Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 79253 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 396(@200wpm)___ 317(@250wpm)___ 264(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79253 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 396(@200wpm)___ 317(@250wpm)___ 264(@300wpm)
Benny is my best friend.
I love him.
University life wasn’t for me.
Mother and Father told me my test scores weren’t as high as they’d hoped.
“Christ, with how weird he is, you’d think he’d at least be smart,” Father said.
“He is smart,” Mother responded. “He just has a very…unique intelligence.”
Unique.
That’s a word I hear often.
Without a match. A child who marches to the beat of his own drummer.
No longer a child, though. I’m eighteen, marching into a life outside of my parents’ loving embrace.
Father took me aside a month before my eighteenth birthday. “Look, Chet,” he said. “I’m going to have to be frank with you.”
“And I’ll be Chet with you,” I replied with a smile.
Father’s name is Frank. It was a good joke.
“Frank as in honest, Chet.” He rubbed at his forehead, the wrinkles deeper than they were when I was a child. “Your mother and I can’t afford to take care of you after you’ve turned eighteen. Since it doesn’t look like you’ll be going to college, you’re going to have to find a job once you graduate and support yourself.”
“Of course, Father,” I said. “But I just don’t know what I want to be.”
“You’ve had eighteen years to figure it out. But right now, any job will do. You’ve got a month before you’re out. Start making arrangements now.”
I didn’t get a cake for my eighteenth birthday. Just a suitcase in my favorite color, purple.
I pack it to the brim with my suits and a few mementos—and that old book of riddles, of course; I’ve even started to write some of my own—and I head into town, looking for businesses seeking help.
I talk to a few people, but they are taken aback by the way I speak to them. Mother says I’m eloquent, Father says I need to speak more like a man.
I’m not sure what that means. I am a man, ergo the way I speak is how a man speaks.
But none of them hire me.
Father made it clear I couldn’t sleep in his house tonight. Perhaps I can spend the night with a friend.
I know Benny’s address by heart. I memorized it years ago. I make my way into his neighborhood on foot, knock at his door.
He opens the door, his eyebrows raised. “Chet?”
“Good day, Benny. I was hoping I could make use of your hospitalities for the evening. Perhaps even two or three. Would you be amenable to serving as my host?”
“What the hell?” Benny cocks his head.
Like Father said. Speak in plainer English.
“Can I…spend the night?”
Benny rubs at the back of his neck. “Jesus, Chet. We haven’t spoken in years.”
“But you’re my best friend.”
He laughs at that. “How on earth can you think I’m your best friend? I treated you like shit in elementary and middle school.”
“You were teasing. That’s what friends do. That’s what Mother always told me.”
“For Christ’s sake, Jer—I mean Chet. Will you ever get a clue?”
He closes the door in my face.
I guess he’s busy tonight.
No matter.
I sometimes see people sleeping in the green area by the airport. Some of them even have tents. I’ve always been fascinated by the notion of camping. The reserve is not far from where Benny lives. I walk over there just as the sun is setting and take a seat on a nearby bench.
This is lovely. Cool night air. A blanket of stars above me, and the roaring thunder of planes taking off nearby.
It doesn’t get much better than this.
A man with stringy hair with aluminum cans lining his arms and a crown of tinfoil passes by me, giving me a strange look. “First night here?”
“Indeed, sir,” I say. “May I ask why you are bedecked in metal?”
“Why what?” He looks at his arms. “Oh, yeah. The cans. It keeps them out.”
“Them?”
“The CIA. NSA. Illuminati. Lizard people. Whatever the hell you want to call them. They’re listening, and these”—he bangs on the metal can on his left arm—“are the only way to scramble their signal.”
I widen my eyes. “Fascinating.”
“Yeah, you wouldn’t believe what those bigwigs can get up to.” The man scratches at the side of his face, and his eyelids twitch. “It’s going to rain, I think.”
I look up. “Heavens, I didn’t plan for precipitation.”
“Here.” He gestures me over. “I have a tent. There’s room enough for two. Come on, you can crash with me. I’ll get you some cans, too. Keep you safe from listening ears.”
“I’d certainly like that.” I extend my arm. “My name is Chester Tabbitt. Chet for short.”
He shakes my hand, not meeting my eyes. “I’m Tim. Timothy Mann.”
It has been grand getting to become friends with Tim. He’s unlike my other friends. They laughed at me, pointed fingers, said unkind things. Tim doesn’t do that. When he laughs, I’m laughing with him. And he’s never said anything unkind to me in the months since we met.