Losing Hope

again,” he says disappointedly. “She’s crazy. She’s so fucking crazy.”
    “I thought that’s why you loved her?”
    “But that’s also why I don’t .” He drops his leg to the floorboard and scoots his seat forward. “Let’s get out of here.” He cranks the car and begins backing out of the driveway.
    I put my seatbelt on and slide my sunglasses off my head and over my eyes. “What do you want to do?”
    “I don’t care what we do,” he says.
    “Me neither.”
    • • •
    “Is Breckin home?” I ask his mother, who’s now eyeing Daniel from the doorway in the same way she was eyeing me last Friday night.
    “Well, aren’t you becoming a real regular,” Breckin’s mother says to me. There isn’t any humor behind her voice and quite frankly, she’s a little intimidating.
    We stand silently for several awkward seconds and she still doesn’t invite us in. Daniel leans his head toward mine. “Hold me. I’m scared.”
    The door widens and Breckin replaces his mother after she turns and walks away. He’s now the one eyeing Daniel suspiciously. “I’m definitely not doing you any favors,” Breckin says to him.
    Daniel turns to face me, shooting me a quizzical look. “It’s Friday night and you bring me to powder puff’s house?” He shakes his head disappointedly. “What the hell has happened to us, man? What the hell have these bitches done to us?”
    I look at Breckin and nudge my head sympathetically in Daniel’s direction. “Girl trouble. I thought some Modern Warfare could help.”
    Breckin sighs, rolls his eyes, then steps aside to let us in. We make our way inside and Breckin closes the door behind us, then stops in front of Daniel. “You call me powder puff again and my new second-best friend ever in the whole wide world will kick your ass.”
    Daniel grins, then cuts his eyes to mine. We have one of our silent conversations where he tells me this kid isn’t half bad. I smile, completely agreeing with him.
    • • •
    “Let me get this straight,” Breckin says, trying to clarify the confession Daniel just made. “You don’t even know what the girl looked like?”
    Daniel smiles boastfully. “No clue.”
    “What was her name?” I ask.
    He shrugs. “No clue.”
    Breckin sets down his game controller and turns to face Daniel. “How the hell did you end up in the maintenance closet with her?”
    Daniel’s face is still awash with a smug grin. He seems so proud of it, I’m shocked this is the first time he’s mentioned it to me.
    “Funny story, really,” he says. “Last year I was never assigned a fifth-period class. It was a mistake on administration’s part, but I didn’t want them to know. Every day during fifth period while everyone else went to their scheduled classes, I would hide out in the janitor’s closet and nap. They never cleaned that section of the hallway until after school, so no one ever went in there.
    “I guess it was about six or seven months ago, right before the end of the school year, I was having one of my fifth-period naps and all of a sudden someone opens the door, slips inside, and trips over me. I couldn’t see who she was because I always kept the lights out, but she landed right on top of me. We were in this really compromising position and she smelled really good and she didn’t weigh very much, so I didn’t mind her landing on me. I wrapped my arms around her and made no attempt to roll her off me because she felt so damn good. She was crying, though,” he says, losing some of the excitement in his eyes. He leans back in his chair and continues. “I asked her what was wrong and all she said was, ‘I hate them.’ I asked her who she hated and she said, ‘Everybody. I hate everybody.’ The way she said it was just heartbreaking and I felt bad for her and her breath smelled so fucking good and I knew exactly what she meant because I hate everyone, too. So I kept my arms wrapped around her and I said, ‘I hate everybody, too, Cinderella.’ We were still in . . .”
    “Wait, wait, wait,” Breckin says, interrupting the story. “You called her Cinderella? What the hell for?”
    Daniel shrugs. “We were in a janitor’s closet. I didn’t know her name and there were all these mops and brooms and shit and it reminded me of Cinderella, okay? Give me a break.”
    “But why would you even call her anything ?” Breckin asks, not understanding Daniel’s penchant for random nicknames.
    Daniel rolls his eyes.