rockin' chair. (john bender).

Chapter Seven: Shattered Facades

"How are you bizarre?" Beth asked him.

"He can't think for himself," Allison replied.

"She's right. Do you guys know what I did to get in here? I taped Larry Lester's buns together," Andrew said, and Claire laughed.

"That was you?" Brian asked, looking hurt.

"Yeah, you know him?" Andrew questioned.

"Yeah, I know him," Brian muttered.

"Well, then you know how hairy he is, right? Well, when they pulled the tape off, most of his hair came off and some, some skin too," Andrew told everyone.

"Oh my god," Claire laughed.

"And the bizarre thing is, I did it for my old man. I tortured this poor kid because I wanted him to think I was cool. He's always going off about, you know, when he was in school... all the wild things he used to do. And I got the feeling that he was disappointed that I never cut loose on anyone. So I'm... I'm sitting in the locker room, and I'm taping up my knee. And Larry's undressing a couple of lockers down from me. Yeah... he's kind of skinny, weak. And I started thinking about my father and his attitude about weakness.

"And the next thing I knew, I jumped on top of him and started wailing on him... And my friends, they just laughed and cheered me on. And afterward, when I was sitting in Vernon's office, all I could think about was Larry's father. And Larry having to go home and... and explain what happened to him. And the humiliation... fucking humiliation he must've felt. It must've been unreal... I mean, how do you apologize for something like that? There's no way... it's all because of me and my old man. Oh God, I fucking hate him! He's like this... he's like this mindless machine that I can't even relate to anymore...

"Andrew, you've got to be number one! I won't tolerate any losers in this family... Your intensity is for shit! Win. Win! Win!!! You son of a bitch! You know, sometimes, I wish my knee would give... and I wouldn't be able to wrestle anymore. And he could forget all about me," Andrew cried. Everyone stayed silent for a while before John spoke up.

"I think your old man and my old man should get together and go bowling," Andrew laughed shortly after that.

"It's like me, you know, with my grades... like, when I step outside myself, and when I look in at myself, I see me and I don't like what I see, I really don't," Brian spoke up.

"What's wrong with you? Why don't you like yourself?" Claire asked.

"'Cause I'm stupid... 'cause I'm failing shop. See, we had this assignment to make this ceramic elephant, and, um... and we had eight weeks to do it. It was supposed to be a lamp, and when you pulled the trunk, the light was supposed to go on. My light didn't go on, I got an F on it. Never got an F in my life... When I signed up for the course, I thought I was playing it smart, you know. 'Cause I thought, I'll take shop, it'll be such an easy way to maintain my grade point average," Brian explained.

"Why'd you think it would be easy?" John questioned.

"Have you seen some of the dopes that take shop?" Brian inquired.

"I take shop," John replied, shocking Brian. "You must be a fuckin' idiot!"

"I'm a fuckin' idiot because I can't make a lamp?" Brian quizzed.

"No, you're a genius 'cause you can't make a lamp," John told him.

"What do you know about Trigonometry?" Brian asked.

"Literally nothing," Beth interrupted.

"I could care less about Trigonometry," John scoffed.

"Bender, did you know without Trigonometry there'd be no engineering?" Brian informed.