Blue

Boiling Over

The unfortunate thing about living in a tourist trap was that during the on season, Adam still had school five days a week. Sleep had just barely brushed Adam's eyes blissfully shut when the blare of his alarm sounded off, scaring him so badly that he jolted out of his uncomfortable position on the window ledge and landed on his floor, his limbs in disarray beneath him. He rose up off of the floor, grumbling and cursing, and fumbled with his phone as he attempted to turn the alarm off. He couldn't believe it was still alive. He had tossed it onto his bed when he had come in last night after work and had fallen asleep without putting it on the charger. He checked the battery. Five percent. It was going to die on the bus ride. He cursed.

He assembled his belongings in his bag, stumbled down the stairs to the toaster, and was about to head out the door when he realized his English book was upstairs. He considered leaving it there. His life probably wouldn't be impacted by his lack of To Kill a Mockingbird or whatever they were reading in his English class. He certainly didn't know what book it was. He hadn't read any of it and probably wasn't ever going to. He rocked back and forth on his heels for a moment, trying to decide, before dashing aggressively up the stairs and jamming the book roughly into his bag. Getting yelled at by Ms. McClarsen was the least of his worries right now. He'd had enough yelling all weekend during his shifts.

The bus was dirty and yellow, with flashing carnival car lights and seats that were cracked and oozing their stuffing in places. Adam wondered briefly how many butts had touched the seat before his and how many butts were going to touch these broken seats after him. Too many to really consider. He hated riding the bus. The quick stops and the jerking movement of the engine struggling to pull the enormous structure forward always gave him motion sickness. He had prescribed medication for it, but his brain didn't seem to be working particularly well this morning. His head was already aching and he hadn't even made it into the building yet. The bus screeched to a stop and the seat in front of Adam shook.

"So, how was your night? You didn't answer your phone," Chase said. He was twisted around in his seat, his dark hair pointing every direction in daring, gravity defying curls as he hung over the top of the seat. Adam lifted his phone into the air to showcase that it was dead and that was definitely the reason that he hadn't responded to Chase all night or all morning. Definitely not because he had been staring at the moon, thinking about Blue.

"Oh. I just got kind of worried after our talk and then you not responding. Besides, you weren't on last night. Was kind of boring shooting things all by myself, dude," Chase said. He was baiting Adam, like Adam was a bear. Adam was always online; it was how they had become such good friends and how they stayed such good friends. Chase dug the sharpened stick a little deeper into Adam's side.

"Beth and her stupid friends were so loud too. I think that little blonde one has a thing for me or something because she kept trying to talk to me. I was texting you about it." Chase looked at Adam's blank face pointedly.

"Chase, shut up. Nobody wants to hear your speculations. And just so you know, Clara definitely would never waste her time on someone like you anyways," Beth broke in, her voice impossibly loud in the nearly empty bus. Chase whipped around to glare at her.

"Hey, Beth, nobody was talking to you. Why are you so annoying?"

"Chase, I swear to god you're the dumbest person on the planet. I wish I had been born an only child."

"I was the first child! You couldn't have been born without me!"

"Whatever, loser." Beth turned to face the front of the bus, her arms folded so tightly that she looked like she wanted to crawl inside herself. Or, more likely, Adam thought, she was trying to stop herself from leaping over the bus seats and beating her brother to death the way she used to when they were younger.