"Death and vengeance at my back, as Fate
has turned now, I came wandering overland.
Give me a plank aboard your ship, I beg,
Or they will kill me. They are on my track."

"The Odyssey," Fitzgerald Translation. Book 15, Lines 343-346.
Used without permission.
 

MICHAEL:

I've gotten a little bit of stuff that might be useful from Georgetown. Not direct references, but stuff that might help give me some statistical backup. I was hoping for a little more, and I know there's stuff at Georgetown and Johns Hopkins that's classified, but in order to get that, I'll have to get, well, creative.

I don't feel like being creative right now. And if I don't get my ass over to ACC and sign up, I'll be stuck with whatever's left over. No thanks.

I still have no idea what to take. I suppose I'll have to see what's there. And I'd like to do it before Kelly gets back, so I can spend some time with her (I can do this tonight, Dad's not around, he's not gonna get on my case about slacking).

Ally says fine, take the beast, she's not going anywhere tonight, but it's low on gas, can I stop for her? She hands me some dollars, she knows I'm low.

I think I can deal with that. Even if I do hate buying gas. I don't know why it annoys me. Having to get gas-I wait until I'm running on fumes to do it.

Since I drove her little car around all day, I should probably kick in some of my own dollars.

What's she talking about? She's got a quarter tank left!

Ally's a California girl, though, and spent about twenty years in LA, land of cars. She's paranoid about getting below a quarter.

Weird.

Hey, if it makes her happy...that probably means I can keep borrowing her car. Which right now is a Good Thing.

ACC is parking hell. They sell anyone parking tags, but they sell more tags than they do spaces, so it's like, good luck. And you can't park on the two blocks nearest the school, so if you don't luck out, you end up doing a pretty good walk to campus. Which tonight, I have to do.

I get to admissions, and I discover I'm not the only one who put this off until damn near the last minute.

I'm gonna be here for a while. Should've brought a laptop. I could've worked on some stuff while I waited for this FUCKING LINE TO MOVE! Which it's not.

I'll be lucky if I make it to the counter by closing time, which is 8 p.m. And if I don't, I have to come back. People who work here, when it's quitting time, they are like so gone.

I brought my catalog with me, which I printed out before I left-they supposedly update every day, so you can tell what's open. I grab some blank tickets, you do one for each class, so I can have them filled out when I get there. And I notice with some relief that my student ID is in my wallet. You don't have that, the fucking morons here can't register you. Never mind that your student ID is your social security number, and I mean, everyone knows their social security number. Nope. They don't do it.

I flip to the writing classes. Casey's teaching, but the classes she's teaching, I already took. I hear the other two writing teachers are nowhere near as good. Scratch that.

Computer science, I took everything last year that I'm interested in, and everything left is too basic. They need to offer some more advanced Java type stuff. I was hoping they had something with JFC, they offered it in the spring, but I don't see it-wait, there it is. Fuck, it's closed. Enrollment restricted to 20. 20 people enrolled, 8 wait-listed.

And in comp sci classes, you get picked according to what your number is on the waiting list. I'd be 9, and that's assuming nobody's ahead of me. No fucking way am I gonna get that section.

Let's see. Calc III. Okay. There's an easy A. Only problem is, it's offered from 5 to 7 on Monday and Wednesday nights. Yecch. But hey, I do that, I complete the sequence, and like I said, it's cake for me. I fill out a ticket for that one. I'm sure I'll get in-max enrollment is 40, only 19 slots filled.

Physics. I took Astronomy last year, it was fun. I don't mind physics. I can do it. And only one section is closed out. Two other sections, offered at 9 a.m. and at noon. I bend the corner of the page and mark those.

God, what else? I need two more classes. Jesus.

Kelly keeps saying, take some chem and bio. Never had a big interest in them, teachers I had all sucked. But pickings are starting to get thin here. So I flip to the chem section. Lecture, which meets three days a week, 10 to noon, is still open. But you have to sign up for one of the labs, and some of those are full. There are four labs, and two of them are closed, one is near capacity. The one with the most openings is from 2 to 6 p.m. on Thursday afternoon. I can understand why. Sucky time.

Biology...let's see...lecture from-oh Jesus Christ!-8 to 10 a.m. three days a week! Aargh! I don't think so! And it's got a lab you have to sign up for, and the labs are five hours long. Two of them filled up, three open. The open ones are 8 to 1 on a day you don't have lecture, 2 to 7 on Tuesday, and 3 to 8 on Wednesday. I don't think so. I have to do 25 tutoring hours a week...I need something resembling availability.

At least this kills some time. Not that I've reached anything resembling a decision, but at least the line has inched up some.

Two girls I tutored in basic algebra come up to me, they're like, Hi, Michael. I talk to them a little. Nice girls. Not terribly bright, but not assholes. Dude from my astronomy class waves, comes over and asks how it goes, sounds like it goes about the same for both of us.

This is weird. I never had people remember me. And never had them want to talk to me, either. I mean, it's nice and all...just bizarre. I hated everyone when I was younger. And they hated me back. Which at that time suited me fine.

I don't feel that way anymore. Every once in a while, it'd be sort of convenient, because then you don't have so many obligations to people, but I think, on the whole, I like it better the way it is now. I mean, even my dad, who I'm ready to kill right now, I'd be dead without him. Swear. To be fair, he's been through a lot with me. He takes good care of me.

But he's still such a bastard sometimes.

And I wish he'd get off my case about stuff! It's not as if I'm not trying, for God's sake!

I'm like almost lost when I finally get up to the counter. I have two of my tickets filled out. The clerk bitches at me, I'm supposed to have them all filled out when I get up here. And the physics section I signed up for closed out before I got up there. Shit!

She's like, you don't pick now, you're going to the back of the line.

Not in your lifetime or mine, lady.

So, in desperation, I sign up for the bio and chem classes. Hell, I can drop them if I really hate them. And I can probably do them, no sweat. So I fill out my tickets for that, and I sort of breathe again when they go through. Least I'm registered now.

It's temporary relief. Very temporary. I realize, looking at my schedule, that I have lectures from 8 to 12 Monday-Wednesday-Friday, a calc class from 5 to 7 on Monday and Wednesday, a bio lab Thursday morning from 8 to 1,  and a chem lab from 2 to 6 on Thursday. I come to one conclusion. I'm gonna start hating Thursdays real fast. They're gonna be hell. 9 hours of lab. My brain will be dead, among other things.

And put 25 hours of tutoring on top of that.

I'll be lucky to come out alive from this semester.

And what the killer is, you only get 1 credit for the labs!!! You're in there for all that fucking time, you get one measly credit! You get 3 for the lecture, and you're not working all that hard in lecture. Biggest challenge for me is staying awake. I get 4 for calc, 1 for each lab, and 3 for each lecture. That's 12 hours, what's considered a full load around here.

No kidding.

Oh god, I should've signed up sooner, made my life easier. Aargh!

Well, Kelly'll be happy. Maybe she can help me if I get stuck.

Not that I ever got stuck in a class before. I just didn't do the work when I was younger. I discovered that if I just did the work, piece of cake. A's for Michael. No problem.

Hope that trend continues. Because no way can I put in the study time Kelly does. I got too many other things going on.

I'm digging out my keys, I got my face turned towards the car, when I hear a voice. Weird voice. Soft. Could be kind of soothing...if it wasn't so chilly.

"Young Frohike." I just about jump out of my skin.

I turn to stare at an old dude, dressed in a real expensive suit, think it's Italian (Miranda tries to educate me on fashion. Guess more of it stuck than I thought). I'm totally freaked. I mean, there're people that know me around here. But they call me Michael. I don't even tell that many people my last name. And all my teachers botch it, anyway. You wouldn't believe.

He lights up a smoke, and you can tell, it's not one of Ally's Marlboro Lights. No, this is really rank. I cough when he does. After I had pneumonia last year, I can't be around smoke too much. Really hurts my chest. And also not like Ally, he doesn't offer to stub it. No, he's a rude fucking bastard.

Whoever the hell he is.

I've seen this creep...where?

And I've smelled that smoke. I remember smelling it...

About a week ago. Leaving Chateau Langly. It was Ally's birthday. It was the night Kelly told me she wanted me to get her pregnant. That alone was freaking me.

But I didn't see anybody. Probably somebody out walking their dog, having a fag before turning in.

I know I've seen this dude! I can't place where. It's bugging the shit out of me.

And making me nervous as hell. He shouldn't know who I am if I don't know who he is. Should he?

"Who're you?" I don't like how scared I sound. I'm trying to be cool.

I'm failing miserably.

He smiles...and it's the creepiest smile I've ever seen. He's got real dead eyes. Like you see on serial killers. Dead cold eyes. Light blue, just like Langly, but Langly, he's like a little kid, those eyes are always moving. This guy's eyes, they just stare.

"'Scuse me," I stammer out, trying to unlock the Neon. "This isn't my car, and I got to get it back."

"I'm aware of that. You borrowed it from the lovely Mrs. Langly, didn't you?"

Now I'm really getting creeped out. He knows Ally?

Oh shit.

Where did I see him? Think, Frohike, think!

"I didn't come to talk to Allison. I came to talk to you."

"You know her?" I hope not.

"Oh, quite well. I was a friend of her father's. Believe me, I know the little princess well. But we're not here to talk about her."

"So what are you here to talk about?" I should just bail the hell out of here. But this guy is...weird. Like he casts a spell over you or something.

"I think it's time...we got to know one another."

"How do you know who I am? Where'd you get my name?"

He laughs, this sick creepy laugh. "Oh, please, young Michael. It's so much easier than even you think."

I don't like him using my last name. I think I like him using my first name even less. That's personal.

"Fine. So you know who I am."

"And who your father is, and who your associates are."

Now I'm REALLY getting weirded out.

"You have...so much potential, young Michael. Why are you wasting it on them?"

Huh?

"Look, I dunno who you are, or what you want, but I have to get home."

"Fine. There'll be another time." And he vanishes, and it's like weird. I don't see him go.

I realize then I'd stopped breathing. I feel like my old asthma is kicking in.

Stay calm, Frohike. Just breathe. Slow. Easy.

I feel like I'm drowning inside. I'm trying to catch my breath, and staying calm is real hard when it's not happening.

Finally. After a few minutes, I can cough a little. I feel like something just flooded my lungs. At least now, I can sort of break some of it loose.

I wait till my head doesn't feel so light. Man, should I go to emergency or something? It's real hard to get air. Between his nasty cigarettes and scaring the shit out of me, he kicked my old enemy into high gear.

I had this as a little kid. One of the reasons I started swimming was to try and get rid of this. It helped, but right now, it's not helping at all. I feel like I'm gulping for every breath.

Oh man. If my dad was at home, I could call him and he'd come and get me.

I think it's getting better, and then all of a sudden, I feel like another flood hits my lungs. I'm gasping now. Jesus. This not only scares me, it pisses me off, because it's truly a wimpy way to die.

I luck out-Ally's got a cell phone on the floor of her car. She probably forgot to take it in the house. Thanks Ally. I just hope the batteries work...

I should call 911.

I call Jo's instead, and Jo answers, and she's like, Michael, what's wrong, I tell her, just get my dad, now!

Dad comes on. "Michael?"

"I'm...at school...can't breathe...come get me." It's hard to talk. Sure sign you're not breathing too well.

"I'm on my way."

He hangs up before I can say anything else. How's he gonna find me?

I just hope he does, like he always does.

Please. Do it fast.
 

I don't know how long it took. By the time Dad gets there, I'm a little better, but it still hurts, and I'm still having trouble sucking in air.

He's like, oh no, not again. He gets behind me, starts rapping me on the back of my ribs, trying to get junk to come up.

I remember him doing this when I was little. He got real good at it.

Hasn't lost his touch, either. A few minutes of this, and all this crap starts coming up. Gross. But it helps. I don't have so much trouble getting a breath.

He slips his arm over my shoulder and I lean up against him. I'm kind of weak right now. Not being able to take in oxygen will do that to you. Make you real tired.

"What happened?"

I don't think I should tell him. "Don't know. Just happened."

"Uh-huh."

"Really."

He looks at me, studies me. He's got the same eyes as me. Green. I got the good lashes, though. Those are from my mom. "Are you all right to drive?"

"Yeah."

"Come right home."

"Dad, I gotta see Kelly, I got work-"

"Come right home." He's got that don't-argue-with-me voice going on.

I groan. I'm never gonna hear the end of this.
 

He gets there before me. He's already got a J&B going. And the coffee maker. Smells like espresso. Which he's gonna feed to me. Caffeine's a bronchodilator.

I'm going to be up all night.

"You all right?" He asks me when I come in.

"Yeah." I think so. "I gotta call Kelly."

"Fine, but don't be on long. You don't have that much breath yet."

Kelly's not down in her room. I try upstairs. She might be with the family.

Which she is, but unfortunately, I get Langly.

"Hey, Junior! Thought you were gonna be here! Flaking out again?"

"Fuck you, Langly."

"Only in your dreams. What's up, dude?"

"Where's Kelly?"

"She's with Ally, lemme get her." I think he's gonna walk over to wherever they are, but instead, I just about get my ear blasted off with him screaming, "Hey Kelly! It's loverboy!"

I am truly going to kill that fuckrag.

"Michael? What's going on?" She was expecting me.

"Hey, I had an asthma attack when I was coming out from registering for classes...Dad came for me, made me come home."

"Do you want me to come over?"

"Sure. If you want."

"Let me show this stuff to Ally, she's doing a model, and I need to tell her about some...of the things we found."

"Anything interesting?"

She pauses. "I'm not sure...that's the word you'd use. Anyway, let me finish up and grab a bite, Ally's making pasta primavera, and then I'll be over. 'Kay?"

"Sounds good. Love you."

"I love you, Michael."

She is so awesome.

Dad, being a snoop by profession and nature, has listened to the whole thing. "You'd think you two could manage 24 hours without each other."

I'm getting real annoyed with him. "Look, Dad, next week we start classes, I barely get to see her during semester, so get off my case, okay?"

"I just think you need to pay attention to...other things as well."

"Excuse me, I do pay attention to other things, so much that I'm going nuts, okay? I got work on the magazine, I got 25 hours of tutoring, and I just lost my mind and signed up for two lab sciences, so don't bug me!" I find myself getting short of breath again, and have to sit down.

"Two lab sciences? How do you plan to manage that?" He starts patting my ribs again. This is bizarre. He's bitching at me and taking care of me all at the same time.

That's my dad.

"I got no idea." And I don't. I hope I don't have to drop anything. That means longer till I get to upper division...

Which I haven't even picked out a place for. Fuck.

"Well, you'd better come up with an idea, fast, or you're going to be drowning all semester." Words of wisdom from the great Melvin.

"I'm working on it! Jesus, Dad, you act like I never do a fucking thing!"

"Michael, watch your mouth!"

"Well, you do!"

"I do not. I simply want what's best for you."

"Oh, sure Dad! Then why are you always bitching at me?"

"So that you'll do the right thing."

"Not working, Dad." I'm running out of breath, again, but the coffee's ready this time. He pours me some. It's powerful stuff. I will be bouncing off the walls all night long. Like eating a dozen chocolate covered espresso beans. I did that once. I'm like, whoa, chocolate, these are good...and I was like, zing! For hours.

"Michael, how many times do I have to tell you? I don't want you making the mistakes I made."

"And what...makes you so sure...I'll do the same things over you did? Huh? You think...I don't learn anything. Do you?"

He doesn't want to answer that. Ha ha. Wonder why.

"Michael, stop talking now."

Fuck him!

Only reason I do, is because I've got like no wind left.

And I'd like to have a little for later. When Kelly gets here.

END OF PART 6