here we have for you part 2 of the first chapter of a.w. fox's "i hate you, please love me." throw us a comment if you like it!

Halfway to Seattle's Best, Kelsey stopped abruptly, doubling over with stomach cramps. He spat on the ground miserably. Once again he was reminded of why he chose not to deal with Len: Len truly seemed to enjoy drug transactions, viewing them as an extension of his social life. He felt at home in the gritty environs of The Blade. Kelsey, on the other hand, found it to be a miserable, almost apocalyptic, carnival. The desperate seekers moved like hyper-competitive versions of a blood cell through a vein. They all wanted to make it to the lungs and heart as fast as they could, to gobble up all the precious oxygen first. Once they got what they thirsted for--what they needed to survive--they'd then dissipate and separate through endlessly splintering arterials, heading home to the extremities. In this type of environment, he couldn't stand having to engage in the kind of useless social intercourse that made him feel ill under normal circumstances.

Kelsey straightened up, clutching his stomach, willing himself to pull it together. "I'll be okay once I...you know."

"I sure do!" Len said, his eyes practically gleaming with a merry Schadenfreude. He clapped Kelsey on the back as the two began walking again. "Hey, have you ever considered doing speedballs with mostly coke, instead of doing just dope?"

Kelsey shook his head. "Hell, no. I see heroin as medicine. I won't touch coke."

"Dude, you're missing out! There's nothing like a speedball. That rush, the clanging in your ears, the taste of the coke in the back of your throat, the way everything goes into stereo right after you shoot it in--nyang, nyang, nyang!"

Kelsey couldn't relate to people who treated drugs as if they were some new death-defying extreme sport. He'd take his narcotic version of a peaceful day at the beach, thank you.

"You wouldn't get so sick if you cut down on the dope, and did coke-heavy speedballs," Len continued. "I shoot so much coke that if I don't get any dope, I don't notice withdrawal symptoms. My habit's mostly coke, you see. If you shoot coke whenever you start feeling the sickness coming on, you'll be so amped out of your head, you won't notice shit."

Kelsey nodded. He thought Len was an idiot. The idea of shooting coke as a way of curing heroin withdrawal seemed to him like purposely breaking your own hand because someone had just amputated your leg with a chainsaw. Also, it annoyed him that Len kept referring to heroin as "dope". He found that heroin aided his intellectual capabilities--it quelled his bodily misery and naggingly intense emotions, paving the way for the far less complicated realm of distant, theoretical rumination.

But right now, its deficit was causing both his bodily misery and naggingly intense emotions. He quickened his pace as Len pointed at a band poster tacked to a rare tree.

"'Ruined By Birth'," Len read. "Don't you work with the frontman from that band? Didn't they get signed? Well, whatever. They fucking suck!"

Kelsey exhaled. At least there was something that he and Len agreed on. However, the last thing he wanted to do was think about Justin Michaelson. "Yeah, I used to work with him," he said. "He quit a while ago. I guess he doesn't need to work at a record store anymore."

Justin's awful, faux-British, pompous "New New-Wave" band, Ruined By Birth, had recently been on the cover of Seattle's liberal free weekly, The Seattle Libertine, as the subject of a major record label bidding war. Justin had smugly quit his job at Kill Yr Idols Records a few days before the article came out, enigmatically and irritatingly claiming that his band was "on the verge of something huge". Kelsey had never forgiven him for a variety of offenses--the least of which being that his awful band was legions ahead of Kelsey's.

Justin was incapable of uttering a sentence that wasn't either sarcastic, ironic, or mean. He routinely made fun of Kelsey's favorite seminal bands for being "maudlin"--and then, in his own band, ripped them off in the most soulless way imaginable. His defense was that "sad people are losers; my band's about fun," but even that didn't explain his egregious, self-referential lyrics ("Don't you wish you were just like me/Playing sellouts from Milan to Perth/Don't you know that it's not easy/For an ice cold boy who was Ruined By Birth!"). He'd brag about trying to impregnate various hipster girls in the music scene. "I want to ensure that my legend continues," he'd said, grinning. When Kelsey evoked this line to his coworkers as evidence of Justin's assholery, they all claimed that Justin was just being funny, and that Kelsey took people far too seriously.

The day before Justin quit the record store, Kelsey returned from his lunch break feeling ill. He just knew that the sandwich maker at the sub shop he called "Aging Hipsters Heroes" had slathered on the butter and snuck in a few jalapenos in his sandwich despite his instructions to the contrary. Kelsey's boss, the flamboyant and unsympathetic Brad, told him to get over it and price gun CDs with Justin, who was scheduled to leave within the hour.

Brad considered himself the stand-up comedian of Kill Yr Idols Records. During store closings, he'd grab the store mop and use it as a microphone, swiveling his hips and singing along to CDs of interchangeable cloying teenage divas with fake-sounding names like Misti Cherry and Destini Childs. Brad had particular contempt for Kelsey's bisexuality, which he considered a "narcissistic, immature, sexual non-preference." At first, he asked Kelsey if he was just a boring straight boy trying to be avant-garde, or was else engaging in sexual layaway--"bi now, gay later." When Kelsey attested that neither was the case, Brad sniffed that he was obviously a sex addict trying to "have his cock and eat clit too." This got a predictable laugh from Kelsey's coworkers.

Kelsey could have kicked himself for trying to appeal to Brad's nonexistent sympathies. He resigned himself to the price-gun and a carton of CDs. An uncomfortable silence settled upon Justin and Kelsey as Kelsey's condition declined. Even a few minutes of flirtation with a cute girl--who chose looks over fame by sidling up to Kelsey, not Justin--didn't take away his unease.

"Um, Justin?" Kelsey began. "I think that Aging Hipst--I mean, Age of Hipsters Heroes screwed up my order and I wound up eating something that I'm really allergic to. Would you mind staying a little later so I can go home? I'm only supposed to be here for a couple more hours."

He tried not to show any evidence of not feeling well, because he knew that Justin would seize on this opportunity to gleefully decline. But when it came to his physical fragility, Kelsey was horribly transparent.

"Sorry, Kelsey." Justin laughed. "I've got a hot date after work. Better get your Epi-Pen ready."

"Epi-pen?" Kelsey asked.

"Yeah," said Justin, smirking. "It's what people with real food allergies carry around in case they have a reaction. Too bad there's not an Epi-Pen for being a fucking hypochondriac."

Kelsey had numerous fantasies about ripping out Justin's mustache hairs one-by-one ("They're all the rage in Williamsburg," he had replied, upon returning from a trip to New York sporting a 'stache). These fantasies didn't dissipate after Justin left the store for good, and worsened every time he saw an article about the fucker's band in The Libertine, complete with annoyingly clever titles: "Ruined By Birth, But Saved By New New-Wave!" "Ruined By Birth Excavates The Grave of Eighties Brit Pop Nostalgia", "Ruined By Birth Is A Premature Hit!" To make matters worse, the store's assistant manager--a sycophantic rockabilly aficianado named Meggie-Lee--never failed to plaster the bulletin board in the employee breakroom with news of Justin's band's unwarranted success. Kelsey vowed to himself that the next time he felt like he was going to puke, he was going to take aim at what he called "The Justinsanity Clippings".

His one guerrilla attempt thus far had been thwarted by his desperate fear of confrontation. He had reached a breaking point the day that he saw that Meggie-Lee had put up an actual promo poster of Ruined By Birth on the employees' refrigerator. It was tacked up with a magnet that claimed "Women are from Venus, Men are from Uranus". The poster depicted Justin and his bandmates dressed in all black, scowling ponderously in the middle of a cemetary. The four of them were centered around a large headstone which somehow had been manipulated to read "Ruined By Birth".

Kelsey had seized a black Sharpie marker and had written underneath the band's name, "Too bad you weren't all aborted!"

He had cackled like a loon after he'd written the final exclamation point in the sentence, but then spent the following hour terrified that his employees would know that he was the one who had defaced the poster. The very thought of someone approaching him about the matter gave him a stomach ache, so he retreated to the back room at his first opportunity and scribbled out the sentence. From then on, he confined his responses to news of Justin's band's continued success to mere passive-aggressive eye rolls. He had thought that The Blade, at least, would be one area where he wouldn't have to ever hear about Seattle music scene gossip. But despite Len's exhile from the Pacific Northwest music scene, the kid still had his finger on its fibrillating, arrhythmic pulse. It seemed that Len always wanted to talk about various dreadful bands that were far more successful than Kelsey's. Last week, he had drooled over a horrible speed metal band called Charles Manson's Last Lay. The band's four members were rumored to be Satanists, crackheads, and serial rapists. Kelsey didn't know if their Lord Voldemort schtick was merely a publicity stunt, but he did know that all four of the members worked at a slaughterhouse in Tacoma and used deliberately offensive monikers such as Penis and Mr. Clitoridectomy. Their execrable music was merely the cherry on top of a shit sundae.

Luckily, Len--his brain zipping merrily along--was already on to a new topic. He began waxing nostalgic about his erstwhile attempt at punk rock immortality.

"Yeah, well, I'd never sell out like Ruined by Birth. Did I ever tell you about the time that my band, The Crusty Curmudgeons, went on a huge tour all over the Midwest? Damn, it was fucking amazing..." Len continued describing the glory of his days as a punk rock drummer. Kelsey exhaled thankfully as the two of them approached the door of Seattle's Best Coffee. Unfortunately, there was a line six-person deep. He steadied himself against the glass case filled with pastries as a wave of dizziness threatened to send him sprawling on the tiled floor. His equilibrium worsened when Len asked him the one question Kelsey had spent the entire day trying not to think about himself.

"Hey, didn't your band have a show recently? Wasn't it last night? How'd it go?"

"Fine," Kelsey said tersely. The last thing he wanted to do was admit to Len the truth--that he could potentially have more in common with the ex-drummer for The Crusty Curmudgeons than he wanted to admit. Kelsey's goal was to ease the screaming cells in his body and try to forget the growing dissent that was fomenting between himself and his bandmates.

"Cool, cool," said Len. He laughed, oblivious to how slow the line was moving. "Shit. Have you seen the latest anti-drug commercial on TV?"

Kelsey groaned. He had yet to exchange money and product with Len, and the last thing he wanted was for his impending connection to start discussing topics that would make the customers at Seattle's Best--largely Midwestern tourists who had come for coffee before watching the fish-tossers at Pike Place Market--suspicious. He told himself not to worry. Because he had tattooed arms, dyed chin-length black hair, and a labret piercing, the type of person ahead of him on line at the coffeehouse would have stared at him as if he was a piece of dogshit on their shoe long before he had ever tried heroin. He lowered his voice to a whisper, trying to get Len to quiet down himself. "Are you talking about the commercial that, like, takes place in some kind of army camp in the jungle?"

Kelsey was not a fan of television, but his three roommates spent an almost inconceivable amount of time in front of the screen in their living room. Darren, Mikey, and Miranda couldn't believe that Kelsey didn't like TV, and always invited him to partake of their favorite evening activity--drinking (beers for Mikey and Darren, a nasty-tasting diet alcoholic concoction for Miranda called NoCarb Girl! Cooler) and eating pizza while watching hours and hours of it. A few nights ago, he had stopped by the living room to request that his roommates open a window. He couldn't stand the smell of food, particularly the anchovy and pineapple pizza that Darren and Mikey favored. While Miranda gushingly enthused over his vintage ski vest and tight flared corduroys, and Mikey taunted him by putting a slice of the offending pizza under his nose, Darren tossed Kelsey a bottle of beer and invited him to park his ass for a while. In the interest of domestic harmony, Kelsey consented, although he did ask if there was any other kind of alcohol in the house other than Miranda's diet crap.

"Beer kind of makes me sick. It's so yeasty," he explained.

Mikey guffawed. "Try going down on a girl with a yeast infection!""I'll assume you're talking about that skank you used to date," Miranda shrilled.

"Sorry, dude. But this is a Stella Artois. It's a really good beer, trust me," said Darren.

Kelsey opened his beer with Darren's bottle opener and stared dully at a series of commercials. A forty-something blond woman danced joyfully with a seventy-something man to a disgustingly catchy jingle that touted something called Penimax. The man then priapically dangled car keys in front of her gleeful face and then carried her into a red Ferrari.

"Penimax," a male announcer's voice oozed. "For men who want to live their lives to the max! Discuss with your doctor if you're healthy enough for sexual activity at your age, and if Penimax is right for you. Side effects include a runny nose, male-pattern baldness, weight gain, hirsutism, and priapism, an erection that lasts more than four hours..."

Darren, Mikey, and Miranda burst into laughter.

A jaunty instrumental tune announced a show called Running In Stilettos. A bony, Pomeranian-faced blond with a nasal voice started gesticulating wildly as she spoke.

"My college roommate Bunny always told me that men were like wine...The older they were, the richer they were! And Hamilton Mann III is certainly rich! I've fantasized about a beautiful home in Greenwich, with two point one beautiful children and a closet stuffed with Manolos and Jimmy Choos, but how can I give up on my Holly Golightly fantasy of life as a single gal about town in Manhattan?"

"We are so not watching this crap," said Darren. Kelsey silently agreed.

"It's okay," said Miranda. "I've already seen this episode five times. Lizette finds out that Hamilton's cheating on her with a nineteen-year old model."

Mikey clicked the remote control. "Catfight!" he enthused. On the screen, two women in business suits screeched insults at each other and began wrestling while surrounded by a pit of fecal-appearing brown mush. The show's host, a casually dressed man with a chiseled face and a posh British accent, began his imperious introduction.

"Welcome to 'The Best Beard', the reality show with a twist. Our two eligible bachelors appear to be the icing on the wedding cake for the forty desperate thirtysomething career women who've been woken up each morning by the incessant buzzing of their biological clocks. But what happens when these ladies realize that the menfolk for whom they've been so desperately competing are gay, gay, gay?"Miranda squealed. "I love this show!"

Darren and Mikey turned to Kelsey expectantly, to see his review of the latest top reality television show.

"What?" Kelsey asked, appalled. "Just because I'm bisexual doesn't mean I like this crap!"

The two best friends shrugged at each other.

"I think it's kind of funny," Mikey muttered self-consciously.

"Just because I like it doesn't mean I'm gay or anything," Darren echoed. "Not that there's anything wrong with being gay," he added.

Miranda tittered, as the host for The Best Beard threw his be-suited arm out enthusiastically.

"When we come back, we'll see Tammi and Judi go head-to-head in the swimsuit and evening wear competition! Our two lovely ladies will be judged on their tummies, bummies, and boobies by our celebrity judges. Let's see how much progress they've made in fighting their figure flaws, food foibles, and fashion faux pas! The winner will enter the Physical Challenge round, where they'll wrestle the triumphant bachelorette from last week's Best Booty contest! But after the past several months of a strict diet and exercise regime, are our bachelorettes woman enough to get down and dirty in a ring filled with rich, succulent, caloric, sinful Godiva chocolate? Or will they give in to temptation, like a pig at its trough, and be distracted from their ultimate goal? Don't touch that remote control! We'll be right back for more of The...Best...Beard!"

"Not your speed, Kelsey, huh?" Darren asked, observing the disgusted expression on his roommate's face. "Or is the Stella not doing it for you?"

"It's okay," Kelsey managed, choking down another sip of beer.

Yet another commercial began. It depicted a gaggle of parental-looking figures dressed in military fatigues. Each middle-aged husband and wife couple were lined up near a tented camp in the woods, receiving various weapons. A cop, in uniform and badge, played the role of army general. Once the artillery had been distributed, he stood in front of the parents, outlining a battle plan. The parents then all saluted, grabbed their weapons, and dispersed throughout the woods in spousally-determined groups of two.

The camera then cut to a high school basketball court, where a group of six multicultural teenagers finished a pickup basketball game, laughing and joking. One of the boys, distinguished from the other five by the fact that he had jaw-length hair instead of a crew cut and was wearing a concert T-shirt instead of athletic gear, showed his friends a baggie full of pills. "They'll make you feel really good," he intoned in a gravelly voice.

The scene flashed back to the parents, who were now deep in the jungle, shooting at bottles of pills, syringes, baggies of white powders, and rolled-up joints--the War on Drugs taken to its ludicrous and all-too-literal conclusion. The cop kept yelling, military-style, as the parents slapped each other five as yet another prescription bottle or plastic baggie exploded: "C'mon, soldiers, don't give up now!"

A matronly, bespectacled middle-aged woman brandished an AK-47, which she aimed at a pyramid of bottles of pharmaceuticals and paraphernalia: "Ratatatatat!" A crackpipe burst into flames. A skinny man with a crimson and forest-green bowtie and a balding pate stuck a hunting knife into a technicolor poppy plant. At the moment of impact, he emitted a resounding "Hyiaaaa!" The police officer/sergeant screamed "Fire in the hole!" Flames licked the sky as a randomly-placed trailer (identified as a "meth lab" by the policeman/army sergeant) exploded amongst acres of marijuana plants.

Back at the basketball court, the five players regarded their "druggie" friend warily.

"I don't need anything to feel good, I'm high on life!" swore a wholesome African-American boy.

"That's right. Drugs are for losers!" enthused a Latino kid, who continued to bounce a basketball.

"Yeah, dude, we're outta here," said a blond Caucasian, martialing his troops and shooting the druggie miscreant a dirty look over his shoulder.

Back in the woods, the parents had somehow been reunited with their anti-drug kids, while the pill peddler--who had also been magically transplanted into the jungle--was led off in handcuffs by the police officer/army sergeant. John Philip Sousa-style patriotic fight songs echoed in the background, as the gaggle of parents and their five law-abiding kids sat around a campfire, their arms around each other.

"Parents, talk to your kids!" they all chorused, in cultish voices. "Join the battle! Be a Freedom Fighter! Be a soldier in the War against Drugs! Paid for by DrugFree America."

Kelsey barely heard the subsequent commercial ("Meat. Cheese. Fries. Food for guys, who ain't ashamed to be guys. BusterBurger."). He stood up abruptly, willing himself to not spit out a scathing critique.

"I'm going to bed," he said.

Kelsey suddenly felt a sharp elbow in his ribs. He immediately transported himself back into the present--dopesickness, Len from Olympia, Seattle's Best Coffee. Len elbowed him again, grinning. "Earth to Kelsey!" he bellowed. "The good man wants to know what it is you're buying."

"Sorry," he murmured. The cashier--a stocky, crew-cut guy with nerdy glasses, a thick neck, and bodybuilder biceps--gave him a dirty look. "Yeah. Um, could I have a chocolate bun, a mocha, and a small coffee, with room for cream?"

The anabolic mathlete called out Kelsey's order and then gave him the pastry and drinks. He paid and handed Len his snack. He tried to maintain control, as another round of stomach cramps made his bowels seize up dangerously. He had already slipped the money he owed Len inside the bag where the chocolate bun was safely ensconced. Once they were outside, Len would shake his hand--placing the half-gram balloon in his fist--and then Kelsey would be reassuringly on his way to both bodily and territorial safety.

The pair stepped outside and Len grinned broadly. "Like I was saying, do you remember the anti-drug hysteria of the 1980s? Nancy Reagan, Mr. T, and all of those 'this is your brain on drugs' fried egg ads."

Kelsey nodded, his eyes fixated on the distance he'd have to travel in order to get back to his apartment and cure himself.

"Well, the commercial I'm talking about is like an update on all that fried egg bullshit. It sure doesn't take place in a fuckin' jungle. In this ad, there's a cute little waif girl cooking your standard 'brain on drugs' fried egg in a sizzling pan. But this time, she says 'this is your brain on heroin.'" Len affected a soprano voice. "Then, suddenly, she picks up the frying pan and starts smashing up her entire kitchen with it. 'This is what happens to your job on heroin!'" he imitated screechily, gesticulating wildly. "'Your friends! Your boyfriend or girlfriend! Your entire faaaamily!' She starts throwing shit around the kitchen, dude. Wham, there goes the glass door to the oven. 'Your dreeeeams!' Oops, sorry microwave, didn't mean to hurt ya there, li'l buddy. And then she throws the fuckin' frying pan across the room. 'Your entire liiiiife!' And I'm watching, thinking, okay, so heroin smashes up kitchens? Can you imagine, Kelsey? 'Oops, hun, was that your new Cuisinart? Sorry, ossifer. You know what heroin can do to a kitchen." He threw his head back and hooted with laughter.

"Sounds pretty grisly," said Kelsey, disturbed, wondering when Len would part ways with him. He had what he needed. It was only his physical weakness and sickliness that kept him from breaking into a run.

"Yeah, well," said Len, eyeing a hesitant-looking, scraggly male/female couple crossing the street towards the main intersection of The Blade, Pike and Second Avenue. "I think it's fuckin' hilarious. Hey, I gotta go. I think I see a couple of customers. See ya soon, Kelsey."

"Yeah," said Kelsey, exhaling with relief. "See you soon, Len."

to be continued in part 2 of chapter 1!
 btw, the musical suggestion, "the crying light," by antony and the johnson's, is a stunnig record and makes a great soundtrack to kit's writing!

Currently listening: The Crying Light By Antony and the Johnsons Release date: 2009-01-20

here is part 1 of chapter 5 of "i hate you, please love me," by a.w. fox leave an encouraging comment if you like what you read!

Chapter Five
 
 After exchanging perfunctory greetings with his wife, Kenton calmed down considerably.  He didn't even look at Kelsey until after he paid the toll across the bridge to Mercer Island.  In contrast with his feckless younger brother, Kenton felt unbelievably mature and grounded.  As a high school football player who regularly tormented Kelsey as much as possible, Kenton could not have imagined a time when he would wish for a good relationship with his bratty sibling.  But after marrying Marissa and rather enjoying the idea of being a successful businessman, a faithful husband, and--eventually--a dutiful father, it irked him that Kelsey seemingly had no allegiance to their family.  In Kenton's opinion, it was time that both of them grew up, put the past behind him, and became friends.  In Kenton's eyes, Kelsey's refusal to do any of the three was absolutely enraging. 
 It never occurred to Kenton that perhaps Kelsey's unwanted role as the tormented--in contrast to Kenton's chosen role as the tormentor--might make this transition more difficult.  It wasn't until a couple of days before his wedding that Kenton imagined that there was more to Kelsey's refusal than the fact that his brother was a fucking freak.
 Characteristically, Kelsey had arrived late to the wedding rehearsal.  Kenton had little interest in the pompous pomp and circumstance that led up to the wedding like an endless red carpet.  He had spent the Kelsey-induced delay joking around with his best man, Paul Metcalfe.  Paul was Kenton's best friend.  The two of them had met while fraternity brothers at the University of Washington.
 Despite Kelsey's excellent SAT scores and grades, which could have assured him acceptance at an even better school, his distaste for travel had landed him at the U of W as well.  Yet the two brothers' college experiences could not have been more different.  Kenton had lived in a fraternity house and spent most of his time on campus.  Beginning in his freshman year, Kelsey had lived in a run-down off-campus apartment in the student slums with his "bandmates" and spent most of his time at the college radio station.  While Kenton and Paul remained best friends even throughout Paul's years as a law student at the University of Illinois, and Kenton's years as a business student at the U of W, Kelsey had dismissed his former bandmates as "insensitive twats".  He had moved into a series of similarly seedy apartments in the gay-and-freak infested neighborhood which Kenton called Crapitol Hill.  Ensconced in his slacker shithole, Kelsey played in bands and did God-knows-what for the past decade.
 Kenton hadn't seen his little brother for months, yet Kelsey's panicky demeanor and sickly appearance upon finally running into the ballroom didn't shock him in the least.  This was typical Kelsey.
 "Places, places," the wedding consultant--whom Kenton considered an uppity faggot--pleaded.  He flopped his wrists as if all of his metacarpal bones had been liquified.
 "Um," Kelsey had said, staring at the stilted positionings of the main wedding participants, not knowing where to go.
 "Who is this?" oozed the salon-tanned, well-muscled wedding consultant.  Kenton, who had never been good at remembering names, couldn't recall if his name was Rick or Mick.  He watched Rick-or-Mick lick his lips and look Kelsey up and down lasciviously.  Kenton wanted to beat the living shit out of the incongruously weight-lifting, flitting fuck before he could try to hit on his innocent, vulnerable little brother.  Sweet little Kelsey would probably follow Rick-or-Mick to some leatherdaddy bar for the promise of free intoxicants, not knowing that his asshole was at risk!  At times, it seemed to Kenton as if Kelsey was perpetually the archetypal little boy who was on the verge of being kidnapped and raped by a trucker after being lured into his big rig with the promise of candy.  Kenton didn't like watching Rick-or-Mick stare at his little brother in a similar way to which he and his fraternity brothers had--seemingly aeons ago--lewdly ogled their female classmates.
 "Shit howdy!  Keep it in your pants, dude, that's my fuckin' baby brother," Kenton said lazily, as both Marissa, her mother, and his mother drew in sharp intakes of breath at both his curse-laden comment and what it implied.  Kenton realized that now that he was going to be a married man, he had to stop talking in frat-ese--at least when he wasn't around his buddies.
 "Your baby brother!" exclaimed Rick-or-Mick, ignoring the rest of Kenton's comment.  He checked his purple notebook.  "Kelsey, right?  You're supposed to stand next to Mr. Paul Metcalfe, the best man."
 "Um," said Kelsey again, looking nervously around the room.  "I'm wondering if I could maybe go to the bathroom before we start this rehearsal thing.  I'm sorry I was late, but my stomach's really bothering me, like really severely and stuff."
 "Poor thing."  Rick-or-Mick raised his sculpted eyebrow.  He actually dared to pat Kelsey's stomach, before flashing Kenton and Marissa a quizzical look.
 "Kelsey, don't you dare move.  This isn't gonna take more than a few," Kenton said firmly.
 Rick-or-Mick gave Kenton a surprised glance.  "Groomsman, surely we can take a time out while your little brother, er, remedies his situation?" He pursed his lips, refusing to even mention a bodily function that dare not speak its name.
 "Kelsey's stomach is always bothering him.  I think he can control himself for a few minutes," Kenton explained.  He turned to Paul.  "Do we really want to stand here on ceremony while my 'little brother' spends a year in the bathroom puking, popping a dook, or both?"
 "Kenton!" admonished Kathryn Manchester.  Kenton laughed to himself.
 "Not particularly," Paul mused.  He had spent the two hours before the rehearsal drinking beers with Kenton in a nearby bar, complaining about how fucking stupid weddings were.  Kenton agreed, but at the same time he thought that Paul was jealous.  Originally, it had been Paul who had hit on Marissa--and had been solidly rejected.
 Kenton watched as Marissa's almost identical bridesmaids giggled to each other.  He imagined they were tittering about how cute Kelsey was, how weird he dressed, the candor he evinced as to his bathroom desperation, or perhaps all three.  Girls had been giggling in Kelsey's presence even before he had sprouted his first pube.
 "If I can't go to the bathroom first, I assume no responsibility for what might happen," said Kelsey, as he shakily took his place next to Paul.  Kenton watched as his mother and father rolled their eyes at each other.  They had heard it all before, many times.
 About a minute later, there was another hold up in the proceedings.  Marissa threw a fit when she found out that instead of tiger lilies, the flower consultant had mistakenly ordered calla lilies.
 "This isn't a fricking funeral, it's a wedding!"  She stomped her foot, which was shoved into a too-tight pair of muslin satin open-toe kitten heels, with a Swarovski crystal adorning the shoe's narrow tip.
 Kenton heard Kelsey hiss "Bridezilla" as Marissa's anorexic mother rushed in to comfort her.
 "Marissa, darling, we can fix this, I promise," the woman Kenton had nicknamed Skeletor soothed, patting the veil on her daughter's head.
 "That's right, honey, I promised you a storybook wedding, and I'm not going to let you be disappointed for anything in the world!" her elderly father trumpeted. 
 Kelsey looked distinctly nauseated and increasingly sweaty.
 "Do you know the difference between tiger lilies and callie lilies?" Paul poked Kenton, ostensibly about to begin one of his many impersonations of endless stand-up comedy routines about the Differences Between Dudes and Chicks.
 Rick-or-Mick dashed over to the now-fretting flower consultant, a nervous-looking, bowling-pin shaped British woman named Lizbeth, and began whispering sibilantly in her ear.  Kelsey used this opportunity to make another appeal.
 "Kenton, Mom, Dad," Kelsey said uneasily, "I feel horrible.  I really need to go to the bathroom."
 "Kelsey, don't start," Kathryn Manchester warned.
 "But I'm in a really bad way," Kelsey pleaded.
 Kensington Manchester shook his head exasperatedly.
 "Unless you're gonna soil your pants or puke all over your suitjacket, I'd suggest you don't fu--frickin' move," Kenton grinned.  He was undisturbed by both Marissa and Kelsey's distress.  The entire wedding, by now, had taken on an almost farcical quality in his mind.  Why so much emphasis on one day?  Marissa, for instance, had temporarily given up her addiction to  magazines such as Paparazzi Paper, Starzz! and You Go, Girlfriend! in order to read nothing but bridal magazines for the past six months.
 Kelsey shot Kenton an undisputably cornered look, and then ran out of the ballroom.
 "My little brother," said Kenton jocularly.  "Isn't he a piece of work?"
 Paul eyed Kenton dubiously.
 By the time Kelsey had returned, the flower fiasco had been resolved.  Kenton was almost shocked at the change in his brother's demeanor.  Kelsey practically floated into the ballroom, a beatific smile on his face.  Stomach ache my ass, he probably just beat off, Kenton thought.  Or else he found some slut to suck him off.  Knowing Kelsey, he wouldn't have been surprised by either possibility.  But he was surprised at the depth of peace that this particular orgasm had apparently caused.
 "Feel better, little Manchester brother?"  Rick-or-Mick simpered, looking down his tanned Roman nose at Kelsey.
 "Uh, yeah," Kelsey said.  He smiled.
 "Well, let's get you back where you belong, then."  Rick-or-Mick put his seemingly boneless wrists on either side of Kelsey's shoulders and led him back next to Paul.  Kenton watched, irritated, as Rick-or-Mick actually patted Kelsey's stomach once again--this time for twice the duration as he had before.  "Are you sure you're okay?"
 "I feel really good," said Kelsey uncharacteristically.  Kenton could not remember a time when his brother had said he felt fine, let alone really good.
 After the rehearsal ended with no further complications, the main members of the wedding party went out to Le Chateau, a highly-rated restaurant that was regularly patronized by the Manchester family.  Kelsey blanched as every special was read by the waiter, picked at his food, ate the entirety of his dessert, and then practically fell asleep during the espresso-and-pastry course.
 "Kelsey!"  Kensington Manchester thundered, as his younger son's chin almost dipped forward into his cup of cappucino.
 Kenton had watched his father become angry enough after Kelsey had asked if the restaurant had "lactose free" milk.  "If I drink milk with lactose, I'll have to spend, like, five hours in the bathroom tonight.  That is, if I don't puke my guts out first," Kelsey had explained to the waiter, who looked endlessly amused.
 "Kelsey!" Kensington blustered.
 "What?  It's true," Kelsey protested.  "I mean, you've seen it happen before!  Remember the time you and Mom had to take me to the emergency room after I drank a breve latte?  Isn't it weird that I can eat ice cream, which has lactose, but if I drink regular milk or cream by itself, I'm in bad shape?  There was that other time after eating here--I think I had fettucine alfredo, which has a ton of cream in it--that I got so sick that our downstairs toilet got stuffed and--"
 "--And you're rude!" hissed Kensington.  But Kelsey's forthright description of the perils of lactose didn't incite his father's rage to the same degree that his sleepiness did.
 "Wake up, Kelsey!"
 "What?  What?  Oh, sorry, Dad.  I guess I've just been working real hard lately.  And practicing real hard, too.  The band, you know."
 "Working really hard.  Practicing really hard," corrected Kathryn.
 Kensington shook his head disgustedly.  "And to think, you got a degree in English?"
 Predictably, this enraged Kelsey, who valued his intellect highly.
 "Shit!  Why do you have to pick on me all the time?" Kelsey protested.  He got up from his chair abruptly and stalked out of the restaurant.  Marissa's comparatively less dysfunctional family openly gaped at the drama.
 "Kenton, go talk to your brother," Kathryn instructed, after flashing Marissa's parents a brittle yet apologetic smile.
 Kenton rolled his eyes.  "Why do I have to go after him?  You guys were the ones who pissed him off."
 Kenton, his mother, and his father all eyed each other warily, trying to figure out who exactly was at fault for not only Kelsey's behavior during dinner, but for his life in general.  At that moment, Kenton realized that the balance of power had shifted within his family.  While the two brothers were high school students, Kenton had carte blanche to needle and torment Kelsey as much as he wanted.  Their mother seemingly enjoyed shaking her lovely head dejectedly at what a colossal disappointment Kelsey was.  Their father definitely delighted in yelling at Kelsey in an excess of what Kenton found to be amusing fist-pounding and forefinger shaking.  Back then, when Kelsey would try to leave the dinner table after barely picking at his plate, Kensington would often get up from his seat, grab his younger son by the collar, and drag him back to the dining room.  Until Kelsey had finished his plate ("If you make me eat this indigestible gruel, I'm going to throw up all night, nonstop!"  "Fine with me!  Maybe you'll see a doctor then!") and answered his father's argument-provoking questions ("I told you!  I don't want to get a business or law degree!  I want to play music, okay?"  "Fine!  Then leave this house right now and go find a squat in some crackhead neighborhood in Seattle!"), he wasn't allowed to escape to his room.
 It was clear to Kenton that his 'rents no longer had power over Kelsey.  He certainly didn't.  Kenton knew that if he tried to torment Kelsey the way he had back in high school, Kelsey would very happily take a cab back to Crapitol Hill and never talk to him again.
 Kenton's best friend Paul poked him in the ribs, breaking the tension.  "Hey.  Why don't we go outside and look for your brother?"  He surreptitiously showed Kenton a pack of cigarettes under the table.
 Kenton nodded.  He had been trying to quit smoking in time for his wedding, just as Marissa had been trying to lose five pounds.  The difference was that Marissa didn't have five pounds to lose--"Dude, if she loses five pounds, it'll all come off of her tits, and what's the point of that?" Paul had asked, and Kenton agreed--while Kenton had been badgered into quitting smoking for years, by both Marissa and his parents.  Of course, his habit couldn't compare to his brother's; Kelsey had been smoking almost two packs a day since he was fifteen years old.
 The two of them went outside and lit cigarettes.  There was no sign of Kelsey.
 "I bet he's in the bathroom," Paul said.
 Kenton laughed.  "Paul, I don't give a fuckin' shit where Kelsey is right now.  Let's head over to the bar next door and do a couple of shots.  If Marissa or Ma tries to text me, I'll just tell them that we're trying to find him." 
 Kenton was growing weary of the family drama.  He longed to fast-forward to his bachelor party, and then skip once again to his honeymoon, as if the entire wedding hoop-de-doo was a DVD of various uncut scenes and special effects.
 Paul gave Kenton a strangely concerned look.  Kenton had not seen that sort of look on his best friend's face since the two of them had been juniors at college, right before Spring Break.  Paul had confessed to Kenton that while he had been beating off to thoughts of Marissa's skinny legs and tanned cleavage for months, he had come to terms with the fact that she wasn't into him and therefore Kenton could pursue her.
 "What?" he asked Paul.
 "Dude.  I think we should find your brother.   Like, right now," Paul said.
 "Why?  Like you said yourself, he's probably in the bathroom.  Why the hell do you want to burst in on Kelsey puking, shitting, or jerking off?  Seriously, these are three of the only activities that Kelsey's willing to leave his bed to do, trust me.  That is, other than getting some bitch to jerk him off, or playing his guitar and pretending that more than three people on the entire planet would actually enjoy his 'music.'"  Kenton laughed.
 Paul shook his head exasperatedly.  "Look, Kenton.  I know that you and your brother don't get along too well, but, say, if he was in some kind of life-threatening emergency, wouldn't  you want to help him out?"
 Kenton thought that his best friend was being frighteningly serious.  Paul was never serious.  He had blared "Rape Me" by Nirvana from the main frat house speakers during the University of Washington Feminist Union's Take Back the Night March.  He had been appointed the Head Fat Inspector by the sorority Beta Pi during their annual Pledge Week.  His job had been to go to the sorority house in a white lab coat with a magnifying glass, which was used to analyze "fatty spots" in the naked bodies of the blindfolded Beta Pi pledges.  Paul got to use a black Sharpie marker to draw circles on the areas of the pledges' bodies to denote areas that "needed improvement".  The sorority sisters would then choose who to accept in their sorority and who to reject based in part upon how many "trouble spots" Paul thought they had.  In addition, Paul had been a font of hilarity for jokes about every sociopolitical or ethnic group except straight white men and straight black men.  Paul, like most of their fraternity brothers, was a straight white man who thought that straight black men were the coolest people in the world.  Unlike Kenton, however, Paul put on a self-consciously Ebonic accent whenever he ran into black guys.  Kenton still couldn't figure out if it made the guys in question treat Paul in a more friendly manner, or in a more sarcastic manner.
 "Look," said Kenton, trying hard to be mature.  "Kelsey is my brother.  We don't have a lot in common, but of course, if something was up with him, I'd help him the best I could.  What the fuck are you talking about?  Does some guy you know want to kill him because Kelsey fucked his wife or something?"
 Kenton couldn't imagine this occurring, because--to the best of his knowledge--Paul and Kelsey didn't travel in the same circles.  But his brother was a mysterious, elusive, and horny motherfucker.  Kenton remembered hearing that his sexy next-door neighbor, Laurel Healy, had filed for divorce from her husband, Eldon Healy.  From eavesdropping on his parents, Kenton had learned that Laurel Healy claimed that her husband "conjugally abandoned her", while Eldon Healy accused Laurel of having cheated on him with a younger male in the neighborhood.  In the upper-middle class WASP nest where the Manchesters and Healys lived, this was a huge scandal.  Kathryn and Kensington Manchester didn't suspect Kelsey's involvement, but Kenton did.  After all, he had seen Kelsey, clad only in a pair of ridiculously tight swim trunks, cleaning leaves out of the Healys' pool while Eldon was away on one of his many business trips.  Meanwhile, Laurel fluttered around him in a bikini, pinching his cheeks and making Kelsey--a moody little shit under the best of circumstances--grin like a little kid at his birthday party.  A normal little kid:  At Kelsey's actual childhood birthday parties, he had usually thrown up, cried, or locked himself in a closet.
 A few weeks after Kenton heard about the messy Healy divorce, the angry, nerdy husband banged on the door of the Manchester home demanding to beat the shit out of "that little prettyboy dickwad who fucked my wife."  Kenton realized that his suspicions had been correct.  As a rare favor to his brother, he told Eldon that not only was his brother not at home, but also that he had no idea what he was talking about--Kelsey had a long-term steady girlfriend whom he'd never, ever cheat on, especially not with a married woman who was almost three times his age.
 The 'three times his age' comment gave Eldon pause.  In his mosquito mind, women fucked men three times their age--after all, he had done so numerous times on his business trips, despite the fact that he resembled a disastrous and unlikely cross between a hamster and a parrot--but the opposite was inconceivable.  "I knew she was a lying bitch," he had hissed, before slamming the door.  "After all, who'd fuck her?"
 I would, Kenton had thought to himself.  Three months later, Laurel was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.  Kenton had never even asked Kelsey about his affair with their next door neighbor.
 "Okay, Paul," said Kenton, irritated.  "Whose wife did Kelsey fuck now?" And don't say mine, he thought to himself, or I'll kill all three of you.
 "Wife?"  Paul gaped at Kenton.  "I'm not talking about your little brother fucking anyone.  I'm talking about the fact that I think he's a fucking junkie."
 Kenton started laughing.  To him, this accusation sounded as ridiculous as Paul suggesting that Kelsey was fucking someone's husband. 
 "What?" Paul asked.  "Why the hell are you laughing?"
 "My brother's a fucking pussy," said Kenton, still cracking up.  "If he ever has more than two drinks, he gets sick.  If he smokes pot, he starts crying and thinking that little green men are coming down from space to munch on his penis.  He spent four years in high school whining about how much his stomach was bothering him, but he wouldn't go to the doctor because of the time in seventh grade that he stepped on a nail and had to have a fucking tetanus shot.  He passes out if they ever show blood ‘n’ guts in movies or TV!  He had to run out of sophomore biology to puke his guts out when the class was dissecting frogs, and you're telling me that he's a hardcore heroin addict who, like, shoves needles in his veins?"
 "Not every junkie shoots up," said Paul defensively.  "Some of them smoke it, okay?  And Kenton, dude, I don't think you know enough about dope to say what your brother is or isn't doing."
 "Okay, Paul," said Kenton sarcastically.  "Since you're such a fucking expert, why don't you tell me all that you know about 'dope'?  And also, please enlighten me about how you think you know more about my brother than I do."
 "Jesus, Kenton, you're the one who's always talking about what a fucking weirdo freak wild card your brother is, and how you never see him, and how you have no idea what he's doing with his life."
 Kenton tossed his cigarette on the ground and pulled a well-hidden pack out of the pocket of his overcoat.  It was the last smoke in the carton.  As he lit it, he realized that he'd have to buy another pack and hide it from Marissa, or else get through the rest of the night and the following morning without a smoke.  At this point, he didn't want to ask Paul for a few more of his; it would feel at worst like defeat, and at best like admitting that he was pussywhipped.  "Fine, fine.  I'm listening."
 "Did I ever tell you about my roommate during my first year of law school at the U of I?"  Paul asked sententiously, clearly enjoying his platform.
 "Yeah," said Kenton, remembering.  "That dude from Boston who had a fuckin' nervous breakdown and had to take the semester off." 
 "And why did he have a nervous breakdown?" Paul pressed, as if he was utilizing one of his erstwhile law professors' Socratic Methods in order to bait Kenton.
 "I don't fuckin' remember!"  Kenton spat, slamming his fists against his sides, resisting the urge to punch his best friend.  "Why should I care?" 
 In Kenton's memory, a 'nervous breakdown' was something that his brother Kelsey had always threatened to have, usually after their father tried to get him to eat, see a doctor, sit in the backseat of a car, go on a family vacation, attend school, or be kept from one or another of his myriad 'girlfriends', most of whom were years older than him.
 "His girlfriend was a junkie, and he felt that his ethics as a lawyer-to-be specified that he should break up with her or else turn her into the cops, but he was in love with her.  It all came to a head when she came to visit him." Paul said triumphantly.
 "So?" Kenton asked, bored.  He couldn't imagine his pussy little brother doing a hardcore drug like heroin, even if he didn't need to go near a needle.  If Kelsey was too fragile to smoke pot or drink heavily, then obviously he wouldn't try the most bad-ass drug of all.  Kenton thought that Paul was still pissed that he had been rejected by the girl whom Kenton was marrying.  Picking on Kelsey as a way of pissing off Kenton not only was futile, it also seemed completely ass-backwards.  After all, Kenton had spent almost a decade picking on Kelsey himself.
 "So," Paul imitated.  "So, the way Kelsey looks and acts is all too familiar.  Pale as shit.  Slender, yet muscular--not skinny like a speed freak.  He barely touched his meal, but he ate all of his dessert.  He acted desperate to go to the bathroom during the rehearsal, and during the dinner he sat there smiling like a fool and falling asleep.  I mean, your brother almost drowned in a cup of espresso tonight, and my roommate's girlfriend almost asphyxiated in a bowl of chicken soup at a diner the day before Reading Period began.  And his eyes--shit, Kenton.  Junkies have tiny pupils, so their irises look all weird and alien-like.  Your brother has these crazy blue eyes; they almost fuckin' pop out of his head."
 Kenton rolled his own brown eyes, which were dilated from the pot Paul had given him prior to dinner.  "Kelsey's always pale, and he's always refused to eat anything other than dessert because of his so-called stomach problem.  That's why he goes to the bathroom all the time too--he constantly thinks he's about to puke, okay?  Also, he's always been thin and cut--I'd never call him muscular--even though he's a pussy who's never gone to the gym a day in his life.  And he's always had those big-ass blue eyes, which all the bitches fuckin' love."
 "Just look at how small his pupils are.  And what about the sleeping thing, Kenton?" Paul pressed.  "Has he always fallen asleep in public, as early as--" he checked his watch, "--nine p.m.?"
 Kenton didn't want to dwell on this, but he had to admit that in the past, Kelsey had been too high-strung to even sleep well late at night.  Back when they both were in high school, Kenton had woken up numerous times in the middle of the night to hear his brother padding into the kitchen, sighing mournfully.  Before easily falling back asleep, Kenton would smell cigarette smoke and hear the faint sounds of depressing music ringing from the living room stereo.  The following morning, Kathryn Manchester would coo over Kelsey's sepulchral complexion and the dark circles under his eyes before asking him why he couldn't sleep.  "I never can sleep, Mom," he'd intone morosely, while Kenton would roll his own chipper brown eyes over Kelsey's typically overdramatic reaction. 
 "Okay," Kenton said, resigned.  "But how do you explain the fact that my brother has always been, like, completely incapacitated in every way?  I mean, if he's not whining about how depressed he is, he's hyperventilating about how anxious he is.  If he's not hyperventilating about how anxious he is, he's moaning about how sick he feels.  If he's not moaning about how sick he feels, he's complaining about how horrible society is.  I mean, the day Kelsey actually feels physically and emotionally good is the day that hell freezes over.  It's been that way since we were kids.  He’s the only person I’ve ever known who doesn’t automatically say ‘fine’ when someone asks him ‘how are you?’  Any poor idiot who asks Kelsey how he is--even if they're just, like, a cashier--has to listen to a ten minute diatribe about my brother's fucked-up stomach and fucked-up head.  As if some minimum-wage drone at Starbucks wants to hear about how Kelsey's getting a cup of oatmeal because he can't digest their new maple sausage scones!" 
 "And that's exactly why he'd love heroin and hate every other drug he's ever tried," Paul said excitedly. "Shit, Kenton.  From what I heard from my roommate, heroin is the only drug for those who can't deal with life.  It's the ultimate escape.  It makes you more immune to everything that bothers you.  It's considered a 'hard' drug because it's dangerous and addictive and, can, like kill you, but as far as its effects, it just makes you numb and sleepy.  Your brother can't drink, he gets paranoid from pot, he's always whining about how sad and sick he is?  Well, when he's on heroin, I bet he feels like a million bucks, or at least a million more bucks than he did before he ever did heroin.  If I were you, I'd stop acting like I'm making wild accusations and start looking a little closer at your fucking brother."
 Kenton stared at Paul.  Frightentingly enough, his logic made sense.
 "And, Kelsey also plays in a band and lives on Capitol Hill.  I bet when your brother was in high school, he loved Nirvana, am I right?"

to be continued in part two of chapter 5. call or email us if you have any advice or connections, and thank you... 323-382-3803.

a few words about "punk and zen," and j.d. glass:  j.d. glass, like a.w., writes romantic, erotic, queer, punk rock fiction, and she does so with unbridled passion. she also plays in a great band called "life underwater," and happens to be one of the tt$t's favorite myspace friends. get all of her books.