Flyover City! A Novel (with Superheroes)

2. Take the Skinheads Bowling

I've noticed a fundamental difference between people who go away to college to get their degree, versus people who stay close to home to go to school. Or don't go at all, as the case may be.

It has nothing to do with education. Hell, I'm at least as smart as most of the people at work, many of whom have degrees from big, expensive universities. And it sure as shit doesn't have anything to do with earning potential; I make way more than the staff writers for the Cowtown, driving their busted-up, mid-90s Hondas, adorned with "If You Think Education is Expensive, Try Ignorance" bumper stickers. And they don't even have health insurance.

No, it has to do with the people you keep close. Your social network. Gwen was raised in East Coast private schools. With her peers, there's this shared experience; they can talk for hours and hours about "The Schultzes", or "The Myersons". The: not the midcountry cast-offs, the fake Hendersons and Lipschitzs who associate with townies like me, but the real ones. Royalty. The King of Kings, as opposed to "Jesus", who sells tamales from the cart downstairs at lunch.

God, how I hate her friends.

Me, I haven't actually completed any education since high school. It's been 5 years since Vaig stopped with the tuition reimbursement, which has re-purposed my "day job" into a depressingly dead-end, bourgeois actual job. When I reminisce with my friends about people we all know, it's, "Hey, remember Dave? What a dick!" or "Whatever happened to that guy who used to dress up in a tutu and rollerblade up and down the 16th Street Mall?"

Died, apparently. I miss that guy.

I don't know anyone who's spent a semester in Madrid. Instead, I've got Craig Michaels, my best friend since the eighth grade.

Which isn't to say that guys like us don't grow and change - evolve even - over time. After coming out of an unusually long Goth phase a few years ago, Craig went so far as to insist that we all start calling him Spliff MacGuffin. "Spliff" for his earlier profession (obsolete now, thanks to recreational use laws in Colorado), and "MacGuffin" for the so-called "Father of Malphysics" (but of course). Got it changed on his driver's license and everything. And I've definitely changed. I've learned to keep a straight face when addressing my closest friend as Spliff, for one.

As Wally Cleaver once said of Eddie Haskell, "A guy's gotta have a best friend."

"Look, these are the facts," Spliff pontificates, "your average, everyday blast of radiation isn't going to be enough to turn you into someone like Halflife." He takes a long gulp from his beer, affecting the manner of someone sitting at a café in post-war Paris discussing Hegel, rather than somebody who just botched a seven-ten split at Moe's BBQ and Bowling in Englewood, Colorado.

I feign interest in our scores to avoid the conversation. The overhead monitors are the one modern amenity here; otherwise, it's completely old-school. 8 lanes, cheap beer, and heavy representation from the Engleweird Council of Elders sprinkled in among the youngsters who imagine they're slumming. When we were in high school, this place was big skinhead hangout. We used to call it the "Nazi Bowl".

Gwen brushes her long red bangs from her eyes, soaking this all up. I can't decide whether she's humoring him or actually taking this seriously.

"Your 'average, everyday blast of radiation'" I say, stepping up for my turn. "Dude, just how big is your Lean Cuisine, anyway?"

"I'm hungry, and I accidentally left my fork in there, okay?" He says, undeterred by the fact that I'm most definitely not taking him seriously. "But still, with all that - what? The microwave explodes, and I wind up with cancer, maybe."

"Or your apartment burns down, Spliff. If that. It's not like we're talking Chernobyl, here." I scoff.

Gwen attempts to wedge her way into the conversation. "But the amount of radiation it takes to create a hero - or villain, in this case - that's a little more drastic, right?"

"Right! Yes! Exactly my point. That amount of radiation would pretty much turn you into oatmeal. You remember Emil Antonowski in Robocop?"

She's losing the thread, now. Leave it to Spliff to completely alienate someone who's actually trying to give him the benefit of the doubt.

"Like Chernobyl, but all over a guy's face." he clarifies, "But see, the laws of physics, they're not really 'laws' at all. They're more like suggestions. Strong suggestions, but there are these little little cosmic loopholes. They're malleable."

I hear this just as the ball leaves my fingers. Here it comes: I mouth the words as he speaks them, like an impeccably dubbed kung fu movie.

"Mal-physics, get it?"

STRIKE! Nice one.

I ignore the ball return and walk back to our seats. "See babe, if you were wearing your tinfoil hat, it would all make sense. Of course, it's all completely theoretical, and quite likely a steaming pile of bullshit."

"Well, it's not like the faculty at MIT has an answer for why Alphamale doesn't tear up an entire city block every time he jumps up into the wild blue yonder." Spliff says.

"Why don't you have 'em over to your dorm room for bong-hits, so you can explain it to them, dude?"

"Don't mind him," Gwen says, her hand on my thigh. "He's just upset that he never had a dorm room to have anyone over to. Have you ever thought about enrolling in some classes, Spliff?"

It's a loaded question; one that leads (when it's addressed to me, anyway) to an email linking to the Career Opportunities page on the Vaig website. I tell Spliff to bowl my next frame while I head out front for a smoke.

So I'm standing outside, freezing my nipples off, lying to myself that I really am gonna quit one of these days - maybe even take up running, or, I don't know, road biking, or something. But I vow to never, ever turn into one of those scarf-wrapped fixie-fetishists like the guy cruising up Broadway in 34 degree weather.

"Hey, Joel, what's going on?" he says, executing a perfect dismount as he comes to a stop.

Shit. Kyle Tyler. Spliff must have invited him.

On bowling night?

And you think you know a guy.