The Art of Being a F*ck Up

13. Finger in the Dike

Exams have come and gone, and I feel like a free man. Or I should, but honestly all I can think about is this time when I was like twelve that I went to stay with my uncle for a month after my dad got arrested. He had told me this dumb story about a boy who shoves his finger into this hole in a dam or some shit to keep it from breaking, which still sounds kind of dirty to me to this day, but I guess the moral is supposed to be about keeping small problems from becoming much bigger. I'm fairly certain it was meant as a warning, like maybe my dad didn't have the foresight to address those problems when he should've, but that I could be different—that I could make better choices in my life.

While it's not the kind of hole plugging I typically enjoy, I've got to hand it to Bill, because it feels like that's all I've been doing lately. Getting Maddy to help me prep for exams was a lot like sticking my fingers in those proverbial holes, she's probably the only reason I stand a fighting chance at passing this semester. I'll always be grateful for how she stayed up with me all night the day before to study, and even met me the morning of so that we could cram. It's weird, I had thought we might go back to hating each other once her empathy ran dry. I have no idea what's changed, but things are just different with her now.

They're different with Jonah too, he really seemed to take the whole competition and barricading himself in his room thing to heart. I've barely seen him in over a week and I miss him like crazy, but I try to remain happy for him in spite of all the blossoming anxieties his newfound goal is stirring up in my brain. There are so many more unknowns in my life than ever before, and I've always been too much of a coward to thrive in that, but every new day brings its own challenges. Today is no different.

"Hey, kid. You got a minute? I'd like to talk to you about something." Bill approaches my desk forlornly. It's over halfway through my shift but I'd already known to expect that something was coming—he's been peering out of his office for hours trying to work up the nerve. That's odd enough as it is, but more so when you consider that he's been back to work for a while now and acting like normal, like nothing happened. He's hardly paid me any attention in the last week either, though something has obviously changed. "Would you mind coming to my office?"

"Can't we just talk out here?" The unknown still terrifies me, especially coupled with the indecipherable look he wears. Being summoned to the principal's office is never fun, but I follow behind my uncle anyway as I comply with his request. He's never given me any reason to be distrustful of him before, though I start to question that when I join him in the office to find my dad already waiting. I glower first at Bill, the betrayal plain enough in my eyes I'm sure, and then back to my father. "What the hell is this, what did you say to him?"

"Nothing that isn't true. How stupid can you get, you really thought you were going to go a whole week without showing up and we wouldn't notice?" This is pleasurable for him, he's giddy, my dad's ecstatic to have tattled on me to teacher. What else did he expect? No matter how I tried to play it out it just made the most sense to wait until Bill got back, so that's what I did. After that I was sure my dad would return to only showing up periodically like before, but there's something different about him too now, about the both of them.

"Why would I come here just to fight with you?" I ask defensively.

"If you got a problem with me you could always quit." He counters, snidely.

"Knock it off, the both of you! That's not why we're here!" Bill pounds his fist on the desk, reeling the situation in quickly before it can very easily spiral out of either of our controls. He stares hard at his brother, a silent communication between them before my dad backs down and crosses his arms, and then he looks at me. "Eddie's right though, we've all got a job to do, you can't just stay home whenever you feel like it. Given the circumstance I think we can all agree not to make a big fuss about it, but going forward, that can't happen again. If you want to take time off you at least got to call."