Weeds

I slouched back on a couch and watch an inebriated Alfonso play Marvel vs. Capcom against another inebriated guy. It was 3:30 AM, just an hour and a half after we all got some Mexican food and celebrated the end of our dance camp’s July session. The impromptu kickback at an apartment of a dancer we hardly ever talked to already started to die. At least, it was dying until a few others came through the door with a fresh bag of greens.

No one wasted any time. In less than a minute, people were already lighting up a bong.

After taking a few hits, one particular dancer named Walden planted himself next to me on the couch. “Since you refused to drink,” he said to me, “you have to get high.”

I rolled my eyes. “No,” I told him.

“Com’n, just one hit!”

I folded my arms. “No, and don’t bother trying. You’re not going to convince me.”

“Look, I don’t want to convince anyone to try anything that they haven’t ever done before, which is why I’m leaving your friend Kelvin alone over there, but you said you’ve tried it once before. Why not do it again?”

“Because I didn’t like it my first time.”

“Why didn’t you like it?”

“It’s complicated and it’ll take forever to explain. So just know, I didn’t like it before, and I’m not going to like it now.”

“Maybe you didn’t smoke with the right people. Maybe you need to smoke it with uuuh-uh-uh-us.” He motioned at some people standing in the kitchen chatting amongst themselves. I looked at Jacob, who was sitting on another couch taking a hit. He looked up at me and shook his head, cautioning me not to give in.

“It’s not about the people,” I said. “It’s about smoking itself. It’s the effects that I don’t like.”

“What’s wrong with the effects?”

“Look, my full reason is long and convoluted, so I’ll just tell you this: I like reality the way it already is, and I hold my perception of it really dearly to me. I don’t let anything or anyone come and change my reality and the way I perceive it. Okay?”

“So you won’t even take just one hit?” Walden asked.

“No, I won’t.”

Walden dropped his shoulders and sighed. “Ok, fine.” He lifted himself off the couch and left somewhere outside.

I sat there quiet, still slumped in my seat and twiddling my thumbs. With Walden out of my face, I buried myself deep into my thoughts, deep enough to seriously consider whether or not I wanted to do this.



“Realize what?” Trung asked.

My eyes followed a bright green sign until it disappeared over the roof of my car. Two miles until the Bay Bridge, a four-mile menace that hung some several hundred feet over a deep dark boundless body of treacherous waters. I took several deep breaths and grasped my steering wheel with both hands.

“Maybe I was wrong,” I paused to take a breath and noticed that my emotions were starting to overwhelm me. “And maybe I’ve been wrong the last entire two years.”

“Well hell yeah you’ve been wrong!” Trung chastised me. “Rainy was pretty much all you could ask for in a guy. Dancer, singer, Filipino, not a douchebag, yet you broke up with him! And for what, Brian. For what?”

“Well it was because—”

“It was so you could continue calling special ed kids stupid! So that you could make fun of students with mental disabilities for not being as smart as other kids their age.”

I kept my hands glued to the steering wheel. The last exit before the Bay Bridge was approaching in less than half a mile. Should I use this chance to escape? “It’s more than that,” I tried to rationalize. “It was about the way I think, the way I see things, which was what Ranier tried to change. And you know that I can’t let go of the way I see things. It makes me who I am, and who I’ve been for a really long time. I made a sacrifice and...”

“And what?”

There was no use rationalizing, especially since I already admitted the truth to myself. “Like I said, I—I’m wrong. I...I made the wrong choice.” My throat throbbed.

“Look Brian, I know this whole thing with you calling special ed kids stupid and your rationale for doing it—I know that this is you, that this is something you can’t and won’t change for a really long time, but...” Trung looked at me and noticed my lips quivering. “...Are you okay?” he asked.

I barely uttered the “f” in “I’m fine” when I felt every little bit of anguish pent inside of me come bursting out in an embarrassingly high-pitched wail. Tears immediately streamed down my face.

“Brian!” Trung lifted both his hands as if to do something, but his seatbelt restrained him.

“I’m...” A pant accompanied each syllable, and each syllable came out distorted by my struggle to fight back more sobbing. “I’m. Fucking. Fine. God fucking damn it!” I pried one hand off the steering wheel so I could wipe off my tears, and shielding my face from Trung, I wept under my breath and panted through my nose.

“Brian...” Trung sighed. He placed his hand on the back of my head and rubbed it gently. “It’s okay, Brian. Let it all out...and maybe you should get off the freeway before we get onto the Bay Bridge.”

I looked through the rearview mirror to see the last exit disappear behind me. It was too late to get off. But that didn’t matter. I opened my mouth and breathed out, letting the cries stagger out.



I leaned forward on the couch and scratched my head. “Alfonso,” I said. “I wanna take a hit.”

Alfonso, bong in hand, exchanged a glance with Kelvin. “Wait, what?” Kelvin said. “Did Walden change your mind?”

“No, he didn’t. Just pass me the bong.” Alfonso sat down next to me with the bong, and Jacob came over to ask me if I really wanted to do this. “Yeah,” I told him. “Don’t question my reasons. Just light it up.”