17 : Tuesday

Step Seventeen: Don't gossip or talk about drama. If a boy realizes that you have lots of drama surrounding you, he might think that there'll be a dramatic scene between the two of you!

"Happy llama, sad llama, mentally disturbed llama, super llama, drama llama, big fat mama llama..." I hum to myself. Right now, I don't feel like any of these except the mentally disturbed llama. I don't know why someone added that to a children's song, though. That gave me nightmares as a youngin'.

Blake laughs, recognizing the tune. Amanda has been drilling it into our heads ever since she first heard it, and FROG wouldn't be the same without a good ol' nursery rhyme. Or so she claims. Anyway, Blake has been awfully nice to me since our argument yesterday. He winks at me. "Don't be a drama llama!"

"I won't," I promise.

Shrugging, Blake leaves the room to make another poisonous creation. Apparently, yesterday's dish didn't kill him. When I walk in, I make a disgusted face at the strawberry-garlic product defacing my beautiful kitchenesque niche. If my nose doesn't lie to me (although it usually does lie), then I may sense a hint of peanut butter. His creativity is only growing, to my dismay.

Blake probably has some kind of obsession with peanut butter. Maybe, I should stop buying it, so that he pays for it himself. I still owe Russell money for my green turtleneck and acid-bath-whatever-whatever jeans. I need to repay that.

I'm also in debt to Bar-Taco. The other day, I went there and got a custom taco made for me. Three, actually. They don't offer fewer than three, and unfortunately there's only one decent taco joint in the Bay. We're not big in non-boutique establishments. That doesn't leave much room for variety.

Anyway, so I went to Bar-Taco and got my tacos. I was about to pay, when...

"My wallet!" I cried, looking at the depleted piece of leather. "It's empty!"

The cashier looked at me, raising an eyebrow. "You can't pay?"

I quickly looked up at her, then back at my tacos. Then back at her. Then at the tacos.

I was screwed. There was nothing to do, except...

I could feel it.

The beginning of a haiku, forming on the tip of my tongue.

Maybe there was hope left for me, after all.

"If I make up a haiku on the spot, will you let me go into debt to Bar-Taco?" I asked the cashier. She nodded, seeming confused.

"Make it fast," she said, leaning forward. The next part came as a whisper. "There's a scary, buff dude behind you, next in line."

I took a deep breath.

"I call it, 'The Tacos,'" I began.

She nodded, interested.

"The tacos call me.

The tacos are destiny.

The tacos mean life."

The girl blinked, pushing her hair back in surprise. I caught a glimpse of her name tag; Haven Walker was her name. Someday I would show my respect for what she did next, somehow tribute her. What. A. Legend.

"Pay me back by Saturday," she said, saving my life. "Don't forget."

I nodded, then frowned. "Take a picture of me so you remember what I look like."

"Nah, I know who you are. Felix Gray, a.k.a. ThatOneGuyFromYourLocalFrenchClass. You're the one who did the orange justice on top of a lunch table a while ago. You must have seen it, that video went viral big time! I've watched it a couple times."

Ah, what a great legacy to have.

Before Blake manages to take a bite of his creation, I pull it away from him. "Nuh-uh. If you want to eat that, you'll have to repay me for the ingredients." He pouts and whines, but eventually gives in.

Ah, the feeling of someone else's money in my hand.

And if he gets sick again, it won't be on my account.

Now that is a win-win.

~~~~~~~~

School is pretty boring, except for gym. Today I share the class with Jason—and only Jason, unlike the usual—because Russell and Blake are going on some kind of field trip to a movie theater. They're going to watch something in Spanish to see how well they understand it. Jason and I are taking French, so we're instilled with a natural feeling of superiority. That's just how it is. However, today that only means we have to suffer through gym class. A tragedy.

We start a new unit today: basketball.

Here's a little background knowledge on why I'm ecstatic about the aforementioned sport.

When Blake and I were twelve years old, Blake's mom signed the two of us up for a basketball team. Something about how we were being lazy couch potatoes all day, never getting anything done beyond what was absolutely necessary.

All I remember is being on the court. I gave that team every Saturday, Sunday, Wednesday, and Thursday night for a solid year of my life. From 5:30pm until 8pm, I worked my gluteus maximus off.

I became really good at basketball, but I'd never played a game. So, naturally, the first time I was ever faced with an opponent, I had to mess up.

1) Felix catches the ball. The ball is in his hands.

2) Felix dribbles the ball. The ball is in the other team's hands.

3) The ball hits him in the knee. Felix falls over, screeching. He skins his elbow.

4) The ball is far away from Felix's face. All of a sudden, it isn't as far away. In fact, it's getting closer... closer... closer...

5) Felix's early thirteenth birthday present is a broken nose. Yay!

I still have lingering side effects from that. This is part of the reason that my nose lies to me a lot.

I ask it, nose, is that smell the smell of a fart?

My nose replies, nah, it's eggnog.

But eggnog smells good. This doesn't smell good.

My nose doesn't reply, so I'm left under the impression that eggnog smells like farts. Or something like that. Kids, don't use any of my stories for morals. You won't find any.

Needless to say, Jason wants to know why I refuse to come closer to the ball than six feet. I look like a clown, standing far away from all the basketball action. Well, I always look like a clown. But that's not the moral of this. Like I said, I'm a chaotic disaster.

I explain my story to Jason, and he laughs, like, a genuine laugh. This, of course, sets off a chain reaction in my body. My whole face looks redder than Blake's strawberry breakfast. But Jason's face is also tinted pink. Maybe we need to turn the air conditioning on.

"Are you hot?" I ask Jason.

He smirks at me, taking a half-step forward. My whole body goes into PanicOverloadMode™️, Code Red. Red for the color of my face. No, actually, at this point my face must be purple. Code Purple, then.

"I don't know," he says. I take a step back and find a wall against my back. Was the wall there earlier? "Why don't you be the judge of that?"

"Uh," I say, fumbling to find a properly worded coherent response. My brain shuts down. "You're very hot."

He laughs lightly, pulling away to a friendlier distance. I'm not going to lie; I actually miss his close proximity. Even though it made my last brain cell's rate of decay speed up exponentially. "Gay panic much?"

My whole expression drops as I feel my body rushing to reinforce the purple hue of my face. What color is after purple on the electromagnetic spectrum? UV light? Yikes, my face is invisible now. "W-What?"

"You seemed like you were dying inside. It was kind of funny," Jason clarifies. Funny. I was funny.

I must look like a brokenhearted puppy, because Jason comes closer to me and wraps me up in a hug. It's the warmest and softest thing ever, despite our smelly gym clothes and the awkward moment just an instant ago.

"Sorry, Felix. I didn't mean to make you panic like that."

"I-It's fine..."

"No, it's not. I won't do it again."

Have I mentioned that I'm in love with Jason Crowe?

Slowly, I hug Jason back. He pulls away from me, standing a respectable distance away. "You want to substitute out? I'll play for you if you want."

Yeah, I'm in love with Jason Crowe.

It's not my fault that he's just the most perfect guy in the whole universe.

The only criticism I have is his basketball playing... I think even I could do a better job than he.