We Come Alive 4

"I'm A Lot Smarter..."

Wednesday midday, Ricky had just gotten back from his lunch break. He had on a hoodie since it was drizzling outside. When Ricky walked into the common area of the offices, he heard Mateo instantly calling his name for him to come into his office instead.

Ricky unzipped his jacket and went into Mateo's office, seeing the older Mexican man sitting behind his desk with his long black curly hair up in a bun on the top of his head.

"What's up?" Ricky wondered, leaning down against the door frame.

Mateo leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms. "It's about Ethan. The warden, or whatever he's called, at his facility wants a meeting with me so he'll be here in about an hour. We're gonna be having it in the conference room. He wants to know if Ethan's staying clean. To know how he's acting on the outside. Wanna sit in and talk some?"

Ricky shrugged shoulders while sliding his feet against the floor and flopping down in the chair on the outside of Mateo's desk. "I don't care. I'll do it if I need to. I'll probably do it though."

Mateo nodded his head and was about to tell him he could do whatever he was gonna do before, but Ricky interrupted him.

"Ethan told us about your story you told him." Ricky threw his left leg onto the arm rest of the chair and leaned the right side of his lower back on the other arm rest. "About your friend? Him dying from drugs. It's sad. Why didn't you tell us?"

Mateo shrugged, spinning around in his chair to pick up one of the picture frames on his filing cabinet. "Not a story I tell everyone." He admitted, turning around and showing Ricky the photo.

Ricky took the picture and looked at it. Mateo, who was only 36 now, was only 18 in the photo. He still had his signature long black curly hair in a ponytail and he was in his varsity jacket. He was standing next to a boy, Ricky guessed it was his friend who died. He was taller than Mateo by a couple inches, but he looked slender, sickly thin. His cheekbones were prominent on his face and his varsity jacket was baggy on him, like it use to fit him snug like Mateo's but hollowed out over the years.

"He's looks like a drug addict." Ricky said, holding onto the photo as he met Mateo's gaze.

"I know." Mateo sighed, leaning back in his chair. "I see that now, wish I saw it back than. Dude from the year book just came up to us and asked us for the picture. We couldn't say no. Last picture I have of just me and him. We were inseparable back then. Than he chose drugs over life."

Ricky nodded slowly as he listened to Mateo's story, gently biting his lower lip as he thought. "Mateo, I'm gonna be honest with you. I know there's more than what you're telling us. There's holes in your story and we both know it."

Mateo's eyebrows furrowed and he stared at Ricky like he was insane. "Excuse me."

"Listen, no disrespect or anything." Ricky started. "Him dying is incredibly sad, but I know you can come up with a better story. You went from being best friends with this guy all through high school, he at one point was Manny's godfather and you just lost all connection with him. Instantly? Just like that? And you had no idea he was on drugs? Fishy. I mean, yeah we didn't know Ethan was hooked for a while but Ethan didn't go from 200 pounds to 100 pounds in two weeks. You were inseparable, like you say, but you can't notice he has a drug habit? Shit, Clover and Manny are inseparable and last week I heard Manny asking Clover how she cut her arm because she a goddamn paper cut. That's inseparable. So either you're lying about how close you and him were, or you're lying about how much you knew about this."

"Ricky...Barnes..." Mateo trailed off, grabbing onto the arms of his chair. "I have no idea what you're trying to say but—"

"Before you finish," Ricky interrupted, "in this picture, the last picture of you two alone together before he died and the picture a guy from the yearbook made you two take, look what's in your hand."