Dish 7

            “What’s a six letter word for poisonous?” My dad says, tapping a pencil against his plate.

            “Dinner,” I mutter. I poke my fork against the creamy brown sauce drizzled on a chicken leg. Broden is stabbing toothpicks all over his chicken and mashed potatoes. There’s a jug of Berry Berry Crush well within his reach. My mom pulls the toothpicks out angrily and rearranges them in a straight line.

“Honey, can you please put the paper away? We’re eating.”

My dad has a bad habit of doing crossword puzzles all the time. He wants to do 1,000 by the end of the year. When he finishes a puzzle, he tears it out and saves it…on their bedroom wall. My mom hates it, of course, so he’s only allowed to do it on his side and if they’re taped in chronological order.

“Eating is break time. When I’m on break, I like to do my puzzles,” he says. “ This is my 83^rd, can you believe it?”

“When are you gonna get a real hobby, Dad? Like collecting knives or swords or something?” Broden says, giving us a full view of his chewed food.

My dad smiles and scoops some more mashed potatoes. It takes him a couple shakes to get it to plop on his plate. Disgusting. As OCD as my mom is, you’d think she’d be a master chef, but since she’s a little over the edge, everything she makes seems to be too. Sadly, her food only marginally beats the cuisine of Ben Franklin High. I guess the picture perfect American family with the mom who cooks delicious food is all just a sham.

I feel my pocket vibrate suddenly. I pull out my phone and see a text from Adem.

“Is that a cell phone I see? You know the rules. Why does no one act like we have any rules here?” my mother says, raising one scarily arched eyebrow. I think she looked madder than she meant to be because of her new brows.

“Putting it away, Mom,” I say, despite my desperate urge to read the text. I’m impatient and I’m not afraid to admit it. I grew up in the instant gratification generation, so it’s not totally my fault.

I rush through the rest of my dinner so I can go back to my room and check the text. My dad lounges on the couch to continue his crossword puzzle. Broden helps our mom put away the dishes—his way of raking up brownie points to boost his already sky-high “perfect child” jackpot. The little devil.

“WOO HOO! Party this Friday 8pm @ Josh Gomez’s. Ask for plus ones. Be There Suckas!!!!”

The text looks like part of a mass text, something I rarely receive since I am not exactly in the contact list of party people. The only chain texts I get are those one about little girls dying or showing off how many people love you. Why did Adem send this to me? It must have been by mistake. Josh Gomez hasn’t talked to me since the eighth grade because I made him get a zero in a group project because I told the teacher he didn’t do anything. Now he thinks I’m a loser d-bag. He wrote this on a bathroom stall so I know this. But hey, I’ll only have your back if you’re a friend and Josh had been far from that.

I call up Adem to figure out what it’s about. It takes my phone awhile to connect, because the service sucks really bad around my house.

“Hey Zac. You got my text?”

“Yeah. That’s what I’m calling about. Did you realize you send that to me?”

“I meant to. Think you can come?”

I laugh and roll over on my bed, knocking the remote and a bag of Doritos Cooler Ranch. I sneak my hand inside the bag but there are only crumbs.

“You’re asking me. Zac, the nerd who works in the cafeteria and is in the AV club to go to a party held by Josh Gomez. I bet he has a restraining order against me that I don’t even know about. I’m sure all his friends do. What would I be doing there, really?”

I hear Adem sigh. “I hate how you always beat yourself up like that. That’s even more reason you need to go to this party. You’ve got to see yourself as someone who can hang with anyone and be confident and strong. Susannah even agrees with me.”

I snort. “Susannah? You were talking to her about me? How close did you guys get on the car ride to her place?”

No way in hell does that harpy know anything about me or have any right to discuss my flaws with my best friend.

“Chill dude. We were just talking about the party and when I mentioned that you wouldn’t go, she asked me why. I just told her the truth, hat you’re not comfortable around people who aren’t in your crowd and you don’t go for that sort of thing. But there’s still hope for you, Zac. I think you should go,” Adem says.

“Why now? You’ve been to parties before and you never invited me.”

Not that I cared. I am scared of high school parties. I’m not sure if they are like how they’re portrayed in movies—wild orgies or deadbeat poetry slams.

“Well, seeing you get all caught up with Katie made me think that you need to get yourself out there. I was cool with you being all over her for the past year, but now that she’s with Tyler, you can’t be holding on to her. I mean, Tyler’s a nice guy.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’m a nice guy too, you know. And he’ll be gone by the end of the year. Aren’t I doing Katie a favor by saving her the distress of a long distance relationship? You know those never work. I’m the one who’ll be here for her.”

“Zac, I’m serious. Go to this party and have fun. Don’t think about Katie. Even if she’s there, which she might be, if Tyler goes. But still, I’m telling you. Stay away,” Adem says. “There are plenty of girls for you. Katie is just whatever.”

He doesn’t get it. Katie is not whatever. If she was, would I be so crazy about her and concerned with what was going on with her? We could have been together until Tyler got to her and some alien life force drained Katie of her personality. You don’t get over a person through one party. How superficial does Adem think I am?

“Well, I better have VIP class treatment for being your plus one to the party. That’s my only requirement,” I say, sarcastically.

“Actually, you’ll be more my plus two. I asked Susannah to come to the party too.”

I want to punch a hole in the wall. “Way to kill it, Adem. Thanks. You’ve already replaced me with a girl that you just met. Now I know how much our friendship means to you.”

“Whoa, it’s not like that, Zac. You know you’re my bro, but she’s new to our school. I thought it’d be nice to invite her. She’s a really cool girl. I don’t get why you’re hating on her like that.”

“Whatever. It’s your choice. I’ll come to Josh’s dumb party not because you want me to, but to prove to Susannah that I can hang with people who aren’t in my crowd. I’ll show you guys that Zac Daniels isn’t the lame-o you two think I am. Katie won’t see what’s coming and Tyler will be nothing more than a ghost in the back of her head. I’m gonna be the life of the party and everyone’s gonna remember me!”

“But—“

I hang up on him and exhale deeply.

“Hey, does anyone know a six letter word for foolish?” my dad yells out.

Stupid. Which is exactly what I am.

Dish 6

I get home a while later after taking some injera bread to-go. I don't feel like waiting around for Adem like I'm his sad little puppy. He can come home and think about whether that ride with Susannah was worth it. I can disappoint people too, you know. My parents know that very well. 


The one good thing that perked me up on the walk home was seeing that someone had stolen the 'e' of our neighborhood sign again, making the words read Red Butt. This was a routine vandalism that bugged Mrs. Peterson so much that she personally would go out and replace the 'e' herself, a lot of times the very next day. She must have some kind of personal collection of e's in her house. I don't know where she gets them from.


"What are you doing, Mom?" I say, dropping my backpack by the umbrella stand. I walk into the kitchen. There are spice bottles and cans all over the counters.


"Hi, honey! How was school?" she says, standing on a stepping stool to reach up to a shelf in the cabinet. 


"Mom, are you organizing the spice shelf again?"


She sighs. "Well, I'm not the one who put oregano after paprika! Who's gonna keep this family together, huh?"


"School was great. Here's some injera from Mrs. Y," I say, placing the plastic bag on the table. My mom is slightly OCD about organizing things as well as blowing everything out of proportion. She works as a secretary at a dental office and I don't think she knows how to leave work at work. So I try to allow her unusual tendencies slide. I'm kinda hoping those skills will rub off on me and make my school binder magically tidy.


"Can I have some more of that Berry Berry Crush drink?" That would be the yell of my 12 year old brother Broden.


"Berry Berry Crush, you only get that for him when he's sick? Is Broden sick?" I ask.


My mom steps down and folds her arms together.


"Broden had a rough day at school today. Some kids fought him at recess, so I brought him home early. Be nice to him, Zac."


"I'm always nice! He's the one that gets in fights all the time," I say, shaking my head. "I bet you he started it."


"Zachariah, you take that back! He's your brother and you need to support him. Those kids at school are out to get him, I swear. Just because he's different they decide to pick on him. And that arrogant vice principal is no better," My mom exclaims, opening the fridge door. 


Poor Mom, she is so delusional that she believes Broden is this angelic kid that gets ganged up on. He might be slow in the classroom, but he sure isn't slow in taking kids down that annoy him.  She won't admit it, but Broden is her favorite child. This has completely blurred her sense of judgment. My father is always too tired from his construction jobs to even notice Broden's behavior problems, so I'm the only rational one left. Broden's pictures and quizzes are all over the fridge door under colorful alphabet magnets. To be fair, Mom did put some pictures of me up before, but they were all really unflattering ones, so I ended up just taking them down.


"It's not my fault you don't like taking proper pictures," she said.


 If I ever ask her about her not so subtle favoritism, she always says, "Could I ask you to choose between your left and right eye, which one is better? I could never!"


Actually I could, because my left eye is weaker by .75 degrees than my right, so I'd have no moral qualms about that one.


"Here, go pour some more juice for your brother and ask him how he's doing. Your father will be home soon and I need to start preparing dinner," my mom says, handing me a blue jug.


I take the jug with a groan and walk down the hallway to Jungle Boy's room. I push open the door and a waft of strong minty-ness invades my nose.


"Gross! What did you do roll in Vicks?" I say, pinching my nose shut. Broden is slouched under the covers of his bed, his thumbs rapidly punching buttons on his PSP. I step over a box of cookies and a skateboard wheel.


"It makes me think faster and play better. My personal secret," he says. "Did you bring me Berry Berry Crush? I'm playing the boss level. I need to refuel now. "


Refuel with a sugary blue drink that says "with real berry flavor!" but has 0% juice on the label? Berry Berry Crush is probably one of the worst drinks Mom could buy Broden, but he's loved it since he was little and got the chicken pox. He was part of the last bunch to get it when the vaccine came out, so Mom thought he was some kind of hero and babied him the whole time.


I poured the drink in his cup to the halfway mark. 
"So you got in a fight at school?"


"Yep."


"Why?"


"None of your beeswax."


"Oh that's fine, Broden. Would you like me to pour your drink on this?"
I pulled out one of his Spiderman comics from his pillow.


"No idiot! Stop it!" he says, finally making eye contact with me. He has a bruise on the side of his right cheek. "Go away!"


"Tell me what happened at school," I say. "I thought bullies were supposed to enjoy sharing their exploits or is that just the stereotype?"


Broden smirked.
"I thought nerds were supposed to be skinny or is that just the stereotype?"


Why did he have to turn 13? I miss when he didn't know how to talk and pooped in a diaper. 


"I can't talk about it. That's the rule," he says, picking up his cup.


"What? That's the rule?" I say.


"Rule number 1."


 "Says who...Oh no, Broden. You didn't!"


He shrugs and takes a sip. 


"I'll take that," I say.


"Hey!"


 I grab his cup, the jug and march angrily out of Broden's room. I bump into my dad and his giant lunchbox, as he walks in from the garage door.


"Whoa hello there, Zac. What's the rush, son?" He says, patting me on the shoulder with his tanned, rough hand. "What were you doing in your brother's room?"


"Nothing. Everything's fine."


He tilts his head and scratches his beard.
"You're holding a jug of Berry Berry Crush? Wait, is Broden sick?"


"You could say that."


"Aw man, poor kid. I just brought him that new game he's been asking for. One of my buddies from work said his son doesn't want it, so he told me Broden could have it. Isn't that nice?"
My dad pulls out a black box from his jacket zipper pocket.


"But-"


"Here, take my stuff to the living room. I wanna check in on my little guy."


Great.  Just great. My brother just admitted to starting a junior high version of Fight Club and was being rewarded with free video games. I can't believe I'm even related to these people. They're crazy. It's no wonder I have issues.