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  to steal

  my father’s

  master keys.

  As if she knew

  I’d already been

  thinking about it.

  THE OTHER KIDS

  * * *

  Most of them thought

  the gun was just a big

  stinking lie.

  No one brought guns

  to school.

  Maybe in Detroit

  or that part of Miami

  that’s pure poverty,

  an area that’s smoked

  enough crack to kill

  itself twice over.

  Our school was small.

  Our school was safe.

  Sure, our metal detectors

  were terrific at belt buckles,

  cell phones, and tongue

  piercings, but if the hall monitors

  were out for a smoke

  or traffic jammed after

  a quick Wendy’s run,

  we didn’t funnel through—

  we sidled right past the sensors.

  Because our school was small.

  Because our school was safe.

  No one brought guns here,

  most of us decided.

  Though a few steered

  clear of Blake.

  Just in case.

  They tugged their baseball caps

  low over their eyes

  as his shadow lurked

  past, a stormy presence

  that made us cower

  like Coach Tom’s whistle,

  or the tornado siren drills,

  or Aaron looming down

  the hall with that gonna-get-ya

  look in his eyes.

  WHAT I SAW

  * * *

  Riding past on my bike

  toward the arcade one Saturday,

  I saw someone moving atop

  the second story of Jefferson High.

  A copper pipe gleaming in his hand,

  he brought it crashing

  against an exhaust vent,

  the noise scattering birds

  all the way to the football field.

  Then again. Again.

  And again.

  I paused, watching this

  dark figure—Blake, I realized—

  who paused too,

  his shoes on the edge

  as he eyed the blacktop below.

  I shielded my eyes against

  the afternoon glare

  and wondered if this was

  the moment before a wild leap,

  testing fate, or faith.

  Blinking, I realized Blake was gone,

  and I told myself I’d imagined it.

  Who’d do such a thing? I wondered,

  but then I thought of ham-fisted Aaron,

  the cheerleaders who laughed at “all those dumb geeks,”

  and the sophomore backup QB

  who called Blake “a big-time queer.”

  WORLD OF WARCRAFT

  * * *

  I played it more

  than I should’ve,

  sometimes

  all weekend,

  especially

  when Dad

  took Mom

  to see Grandma,

  who usually

  didn’t remember

  to put in her

  good teeth

  and hasn’t

  remembered me

  since last July.

  I just pleaded

  asthma issues

  so I could stay home,

  then plugged in

  for hours.

  I killed wave

  upon wave

  of undead

  warriors,

  blasting them

  to smithereens,

  wondering

  if Blake ever

  played World

  of Warcraft,

  and if he did,

  was he the type

  to tiger-stalk

  my gnome rogue

  and slay him,

  taking a pipe

  to my head

  like a two-handed

  sword shrouded

  in golden flames?

  My shrink, Dr. Zigler,

  once said games

  were a “reasonable outlet

  for pent-up aggression.”

  I clicked the perfect

  combination

  and the screen

  became an inferno,

  its orange glare

  too bright

  to look straight at.

  Ka-BOOM.

  GRANDMA

  * * *

  Mom tried to see her

  a few times each month.

  She wished it could be

  more, but it’s so terrible

  to see someone wasting

  away like they’re being

  devoured from the inside out.

  They cried a lot, both Mom

  and Grandma, each unable

  to voice the agony

  that had become their lives.

  They didn’t make me visit

  any longer, as if that made

  any of it less real.

  WHEEZE

  * * *

  Between gym and English,

  I felt the breath whoosh out

  of my lungs. I usually forgot

  my inhaler, but not that day.

  I sucked down the medicine

  and stood there, leaning against

  the wall of lockers, watching

  everyone stream past—

  a river of kids heading every

  direction but toward me.

  If I went blue in the face

  and lay gasping on the floor,

  would anyone even dial 911?

  PROMISE

  * * *

  Becky Ann

  ignored me

  for days and

  days and forever,

  so I thought she

  must not have

  meant it, or perhaps

  I merely imagined

  her breathy request

  to see if Blake

  really had a gun.

  But then, like a boundless

  dream bursting

  to life, she cornered

  me at the 7-Eleven

  after school,

  and I stood there,

  a doofus holding

  a sizzling bean-

  and-cheese burrito,

  my Big Gulp

  spilling over

  unnoticed

  while her three

  friends looked

  through the magazine rack.

  Becky Ann leaned in close

  and purred, Do this for me,

  I’ll do something

  for you.

  My throat shut

  as I watched them

  saunter into her

  older sister’s

  blue convertible.

  They roared away,

  laughing freely,

  as loneliness stabbed

  through me again,

  a steel needle

  pushed slowly

  into my skull.

  I’ll do it! I yelled

  as I ran outside.

  They were half

  a block away

  and moving fast.

  I swear I will!

  BELIEF

  * * *

  Most days,

  I just wanted

  to avoid

  looking bad.

  Sometimes,

  though,

  I wanted to

  look good.

  With Becky Ann

  at my side,

  it’d all have been

  so different.

  Like hitting

  an earth-sized

  RESET button

  or getting

  a bonus life.

  What better way

  to rack up a high

  score than that?

 
; THE KEYS

  * * *

  Dad kept them

  on a huge steel

  ring at his hip.

  The master keys.

  They opened everything

  at our school.

  You could hear

  him approaching

  by their jingle.

  Cling, clang,

  Mr. Clean.

  Cleans up soup,

  Smells like poop.

  Cling, clang.

  Jing, jang.

  Loop-de-loop,

  Smells like poop.

  And so on.

  How many

  other kids’ dads

  had songs about them?

  PETE

  * * *

  My father’s part-time help,

  Pete, worked three hours each

  morning and skipped out early

  once in a while through

  the band-room door.

  My father wished he had

  full-time help, which he needed,

  even though our school

  was a hundred and fifty less

  than capacity. REAL full-time help,

  my father muttered over a mop

  after hours one day,

  cursing the kids who

  exploded ketchup packets

  all over the cafeteria floors.

  I’ll help, I said to him,

  watching the keys on his hip

  jingle on the thick D-ring.

  He told me to concentrate on

  homework so I’d never have

  to worry about cleaning floors

  or repairing rooftop exhaust vents.

  I didn’t stare at x2 + 3 = 28

  but watched those keys

  wink at me, clink at me,

  beckon as if they were made of pure silver.

  BLAKE

  * * *

  A few of the science teachers

  were crabbing about him

  in the teacher’s lounge

  while I waited for my father

  to take me home. I sipped my Coke

  in the corner, ignored again.

  “Wack job,” one said.

  This was how people talked

  about him behind his back.

  I started to really worry about

  what people said when I

  wasn’t around.

  ME

  * * *

  I don’t know

  if I really wanted

  to see if Blake

  had a gun

  or whether

  I just wanted

  to impress Becky Ann

  by having the guts

  to go look.

  Who knows what

  the “something”

  she promised

  would be?

  Remembering how

  every day after lunch

  she eased a single

  square of strawberry

  Bubble Yum

  from the pack

  and slid it

  into her mouth

  so slowly

  made me think

  of a praying mantis,

  and how the females

  leisurely devour

  their mates alive.

  Maybe I imagined

  myself a hero,

  saving the school

  from a wack job,

  though Blake

  didn’t look

  like a wack job—

  just a hollow-eyed

  kid whose father

  never came back

  from Iraq.

  But I started

  to wonder.

  I’d only seen

  a gun on TV,

  never in person.

  Maybe Nicholas

  was lying.

  Maybe there

  was no gun.

  Surely the teachers

  would know

  if a kid had a gun.

  Surely someone

  would do something.

  Then I realized:

  what if

  I

  were that

  someone?

  MATH CLASS

  * * *

  Instead of moaning

  over memorizing

  the rules of geometry,

  I considered Blake

  across the room,

  how he slumped

  in his second-row desk

  and yawned, scratching

  a giant into its face

  with a set of keys.

  Was that really him

  I’d seen atop the school,

  going berserk?

  And even if so,

  so what?

  Kids busted up windows, spray-

  painted fences, and broke streetlights

  with rocks all the time.

  I’d smashed up my share

  of things and had even once let

  the air out of Dr. Trimbourne’s tires

  after two days of detention

  for spitballs I didn’t shoot.

  Blake wasn’t any different

  from anyone else with

  a dead dad, I decided.

  I thought about Grandma

  withering away upstate

  in a hospice.

  It’s not the same,

  dying slow versus BOOM

  being killed. But dead is dead,

  and I tried to imagine

  someone close to me

  being gone forever.

  Mrs. Cullerton, our neighbor

  who bakes us rhubarb pies.

  Grandma. My dad.

  Would I act any differently

  from Blake if I woke up

  one morning and they weren’t

  there? Would people make up

  stories about me to make

  themselves feel better?

  LUNCH

  * * *

  Becky Ann’s brushing her hair,

  but I’m unshirting her

  again in my mind,

  me and a half dozen other

  kids with candy-glazed

  eyes who no longer saw

  cell phones and ice cream

  sandwiches but simply

  a bright orange brush

  pulled through the rivulets

  of her amazing hair.

  When the guidance

  counselor, Mr. Green,

  said, Andy? Everything

  going all right? I dog-paddled out of

  the ocean of my desire,

  saying, I’m fine I’m fine, why wouldn’t I be fine?

  I read that every boy

  between twelve and twenty

  thinks of sex

  every

  seven

  seconds.

  Maybe Mr. Green

  sensed this since

  he is a guy, after all,

  but I probably helped

  skew that statistic,

  thanks to Becky Ann.

  MR. GREEN

  * * *

  We called him Mr. Green,

  but he’s barely older

  than my cousin Luke,

  who’s on scholarship

  for lacrosse at U of M.

  Mr. Green meant well.

  He tossed a Frisbee

  and joked with us after school.

  He wandered the halls

  between periods.

  He tried to get along,

  talked Jaguars trivia with

  the jocks, but he’s not

  one of us, so no one tells him

  anything. Not really.

  Sure, he sat down with Blake,

  whose father died this past June,

  the explosion supposedly strong enough

  to blow out windows a block away.

  Sure, Mr. Green cared.

  But Blake swore he was fine,

  the same lie any of us would’ve told

  to a counselor or a teacher

  who didn’t know not to believe it.


  No one breathed a word

  to Mr. Green about a gun.

  Mr. Green saw the world in bright

  colors—he imagined people as good.

  He didn’t notice the bullying,

  the desk graffiti, the kids who

  stank of smoke and beer.

  Mr. Green truly meant well,

  and that, at least, was something.

  GOING AFTER THE GUN

  * * *

  You get an idea

  like that in your head,

  it’s pretty much impossible

  to shake free of it.

  HEALTH CLASS

  * * *

  Well-armed with sexual

  jargon after the two-week

  barrage from Mrs. Drummond,

  the science teacher,

  we still tittered over

  scrotum and nipples,

  watched encore videos

  on self-examination

  and the 72-hour life

  of Mr. Sperm. Even

  the teen pregnancy

  scare tactics fueled

  our desire instead

  of dousing its flames.

  No surprise that I,

  ignoring well-deserved shame

  over my 24/7 desire

  for Becky Ann,

  thought not of babies

  and diapers, gonorrhea

  or safe sex,

  but of silk panties,

  denim skirts, and silver-

  painted toenails.

  I knew then

  I’d do anything

  for the “something”

  she promised.

  I knew that gun

  was going to be

  the turning point

  of my world.

  My salvation.

  And if Blake REALLY

  had it, I knew

  just how to find it.

  SICK

  * * *

  Surrounded

  by pale blue tile,

  Dad lingered

  in the tub,

  his uniform

  forgotten

  on the floor.

  And right there, too,

  the ring of keys.

  He couldn’t stop

  coughing.

  I couldn’t stop