Asher ✓

16 | adventure

MARCH 1, 2010 / COMBER PARK

Though Mrs. Gonzales was nothing but a gem to the three (plus Ryanel) of them, Asher, Kerrish and Vinnie scrambled out of the minivan and ran as soon as the minivan stopped at the local sign of Comber Park. In the minds of the four teenagers, that day would be a day of birthday celebration and initiation into teenage-dom: provided by the filthy minds of Kerrish Soto, Ryanel Gonzales and Vinnie Fei.

And if Asher had been just thirteen when this happened, maybe things would have gone differently. One sleep's worth of growth might have been reversed; that insignificant lack of neuron connection might have prompted Asher to turn away from his wild friends and go home — even though Mrs. Gonzales was coming back to pick them up at five. 

But that didn't happen, and with the steady throb of impulse and recklessness running over his broken bones, Asher decided to be careless for just one day — his (almost) birth — and deal with the consequences later.

Vasily's heart would have clenched seeing his son behave so stupidly. Except, seeing through the glimmered lenses of youth, Asher only saw the best day of his life waiting to be lived, the most exciting adventures dangling from the promises of his friends — waiting to be grabbed up. Today was his day, and on his day, anything was possible. No broken bones had to come if he was strong enough, no heartbreak had to come if he was happy enough.

It was using this mentality that Ryanel, Kerrish, Vinnie and Asher stumbled across a group of three girls from another local high school (Vinnie had to seventh-wheel it). They wore knee-high floral skirts, and four sentences into a conversation, one complained that she was cold.

Kerrish, eyes alight with promise, said, "How's about we warm you up?"

The tentative chuckles from the girls merged into laughs of glee as Kerrish revealed his entire plan. They asked to join in with a group of boys playing basketball, and started playing games of sloppy basketball (the girls had no idea about the concept of rules). 

Asher ignored the annoying moments when any of the three girls picked up the ball and ran with it like that was normal, screaming happily as they barraged past the blockade Asher's team had tried to make. No arguments were exchanged about this, but every male component of the game knew that just for today, they'd hold back their abilities and not jump so high and not run so fast to go easy on the girls.

Kerrish had stumbled upon the trio taking selfies with the wildlife; one girl said, "Just get a picture of me with the ducks quickly — I don't want to be near them for too long." 

To Asher, the girls who didn't seem to like ducks all that much but still wanted a picture of them were not all that bright, not all that funny but very pretty. Not much potential for anything there — but for his birthday, why not have a bit of fun? 

When the boys were reeking of sweat from the game — they secretly kept score, but wouldn't say it aloud because it would embarrass the girls — and the girls panted like they were tired and their feet were sore, all seven of them decided to get ice-cream, and sit under one of the trees.

Asher had a specific type of person. 

He liked calm people, who were excited over cool things, who could laugh about stupid things and talk about smart things. More or less, all of his friends fit that description (Kerrish was walking the wobbly tightrope.) 

The girls who took selfies with animals to seem like they loved wildlife but complained about being near them, the girls who wore heels to the park and didn't know how to shoot a basket, they weren't his type. 

But they followed the four boys to one of the oak trees, and sat down in a circle next to them and Asher was too nice to turn them away, especially when Kerrish was looking at them and licking his ice-cream weirdly at the same time.

Yes, Kerrish was almost not Asher's type of friend either. But clearly, Kerrish was the girls' type, because when Ryanel's phone chimed, and he said, "Mom's going to be here soon," the mobile-number-swapping frenzy began.

Asher didn't have a phone, and he never asked for one, because Vasily had dedicated enough income to protecting Asher from his imperfecta. Asher was grateful for what he had, and kept silent about what he didn't. The slimmest girl was persistent, and almost scarily so. 

She said, "That's so weird that you don't have a phone. But, do you at least have Facebook?"

Asher could honestly answer yes to this question, but would have rather answered dishonestly if it meant preventing this pretty but picky girl from trying to make conversation with him. Based on her previous sentence starters of, "What's your Instragam?" and, "Do you watch reality TV?" online conversations would be even duller than real life ones. 

His hand twitched around her phone; Asher was tempted to type down a fake name. If there was anyone on Facebook with that name, Asher was sure it wouldn't have any link to him.

But she was pretty, and there was no harm in telling her. Avoiding her sparkling eyes and straight hair, Asher wrote down his real name, and looked up to meet a breathtaking smile.

"Thanks," her glossy lips stretched around the words. "I'll look you up tonight."

Mrs. Gonzales was confused when her son and his three friends crashed back into her minivan, faces sweaty and arms streaked with dirt; did Kerrish have sunburn on his cheeks?

"How was your day, boys?" her maternal instinct pushed her to conversation.

"Good," came Ryanel's obligatory response, in unison with Vinnie and Asher.

Kerrish, the flamboyant one, whooped, "We had fun, right, Asher?"

If fun meant two hours of contrived basketball (the worst kind), a moment of fleeting frozen goodness and tortuous hours of meaningless and stressful flirting with girls they would likely never see again — seriously, Asher didn't know why they all tried so hard to impress three girls who weren't that impressive themselves — then absolutely, they had tons of fun.

Mrs. Gonzales dropped them off in the reverse of how they came. Vinnie walked back into his house with a grimace, Kerrish ran up his driveway second and Asher went through the garage door when the minivan rolled into his street, and Asher saw a flicker of movement at the curtains. 

Vasily had been watching, after starting to worry once it was three minutes past five. They had dinner in relative silence, before Asher disappeared to his room. He did that a lot those days. On his laptop, a friend request from a girl with a profile picture of her and ducks at Comber Park appeared. 

Her name was Tracey, and her timeline looked normal. Her beautiful hair and beautiful face, coupled with beautiful quotes that were not hers alongside her selfies, made Asher think that she was the type of girl that most guys at his school coveted. Tracey looked perfect from the time she woke up (one selfie had immaculately messy hair and a caption 'days that you wake up are always a good day' — Asher wouldn't argue with that) to the time she went to bed (another with her in a satiny nightie and short-shorts, 'wish I didn't have to sleep, because my life is better than dreams could ever get').

All the boys at Symont Middle School would be madly jealous of Asher for just knowing a girl like her. But she just wasn't his type, and not much (except for time) could change that.

Nevertheless, he still accepted the friend request.