HOTHEAD

chapter 8

12:02 P.M.

I keep running. I don't look back. It's not that I'm expecting anyone to follow me, I just need to put as much distance as possible between me and that place.

What the hell was I thinking? About to start a fight in the middle of a McDonald's. Pull it together Jay. Eye on the prize. Tunnel vision.

I make my way through the parking lot, all the way to the bus station. It's 12:04. Less than two hours to go. I still have some time to kill but I no longer trust myself. The way I see it: I should get as close as I can to the school before I do anything else that might jeopardize my mission.

Inside the bus station I go to check the bus schedule. The bus I would normally take just left a few minutes ago. That doesn't matter. It takes two buses to get to my school. The first bus is just to get to another station, so any bus with it as its destination will do. The 161 is supposed to leave here at 12:09, and just as I look away from the list of bus schedules, I see it approaching.

When I exit the station, I go and wait at the bus stop. When it comes to a stop in front of me, a woman with a stroller exits, and I wait patiently until she clears off before I walk on and place my change in the slot. I wait for the driver to give me a transfer, but he doesn't. He just stares at me.

"What?" I ask.

"The bus fare is three dollars and twenty-five cents," he says, glancing at the amount I just put in.

"Yeah, okay," I say, feeling my temper starting to flare. "That's all I have. I put in close to two dollars."

"Yes, and the bus fare is three dollars and twenty-five cents," he repeats patiently. This stingy bastard has got to be joking. "If you don't have enough, you should ask politely if that is all right, not just shove your change in and hope that I'm too stupid to count a few coins."

I take a deep breath. Relax Jay. You can't lose it. Not yet. So instead, I put on the sweetest fucking smile that I can muster. "I am so sorry sir," I say, failing to keep the sarcasm out of my voice. "May I please ride on your spectacular bus? Pretty, pretty please?"

"Sarcasm isn't the right choice here son. You ought to try being sincere," he says firmly.

This fucking bitch, man. Why the fuck is he being so stingy? And why the fuck is he calling me son? I should pull my gun out and fucking hijack his bus!

But I don't. Instead, I just turn to leave.

"You may ride the bus today, but you might want to think about an attitude adjustment there."

"Yeah, thanks for the advice," I say, walking past him.

"You forgot your transfer," he calls out.

"I don't need one," I practically hiss.

I go to the back of the bus, as far away from that prick as possible. My school is only a fifteen-minute walk from the station. I really don't need a transfer anyways. Or his hospitality.

# # #

My freshman year came and went, and I entered the eleventh grade in no higher spirits. Things at home were getting worse, and I had barely seen Lily or Breanna at all over the summer. Instead, I spent most of my time with Mikayla. Smoking. Drinking. Arguing. Fucking. I was kind of hoping that things between Calvin and me would have cooled down, but they didn't. I still hated his guts, and he still hated mine. During the first week in the hallways he called me a pussy, and it was really hard for me to find that resolve I had found the previous year, when I had avoided him and didn't pursue any physical confrontations. I tried going inside my turtle shell, but the shell was out of use. I had been with Mikayla for so long, and we always aired out our frustrations with one another.

As the weeks went by my turtle shell wasn't growing any stronger. I was fed up with Calvin. I had been walking down the hallway. I wasn't really paying much attention. My iPod was in my hands, and I was casually flipping through my playlist. That's when that stupid asshole shoulder checked me. My iPod fell to the floor, and the corner of the screen cracked. It had disconnected from my headphones, and Eminem started blaring throughout the hallway. Even though Calvin had his goons with him, I was itching for a fight. But as my fists curled into their all-too-familiar balls, Principal Bradley's face came swimming into my mind. I tried to get it to go away, but it wouldn't.

And then I snapped.

Calvin and his goons were already laughing after he bumped me, but when I started yelling and punching myself in the face, they became hysterical. Everyone in the hallway was either looking at me as if I were a psychopath or laughing their asses off. I didn't care. They already thought I was weird, why not add psycho to the list? I was just so angry, and I wanted to hit him. I wanted Principal Bradley's face to go away. I wanted to feel pain. This solution had always worked for me in the past, so why not then? At least I wouldn't get into trouble. I wasn't starting a fight after all. . . .

Wrong.

Some douche-bag teacher stumbled in on my self beatdown and broke up the fight I was having with myself. What a hero! He sent me to Principal Bradley. I tried explaining my thought process. I told him that I was angry but that I also knew that I shouldn't be getting into a fight. Needless to say, he wasn't impressed by my decision. Far from it. He was actually quite visibly concerned. Maybe I was a little more unhinged than he thought?

"Hitting yourself instead of others isn't a good solution Jay," Principal Bradley had explained. "You should try to find more positive ways to let out your frustrations."

Yeah, whatever. I did that for him and he was scolding me for it. I told him that I'd do my best, closing my eyes and forcing my lips to curl upwards into what probably was the creepiest fucking smile possible, and left his office.

It didn't take me long to find my way back. I was in social class and our teacher had assigned a group project. I never liked group projects. It was my preference to work alone. I only liked the company of a select few, and my classmates never made that cut. That doesn't mean that I didn't do the projects, just that I was never really a productive partner. One of the girls I got paired up with was this annoying chick named Lindsay. She had a fast mouth but everything it spewed was utter bullshit. A few days before the project I had overheard part of her conversation: "I mean seriously, why would he go out with her? Hashtag Ew."

I wanted to kick her in the face.

We had been working together for maybe three minutes before I decided that I couldn't

do it. I got up, walked directly over to my teacher and told her that I wasn't working with Lindsay. I didn't even bother to keep my voice down. Lindsay looked hurt by my statement, but I didn't care. When my teacher insisted that I work with my assigned partners, I flat out refused, so I was sent to the office.

This time Principal Bradley looked really tired when he spoke to me, not at all like his cheery and upbeat self. For the third time, he recommended that I begin seeing our school counselor, but again I refused. My time with Mr. Patel had turned me off school counselors, and I wasn't going to change my mind about that for anybody, not even Bradley. So instead he suggested a few therapeutic exercises that he felt might help deal with my anger and connect better with those around me. I let him know that I'd think about it, and he ended up convincing my teacher to allow me to do the assignment individually, but he implored me to try and be a bit more open-minded and considerate of other people's feelings for the time being.

I could tell that his patience with me was finally beginning to wane.