Hall & Oates [NaNoWriMo Fail]

Some Things Are Better Left Unsaid

This is a short chapter.

Oates

prompt 8: in which something important goes missing

I hated anger management almost as much as I hated history class. History classes are essentially a competition to see who can memorize the most vocabulary laden drivel in the shortest amount of time. Don't get me wrong, learning about history is important, but trying to fit the entire history of the world into 36 weeks just won't work. Especially not when Mr. Bowen is teaching and Mike is in the class.

"Excuse me, Mr. Robert?" Mike raised his hand high and tapped his sneakers on the floor.

Mr. Bowen sighed and mumbled something under his breath (it sounded a lot like "fucking hell"), leaning on his podium and glaring at Mike. "That's Mr. Bowen."

"Right, can you explain the New Deal one more time?"

"I've explained it three times now, I even drew a T-chart up here for you." He gestured toward the chalkboard that did, indeed, have a T-chart filled with chicken scratch that kind of resembled words in the English language.

"But I don't understand."

"What don't you understand?"

Mike scoffed, "What do I understand?"

This was when I'd usually tell Mike to shut the hell up so the rest of us could get through the class, but I was still pondering our conversation from the night before. We were really competing for Noelle Pierce as if she was some kind of trophy or McDonald's gift card. We were going to split our band so that we could enter the Battle of the Bands, when our best shot at winning was definitely as one. In a way, we were destroying everything we'd spent so much time working on, for a girl that we'd just met. It was stupid, I knew that, but I wasn't going to back down. That would mean a loss.

I wasn't going to lose.

"And Franklin D. Roosevelt, what did the 'D' stand for?" At this point, people were losing their shit, laughing like maniacs and furthering the myth that Mike was actually funny.

Mr. Bowen threw his hands up in frustration, "What does it matter?"

"Are you saying that our 32nd president is not important? The president that served for nearly 15 years?"

Mr. Bowen sighed as the bell rang and everyone began to bustle out of the room, ignoring his shouts about homework and quizzes and reading the textbook and blah, blah, blah.

Mike met me at the door of the room, sticking to my side as we walked into the hallway. "One of these days you're gonna be a jerk with me."

"Not to the guy that handles my grade, not everyone is a genius like you."

"I'm not a genius."

This was a lie told from the Father of Lies. Mike had some sort of genius gene or something like that, he'd never gotten anything lower than a B and he didn't know the definition of studying (well, he did, because he's a genius but...you know what I mean). Somehow, he took in information without knowing, but he was able to spit it out when he needed it (and when he didn't). I always thought that he was a prodigy and he just didn't know it.

"Bull shit."

He rolled his eyes and gripped the straps on his book bag, "Fine, whatever. Where are we meeting?

"My house, right after school."

***

Frankie, Spunk and Onyx stared at us like we were crazy, because we pretty much were. We stood before them, attempting to put on our no-nonsense faces (Mike's looked more like a cross between a child's poker face and a school security guard attempting to look tough). On the inside I was cowering, the only person with scarier anger than me was Frankie. And her face was brightening by the second.

"Nostalgic Burrito is disbanding?" Frankie asked.

"Why?" Onyx asked, looking back and forth between the two of us.

"What the fuck?" Spunk was the most upset for some reason, glaring at Mike and I while he inhaled a pack of Chips Ahoy cookies. He was wearing a poofy pair of pants and a giant, wrinkled t-shirt that said "Rebel."

"It's a stupid reason isn't?" Frankie asked, crossing her arms and leaning forward. She was on Spunk's right in the giant chair my mom loved to sit in when she was watching action movies (it was easy to stand on so she could emulate the fighting and shout in frustration).

Mike smiled and shrugged, "You know it."

"Well what is it?" Spunk yelled, stuffing another cookie in his mouth.

I sighed, "See, there's this girl--"

"Really? A girl?" Onyx rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, making all of our jaws drop (because he never reacted that way...to anything). "I love you both, you're both musical treasures, but neither of you are too bright."

"Actually," Mike stepped forward. "Gabe thinks I'm a genius."

"Then, Gabe is stupid."

I frowned, "...You're stupid."

"What is happening to the band?" Frankie asked, standing from the chair and snatching the pack of cookies from Spunk.

"We're going on hiatus."

"That's band leader talk for 'We're over.'"

"No! Definitely not. For Battle of the Bands Gabe and I, each, need to make a band. You guys are welcome to join either."

Frankie scoffed, "And take sides so that we can be there to pick up the pieces when this inevitably blows up in your faces? No thanks, NB is the only band I wanna be a part of."

"I'm with Mike," Spunk said.

"I'm with Gabe." Onyx said, standing from the couch.

Mike and I looked at each other and shrugged, we each had to replace two irreplaceable members, it wasn't gonna be easy for either of us.

But I was gonna win. Definitely.

When the other three left, Onyx and I retired to my room to think of a few potential band mates (so far we'd come up with spying on the senior band classes). I eyed the shelf above my bed, looking for my superman action figure (it was instinct by that point), I frowned, just seeing an empty shelf. I opened the unpacked bag on my bed and ruffled through the clothes and video games, expecting to see my action figure in there somewhere. I distinctly remembered packing it and wincing because of his torn cape.

I dumped the bag on the bed, individually throwing everything that wasn't Superman at the wall. No dice.

"Are you alright?" Onyx asked.

"Um, yeah, fine. Can we do this later, I have to do some homework for Bowen."

He nodded and shrugged, heading toward the door. "Sure, see you tomorrow."

I nonchalantly waved as I stared around my room in disbelief.

Superman was gone.