Free Crap Kingdom by D. C. Pierson Page A

the lunchroom, or rather, their usual corner of the cooler, older drama kids’ usual table. Last year they’d been, at best, tolerated after they staked out the very end of the table. Even though they’d gotten to talk to and be funny in front of a lot of the older kids during the fall play, they still sat in the corner. No need to push their luck.
    Tom had his head resting on the metal bar behind him that corralled the line of kids waiting to get food and had been staring straight ahead for five minutes, his untouched chili cheese burrito cooling in front of him, when Kyle took it upon himself to say something.
    “You okay, dude?”
    “Huh? Yeah, yeah,” Tom said. “Just tired.”
    “I sent you a text in second period.”
    “My phone’s broken.”
    “Yeah? That sucks! What happened?”
    Tom thought long and hard about his answer. When he’d come home last night, or really very early this morning, he’d told his mom that he hadn’t answered her calls because his phone was broken. His story was that some juniors and seniors had gone over to somebody’s house after the show and he’d gone along and before he could even call her, he’d gotten thrown in the pool, and he was really sorry, and then he couldn’t get a ride back from anyone until much later, and he knew that he should’ve borrowed someone else’s phone and called her but he didn’t think, and again, he was really really sorry. She’d called Kyle, and Kyle hadn’t known where he’d ended up. He was home asleep when she called. Tom had told his mom that Kyle had left before the people went to the party. Then he’d taken back the word
party
. It wasn’t a party. It was just some people hanging out at somebody’s house, and there wasn’t any drinking there, and no, nobody was doing drugs.
    Tom was shocked by how easily all this had rolled out of his mouth. He was even more shocked when his mom believed it. But of course she believed it, it was way more plausible than saying,
I was semi-kidnapped by a guy who was impersonating Dad and then taken to another world.
But he’d still lied to his mom, and he never lied to his mom. He hated to think about the world of lies he’d have to construct if he wanted to justify returning to the nameless kingdom every day. What concerned him wasn’t that she’d eventually catch on, what concerned him was that she would keep believing him and believing him and the awful knot he had in his chest would keep growing. She was mad and he was in trouble, but she still trusted him, and today was the first day since he was five and he’d lied about hiding cookies under the couch that he’d ever been unworthy of that trust.
    He didn’t want to start lying to Kyle, too, so he said: “Doesn’t matter. Something dumb. Hey, sorry about my mom calling you.”
    “It’s cool. Where did you end up?”
    Tom just shook his head.
    Kyle smiled. “Niiiiice.”
    “No,” Tom said, “it wasn’t like that.”
    Kyle knew Tom had been putting all his romantic efforts toward Lindsy Kopec. Tom’s romantic efforts included talking to Lindsy whenever she talked to him first, trying to make her laugh in these conversations, and furiously analyzing her every word and movement afterward. Kyle was sworn to secrecy about Tom’s feelings, and he was also under strict orders to keep a watchful eye on her interactions with other guys, Tom’s romantic rivals, and report back nonstop for the comparing of notes. So Kyle had to know that Tom wouldn’t have just randomly hooked up with some other girl. Kyle also had to know that if Tom had actually gotten anywhere with Lindsy Kopec, he would not have been silent for most of lunch with his head slumped against a metal bar, he would have been standing at the cafeteria cash register buying sodas and chips and snack cakes for everyone who came through the line, never mind the cost, high fives all around.
    So he could tell Kyle it wasn’t a girl, but he couldn’t tell Kyle what it actually