really was the only one worthy of singing. Of course, the only two people not talking were Alma and Wes. Alma, well, that's because who she is. Wes stood in the back corner of the room drinking whiskey and coke provided to us by the host of the room from her "special" stash, looking uncomfortable as hell. Finally, after some time, I couldn't take it. "Wes, join us, why don't you?" I say.

"I'm fine," he says throwing a weak smile.

"You not fucked up enough?" says our host in a most stereotypical manner, ending with a very girly giggle and leaning into her significant other.

"I'm doing pretty good," he responds swigging his glass around.

"Then why don't you join us?" I ask.

"I'm right fucking here. I don't know what to tell you. I feel very close to you," he says with the smile he makes every time he tries be nice and sarcastic at the same time.

"He's probably just analyzing the music, leave him alone," comes Alma out of the blue.

No one says anything. Even the guitarist stops singing, he just strums his chords, pretending not to pay attention to anything other than what he was playing. Everyone else looked at the ground, except Alma who was trying to fix a run in the joint and me who stared at Wes in fright. I could see him open his mouth, and then close it in consternation. I knew, just then, he was about to say something scathing but he stopped himself. "Hey, you know, I'm going to get something to eat and some smokes. You know where I'll be if you want to meet me," he says instead.

"Sure," I say in a raspy voice. I needed water.

As he walked out the door, I could feel the pressure in the room. The demeanor changed, and everyone could feel it. "Well, I'm going out for a cigarette," says the host. "Who wants to join?"

"I will," says her girlfriend, and they stand up and leave. The guitarist follows with them leaving Alma and me alone in this room finishing this joint that I swear to God will not end- but maybe I was just high.

We sat in silence for a while. Finally, as Alma passes me the joint, she looks at me in a way that I think I've never seen her look at me since. I think it was at that moment I realized something- I realized that there was something deeper beneath the surface, that Alma's bedroom eyes were of such a nature that they were even lost on Wes. But she looked at me with these eyes, and for a moment, she looked like a child, innocent, and I just wanted to reach out and hold her, tell her that I love her, that everything is okay. And then she grimaces. "I must look like such a bitch," she says.

"No you're not," I respond, passing the joint to her and thanking God when she refuses because it gave me an excuse to put it out. "Wes can be like that sometimes. He's arrogant and judgmental, and you had every right to call him out. I think it was good that you did that. Don't be offended. He'll get over it, by tomorrow it'll be forgotten, trust me."

"But still.." she sighs hanging her head. Then, in quick recoil, she goes back to looking at me, but this time more squinting. "You seem like a really nice guy."

"You don't know me. The only reason I came up here was to pick up your friend- didn't know she was a lesbian. Plus, I've been staring at your legs all day," I say with a smile.

She laughs as she pulls some of her hair behind her ear. "Just because you have a sexual impulse doesn't take the fact that you still seem like a nice guy. Not many people take the time to notice a person like Wes."

"What? You nuts? He's the most popular person on this campus!"

"He's got to be the loneliest person on this campus too."

I have to pause for a moment and watch her. For a moment, I can see why they conflict so much, they both have so much pain and are looking for someone to comfort it, and I think they just found each other. "What makes you say that?"

"Well, at the end of the day, who's really there taking the time to defend Wes? I mean, I really embarrassed him there, and you stood by him all night. Calming him, trying to get him to integrate into the party. Instead, you could've been selfish and let him go."

"I did just let him go."

"I don't think you could've done anything this time."

"I think you're giving me too much credit."

"Maybe, but I still think he's lonely."

I lean into her and motion for her to come closer. In a hushed voice, I speak to her. "I'll be honest with you. You're right- he's fucked up in the head. But who isn't? Aren't we all? I mean, I think that's why today really hurt him, because it was the first time that these people saw a human side to him. I don't think he's used to that. People knowing that he's got problems too, that he's not almighty Wes, but just Wes from the Bronx. I mean, I sit here, and watch you, and you know what I think?"

"No, what?"

"That you're trying to psychoanalyze a guy when you don't even know him."

"You're right. I know. It's just a bad habit of mine."

"Well, stop it. You're run yourself mad."

She looks up at me with a smile. "See, you are a nice guy."

"No, I'm just trying to get laid." She laughs and pushes my shoulder with her fist. I stand up and offer my hand. "Stand up, we're going." I was really enjoying being this commander of the day. I was relishing it in fact. It was rare for me.

"Where are we going?"

"The Fleetwood."

We walked through the Diag and Nickle's Arcade in the Midwestern snow. Our feet crunched the blackened slush that lined the sidewalk and our breath came in an orange fog, translucent from the streetlights. The dead silents of the streets were marked by sirens, or drunks screaming at the top of there lungs or a barking dog, and the trees swayed with their empty conversion. Snowflakes aligned our sight and danced on our words as we spoke about little things as we gained a bigger understanding of each other. Wrapped in sweaters and scarves and beanies we walked with a rare ease that came with Michigan winters. Alma danced under the moon, spinning to speak to me, twirling in drunken delight just talking about things, and I would laugh with my hands in my pockets. And as we approached the grey trailer, with people sitting outside smoking cigarettes, the bourgeois intellectuals of the night, sitting waiting for the day to break their arrogance, we could see Wes sitting at the counter, sitting alone talking to the waitress, whom leaned on both her elbows, eyes flirtatious, passing the time, smoking cigarettes. I could sense a nervousness in Alma as we approached. "What are doing here again?" she asked right before we crossed the street.

"Getting something to eat," I respond quickly before running across the street not giving her time to respond. We walk in the door and take the two steps it takes to get to the counter. Immediately I sit next to Wes and he turns to me and smiles.

He was about to speak when Alma walks in through the door and sits next to me, on the far side away from Wes. "You brought her here?" he says harshly.

"Oh yeah, because the Fleetwood is such a fucking secret."

"You mighty sarcastic today."

"Relax. What're you having?" I turn to the waitress. "I'll have a cup of water, and..." I ask Alma what she wants, "And whatever she wants, put on my tab." We place our orders and I watch Wes fume from the corner of my eye. Finally, when the order was done, I swivel my stool to face him. "Why can't you just chill out?"

"Why are you being such a fucking prick? Huh?"

"I''m not. You're being the fucking asshole."

"How? How am I being the asshole."

"Shut up, the both of you," Alma says as she leans over me. Looking straight at Wes, she says: "Look, I came with him really to apologize. I didn't mean to be a bitch. I just am passionate about art."

"I can tell," Wes says sharply, taking his cup of coffee into both his hands and blowing into it.

"Hey, I'm trying to apologize here."

Wes doesn't say anything for a while. Finally, he smiles. "God, you're right. I'm being a child. Sorry if I offended you," he says very matter-of-factly.

"And I'm sorry if I was bitchy."

I pat them both on the back. "See, now we're all one big fucked up happy family."

"Yeah, sure," says Wes. Then, under his breath, "But I still think I had a point about art."

"Fuckin'-a Wes, give it a rest, will you?" I say.

This is where Alma sighs. "No, you know, he's right. I couldn't argue with him because he might've had a point. I guess I should read those books in your freshman seminar, huh?"

"Fuck you."

"You would, wouldn't you?"

Now, I wouldn't say I was the reason for Wes and Alma's relationship, but I was the catalyst, that's for sure. While it seems very fairy tale to start out with, it wasn't. Their first meeting was a problem that was easily resolved because they both admitted to themselves something- that they loved the other's hard headed-ness. That's what made the relationship work, in my estimation at least. The rest of the night at the Fleetwood, Wes and Alma got into mini arguments about everything. It was like they like everything the same but for different reasons, and they had to convince the other that their reasoning was best. I resigned back into my position of just being a nothing, stepping away from being a mini- deus ex machina.

I'll tell you right now that this was just a beginning. Meeting Alma changed our lives completely. For Wes, it meant stability. No longer the ideas of partying or being popular meant anything. The only thing that would eventually come to mean anything would be Alma. I think, for Wes, it was a turning point, a maturing point, where parties now became less of a time to get drunk, but more social gatherings where we brought wine and food and talked about politics and music on a more sociable level, looking less to impress people. For me, because of Wes not going to the wild parties anymore (eventually, it still took some time for the whole relationship to amalgamate), I was cast out of that crowd like a dirty sock. And since I had less "Wes" time, I was forced to become more independent. I began doing a lot more things on my own, expanding my group of friends a bit, and even pursuing an eventual conclusion that I would go to grad school. It also made me look at women less as objects and more as long term commitments. This was due primarily to the fact that I was seeing a more mature group of them, older and wiser, more determined in what the want in life, and I was also seeing less of them, so I appreciated them more. In the end, as we entered 1998, life seemed to follow the moon of wild nights into the peaceful days of growing up.