[Discontinued]

Four Hours

Seventy miles per hour is too fast to be going away. My forehead rests against the window and my eyes slip over the shapes outside, but none of them leave any impression. Four hours is too long a drive from Los Angeles. Three hundred miles is too far from my ex best friend. This would be so much easier if he would just answer a call. "Exit right in one mile." My phone tells my Dad how to drive me even farther from Mitch than he's already pushed me. What did I do wrong?

"In 450 feet, turn left." I shouldn't have applied for UCLA. I knew I couldn't go, and knowing that I got in is only making it harder to move to a lower quality, smaller, less-reputable, more expensive university that's farther from all my friends, my family, and Mitch. I have a full-ride scholarship here, though, and free is all I can afford. Saving for college was never part of my parents' plans. They both work two jobs just to keep a roof over our heads and cover Grandpa's dialysis. Neither of them studied past high school, and they didn't expect me to either. Even I didn't expect this, not at first, but Mitch changed almost everything about me. Maybe he changed too much.

"Keep left at the fork." How much is really me and how much is from Mitch? If I hadn't met him when I was in fifth grade, I wouldn't have flunked math just to keep going to the same school as him. If I hadn't repeated a grade, I wouldn't have been the smartest kid in the class. I wouldn't have had the academic confidence to excel throughout middle school, and I wouldn't have gotten a scholarship to Harper Preparatory Academy, where Mitch was going. I wouldn't have been surrounded by rich kids all the time, kids who were just expected to go to college. I wouldn't have gotten it into my head that it was a normal thing to do. I wouldn't be on my way to being the first person in my family with a degree.

"Your destination is on the right." The building we pull up to matches all the others on the block. They're different colors, but they're all old and wooden, with white trim, faded paint, and steep gray roofs. It looks like a few decades ago, someone painted them lavender, green, blue, pink, and yellow to add life back to the historic downtown neighborhood. Judging by the red plastic cups scattered across the blue house's lawn, there's a little too much life here now.

We park at the pale green house next door. "This looks nice," Dad comments. It really is pretty good compared to where I grew up. I don't know how he did it, but Dad got time off today to bring me here. It makes me feel a bit guilty about not accepting the Porsche, even though I know I made the right choice. Mom and Dad work so hard. In high school I payed my own phone bills, I tried to eat out or stay for dinner at Mitch's, and I bought groceries sometimes, but I'm glad I'll finally be entirely off my parent's shoulders now so they can focus on themselves and the medical bills. I grab a suitcase from the backseat and make my way to the doorbell.

Based on the rent, I thought this place would look a lot worse than the photos online, but so far, it's actually a bit better. The red cups, I notice, spread from next door onto the lawn of the pink house, but none are left in this yard. My landlord must have cleared them away before my arrival. He opens the door. I reconsider. He's not the type to clean up cups. No, he looks like the type to snap your neck if you leave them on his property in the first place.

His veins snake over heavy muscles and under fine-lined pale black tattoos which look like they were painstakingly stippled one needle prick at a time. My eyes follow the dragons down his forearm to his outstretched hand, where I see another, much simpler tattoo near the base of his thumb: four dots forming the corners of a diamond or square, with one more black dot in the middle. His hair is pulled back in a ponytail and his beard is neatly trimmed. I force myself to make eye contact as we shake hands. "Welcome," he greets. I understand now why California has so many earthquakes. "I'm Avi. You must be Scott." His eyes shift. "And Scott Senior."

"Rick. Pleasure to meet you!"

"The pleasure's mine." Avi's smile is neither forced nor happy. It's calm and present, and that's about it. "Come inside." He takes a suitcase from each of us and carries them upstairs like feathers, not like two large, heavy, cumbersome trunks holding all my textbooks and other earthly possessions. When he returns, he shows us around, pointing and humming instead of speaking in most cases. Most of the house is his, but I have a room and a bathroom, and I can use the kitchen when it's free. He gives me a once over and tells me not to use his bench press without a spotter. My room is on the second floor. Four walls, a window, a bed, and a small closet. There's a bathroom down the hall. The plumbing and electricity work, and I see no evidence of roaches or bedbugs, so I sign the lease and write him a check for the security deposit and my first month's rent.

It's cheaper living here than on campus. My strategy is to tell the financial aid office I'm staying in the dorms, collect room and board, pay Avi, and pocket the difference. Dad, of course, is completely innocent of the knowledge of my scam. He raised me better, and I just went off track somewhere a long time ago. I wish him farewell, I send my love back for Mom, and I add, "If you see Mitch, make him call. He's been ignoring me since graduation."

"Really? How have you two been surviving all this time with only half your hips?"

I humor him with a chuckle, but Mitch and I really were joined at the hip, and it would honestly be easier to get a hip replaced than to find someone to stand in for him. "It sucks. I'll keep calling him." It's all I can think to do.

"I'll tell him if I see him." He won't, though. Their paths won't cross. "Good luck in college, Scott. You'll do great. I just wish I could tell you what to expect. We're very proud." It's good of him to say that even when he thinks I'm squandering my opportunities. Despite having failed it in fifth grade, I'm actually pretty good at math. I could study statistics or actuarial science. I could get a stable, solid, honest job with a good wage. Instead, I'm using my scholarship to major in behavioral psychology.

I must have spent too much time with the rich kids, the spoiled prep school students who can spend as long as they want in college. They know people. Their parents had all the time in the world to feed them knowledge while mine were working to feed me green beans. They can afford to major in over-saturated fields like psych simply because they're the easiest or the least-boring subjects for them. I'm not like that, though, and I'm not like the students who genuinely want to help others. I'm not like any of them. I don't belong. I told Mitch as much. "Screw belonging," he said. "You are not wasting your time. You know what would be wasting your time? Statistics. You know what you actually care about? Psychology. Making people's brains do whatever you want them to. If that were normal, if everyone were good at that, then the world would have a serious problem. But it's just you, so screw being normal, get the degree, and cultivate your weird manipulative mind control super power."

So that's what I'm doing. I'm cultivating my weird manipulative mind control "super power," just like I always have. Ages 5-10: Manipulate people into being my friends, like everyone does. Ages 10-14: Manipulate people who have things I want into being my friends. Ages 14-18: Manipulate strangers into giving me their credit card numbers over the phone so I can pay my bills and buy groceries. Ages 18-22: Get a degree and manipulate Avi into getting me food because I'm already famished. Ages 21-121: Get rich, buy Mom and Dad decent insurance, get a house, buy a car... the list keeps going. I just want to have money for once. Maybe I'm supposed to be more content, but I'm really not.

Dad takes off after one last farewell, and Avi leaves me to unpack. I have to get to know him better to decide what the best approach is. Some people are easiest to control with lies, some with bribery, some with aloofness, some with extortion, some with guilt, some with romance, and some with friendship. I haven't even the slightest idea yet where he falls, except that it's probably not the romance category, at least not as far as I'm concerned. I don't like that approach anyway. Out of all of them, it does the most damage. I unpack and then call Mitch twice more. As usual, it rings eight times and then goes to voicemail.

I miss him.

It'd be nice to have more friends like Mitch, friends who know me as I really am and still like me. Or at least pretend to like me very convincingly until graduation and then stop speaking to me. I don't know how to make that kind of friend, though. I know how to make useful friends who see in me what I want them to see. I wonder if my standard formula will work on someone as terrifying as Avi. It seems safer than trying to guilt trip or bribe him into anything. "Hey!" He's outside my door. I don't have a plan yet. I'll just have to start with the default approach and play it by ear. "What do you say to Mongolian Barbecue?" he asks. "My treat."