Free Firecracker by David Iserson Page A

Pierre described it, “It is by the lake. There are some senior guys who have a rowboat.” I wasn’t sure what he was trying to say with that information. Was the party on the rowboat? Was the rowboat ferrying in supplies? Or did the rowboat have nothing to do with the party and Pierre was simply excited to have heard of a rowboat earlier in the day? Pierre was an idiot. Nonetheless, everyone I knew was going except for, well, me.
    â€œYou should attend,” he said. “Dean Rein’s office will still be there tomorrow.” You see, the next Monday, there was to be a test in Dean Rein’s class. That night, according to the plan, was the night we were going to get the answers. It wasn’t just for me. It was for everyone. I was accused of being the one big cheater at Bristol, but truthfully, everyone cheated at Bristol. It was the way things were done. I was just really good at it.
    When everyone else was at the rowboat party, I was outside the administrative building on my own—or so I thought, until I heard a wavering voice say, “You’re soooo lucky.” I looked over toward a collection of trees to see Talia Pasteur fall over, her face hitting the dirt. It does bear repeating that even dressed up for the lake party, she continued to look so much like a tree that she was nearly invisible until she collapsed.
    She lifted her head, probably expecting me to pull her up. But I was still by the door to the administrative building. “I probably have dirt all over my face now,” she said.
    â€œYeah. That’s what happens when your face falls in dirt.”
    Talia was feebly drunk. Drunk-Talia was like one of those inflatable people with swinging arms outside car dealerships.
    â€œWhy am I lucky?” I asked her. I still have no idea why I decided to engage her, but my concentration was shot.
    â€œBecause he wants to be with you all the time. All the time, Astrid.” Surprisingly, I understood what she was talking about. Talia had a burning crush on Pierre. It was a secret only to people who never talked to her. The fact that I was having a conversation about Pierre proved how unlucky I really was, thus collapsing her entire premise.
    Talia pulled herself off the ground and brushed dirt off part of her cheek. “I just wanted to kiss him on the face.”
    â€œThat’s a really disgusting image you just gave me.”
    â€œWhat should I do, Astrid?” She swung her arm out toward my shoulder, either to hug me or kill a mosquito. I stepped back and gave her the opportunity to do neither. “I just need someone to tell me what to do,” she said.
    People like Talia always needed other people to tell them what to do. It’s why she had such consuming crushes and almost nothing to say.
    I didn’t care what she did. Her love life may have been the single least important issue in the world. But like I said, I sort of liked Talia. She was almost a friend. Also, I happened to have a use for her at that moment. The lock to the administrative building had proven difficult to pick, and my master key had gone missing the year before. “You should throw a rock at that window.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œDon’t you ever get so mad you need to just break something? You’re carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders, Talia. It would really help.”
    Talia scrunched up her face so her eyes looked like tiny slits extending from her nostrils. She picked a rock up from the ground and flung it. It didn’t hit anything. It just fell on the ground.
    â€œWhy don’t you try again, Talia?”
    She pulled her arm back again, and this time, the rock hit glass, making a nice shattering sound. I nodded approvingly. Talia was out of breath like she had just had the most important experience of her entire life. “What do we do now?” she asked.
    â€œNow?” I said. “Now we go