Status: Discontinued

Have Kids, Then We'll Talk

Coke and Mentos (in the rag)

"Dude, seriously, party at my place. Invite everyone - and when I say everyone I mean everyone," I say into the receiver. Not even half-an-hour after school and I already have my cell phone growing a tumor next to my ear.

And can I help it? Jared Way is one irresistible biznatch... in a brooding, paint-spattered, top hat and classical way. Whatever. As intense as the guy can get, he's still my best friend. I'd gladly throw someone else under a car for him. Or myself, I suppose. Whatever the situation calls for.

"Are we seriously going to subject ourselves to severe humiliation and public intoxication so early in the school year?" Jared asks, humor twisting the sophistication that lived in his words. Sometimes, since he uses such big, 3-point vocabulary words so often, I don't even understand what the fuck he's saying.

But I manage to grasp the gist of his sentence. Not without the desire to buy him a pipe and a silk robe, though. "Yeah! We have to do it before I get my first test grade back. Minute my dad sees the giant red F on my paper... Like you'll even get drunk, Jay! If anyone's going to get wasted it's me... and hopefully Madie Way."

I'm not a very needy man. I don't want a lot but I always get what I do. Believe me when I say that I fucking want Madelyn Way. I want her so fucking badly that it makes this weird coke-and-mentos explosion in my stomach. I'd do anything to have her... and I'm a Wentz - why shouldn't I?

Besides, I'm fucking hot, she's fucking hot. We'd be perfect together. Let's just set aside the fact that I'm shorter than every other male on the planet, skinnier than the anorexic bitch than lives three doors away from me and stupider than a monkey fucking a coconut. Heh, monkey fucking a coconut... I should go listen to Dane Cook now. Is Dane Cook still alive? Yeah, he should be... he's only like fift-

"Earth to Richard... helllooo?"

"Oh, sorry... I was... distracted." I take the stairs two at a time, too impatient to wait for the elevator to my apartment. I jump in front of my door marked 807 and reach for the door knob... "Jared."

"What is it?"

"My dad has a girl home."

Jared makes a sound of disgust. "Yuck."

Oh, yeah, because yuck sums it all up. "Ugh, I don't want to go in there."

"Just... make a production out of opening the door. Drop your keys and curse as you pick them back up. Let them know that they need to stop... mating... Hey, I have to go..."

Hmph. Now Jared has his I-have-better-things-to-do tone in his voice. Either he really does have better things to do or he just ran into the mouthwatering (but don't tell him I said that. He'd knock me the fuck out) Charlie McCracken. But I guess that's about the same, huh?

"Yeah, okay. Leave me to my peril."

I can hear the smirk in his voice when he mutters, "Don't forget to tell that beloved father of yours about the reinstitution of your academic probation."

"If I wanted you to nag me, we'd be married by now."

"As if I would waste my time kissing you, Richard. Catch you later, Dick." The line goes dead before I can even respond. I snap my cell phone shut and try to shove it in my pocket. It slides right against the outer of my pocket and clatters onto the floor. Cursing I pick it up and shove the door open, completely forgetting that my father - is sitting alone on the couch, staring at the television.

"Uh..."

"Hey, Richey," he says cheerfully, drinking from a water bottle. He thinks that pouring the clear-colored vodka into a water bottle will hide the fact that he can barely go three days without sucking back some alcohol.

"Didn't you have a chick here three seconds ago?"

Bewildered, he looks away from the television. "No..."

"Then what the hell did I hear outside?"

"Oh, I'm watching a sex tape," he says matter-of-factly. Only my father, Pete fucking Wentz, can make I'm watching a sex tape sound more casual than Oy, crazy weather we’re having.

Which brings me to: ew, thanks Dad. I really, really needed to know that you're sitting on the community couch wanking to some porn. Can't he just do that in his own bedroom? Seriously... or at least put some plastic wrap on the cushions and carpet.

"...er, whose?" I ask. Don't look at me like that... what are you supposed to say when your father tells you he's watching two people fuck?

"Mine."

Okay. Gag reflex. "And who else?"

"Ashlee Simpson."

"Who?"

"Ashlee Simpson."

"Never heard of her before in my life."

He turns his attention back to the screen. Although I try not to, my gaze shifts and I see a blond girl smiling at the camera and licking her lips slowly. Instinctively, I lick my own chapped lips and think of my best girlfriend Addie Ross. Only for a second, though.

"You wouldn't have. She dropped off the face of the earth fifteen-odd years ago. I haven't even heard from her in at least ten. As sexy as she was... oh, fuck, this video makes me hard."

I have the greatest urge to vomit on his socks then run from the room to rub my mind with bleach. I need to change the subject. Now. "Oh, uh... I'm on academic probation again."

Shit. Rewind rewind, rewind.,

"...what?" His voice in dangerous suddenly. This is the voice that used to make me run and hide in closets when I was five; the voice that always preceded livid anger and bruises on my body that flared and wouldn't fade for months.

I swallow my spit and choke, coughing until my throat burns and my eyes water. "Er, since I barely scraped a pass last year I have to be on academic probation again."

He stands and lunges towards me. Through the tears stinging my eyes I see his face: it's blotchy red, contorted with anger and resembled nothing short of the devil himself.

His hands grip my shirt, a death grip, a punishing drip and he says in a voice so low, so maddeningly scary: "You get those fucking grades up, boy, or there'll be nothing but black and blue where your face is. Understand, you little fag?"

The part of me that isn't cowering in fear like a little faerie thinks it's kind of hypocritical that he's calling me a fag while my “uncle” Patrick is sucking on his dick every other day.

"Yes," I manage to croak out. My throat is still sore from my coughing fit and fresh tears prick my eyes. Pete's grip on my black Armani shirt that I stole from Jared tightens and his other hands curls up behind my hand to yank my hair.

"You're pathetic, Richard. The worst mistake of my life. God, you're fucking stupid. I kind of wish I let your mother kill you when she had the chance." He shoves me back and I trip over the coffee table, splaying his vodka everywhere.

My heart pounds as his face grows even more red. I can't even think as he takes quick steps towards me and shoves my face into the carpet. I don't let myself feel when he rubs my skin against the ground, screaming for me to clean it up.

I don't let myself move when he leaves the room. My body aches from being pushed around. I bite my tongue so hard that I feel like it'll sever if I press down any harder. I can't let him hear me scream. I can't let him know he's won.

I don't let myself breathe.