 
### Krazy Dreamz

C.B. Smith

This book is work of fiction. Any reference to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Cover design by XYZ Prod.

Copyright © 2007 by C.B. Smith

Published by M.H. Dartos

at Smashwords

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*****

I was born with crooked feet. Pigeon-toed does not even come close to describing my crazy stride. When I walked it looked as if my big toes were magnetically drawn to each other. I could not control the way my legs moved, no matter what I did.

How I decided one day that I should pursue skateboarding would remain one of those unexplainable mysteries.

Until I found skateboarding, I had no idea of this 'want to do' business. You know, adults are always asking all these questions about what you want to do, what you want to be when you grow up. Like they're trying to push you into adulthood. And watching all these adults it doesn't seem like being an adult is such a wild gig to want.

With skateboarding I feel like I've found the one thing that defines me.

When I'm on my board, dropping into the half pipe, flying through the air, I feel like I'm where I was always supposed to be. My parents are not so sure about my choice. They say parent things like, "You'll get hurt. Skateboarding's just for boys anyways."

What's the big deal? My schoolwork gets done, no prob there. But my mom, Monique, doesn't let things go easily, "You should at least pick a sport you can get a scholarship for. Skateboarding is not one. And even if it were, it's not for girls."

Larry-dad is cool with it though. He doesn't say much on the subject. He just lets Monique lead. Smart guy.

Okay, so Monique's stuck on the not for girlz bit. But hey, the world is changing every day and I see girlz out skating. Like my step-sib, Molly. She likes to hang around when I'm skating. She digs it. Even likes it when I call her 'little skater.' She skates for the same reason as I do; because it's fun. And there's no such thing as having too much fun. Yeah, you've gotta deal with the 'rents. But they aren't so bad...if you know how to manage them.

If I believe Monique's stories about my bio-dad, Ned, I would think she did me a big favor saving me from the clutches of that loser. According to her, "loser" has a way of rubbing off on you so best to keep your distance. But I'm not sure. I did meet him once, when I was five I think. He called me "hell on wheels." Maybe because I crashed into an old lady in the Target as I raced through the store on a scooter. Of course, he bought it for me. That's what biological fathers do when they see their kids. Be all generous and guilt inspired. He is tall, skinny, and has reddish brown hair like me.

I think he was like the dangerous, not preppie, kind that all the girls swooned over. I remember him being in the "hot" older guy category, but what did I know at five.

Anyway, I could totally understand how Monique could have fallen on her "oh-my-god" face over him. She had wanted to be a dancer and was pursuing that dream when they met. No sign of that dream anymore except for a few strategically placed pictures. So teenage angst incarnate she was. Bio-dad somewhat older than her nineteen year-old self, exciting and crafty in getting next to her. Then spark met flame and along came me. Evidently this was before contraception awareness.

Sometimes I think how cool it would be to see bio-dad again. Look him up and drop in say hello, bio-dad, check out your hot seventeen year old skater girl! Then I think it sounds childish stupid and I put it away. Though still, psychologically speaking, it is good for me not to ignore my inner child. Mother should be okay with it, right? I mean, she's won.

But there are parts of me that are so out of sync with who Monique is. She's quiet, I'm not. She's about safety, I'm about danger. She's about giving up on your dreams, I'm not. I'm thinking my tenacity must come from bio-dad. I could be wrong. The only way for me to be sure is to hunt him down and spill. Hey, dude, are you like totally wild crazy or is that just me? You know. Whoop it out and lay it down. Finding him shouldn't be too tricky, nothing a little junior detective would couldn't uncover.

Oh yeah, Nancy Drew, Agent Elias reporting for duty!

But I think I'll just be letting that slide for now. I've got to stay focused on what I want. I don't really want like some big maximundo-holy -taco-flyin'-in-your-face-with-a- hurricane-blast life. I just really want simple things. Simple things like some good skate, good bud, good BF. Paring things down to simplicity. Seems to me you hear more and more about people whining about this whining about that on and on and on about how the world has dealt them an unfair hand. Dr. Phil followers. But I've found already-and I'm still pretty young here-that the world or life don't give a flying Farquhar about you me or anybody. It just does what it does and you just have to strap down and hold on for the wild ride.

That's my view anyway. Kyrie View.

So what will I do, what AM I doing with this wonderfully stripped down philosophy of mine? Skating of course. What else? A bad day skating is better than a good day of most anything else. So I spend as much time as humanly possible skating. Though lately I seem to spend a whole bunch of time daydreamin' about my super cool super hot babe-alicious BF who is so totally on fire he's smokin'.

Except I don't even know who this guy is yet.

I just have a picture in my mind. I'm figurin' that if I hit the skate parks enough I might run into my dream guy. So far, nothin' but squeebs. Oh my holy taco! They sit on the wall rockin' their squeeb hair style with clothes ripped in the right places and watch me skate and they're all like, you go girl, molest our masculinity. And baggin' on me 'cause I'm a goofy-footer-riding with my left, guiding foot on the back of the board-which is uncommon. Like I said, total squeebs. But my dream guy's out there somewhere and I sure as shy Mary will meet him soon.

If it sounds like I'm miss hotsy-totsy-gotta-trotsy, my last BF Toby would agree, but he's not around anymore. Sent him packing when it became clear he only wanted to land me like a fish and add another notch to his surfboard. Like the other girls he notched. A girl has to be careful...sharks are everywhere. To-by or not To-by, that is the question. He gave me the sad puppy dog eyes when I told him, "bye bye, gotta fly" the whole time standing next to his surfboard, wistfully passing his fingers over the notches there. A brainiac he is not.

I may be a hormonally driven girl but I'm not stupid. One mistake and I'm sweating it out first then maybe going to the free clinic next.

But I'm not running from it either...the sex part. There is just a time and a place and I haven't yet found the right combination. It just might be when BF next and I finally hook up. Not that I'm gonna push it, just that I'm ready, armed and dangerous. Got me a whole big box of condoms that Monique threw into my room one morning saying, "be careful."

This constituted our "having the talk."

She was a bit uncomfortable talking with me about something so personal, obviously, but it's not like she was telling me anything I didn't already know. I mean, danger IS everywhere. Like last week I met this cool skater at the board shop. He didn't make no "hey how are YOU doin'?" moves on me but he hooked me up with a set of Tsunami wheels. A hefty 65mm x 42mm wheel with a durometer of 95A. I imagined the wheels would be slightly hard and not as grippy, but they rode smooth and gripped the tranny really good as well as being great for long power slides down the hills around my house. A great board for riding bowls and tranny or for just cruising around. I'd never ridden such big wheels and was super stoked at the prospect of hitting some ditches and bombing a couple hills. And to help me gain the speed I'd need to avoid the ultimate meeting of face and blacktop. If I stay totally immersed in skate world I can avoid the BF longing blues.

At least I get along with most all of Surf City's teen social classes: stoners, nerds, drama types, homeboys, jocks, street rats. I don't get street rats, though. These kids stand out on the corner all day and say they don't like the skate park because it's boring.

Say what?

Yeah, I can hang with most, except the Lipsticks. Nobody gets along with the Lipsticks unless you're one of them. And even that can change in the blink of a bee's eye because of the ever shifting moods of Jessica Keppler, self proclaimed queen bee. So I avoid her as much as possible while dodging in and out of the school prison system. No big though. I leave that prison to go to the home prison.

Same grief different place.

But hey that's so last school year. Now I just got the 'rents to deal with, specifically one particular 'rent. If I hear one more time why I should not be skating I'm gonna scream, "Anyone who thinks that skateboarding and girl skaters are not two of the most significant forces in the universe is worthless worm crap and not worth any further brainwork." If I actually said this I would get grounded for like ever.

So I simply smile and say, "Grrrls Rule!"

Summertime comes in with a whisper and goes out with moan. Still it's my favorite time of year. The time where I get to go totally Kyrie and sail the bowls and skies of Huntington Beach.

A time when I get to live life pretty much just the way I want.

*****

"Oh yeah!"

I came sailing out of my ollie and kickflipped up to the lip. When things go right they go way right! This was turning into an exceptional day and it had only just started. Skating, thinking, dreaming, a kind of wonderland. But I thought I was out in the park alone this afternoon, yet I had company. An otherwise benign looking guy in baseball cap, dumpy clothes, and blue Vans was smiling at me as I came up. Harmless guy: PERVE?

"Where'd you get that stuff?" he said, speaking with his lips barely moving so that his voice sounded artificially muffled.

"Stuff?"

"The skating style, tricks and stuff."

"I skate. Watch Rodney Mullen movies. Skate. You know."

"Oh. It shows."

"Thanks."

Maybe all those torturous sessions were paying off, I thought. And it didn't cost me anything but my time, totally spiff.

"You know, you seem like a natural talent. With a little training you could go a long way."

I looked at him with suspicion. I was a bit insulted at this 'with a little training' comment. Was he saying I looked like I needed training? "I already have a little training," I countered, feeling intensely stupid the minute I said it.

"Okay, maybe a different type of training. More intense."

"More intense training. With who?"

He smiled and tried his best attempt at looking casual. He must have imagined that he looked pretty cool, despite the fact that he had crooked horse teeth.

"Me, of course! Billy Zee. Skateboarder, now skateboard designer and sometimes trainer."

I tilted my head to the side trying to remember if I had heard of him in my skateboarding greats research.

"Billy Zee? I've never heard of you."

"Probably because I skated mostly in Florida. I went to the nationals, finished fourth, then a couple of years later went into skateboard design. You've probably seen my designs. Like the Z80 Destroyer?"

"Oh, yeah. That's you?"

"Yep. The Z80 is one of my greatest boards. Extra large tail with lots of pop to help with ollies and stuff. But I've got a new experimental one in the works that makes the Z80 look like a baby's toy."

This was like some kind of dream. I had been skating for the last year, with no instruction, and done pretty good if I said so myself. And then, out of the clear blue, I'm ripping it up at the local skate park and I meet Billy Zee. He looked to be about 22 or 23, still wearing the stock skateboarder's clothes. A bit like surfer's clothes: loose, colorful, and sloppy. So Billy Zee it is then.

I absentmindedly spun the wheels on my board with my left hand, an action much the same as the hair flip, the universal sign that interest is piqued, according to CosmoGIRL. What was I doing? Of course, I was not consciously thinking about me and Billy hooking up. But at fifteen much of what occurs in the hook up department is subconscious, instinctual, cues given and received automatically. Then life, like the crazy joker it is, throws a new potential "potential" at me. Stay cool, I told myself. Maintain. We're only talking lessons, right? Find out if any money is involved.

"So, how much?" I blurted, a bit ashamed at how abrupt and loud it came out."

"Uhm. Not much twenty five per lesson, each lesson 1 hour. Or you could come down to my store and help tune up the boards. Five boards per lesson. If you're a quick learner you should be able to knock out five in about, oh, three hours?"

I ran these numbers through my mental calculation. Five boards, three hours, about 8.5 dollars per hour. Not bad! But three hours? Where was I going to get that? If I asked Mother for the money she would pop a gasket. No money, three hours.

"OK. I don't know. Need to think about it."

"Well, if you're not interested just let me know, okay?"

"OK," I said, and shuffled off into the abyss of not knowing.

The money thing had always been a problem. At one time to ask for anything beyond food and shelter was an act of treason. And now, with Mother's new out of work status, the talk of needing money would be insult extraordinaire.

When the playing field was littered with land mines, it was important to pick your battles wisely. This is something Mr. Trumble, the school guidance counselor, was big on. Of course, since he didn't get out of his chair much you could say he was big on donuts. That and sloth. But this is not about him, it's about me.

Okay girl. Be vigilant. Be patient. Choose wisely. And when given the opportunity, choose fruits, vegetables, grains, and nuts.

*****

"Get up, get up. Come on sleepy head. Don't schlump around. You'll be late! Come on, come on. You'll never get ready on time if you don't GET UP."

I looked up and saw Monique looming above me, like a giant storm cloud.

I shot straight up out of bed. "Oh god, just that horrible nightmare again!" I said, rubbing my eyes. "How rude!"

On school days, I received this wakeup, or something real close to it. Evidently Monique's favorite. Thankfully, today was like totally summer days and I do not have to go, no no no.

I quickly pulled on some jeans and a super cool skate shirt and made my way downstairs. Mornings were a strange mixture of things that didn't necessarily translate to happy days. So I expected almost anything. As I made my breakfast, Monique sat slumped in her chair, reading her paper and sipping her coffee.

"Good morning, Monique!" I said, as cheerily as could be.

Monique looked up from her paper and grimaced. "Oh please! My head can't take all that cheer."

I tilted my head sideways and looked at her. "Hangover?"

She groaned. "No, smarty pants. I just didn't get much sleep last night. Your father and I were arguing so of course we had to make up."

Groaning had become Monique's primary means of communication. She had numerous groans each with its unique tone-inflected meaning. Learning how to decode her groans took repetitive exposure. This last was the groan of "I'm too tired to banter."

"Oh gross Mother. Too much information. I am your daughter." I shook my head and reached for the box of cereal.

"You do know the facts of life, don't you? I'm sure you know where you came from, right?"

"Yeah, sure. I just don't need to think about it."

"I don't do all that PC parent crap," Monique said waving her hand dismissively. "You want Snow White go hang out with Connie Richards. She likes to stay home admiring her breast implants while her husband's out chasing every skirt in town."

I glared at her. "I don't think you should go around saying stuff like that. What if Amelia was here?"

"If Amelia doesn't know she's the only one." Monique rolled her eyes. "Okay, I'm sorry. Charlie Richards is a saint. The whole town's contacting the Vatican right now to have him canonized." She took a sip of her coffee.

"I'm outta here," I said.

"Where you going? Fantasy Island?" Monique was on a roll. She really cracked herself up.

"No. Just going to the park to see if the Seven Dwarves are around."

"Well, just be back by noon. Remember we have to go see your grandmother."

I looked at her in stunned confusion. "Why? You don't even like her?"

With an air of tired resignation, Monique said, "I know honey. She's a crabby old witch. But she's still your grandmother and she wants to absolve herself before she dies."

With mouth wide open in disbelief, I let out a huff of breath. "Why do you say things like that, Mother? It's just plain mean!"

"Well, honey. As you get older, you find that what people perceive as mean is simply the truth they do not want to accept. Denial is such a poisonous drug."

When Monique got into her pseudo psychobabble rant it was time to leave.

"Okay, whatever. See you later."

"At noon for grandma," Monique said to my back as I slipped out the door. I could probably say later that I didn't hear her.

I don't know when Monique became like so annoying to me. It seemed to like just happen overnight somewhere back when I turned thirteen. One day I woke up and there she was waking me up, asking me this, asking me that, interrogating me for I don't what and I thought, "Where the frick am I? This can't be my life!" Wasn't I shocked to find out that yes it was my life and no there was no escape back to the other world where Monique was not like so annoying.

"You're not going to wear that rumpled up tee shirt, are you?"

What's with the stupid question? "Oh, no Monique. Thanks for telling me. I almost wore something I really didn't want to wear."

Is that the kind of answer she expected? Well, she didn't get it. I've gotten pretty good about choosing my clothes and successfully deciding what to wear and YES I'm hell yeah going to wear it!

So since that day I do all I can to stay away. I find this tactic keeps the peace. By the stink eye she throws me once too often I don't think she agrees.

*****

D-Bags are everywhere. Somebody who has nothing better to do than crap on your parade and harsh your mellow comes plopping along right on terror time. Maybe if the particular somebody came bearing gifts, good gifts, I could go with the flow. Unfortunately, this particular somebody was the one and only Jessica Keppler, the girl who nobody wants to run into EVER!

Summer was going along as well as can be expected in my perpetually corrosive world. And I thought the ghouls haunting the school halls would be banished until school start. Evidently the universal roll of the dice threw craps upon me.

"Pidgin, pidgin, pidgin! You are looking so amazingly "YOU" even here in the wilds of summer. How DO you maintain that glorious cadaver glow? You really must tell me."

Can somebody please, please, PUHLEEZ, put this girl out of my misery? Whenever she opens her mouth it's like she unleashes a swarm of evil brain eating locusts. She is a true bio-hazard. Call the Hazmat team. And she is so predictable; (a) she continues to call me pidgin because of my weird walk (b) she mocks my inability to tan. Originality and she are not acquainted.

"Hey," I grunted, refusing to engage her.

"Hmm. The convo minimalist. And I simply said hello to ask how your summer's going. I mean-"

Cutting her off is the best defense.

"Whatever. Buh bye!"

I walked away slowly waving my hand behind me as I did. I thought I heard her mumble something like "how rude" but even if she did what did I care. That girl is mucho no bueno. I was only glad I didn't have my board with me. That would give her something else to throw into her insult blender. I mean, I was going to take my board as I do everywhere I go, unless I'm going where I KNOW Jessica and her friends are inflicting the world with the sweet ways of the Lipsticks. And the friend thing is like...so complicated.

A story for another time.

Anyway for today, no board no suspicions. You never know when you'll wander into an area dominated by a particular skate tribe, a particular skate tribe who may be viciously territorial which is not an uncommon thing. So, better safe than sorry on that count. And it spared me giving more ammo to the Keppler Creature who oh joy happened to be out and about on patrol-talk about territorial!-just when I happened by.

That'll teach me to venture into a new ground in this skating mecca in search of another skate park. Now I'll remember this as Puke Park in honor of the retch inspiring girl of social despair. So why am I on a quest when I already have a home skate park? It's just a good idea in the way of variety to cut deeper bowls, higher verticals, steeper drops, gnarlier the better. My present skate zone is one I've cut up so many times it's become routine.

Time for a new challenge.

Since this is the Keppler zone it's unlikely I'll be skating here anyhow. So this quest has become more a skater quest than a skate park quest. I mean a girl's gotta circulate to spark interest.

Strolling around trying to look ultra cas like I don't give a whoo wha 'bout nuthin' checkin' out the grounds, checkin' out the bowls, checkin' out the...OMG! Suddenly out the corner of my totally-how-could-I-be-so-blind eye I saw him. Not just him. THE him. The dude I'd been seeing in my mind's eye for so long it's like I created him from thin air.

There he was in the slanting sunlight, slouching casually against the wall, Levis riding low-hip, hair spiked and dangerous, nodding at the skaters and trading barbs. This guy is like the poster boy for skating and teenage hotness if ever there was one. Has somebody like signed this dude up?

And now I'm ever so casually making my way into his field of view hoping my telepathic "hey hot guy" waves reach out and grab him by shoulders. Other parts too, no complaints. Trying not to stare but it is so so difficult when such a super duper deliciously hot guy is like ten arm's lengths away from you. Like okay. I'm losing it big time. If his sexy biceps bulge one more time I'm gonna pass out! I'm gonna...Too late.

"Hey, hey, you okay there short step?" he said wrapping his strong arms around me, catching me before I face planted in a most unimpressive way. "I saw you heading this way and next thing I know you're nose diving and I'm like "Whoa!" Let me help you sit down on the wall here. This heat is a killer."

I certainly made a big impression. Nothing like diving in feet first. I never was the look before you leap girl so I guess it's just my style. Coulda been a big no-no bad scene on the first intro. Here I thought I was like invisible. Still. He did see me, before I tumbled, reached out to catch me oh so gallantly, then gives me an excuse for falling to boot. Okay, love at first sight: YEAH BABY!

"Oh, I'm sorry," I said, panting to catch my breath. It was a chore to breathe and the air seemed thicker than usual. "Like you said, the heat," I pushed out all weak and strained, "yeah...it...whooped me...pause, pause...good. I'm just-"

"Hold up and catch your breath," he interrupted patting me on the shoulder. "Heatstroke is tough on the bod. Catch your breath and we'll talk in a few." He looked deep into my eyes with his big baby blues sparkling like he was trying to read my soul. I felt myself tingly from my head to my toes with everything in between screaming YES! YES! YES! If he looked into me deep enough he would see things I would only share with him face to face real close. Nasty close. But I was also radically scared. I'd just tripped and fallen all over him so now I'm like klutz girl. I thought I would just catch my breath and bow out gracefully, come back another time, with a MASK!

I didn't want to scare him away so I made a mental note to maintain and cruise in for this ride. I looked around me myopically and everything went out of focus, all soft and wondrous like a fairy tale. I saw dozens of trees, thick with branches just beginning to bud. I was like totally Cinderella and he was my prince. Whoever this mystery guy was he was whooping me good as a power slam. And my knees were gonna start knockin' if I didn't reel myself in. Hot diggity donuts! I was on the doorstep of something phenomenal!

Wouldn't mind stayin' down for up close and personal care with doctor hot bod. I could see myself stayin' unwell a long long long time. Buy my breathing was evening out. His attentions had brought on a quick healing.

"Thanks," I said, feeling my face going all hot and red. "You must think I'm like so smooth, right? Tumbelina from Tumbletown."

His face lit up and his eyes smiled wide. Then he ran his hand through his hair making it stand up like a prickle bush. The sun reflected off his hair sending a spray of sparkles into the air. If I were dreaming this is the point I would wake up. Right before anything really good happened. I was wishing hard this wasn't a dream.

"Well...definitely a grand entrance. Almost like..." he paused and shook his head. "If I didn't see the shock in your eyes when you stumbled I'd of thought you planned it that way."

He stopped talking and looked straight at me. Like he was trying to see if he'd catch me at something. But if I looked like I felt then he was looking at a whole bunch of stupid staring blankly in his direction.

"Ain't seen you round here before. New in town?"

Looks like I passed the test.

"No. From 'bout three miles south. Near Sunrise Beach."

"Really? My old stompin' grounds. Know it well."

What? Old stompin' grounds? He must be talkin' 'bout like a million years ago.

"Yeah. Used to live up at Landfall Hill," he said, smiling at the memory. "That's where I broke my first deck, bombing that big whompin' hill."

"Oh. Skater?"

"'Fraid so."

I nodded and smiled, my head going like a bobble head. There were so many things I wanted to say but it seemed I couldn't get my tongue to tango. I suppose I was stunned to silence. Anyway, it seemed like he just wanted to talk so I was happy to let him.

"Yeah. Been skating near as long as I can remember. 'Course, I don't skate crazy like that no more. I have learned a few things. You skate?"

Uh oh. He was calling me out.

"Hard to believe from my brilliant entrance but yeah, I skate some. Was cruisin' through to check out some new skate parks and then...well, you know."

"So, a skater girl from south beach cruises downtown to see how we roll. Well, I can see goin' to look at other parks. Gotta mix things up every now and then. Me, I skate this park sometimes but I skate mostly at Dogwood. That's further in. It's where my buds hang and stuff. You might have heard of us. The D-Boyz?"

I seem to recall hearing somebody, one of my skatehood squeebs talking about some team or something hanging out in the downtown area. Can't be sure if D-Boyz is the one they were talking about but it's a good chance they were. Yet as I was thinking about whether or not I'd heard of D-Boyz, I was tripping on his cuteness and getting all tingly.

"My name's Tag by the by the way."

"Kyrie, Tag by the way. You saved me from a major face slam. Thanks," I said, my eyelashes batting away heading south for the winter.

He probably thought I was trying to fly away. My face went all hot and red and I was sure I was radiating like molten steel. In all the scenarios I'd run through my head the way this was turning out was not one of them. Oh sure, I may have landed a get together with him. But the falling into his arms then into his lap was not the graceful entry I'd imagined. Fantasy and reality collided leaving me flailing on the tracks. I was so mentally disarmed I was afraid to say another word. What would I say next, 'let's do it'?"

"So hey. If you'd like to let's check out some coffee and stuff at Big Cuppa Joe. Kinda like a Starbucks but more...well, you'll see. Wanna?"

"Sure."

From the outside Big Cuppa Joe looked like any old store in the district. But once the door opened, there were multicolored lights, Beach Boys music in short measure becoming hard core punk bands Voodoo Glowskulls and Skankin' Pickle, surfboards and skateboards played mosaic on the walls, and big screen TVs raged on with all kinds of radical sports channels. This was like the extreme music and sports junkie's paradise. Wow!

Behind the counter jamming the barista gig was a long, tall, totally babe-alicious surfer type dude with the bitchin' long curly blond hair.

This was like sensory surrounded-by-hot-guys overload.

I started mind tripping. In middle school in Riverside I was in the popular clique and looking back on it, it wasn't worth it. I would have rather been happy and not known to anybody, rather than being stuck in a clique of people that it's all drama and gossip and rumors, things like that. It's not fun.

Then we moved from inland hell to Huntington Beach and once in this beach town I decided to reinvent myself. It was about that time that skating crept into my world. I fell permanently in love with skateboards. I loved the feeling of flying. I loved the freedom from adult supervision and rules. On my skateboard, I roamed the local streets and, later, the whole city.

I was glad I left that inland school because it got to a point where the rumors and the gossip and the bullying - it was more verbal harassment than physical abuse but that's actually more scarring than anything. And I had to leave because I just couldn't deal with it. And I've skated ever since.

Yeah, I was a small, tough-talking fireball, and I held my own with the guys, wherever the guys were skating.

I kind of went through a year when I didn't know what to do and the only thing I turned to was my best friend Amelia. But also my skating. I had so many feelings bottled up that I didn't know what to do with it, so I just wrote in my diary about them and skated like a girl possessed.

I was checkin' out the coffee happenings scoping out the barista and totally eyeballing the monster scrumptious cupcakes they had behind the counter. Cupcakes? I love cupcakes. I was so totally in lust I think my eyes were revolving with the word L-U-S-T flashing from them. Hello Delicious, come to mama!

Tag suggested macchiatos, my yo gabba gabba fave, and asked if I wanted a cupcake to go with it. I guess me drooling over them and doing the yo gabba gabba wiggle tipped him off. Yeah, I want a cupcake and a coffee and a party in my tummy...my eyes were still starry and I would have said yes to just about anything. I could totally go for hanging out here and making out with him like all day.

Okay, so I'm a caffeine and sugar driven sex maniac.

I love boys, but, you know, at the same time, it's like, I'm not going to go out there and date every single guy that I want. I might, you know, get their number and talk to them a little bit, but there is nothing wrong with that, I'm 15.

I don't really like relationships.

I'd rather have a lot of really cute guy friends. That's why you'll never really see me "with somebody" like for a long time. Cause it's like I'd rather have a lot of really cute guy friends that you can have the attention from by flirting with them, but you don't have to kiss them and you don't have to be tied down to anybody. 'Cept this particular guy, right here, right now, I definitely want to kiss real good.

I was so ready I was fit to pop.

Tag leaned toward me to give me my cupcake and I planted a big juicy kiss on his sweet mouth. Man oh man! Talk about electricity! My whole body was spaz-ing. And I thought he'd be in shock but he must've been expecting it with the way I've been acting-desperate maybe?-so he dug in and kissed me for all he was worth. And let me tell you his kissing action told me he was worth a WHOLE BUNCH!

He cupped my face in his hands and gazed at me as if seeing me for the first time. Once more he looked deep into my eyes with a soulful passion that seemed to tug at the tie strings on my shorts. It was the strangest feeling. I knew I was dressed but felt blissfully naked. It was like...oh...oh...OH!!!

What really happened is he handed me my cupcake which I immediately dropped into my lap, totally frosting me. Once again Miss haven't got a clue slumps in to embarrass the day. I was a contrite dog seeking forgiveness.

But he seemed unaware. "Yikes, girl. Those penetrating green eyes, that pixie face, those crazy auburn curls. I've never met anyone quite like you."

"Yeah, I find if I tumble into people's arms things go pretty fast from there," I managed to say through an explosion of nervous giggles. "I'm like so sure you've never met anyone like me 'cause I'm so totally clumsy and doophy. Yay me!"

"Well, you've definitely got your own style, that's for sure. I'll bet you know what the Riot Grrrls say, right? We are mad at a society that tells us that Girl=Dumb, Girl=Bad, Girl=Weak. We can and will change the world for real."

"Uh huh. It's like the secret strength of girls, a revolutionary soul force."

In my case a revolutionary down in the mouth force. If I stopped stumbling over myself any time soon I might actually make him think I'm someone he might like. Maybe. But like most teenage girls, I'm a bundle of contradictions. Sometimes I like soft romance tunes, sometimes I like Bikini Kill. But we were treading some deep waters way too quick. Must be caffeinated corner.

I definitely have a mushy warm spot for cute skater boys. No secret there. We're chilling and connecting (in many ways) and I'm still tingling like I'm waking up from a dream. I sure hope we're onto something else before I really wake up.

Now I know I should have gone adventuring to this side of town long ago. I mean look what happens. I spend this entire time daydreamin' bout my babe-alicious dude and I fall-totally ungracefully-into his arms. Not exactly how I wanted it to go down but I'm not complaining. You know, a little bonus like this helps to smooth out a world where anything can happen totally unexpectedly and send you spinning off into another direction you didn't want to go.

And the way things have been at home lately that "change direction bomb" could drop at any time. In a world where hurricane Monique is raging anything is possible.

*****

Oh joy. Monique trapped me this morning when I was trying to escape with my board and asked me to come see her at her yoga class. She's attempting to brainwash me, "give me some viable alternatives" she says, in her effort to mold me into all the girl she wants me to be. Once on a mission to conform me she's relentless. So I wander into the yuppie strip mall, through a heavily ad plastered door, and next thing I know I'm surrounded by girls with scrunchies in their hair and rings on their toes. Funny, I didn't think I was involved in a cross-generational ballerina competition. But here I am. Maybe I absentmindedly wandered into the Masters of Delusion yoga class. Yeah, that's it. I'm spacing out. Then I see them contorting themselves into these very painful looking poses until I am sure I am going to hear some bones cracking. One girl is bending over at the waist in a pose with her hands on the ground flat in front of her and her butt high in the air. I think they call this dog pose. I've never seen a dog in this pose. I think the teacher-a guy-just likes seeing the girl's butts in the air.

Mucho creepio!

When they get to the reverse dog pose or the cobra pose where they sit looking like they're thrusting their chests at him I'll have to bail.

Then I see Monique, smiling like and angel and attempting to radiate heavenly peace my way. I look at her, look at the butts wiggling in the air, and wonder what it is she gets from this porno-lite display. Maybe she's gone lezbo.

"Hi honey," she says, prancing over to me like we're buds or something. "Glad you made it. Looks great, right? What'd I tell you?"

She is so totally high on yoga-wiggling-z-butt Zen that she can't see that I'm drilling my eyes into her like I think she's on crack. In Monique's world this yoga bonding is the equivalent of fun stuff like...uh...fun stuff. This to me looks like a few one-time-might-of- could-have-been beauties approaching middle age with maximundo gracelessness surrounded by a bunch of actual young beauties. Sounds depressing to me. And she thinks I, a fifteen year old girl, would want to do this crap?! She IS on drugs.

I think these poseurs in the class definitely have some issues. Shouldn't they like be at home like slammin' the ham to stay fit? Whatever. But this is not Monique. Oh, trust me. She definitely does her fair share of home gymnastics if you catch my drift. Only she thinks she's being all sly and stuff. Figures I can't hear her and step-dad attempting to go forth and multiply.

Hello! Walls are like paper thin.

Don't get me wrong. Despite the fact that I'm not all "oh my wonderful mother" she is beautiful in her own I'm-so-cute-I-look-like-a-little-girl way and a big improvement over the other moms I see who look like Siberian Tractor Dykes or Spawn of the Marshmallow People. She's lucky she has the kind of face that still looks like her childhood face only older.

Still, I am not doing the yoga wiggle. I get my Zen on in my own way.

"Yeah. I mean we can come here together, you know? Hang out as you say. Talk. You know, a little mother daughter bonding," she enthuses, her eyes glowing like electric love beads.

Does she really think that kids talk about things like bonding-bondage!-and hanging with mother? I swear she's gettin' into my stash.

"Okay, Monique. It's like, I don't know...athletic and all. But really, me and yoga? I think I have the anti-yoga gene. Maybe from bio-dad or something."

I guess spinning the blame wheel to land on bio-dad rubbed off on me.

"But honey, it's, you know," she stutters, ignoring the bio-dad comment, a little tear forming in her eyes. "I'm just thinking this would be a good way to bring us closer. I mean, I feel so locked out of your world. Our relationship is suffering. Like we're strangers."

When I throw the my real father card out there and she doesn't even flinch, she's totally on a crazy train for glory and can't be distracted. Eye on the prize. Only it seems the prize is me and our relationship, as if we're lezbo lovers. Girls do not have relationships with their mothers. They have mothers who-at my age-they avoid as much as possible. That's what I do, right on schedule. I don't see what the problem is. Evidently Monique just can't get with the parental program. I have to tippy toe away from this real smooth like.

"Look. You're the mother, I'm the daughter. This is who we are. I mean, what did you do with YOUR mother when you were my age? I'm getting from what you've told me not too much. So, no fault no foul."

Monique hangs her head and stares at her ballerina feet like the answers to all life's mysteries are contained there. She's nervously rubbing her hands on her legs.

"That's true honey. My mother and I were like oil and water. Didn't mix then, don't mix now. I just wanted things to be different between me and my daughter. I keep trying. But you keep wanting to push away. Why do you hate me?"

Now the tears are running down her cute little girl's face and she's making a scene in this place of eternal peace and bliss. I think it's probably enough for her to get the boot.

I shrug, "Don't know."

Monique makes a bunch of PFFT sounds which I know are so totally not Zen until she sounds like a baby locomotive. She wipes her tears away leaving big makeup streaks on her face, a look that is so un-bliss, then locks her eyes of eternal sadness on me like I just killed her cat. As if.

"I'm sorry, Kyrie. I really am. For whatever it is I did. But when you figure it out I hope you'll let me know. I'm stumped."

That went well. And here I thought I was coming to town for a time of transcendence. Instead I got pummeled by mother-destroyer. I hadn't realized that she had been systematically trying to draw me closer into a mother/daughter bondage situation for what reason I don't know and this yoga thing was her latest and maybe last attempt. Last year it was theme parks where I got to hear her banshee wails on the rollercoaster and water parks. Then it was movies, shopping, trying to hang with me and my friends. Squeezing into like-a-million-years-too-young-for-her girl clothes. Just wanting to be one of the girls. That went over like a lead brick. And now after this Yoga Turned Ugly moment maybe she was done harassing me with this crap of "let's be buds" and I should be sad why? Okay, I am sad for her that her genius plan didn't work. It sucks to be her. But for me, that meant no more Monique attempts to blend into my world which is crazy enough already. Now that sounds like a primo bit of bliss to me.

Hasn't she ever heard of teen angst? Misery thy name is Kyrie.

*****

Kissing is such a powerful tool. Really. You think it's like a simple getting to know you type of thing but a good kiss, a real HOT kiss, can get your motor running like I don't know what. Now, I've kissed a fair number of guys. Some good kissers, some passable, some thanks and buh bye. And each time was like the first time and scary in its own way. It's like I never knew what to feel until I felt it and only then did I really know.

Yet each time was so awkward, so IDK, so like how did I get here and where are we going. I always felt like I was being graded and probably-most definitely-getting it wrong. So it took me awhile before I reached my personal "comfort zone."

But eventually I got it right.

So Tag and I go through some major kissathons. Totally. And afterwards I felt so IDK "stoopid" I could only smile. Seemed like we might continue this way for like ever.

But only a week passes for reals, when Tag and I finally leave the kissing part and we're going further than I've ever gone before and before I know what's happening I feel like we're ready to go over the top for the ultimate. And my body so wants to go there but my head says no no no. And my body whines saying please please please. But my head says no no no. And my head is stronger and wins this battle and I'm so out of breath and start to cry. Now I'm so totally embarrassed.

I'll be ready to make this step some day. But not this day.

Tag holds me tight and tells me it's okay. Kisses me on the forehead and runs his hands through my hair like my big protector. And I get weak and start to crumble but my head screams NO NO NO. My head will not let me do myself wrong.

Tag asked me to come down and check it out at Ratchett Park so I got going as soon as possible. I got myself to the south side of town by skateboarding down back streets and alleyways to stay out of sight as much as possible. After I turned the corner at Holloway street, I noticed right away how depressed and sort of ghetto the place looked. The entire aspect was one that shouted, "Stay away." I felt a bit put off by this and thought of turning back. But I had come here to find Tag and I was going to continue until I did.

I came down narrower and narrower streets that looked more like unfinished paths scattered with rubble. The area seemed to open up into a park of some kind. This must be Ratchett. And around me I saw the signs of territorial claiming, spray painted symbols and names. Most obvious was D-Boyz, spray-painted in bold red and black design. Further down the walkway was a large sign that said Dogwood in bold black letters and painted beneath it a spooky skeleton finger pointing deeper into the park.

I skated in as far as I could picking up my board when the path ran out. My heart was beating faster as the terror tactics were doing as intended. I asked myself more than once if this was really where I wanted to be.

Then I asked, "When did I start talking to myself?"

It seemed that the sun had drifted behind some clouds or trees as the surrounding area suddenly seemed darker. In an instant, I figured out why. I had arrived at Dogwood, a place as dismal as the area beyond it. A bunch of skaters were hanging around watching as other skaters skated a large bowl. I strolled up and found a place at the perimeter of the bowl. One by one the skaters turned and looked at me with quizzical expressions. What, haven't they ever seen a girl before?

I maintained my silence So did they, until someone finally cracked. A skater of medium build with a thatch of thick ropey blonde hair stared holes into me.

"Hey," he said in a menacing manner. "You lost or something?"

I paused before answering, then squeaking more than speaking said, "Uhm...No. I'm looking for...Tag? Does he come around here?"

"Maybe. What's it to ya?"

"Nothing. Just wondering, that's all."

"Wondering what? Like if we're from the same planet as you?"

My Uncle Jay told me once I was not a good Poker player because my face gave everything away, so I suspected my insecurity showed in my face. But I held my tongue. As a girl in a sport dominated by boys it was not an easy task to be accepted. You had to work three times as hard to be taken half as seriously. And these boys were clearly of the opinion I didn't belong. Especially ropey blonde hair who was openly hostile, and making no bones about the fact. C'mon Kyrie, don't let a wrinkle in the half pipe crash your jam.

"No, just like how long you been happening."

"Always."

Laughs and sniggers all around.

"No, I mean, how long you been skating here, you know?"

A skater with bushy brown hair jumped in and fielded the question. His face gave away his eagerness to please, or brag. "Oh, well, yeah, like we sorta began here. Skated the pool, built ramps, did verts, ran the pipe, you know. Then we totally went street. But like we all trained here cuz there was no other place. But hey, we got the killer moves you know. Became the D-Boyz of Dogwood."

"Pretty spiff."

"Yeah, we dig it."

"I was thinking of coming down here to skate," I said, wondering if I'd crossed the line. "But I guess not..."

I looked around the circle of faces searching for an answer. Bushy brown hair shuffled in place. A dude with punk crew cut smirked at me. A skater with long black hair stared at his board.

"This is our hangout, little spiff," said ropey blonde hair. "You can't just show up to skate here. D-Boyz, Dogwood, they go together. This ain't no public place."

I was in so deep I couldn't stop myself. It had taken more than a fair amount of courage to get down to this Hell's half acre. I was not going to give up so easily.

"So, I guess I won't come here to skate then. That's too bad." I said, with a sorrowful lilt in my voice. "Your bud Tag said-"

"Tag, huh? Shoulda figured. Lance Romance. What about him?" sneered ropey blonde hair, appearing as if he was ready to jump at me.

"He told me to come down here," I answered, feeling like I was wobbling on my board.

"Yeah so he gets around. But he ain't here to back up your story."

An uncomfortable silence settled over the group. A girl had wandered into their lair and they were defending it like pack wolves. Whether or not this was going to get ugly was anybody's guess.

At that very moment, a voice yelled out from behind us.

"Hey, Patch, dudes, I see you met Kyrie. I asked her to come down here," said Tag, strolling up lazy and smooth.

"Oh nice, asshole," jeered Patch. "You just invite this chick and don't tell anybody."

"So what? It's not like you're my parents, dickweed," replied Tag. "I don't need to ask permission."

"Bite me."

Now with Tag there the tension subsided. Kinda.

As we talked I found out their names: Skeeter (bushy brown hair), Chug (punk crew cut), and Foo Boy (long black hair).The D-Boyz carried on casual and cheery, with me joining in as they talked in the familiar skater slang. That is until I brought up the subject of coming around there to skate on a regular basis.

"I was thinking I'd start coming around here to skate," I ventured, figuring all tensions were settled. "So what does it take to hang with the D-Boyz?"

The boys quickly became eerily silent then chuckled as if at an inside joke. "First off you kinda gotta be a BOY," said Skeeter. Foo Boy busted up, looking like he was about to blow chunks. Chug smirked away like he was laughing at the world.

"And you gotta earn the right to skate with us. It's a D-Boyz custom," said Skeeter, breaking into a wide grin.

I didn't know if I was interested in this anymore. "What kind of crap is this 'earning the right?'"

"It's an old skater custom. But since you're not a boy and wanna hang with the D-Boyz, you can earn the right by speedboarding the Motorslam, "said Skeeter, as the others looked on with knowing smirks.

" You can do that, you're totally in."

"Speedboarding?"

"Yeah. Speedboarding," said Chug. "Down that big street that goes downhill into Buellton boulevard? It's a bitch! With that high-speed deep drop, gnarly holes and mongo turn at the end. If you make it...if you live I mean..." he snickered. "I guess you'd be in. That's what I did to bag it."

Nervously shuffling in place I was unsure if this was what I wanted. I looked to Tag for support but he was making a study of staring at his shoes. He seemed so distant. I wanted to skate with a group of totally rad skaters, true. But this idea of having to earn the right to skate with them made me feel like my pants had split. I glanced around at the faces studying my every move, a doe being sized up for the kill.

My voice came out weaker than I had planned. "Sure, okay."

"I don't know, dudes," grumbled Patch. "We don't have girlz skate with the D-Boyz."

Tag clenched his hands into fists and stuffed them into his pockets. "Not YET anyway. You dudes ain't buggin, are ya?" Finally silent boy backs me up.

A strained silence met his question as they all looked uneasily around.

"Okay then, chick. You're on. Let's go!"

Just like that, huh? Why were they suddenly so anxious to have me join them? My feet went numb realizing what I had got myself into so I tried a delay strategy. "Uhmm...how about another time. Like tomorrow? Around the same time?

"Cool chick. See ya," they repeated one by one.

Jumping on my board and skating away I was granted a delay in execution, at least for now.

*****

Today I'm layin' low and hangin' on the home ground to try and sort out all this weird, like totally WEIRD stuff that's been happening. I mean, first it seems like I'm just hangin' about thinkin' of potential BFs skatin' and junk then meetin' Billy Zee who I still have to hook up with for trainin' stuff then smashing heads with Monique at her yoga torture fest then finally meeting my dream BF like he just popped out of my head and into my arms then chillin' with him, kissing with him, other things with him, then meeting his maybe interesting but mostly scary buds the D-Boyz, then being challenged to bomb a hill so's I can join their club, then...then... Too much happening way too flockin' fast for one girl to keep step with!

So that's why I'm layin' low today so I can attempt to soak it all in in small itty-bitty tiny bites to keep myself from hurling.

This is called a great plan!

Funny how time snails along going its merry way until you get to expect it will move that slow like for-ever. Then it speeds up and whacks you upside the head and next thing you know you're in tomorrow land.

"So here's how it goes. Get on your board at the top of the hill, I say GO, and you bomb the hill with all you got. Balls to the Wall as we say. And if you come out of it OK, then you've passed the entry exam to the D-Boyz."

My head was spinning at this news. And Patch was only too happy to tell me this, that master of disaster who seemed to hate me just because, I don't know,' cause I'm a girl? Just bombing this hill and blazing to the end would make me a member? Sounded too easy. I mean sure, it was dangerous and all but it's danger that excites us. Already the band Bikini Kill was jamming in my mind singing Revolution Girl Style.

"Cool," I said, cinching down my helmet, attempting to actually feel cool about this.

"Oh, one more thing," Patch said with a wicked smirk. "Just being Tag's, uh, Board Bunny won't get you any special consideration, in case you're thinkin' it might."

I nodded like a puppet saying "that's cool," as if it was expected of me. But immediately I felt simmering deep inside me a condemning voice calling me slut as if I had hooked up with Tag just so I could get in with his team. I did want in with the D-Boyz. Of course I did. But I didn't like go after him like a groupie or something. When I met him he was just this cute random guy-who happened to be so like my dream dude!-that I had to get with 'cause I'm hormonally driven.

Big whoop!

Is that a crime? Yeah, I get the picture on the double standard BS and it is annoyingly annoying. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I would show these guys there's more to Kyrie than her female parts.

Standing at the top of Motorslam hill I swear I could feel my courage draining away from me like somebody had pulled the drain plug. It was definitely a mondo scary hill. I could see way down it, to a mongo turn that must catch up around the bend and continue straight down. Speedboarding that wild turn would no doubt test me for all I've got. Even from here I could here the traffic racing by. Not a break in the sound. Was I agreeing to skate onto a freeway? Stay strong Kyrie. Go to your happy place, flying over the lip at your home park. I could see myself, feel myself catching air and flying over. This usually calms me right down. But this was not your everyday "just play cool" situation. This was the mother of all skates. All or nothing. Eye on the prize, eye on the prize.

"I sure hope you're ready little girl...GO!!"

Little girl? Bastard! I must win or die. The old Kyrie is gone. I am Rocket Girl.

These last thoughts race through my mind and I am pushing off and moving down the hill. Moving fast. Faster. Faster now. Speed picking up as the wind bristles by and slaps my face. My curly auburn hair tumbling out of my helmet and whipping back around me like wings. I've got my face clenched up so tight my teeth hurt. This street is full of rubble splatter. One the city has been putting of repaving for like ever. Thanks city council. Good thing for you I'm not a voter. My arms are tight behind me as I keep my body low on the board to maximize speed and control. I'm going for broke. I'm not just going to ace this challenge I'm going to go faster than anyone before has ever attempted. Maybe I'm a bit crazy. A bit death wish. Don't know. Don't care. I aim to win, win, win!

I'm so caught up enjoying these visions of myself as raging and triumphant that when I finally reach the mongo turn it catches my by surprise. Upsets my balance. Slightly. Only slightly. Not enough to topple me. But definitely scared me. Talk about bad timing. I dig in and take the turn wide. I'm blazing through in I'm sure record time-like anyone's timing me-and as I'm coming round the turn I can hear the sound of cars, seemingly louder now than I remembered them. Someone beeps a horn. Loud. Makes me take a start. I gulp it down and steel myself for the final moments. When I either fly across traffic-if I'm lucky-dodge cars like I'm dodging a bull stampede, or at the last minute decide I can't do it and bail.

Too late for indecision. I'm approaching the moment of truth. There's the street right in front of me. Busy as busy can be. But I'm Rocket Girl. Master strategist. Failure is not an option. A break. A break in traffic is what I need. C'mon break. Come to mama. And there it is. Right on time. Okay, it's only two cars moving slower than the rest but I'll take it.

Thank you skater gods!

I make for the gap like a scared rabbit. I'm in the street now and moving through at sonic speed. Like I'm in a dream. I feel numb. Cars, buses, trucks, are everywhere at the outsides of my vision. But they can't touch me. I blaze past the middle of the street and suddenly I'm across-YEAH BABY-going down a smaller more gradual hill that ends at a humongous park. Green grass everywhere. Is this the place that skaters go when they die? I put on the brakes and turn hard. The momentum sends me flying from the board and suddenly I'm a free bird flying over the park, for a moment that seems like forever, then losing altitude, getting closer, and then hitting the ground in a tuck and roll onto cushy grass that feels like heaven to me right now. I'm pretty sure I lay there like that for a long time. Just thinking about what I'd just done. Hoping I passed the test. Closing my eyes. Dreaming. Feeling the peaceful melancholy of all things completed.

"Whoa! Holy shit. What was with that hell bent for leather teen suicide bullshit? We asked you to race the Motorslam. Not dodge the deadly Buellton boulevard traffic. Holy connoli, girl. You-are-a-friggin'-PSYCHO!"

Patch was standing over me yelling this crap at me as if I'd done something wrong. Don't even TELL me I didn't make it. Yet the look on his face and his raised eyebrows and barely suppressed smile said something else. Like he was impressed or something. Okay, now I must be dreaming.

"Uhm...I...figgered that was the gig. Race down, over, and through," I mumbled through barely responsive lips.

"No that most definitely was NOT the gig. No way, Jose. But it WIIL be from now on. Crap! It takes one crazy girl to show us what's what. I don't believe it. I don't believe you!"

Now the boyz were all gathered around me, hands thrust deep in their pockets, beaming at me like I was their prize puppy. It was very strange. Strange but good feeling. But it didn't feel real. Like I had passed out on the fall and was still out. This had happened too fast. Way too fast. One minute I'm the offensive intruder the next I'm the favorite. You know, you go a whole bunch of time wanting to be accepted. Work like hell to make it happen. And when it finally does it catches you by surprise and you're stunned stupid. Evidently they had meant me to get to the bottom of the hill and turn off on a side street or something, or just bail and let my board go free. But no one had ever told me...A-holes.

No wonder they were impressed. I guess from this point I would be known as Krazy Kyrie or something. Or just go by Krazy, my very own D-Boyz handle.

"So, Krazy. Welcome to the D-Boyz. I guess now we'll have to call ourselves D-Boyz and a girl. Or-"

"How about DB&G," injected Skeeter.

"Yeah. Kinda sounds pro-like," offered Foo Boy.

But Tag didn't sound happy. "Hold up now Patch. This is so not you. One minute Mr. Hardass, the next minute you're gushing over this skater like you just met god. You're either taking her in because she's with me-which is totally wrong-or you're stringin' her up for a smack down. And if that is your game, I would say it's the cruelest one yet."

With these dudes it was like instant flash pan explosions. Things just sail along quite on their own and in the next second, BABOOOM! Ouch. Glad he wasn't firing at me.

"Listen dude. I'm the first one to admit when I'm wrong, okay? And I was wrong about this wild skater girl. She is all that like you said. But all the same, we haven't really seen her wring out the bowl or nothin' so there's still room for error. I'm not backin' out here, I'm just sayin'."

Sounded like he was trying to talk himself into something.

"Okay, dude. Maybe you're for real. But that 'room for error' thing concerns me. What exactly does that mean?"

"Playin' it straight dude. Any wild crazy type skater can race the Motorslam with no hope of living through it just to show us up. But that's one trick, one time. It takes more than that to really be part of the D-Boyz, right? As we always say, 'Consistency in flow and style.' So she's crossed the first hurdle in her own crazy way. But it's just like school. Just 'cause you pass the entrance exam don't make you a graduate. Same here. She passed the exam now it's time for school."

"So when you said, 'Welcome to the D-Boyz' that meant...what?"

"That meant welcome to boot camp. Now it's time to make her or break her. Just like everybody else. That is what you wanted right? No preferential treatment?"

Sitting by quietly while other people talk about you like you weren't there has got to be the oddest and most difficult thing to endure. I mean, I hear them saying all these things, arguing for me and against me, and I so want to yell, Hey, what about what I think? But I just sense that that would ruin everything. So I just bite my tongue until it bleeds.

Some dudes fight so hard just to keep a chick out of their club and stuff. Like what's the big? It's just a bunch of dudes who like to skate so they form a team for competitions and stuff and choose a skate park to call their own. So what? And somehow I, a skater girl, want to join them for like the same reasons they formed their team to begin with and some of them-most specifically ONE of them-has a humongo masculinity deflating problem with it. Like the squeebs at my home skate park, "You go girl, molest our masculinity."

Geez! Some people make things so difficult. I'm not trying to steal anyone's candy or nothing. I'm just a girl trying to be part of a skate team. That's all.

So it seems Tag has talked to them about not wanting any preferential treatment for me. Fine with me. Just grade me like you do everyone else. Still, when Patch said welcome to the D-Boyz, it felt so super fantastico!

Like I was actually being taken seriously.

And what Skeeter said, changing their name to include me, going by DB&G. Wow...that felt so cool. You mean they would actually change their sacred name for little itsy bitsy me? It was so hard to contain myself when every pore in my body just wanted to explode in excitement.

I was feeling my legs shake like I had the major caffeine jitters.

*****

Ever since I'd called Patch's bluff and showed back up-Tag said Patch was sure I wouldn't-and succeeded amazingly running the Motorslam, not only did Patch not back off but went at me both barrels just because.

"Listen up little girl. When you hit that bowl I wanna see hell bent for glory balls to the wall all out skating, got it?"

"Yeah. Totally."

"And don't go soft or-"

"I won't, dude. I'll be cruisin and bruisin."

I gave the double thumbs up and jumped on my board. Maybe he was scared like Tag said. But since my amazing run I was so blissed out I wouldn't let anything harsh my mellow.

Among all things unknown to me, was why in the world I so much craved acceptance by the Neanderthal slope heads Tag called his buds. I really only wanted to be around Tag. But I was a bit, "confused" as to why the deal with his buds.

"Okay, now come back down and around and go again. That was okay, but not great. Come on now, kick it up!"

There were clearly some things I had yet to understand concerning guy packs and their buds. Funny how life slaps you upside the head at those moments of critical decision.

Oh well. That is like so yesterday. Seems that once boys have their pissing contest they need a time of "brothers in arms" bonding. Plus, I still felt too blissed out to move much. Also, I found their stash of Coke and hooch. No wonder they were so easy to flame. I didn't think they would mind. Or if they did I didn't care. So I helped myself to a taste.

Soon Dogwood was swarming with skaters as the D-Boyz attacked the bowl like ravenous creatures, looking from my vantage point like a swarm of flies attacking a sugar bowl. Very little was heard in the way of talking or jabbing as they focused and achieved Zen states with their boards, a matter of "be the board." Of course I needed to prepare my game too. Just not now. I was having too much blissing joy to harsh my mellow. Did I like say this already? Uh, Yeah! Okay I'm just so...you know...I feel like a head on a stick.

An explosion of knobby knees and blond curls jumped and swung her arms overhead in a modified jumping jack. Flapped her arms like a bird. Planted her feet in a wide stance to begin a hand gesturing dialogue with creatures of her imaginary world. Whatever may have existed beyond the world of her imagination registered not. Yet it was a sight miraculous and enchanting to behold, recalling a poem from the past:

Fill me with your humor, understanding, and gentle care

I am a child, I need your smile and the warm acceptance there

My world is so enchanting, so beautiful and rare

Help me grow and you will know the love I have to share

I was mesmerized by the movements of this mystical child, reflecting on what it had felt like to be that little girl, content in solitude, playing in a land peopled by the imaginary friends and magical happenings that composed her world. It seemed like only yesterday I had been that girl. Now I was completely different, taken by early nostalgia.

"Who is that little girl," I asked Tag, who was busy adjusting the wheels on his deck.

"Oh her? That's Maya, Patch's little sister."

"Patch's little sister?" I had lapsed into repeating his words, pathetic. "Patch? Morose, irascible, rough and abrasive Patch?"

"Yep. The very same."

"Damn. I would never believe it if you hadn't told me."

The girl reminded me of Molly in a way, all youth and wonder, eyes a sparkling sky where things good and great happened unendingly.

My pleasant moment was rudely interrupted.

"Hey, Maya. Get over here."

Patch came stomping around the water fountain, a charging square-shouldered picture of a stern parent. The little girl bounded over like an obedient puppy.

"I told you not to come out here, didn't I? So why are you out here, then?"

A hangdog face greeted him, quickly changing into an expression of delight replete with sparkling puppy dog eyes.

"I'm just dancing, jumping, playing. Wanna play with me?"

Patch's face was a canvas of shifting light and color but beneath the looming clouds, a visible smile of sunrise was breaking through.

"Okay, okay. That's good. Just stay out here where I can see you. It's dangerous around here."

Impressed by the obvious affection and warm manner Patch presented to his sister, I understood that life was certainly full of surprises. This persona I would never have thought possible. A smile spread across my face as I lingered in the warm sensation.

"What are you smiling at, snapper head?"

I shivered at the thought of him, this rough cactus of a man, reaching out to tantalize my flesh across the canvas of sky. This was wicked. He had to be twenty and I was fifteen and involved. Was this D-Boyz thing turning me into a slut?

"Who me?"

"Duh! Ain't no one else standin around with a stupid dumb ass smile."

"Your sister? She is so cute and you're so nice to her. Makes me see you in a different light. Like the troll has a heart."

"Yeah, so what. That's for my little, I repeat, LITTLE sister. A performance for her eyes only."

I tightened my lips against a strong impulse to smile and looked beyond him to the bulging clouds and the great eucalyptus mourning softly. I wanted to move, make some sort of physical contact with him - in love, hate or pity I couldn't be sure - but there was no strength in my legs and I could only lean towards him from where I stood.

"Oh come on. You telling me this being nice was just an accident? I mean-"

Patch cut me off. "Listen Tweety. Let it be. You're makin somethin of nothin. For my little sister, ONE way. For everyone else, another. The sooner you get it straight the better."

I waited in silence until the clouds, which had been building throughout the day, began to obscure the sun, but I couldn't let it go. "So you're saying-"

"I'm saying LET IT BE!" His face was a horror of clashing colors as he stormed away.

I saw a spasm of real pain cross his face but quickly dismissed this as a figment of my over-wrought imagination. The wind whistled and cried while the trees shook as if a large beast had pushed through in a rampage of destruction.

A sense of foreboding made me squeeze my hands into little fists. "Damn," I said, shuffling over to Tag. "What was that about? I was just trying to complement him on the way he talked to his sister and he went postal."

"I know. Patch is a strange guy. Would most often just as soon shoot you as talk to you. Then other times...Well, you saw one of those times."

"Yeah. It was really cute."

"The soft side of Patch is not something he wants to get around. Best you just let it be like he said and don't go spreading the 'really cute' thing around."

I scanned the sky, where the promise of a still evening was beginning to push away the great heaps of summer cumulus that had driven in that afternoon, spreading lighter layers of cloud in irregular folds, ruffled up against the horizon.

"Maybe. But he was so soft and cuddly with her. WOW!"

"LIB, Kyrie. LIB."

"Letting it be" would become my primary way of doing things with this group. Talk about the patience of a saint. If I didn't want this gig so passionately there wouldn't be much to hold me here. Well...except for Tag of course. But that is a whole different thing.

There's lots to learn and lots of time to learn it. Good thing I've got my training gig happening. I tell you, after all the friction and big fallout dropping on me keeping focused on my training sessions really smoothes things out.

Helps me keep it real.

*****

"You need to have some flow. Style is overrated. If you rip it and stick everything you should always get props."

Billy Zee nodded and paced, evidently satisfied with his opening monologue. Deciding to begin with him was the right move. He is a skater and I need real been-there-done-that skater advice. Training sessions usually begin with him greeting me as I arrived, then gazing out over the bowl and waxing lyrical to some unidentified audience. But this particular advice did not fall on deaf ears. In fact, it had been the precise thing on my mind lately as I skated Dogwood. When I concerned myself with analyzing my style I found I was too tough on myself, picking out the smallest flaw and becoming quicksanded in a puddle of brainslush. Of course Patch was right there to double up on the misery. But when I put thoughts of style from my mind and blissed instead on joys small and large of skating or otherwise, I found that I easily got into a flow, a wavelike movement swaying like a sweet melody that felt more like surfing than skating. At those moments I returned to my earliest recollections when all of life and freedom seemed absolutely bound within skating. Billy was right. It was all about flow.

"I was thinking about Dogwood and the difficulties I've been having there, with flow, consistency."

Billy wiped his open hand across his forehead.

"Remember, Kyrie. When you show up to a new place you need time to build a flow through that park."

"Yeah, but-."

"No buts about it. Time is your ally."

Sometimes it seemed that Billy was more philosopher than trainer. Maybe a philosotrainer. But his words were comforting in a way, wrapping around me like a warm flannel shirt, giving me break from his training techniques that cut through me like an arctic blast.

"Okay. Let's work on your strength: 20 jumping jacks, 20 push ups, 20 squats. Begin!"

If it wasn't that Billy performed the exercises with me I would think he just took joy in watching me suffer. That or some perverted thrill in watching me jiggle and bend. But there he was, right along side me, keeping pace with and sometimes getting ahead of me. While I still wasn't sure his age he seemed to be in pretty good shape for an old guy. I tried to put together an educated guess based on what he had already told me of his past, coming from Florida and taking fourth in the nationals and all. Whoa! That made him something like 34 or 35? Okay, not REAL old, but compared to me he was like Methuselah.

"So," Billy said as he stood up and brushed his hair back with his hand. "Ever skate a rail?"

"Uhm...no."

"How about steps?"

"No"

"Good. That's our lesson for today: rails and steps 101."

I'd love to report that me and rails and stairs connected like long lost friends. To spare you the long and short of it I'll just say crash and slam were big on the day's events. Bruised and scratched and pulled and twisted. I was a Gumby doll without end. So maybe I was just being a whiny baby when I said to Billy, "Why do I like need to skate rails and stairs anyway? It's not like these would be in competitions or anything, right?

"Wrong. Absolutely wrong. Did you see the X-Games? Huh? Loaded with rails and stairs and other 'street skating' elements like jumping cars. Sheckler just went ape on the...look, it's just best to be prepared for anything as a good well rounded skater. This is what you want to be, right?"

I felt foolish. "Uh, Yeah! I guess I'm just not quite up on my game."

"Not a big deal, Kyrie. Just remember, learning all you can is your best defense."

This is the kind of down and dirty direct training insider tips I never got from Henry and his strict attention to routines. Not that routines are bad. Gotta have 'em. But Billy was more the kind of coach that worked best for me. A coach who pushed and stretched you to your limit yet was forgiving enough to let you whine without subjecting you to a total smackdown.

*****

"Don't you wanna be just like him, Kyrie? Huh? So totally spiff and flash on your board you'd melt girls' eyeballs if they looked at you? Yeah you'd be like a huge chick magnet. GRRR."

"Funny Amelia. Real funny. So why do you come around and watch me skate if you think it is so friggin' lezbo or somethin'? Maybe it's 'cause you LIKE me that way? Like me like me.? EEUW!"

Amelia scrunched up her face real hard and looked at me like I'd popped a gasket.

"What? Oh you're like-"

"I mean, you're cute and all Amelia, but I like boys," I said, smirking and all but she got tweaked.

"Geez! The girl can't take a joke and gets all hard tits on me! You know I dig your skate, Keer. Wish I could do it myself but me and skating don't gel so I just watch you get my jollies for me. Easier on the knees and butt that way."

We were at the park taking a load off our noggins and watching some of the local skate toughs gettin' their ya yas out in the bowl. Some of them were going total street around the park and some, like me and Amelia, just laid about and watched. Yeah, it was nice sometimes to sit in the bleachers and be spectator.

Amelia did come around quite a bit to watch me skate. But it wasn't just to watch me that she came around. She loved to dig on watchin' the skater boys. I think she even had a thing for one of the dudes here today. We've never talked about it. But a girl can tell when another girl is goin' all moony for someone. And she was definitely goin' all moony for Moose Wheeler. I think his name is Jason or Josh or something but everybody calls him Moose. Don't know why. Maybe because of his big jaw.

I know I was a bit hard on Amelia but she grates on me sometimes with her critical commentary that doesn't always sound like she's joking. It's like she's so hard to read. I guess that would make her a good card player. Her face is totally blank and she's spewing this crap at you and you swear she's dissing you. Then she gets all gooey eyed and hurt looking when you get PO'd and slap her down. She is my BFF and all, but sometimes...sometimes...I JUST WANNA SLUG HER.

"Gotta jet. Coming? I wanna get jammin' on some street skate at a different place."

But Amelia is in a hormone fog. Looks at me like I'm a million miles away.

"Cool if I just hang? I'm feeling kinda laze."

"These dudes come here like everyday," I remind her, as if it matters.

She shrugs and smiles.

"Whatev. Later!"

We all go through these boy craze times and all a friend can do is zip it and hang. I never knew fifteen would be so OMG where boys were concerned and if I did know what would it matter anyway? Not like I could just tell my genie, No thanks, dude. Think I'll just bail on 15. Would be nice but not gonna happen. So I will wait for my friend to come out of la la land just as she's waited for me. Maybe by sixteen this boy crazy stuff will be all smoothed out. Like a distant memory from the past.

Somehow I don't think it will.

In two shakes I've got board in hand and I'm off into the streets. I usually go directly down the street from home and onto the main boulevard, got the lights all wired so I can blaze through and stuff. Some nice jam around here. Parks with steps and railings and the occasional bikes rolling through or kids just wandering around. All the better to work on my obstacle avoidance skills. Gotta be quick on the trannys and all, especially when I'm flowing through traffic, timing lights, shooting reds, dodging pedestrians.

Almost ran into someone last week. Girl's eyes sure did light up when she thought I was gonna slam. It's that kind of thing I try to avoid by working it till it hurts. It's all about staying sharp and tuned in. Today I'm going totally radical and pushing myself to the extreme. Everywhere I look I see a new challenge gunning for a showdown. As a skater of the realm it is mine to answer all challengers if I hope to retain the title of skater girl.

So far the only challengers are railings, curbs, and steps but still I will punish them.

To keep things interesting I play this game with myself where I am the lone defender of skating and I have to take down all opposers. They are everywhere. So my mission never ends. I've already taken down five steps, three curbs, almost one tree (OOPS!) and dodged a few squirrels. Gotta watch them. They are so fast and unpredictable.

Okay. So I've still got a few things to get hammered out. Trees especially. They just seem to pop out of nowhere like they're after me sometimes. Freaks!

*****

When I was little, baby in a basket little, I do remember some things even though supposedly you're not supposed to remember anything from those beginning years. I remember lying there, goo-goo-ing and ga-ga-ing or some kind of burbling sounds.

And doing a lot of smiling evidently.

Monique started to call me Smiley after Larry-dad had told her how smiley I always was and how it made him feel light as air. That was then, this is now. These days me and smiling are distant acquaintances. When I was tiny tiny they called me Smiley and it stuck for awhile. But picking names for me-as if my real name wasn't enough-was a fun thing they used to do. Geez people, watch some TV or something! Anyway, the one name that stuck to me was Curly, like the Three Stooges. I sure wish it was Smiley that stuck but it was a name that passed through like a wispy cloud.

My hair was always curled into tight ringlets, flopping down around my face so much that Monique was always flipping out 'cause she couldn't see my eyes.

"Baby, oh my sweet little baby. How did you get all these curls? Must be your dad because it sure isn't me," she said, brushing the hair away from my eyes.

Whenever she spotted something about me she didn't quite like she went right into spinning the blame wheel and it always landed on Ned bio-dad. He was the source of all things not good where concerned Kyrie. The hair thing drove her bonkers. She was convinced I would bump into something and hurt myself or that I would run into a pole and become retarded.

As if.

Well, Larry-dad loved to watch Three Stooges reruns. Thought they were the greatest thing since sliced bacon. Somehow this whole like conspiracy thing wrapped itself around my world threatening to strangle it in its Python grip. From this Stooges fascination we became Mo, Larry, and Curly. I didn't mind the Curly character. Thought he was the funniest one of the bunch with his nyuk nyuk nyuk thingy. And I could see why it was a natural that I should be Curly since I had always been called curly. Larry-dad said it only once and it stuck.

"Honey we're the Three Stooges, neat huh?" he said to Mo'nique who at first looked at him like he was a few bricks shy of a full load but eventually started laughing like a hyena. No matter what, Larry-dad had this amazing ability to make Mo'nique laugh. Like the secret to their success or something. So every now and again-and as I got older I think it was just to torture me-the 'rents would pull out the old nyuk nyuk here comes Curly and Why I oughta, and they would roar like it was comedy night at the nuthouse. When I was tiny and then just little I played along just because. Hey, I loved to laugh too.

I suppose they didn't notice that as I got older I stopped being amused by this. I mean, The Three Stooges are funny and all but do you really want to go through life being called a stooge? Somehow I don't think that when people call you that they're doing it as a compliment. Naturally, being called Curly in my family of Stooges was not a thing I cherished.

My little step-sibs, Molly and Jackson, escaped this indignity. They missed it by being born some 10 years too late. Good for them, bad for me. And too bad for Mo'nique, Molly has curly hair too, tight little ringlets just like me. Either Mo'nique and bio-dad were doing something on the QT or she has curly hair in her family somewhere. We call Molly "Ringlet." Cute, huh? Not Smiley, not Curly, but Ringlet.

Once again luck ruled in her favor.

I do like having the step-sibs around. In an otherwise looney tunes universe somehow their run-around-screaming-and- wailing antics made all the sense in the world. Brought order to the chaos of my life. And every now and again, just for their little sometimes angel faces, I threw them a nyuk nyuk just to see them roar with laughter. Didn't seem to mind so much when THEY laughed at it. Only bothered me when the 'rents wanted me to be the fat bald guy to their short mean guy and frazzle haired goofy guy. Irritated me to the max.

Funny how certain things are okay only sometimes.

Monique tells me all the time, "Don't get your sister involved in this skateboarding stuff. It's bad enough you're doing it."

Obviously I ignore her. Molly is actually pretty good on the board, all low center of gravity and all. I wish I had started at five so I could be a lot further along. Jackson, being just three, looks at it like it's a girl thing. Something for his big sisters only. Fine by me. Only got one board and I don't want to be like having this total skater school thing. Plus at three I would most totally be afraid of him getting hurt, he's kinda klutzy. If Monique wants to worry about someone running into a pole and becoming a retard she should spend her time following Jackson around. He's run into more than one thing already and sometimes I think he's already gone whack.

"Boo yah, Molly. Watch me fly."

I sailed over the edge caught major air and landed deep into the bowl carving it smooth. A few more signature moves and I'd have it aced for one day. I came here to practice every day during school, starting at 5:30. But being summer I could sleep in and get started at 7:00. That was just fine with Molly.

In the afternoons I would cut loose and mix my practice with some wild and sick jam, spinning, flying and pushing myself to the limits. Molly was my one person fan club.

"That was GREAT Keer! Wish I could..." said Molly, with those big, slightly sad looking saucer brown eyes.

"You will, Molly. It just takes time."

I had been working with Molly these past few weeks and while she had improved, could at least stay ON the board most of the time, there was still the center of gravity thing to work out. But like a big sister, a NICE big sister, I encouraged her efforts. Though now was not the best of times to be concentrating on the dreams of my step-sib. My work was cut out for me.

Since past September, one day a week I trained with my coach, Henry. He's and old guy used to sit on his porch and watch me sometimes while he smoked his pipe. At first it creeped me out until I saw all the cats that used to come hang around with him like they were all friends. Like a Dr. Doolittle or something. The way I saw it if cats thought he was okay maybe he was. And I kept feeling that way until he came off his porch once to talk to me. I felt safe though 'cause Molly was with me. He told me he liked what he saw me doing and how I helped my sister and all and though he didn't skate any more he used to skate old school, had done coaching, and knew enough about skating to be great help to a beginner.

He would watch me go by and yell out stuff to me as he saw it. A total coach type. He was all about 'tweaking it up,' that and perfection in form.

As my trainer, it seemed he did all he could to torture me.

"Routines, routines, routines. The routine moves must be mastered to progress your craft."

Sometimes Henry was like my worst nightmare. And other times I would have these weird dreams slash nightmares where I'm racing through a pipe in a frozen wasteland and he's chasing after me pulled by sled dogs screaming "Go. Go. Go. Don't reject the routines." I don't know if this is (a) creepy old guy stuff (b) bizarre teen drama victim crap or (c) just working too hard when I should be having some fun instead. I'll take "c" for 200, Alex.

Maybe it was time for me to start working alone or go totally Billy Zee. He was at least a professional skater. And maybe my weird dreams contained a message, "go on your own but don't forget my lessons." Well, it could be. He was yelling Go, Go, Go in my dream slash nightmare. Maybe it was just time to-

Forget that noise. It was time for ice cream and here comes Mr. Friendly Ice Cream guy right on time. When in doubt, bring the ice cream out!

Yeah, I'm workin' it too hard.

But I'm not anywhere near ready to wear jeans with I'm Workin' It embroidered on the backside. That kind of tramp stamping is for the Lipsticks and their peeps. Who also go in for major tats. They also go for guys who wear eyeliner and lipstick. EEUW!

Give me a guy with a cute butt, long wavy locks, strong biceps and tight jeans and you've got this girl's attention.

*****

Woke up in a mood this morning. A blazing what the hell is going on here mood. If I hadn't been pummeled to sleep by the sound of parental rumbling I might feel more rested. I'm most thankful when they lay off the bickering for awhile. Last night was not a lay off. It was a lay-up smackdown.

I turn my music way up loud in my headset when they get going. Usually keeps me in a state of silent ignorance. Yeah, it's bliss. But eventually I've got to blow my cover and come out for essentials and into the towering inferno I run. I suppose this is what passes for love and commitment in the adult world. To me it sounds like war games.

That was then and this is now and now I've got to get the hey out of here before the weary wrestlers lumber to life. I'm just rolling over and slipping into my duds when my cell starts vibrating like a jaw harp, threatening to jump off my nightstand. I'm almost afraid to grab it thinking it might have actually come to life with all the surrounding friction in the air. But I tell myself I'm being silly and reach for the maybe living thing. Good thing I did. May be my salvation for the day.

Amelia has texted me, Fair's in town. Let's rock it!

I text her back, Cool. Meet me at the Bucks. Can't go for major action like the Fair without a caffeine jolt. Once we get there we order up a round of macchiatos. The standard brand at the Bucks is 1 shot of espresso in a demitasse topped with a small dollop of foamed milk. The peak of macchiato making is to pour the milk in so slowly that it never makes it to the bottom of the glass. This wild layered drink has been known to inspire fear in the newbie drinker. For those wild layered type macchiatos I go to a place like Big Cuppa Joe who makes them so much more flash than the standard. Today we're being lazy so we went closer to home base.

We grab a seat and get fueled up as we jabber away about this ride or that game or that guy who is so hot we can't concentrate on any of the other stuff. I don't know if caffeine helps or hurts these impulses but I'm not trying too hard to find out. Amelia is dressed for serious action in her low cut top, straight leg jeans, steam-curled hair, and pink sparkled lipstick. I'm dressed in my usual rumpled T-today with a cool Evil Monkey design-loose jeans, and a smattering of makeup just for accenting. We look like the before and after pictures in a Maybelline makeover.

"Damn Amelia. You look like, uh-"

"The Lipsticks? Yeah, I know. Even using their trademark color. I just felt today like being all I could be. Can't see myself wearing this crap every day though. It's way too much work!"

Giggles and knee slaps and heads buzzing like bee hives. Hitting caffeine breakover. I had to admit Amelia did look hot. Totally unlike the lay-low-take-it-light Amelia. But that was quintessential Amelia. From white to black to gray in a flash. Her only consistency being inconsistency.

"So with you looking so hot, and me looking so...not. Maybe we should-"

"Go to the Fair" she says, flipping her hair with a twinkle. "You're lucky Kyrie. You look great even when you do nothing but throw on a T and jeans. Today I feel like we're evenly matched."

Just when you think you know someone they throw you a curve like that. I guess she feels, I don't know, like she's usually on the losing side of some supposed beauty competition we're in? And you would never get that by the way she carries herself. Like she's got the world wired.

Wow! Who'da thunk it.

We all want what we don't have. But does getting it make us happier? There's no evidence that it does. On a wall covered with posters in the Bucks was a cuckoo clock. It seemed to say that trying to make sense of life is like trying to make sense of why a wall of random posters has a cuckoo clock in the middle of them. So life is random and cuckoo.

I can live with that.

Strong coffee, perfume, and air made thick with steam and sweat. That's the smell of a coffeehouse in full blossom. A smell we had to leave quickly before we spend our day here caffeinating, and smelling like a coffeehouse when we wanted to be smelling like two girls in the rising scent of Fairground air.

This year the theme is Farms. The first thing we see upon entering the fairgrounds are the tractors. Moving out onto the Midway, we run into seasoned carnies waiting to lure us into games of chance. Here's one right now: Have a great day. No Refunds. No Exchanges. Five dollars.

Hardened farmers from Pescadero and Salinas stand under the glare of unshielded neon fixtures and go nose to nose with the Florida carnies. It's amazing that they don't fight more often than they do, because the name here says it all . . .Shoot Til-U-Win.

Carnies are a peculiar breed. It takes a special type to survive such a drifting life fueled by hot dogs and funnel cakes. I can see a big guy, all 320 pounds of him, standing casually by his shooting gallery game. A pint of whiskey in his pocket and a shotgun on the counter. I'll be he's real friendly and familiar with hot dogs and funnel cakes from here to the Florida Panhandle.

We passed those games by and headed for the real action, championship Pig Racing. The first races were gearing up to start and I pushed and shoved my way through the crowd to get us seats by the rail at the second turn. As soon as we got seated, they were off!

Pigbuster was favored three to one, and most of the money was on him, but Pigsplat (a 20-1 underdog) was blazing into the lead. The crowd was cheering, and the kids had a wary eye and their hands held high. Last year in Pescadero, a kid lost a finger to a hungry porker on this very turn.

After the Running of the Pigs, we headed out into the midway and the rides. First we had to stop at the Ladies cuz Amelia had got a splattered by Pigsplat on the turn. Just a small spray on her legs but she went totally postal and began calling me every name she could think of for insisting on going to the Pig Races first.

"That horrible pig totally harshed my vibe, Kyrie. What WERE you thinking? Pig races? PIG RACES?! Holy crapoli!"

Maybe the caffeine jolt had pushed her over the top. I told her I was sorry and all but she just grunted and stomped off toward the restos. I tried hard not to laugh when she grunted since she was griping about pigs and it just seemed kind of...appropriate? I think she was screaming on the outside but laughing on the inside. Somewhere.

A small giggle crept out of me but she must've already been too far away to hear it.

We pushed deeper into the smell of cooked meat, spices, perfume and diesel exhaust in air made thick with sweat and humidity. That's the smell of the Fair always, especially midday.

If we didn't meet a couple of cute guys the whole pig trauma might have washed out the whole day. Immediately upon them spotting us at the shooting gallery, one winning a stuffed Chihuahua and giving it to Amelia, things took a crazily sick turn. She became her joyous flirtatious self and off we strolled into teenage wonderland.

She was so stoked she didn't even flinch when she spilled mustard on herself. Girlish laughter and apologies of, Oh I'm such a 'tard, peppered her entirely don't give a damn response.

Unpredictable thy name is Amelia.

*****

I tiptoed in when I finally returned home just in case World War Gazillion had erupted. But all was eerily calm on the home front. Even Molly and Jackson were happily playing princesses in their playroom. How she got her three year old brother to play dress up with her will be one of the enduring mysteries. He would not be agreeing to this for too long I'm guessing. So she is smart to take advantage of his generosity while she can.

At least they were quiet so I could sneak up to my room for a toke or two. Followed by a major Fabreze assault. I go through a bottle a week.

Monique thinks I'm the oddest scent obsessed girl she knows. Unless of course she knew what I was up to and just played dumb. I didn't know her as the type to stay on the QT when they knew something. On the other hand-as I'd just recently found out-sometimes you don't really know a person as well as you THINK you know them. On the rare occasion I take my herbaceous joys into the garage as it's easy to air out. But it's also incredibly peopled and not as private as I need.

So, my bedroom sanctuary it is then: Kyrie World!

Sometimes Amelia and I go toke up at the park in less traveled areas. But she also tends to get more self conscious lately and finds it hard to maintain. The last time we toked she flipped cuz lawdogs were patrolling big time for who knows what but didn't get any closer to us than a few blocks away, so we only heard the sirens. Still she went white as THC powder and I had to spend the rest of our time together being the voice of calm as she harshed my mellow.

Clearly, our days of toking together were reaching an end. I would've asked her over today but being how super self conscious she is and the fragile state of the home state, I thought it best for me to go alone on this mission.

One open-windows-and-Fabreze assault later, I cranked up the punk tunes and went rogue. I danced and sang and whooped it up like a true rebel, entirely oblivious. When I went to the mirror to look myself in the eye I saw a very blissed out red-eyed girl who looked a lot like me, only stoned out. And I had such a great rush of ideas, and stories, and songs, and things blustering through my mind all at once. But whenever I stopped and tried to write them down I spent most of the time staring at my hand, the page, the room, nodding my head and saying, Whoa!

I see no truth in the claims that drugs make you creative or that you need them to create anything. You either are creative or you are not. The drugs take you away to another place entirely of mind that can be anything you wish. And that's a deal the world simply cannot offer you.

Not that I wish to live in that mentalscape world. It's just that I realize it is nice to escape to it every so often.

As the situation demands.

And lately, with the sitch at home, it was demanded big time

"Kyrie," came Monique's voice sailing up the stairs. "Dinnertime."

OOOPS! Now it was time to maintain Big Time. Immediately I went Amelia. Maybe I'm not t so hungry? Yeah, like I ate at the Fair so I'm totally not into eating right now. Pause...pause...pause...visions of sugarplums danced in my head. Right, if I told Monique like that she would smell me coming a mile away. Yeah I was hungry. I sprayed a bit of Fabreze on me for safety's sake and rinsed my mouth with Listerine. Can never be too sure. I opened the door to I didn't know what.

Showtime girl.

The kitchen table was an elongated oblong thing that would look more at home in a medieval castle than a suburban setting. With two leaves it could get smaller but was always kept at its largest. Over time we had settled on more or less fixed seating arrangements that just kind of developed on their own. Monique and Larry sat next to each other on one of the long sides of the table. I sat straight across from them-used to-but now sat at one lonely end with Molly and Jackson, since they were so tiny, sitting at the other. I sure wish the 'rents hadn't pushed the table closer to the wall so we had to sit them on one side and me and my half-sibs at either end. This meant I had to sit closer to Monique and Larry than I felt comfortable doing at this time. I hang-dogged into the dinner zone like I was inching off toward execution figuring it was a make or break performance for me. I lifted my eyes and OMG luck was with me. My half-sibs had decided to sit at the end closest to Monique so that left me sitting closer to Larry-dad. Sweet! Maybe I could do this.

Everything progressed along without incident table chatter keeping to non-flammable topics interspersed with "Oh isn't that cute" moments and the clinking clanking and clunking of utensils and of course the never quiet enough munching noises. Jackson liked to eat with his mouth open and usually he was reprimanded for it. But not tonight. And Molly had the most insistent fingers around as they insisted on reaching into her plate and moving things like corn, peas, and green beans onto her fork or over the plate edge into her mouth. Tonight she was given a bit of free reign but was shut down when she pulled to old over the edge into the mouth trick. I'm guessing this was like penitence for bringing marital war upon the household. That's what I thought and kept thinking until I dropped my fork and when I bent down to pick it up met Larry-dad bending over to get it also at which point he stared hard into my eyes and whispered, "See me in my office after dinner." What? OMG! This was like a horror movie. The 'rents were like hands off on doling out the reprimands but I drop my fork and am told by hard eyed Larry to meet him in his office.

This was so weird I though maybe I was hallucinating. Yeah that's what it is. I'll just ignore him. But I couldn't do that. Not with him. He'd never done me wrong directly only indirectly with he and Monique fighting and causing general discontent. And he'd never before asked me to meet him in his office.

This sounded serious.

Suddenly the idea of being slightly stoned lost its appeal as I was scared straight. I was so straight I could hear the electricity in the air. Could feel the earth move. Felt the sweat dripping down my face and under my arms. You could say I was scared shitless!

I finished up at the table quickly and raced off to the resto to wash up and rinse my mouth once more for good measure. Gotta keep up with your dental health you know. Then I schlumped down the dark hallway to the execution chamber.

The door was cracked open. Larry-dad was sitting in his cozy office chair and lighting his pipe. Oooh! I loved the smell of his pipe tobacco. I think it was Steelton's Black Cherry Blend. When he puffed it out it went looping in long lazy strands through the air performing its intricate air show ballet. Then he'd blow smoke rings one through the other in a dazzling feat of something like magic. Not only did I love the smell it would do plenty to give my own bud tinged scent easy cover. And not only that it was having the effect of restoring my mellow.

Maybe I wasn't as straight as I thought.

He took a long leisurely puff like he was completing a thought. Then he put his pipe hand in his lap and looked directly at me.

"Kyrie. I know things have been tough for you around here. What with adapting to your new siblings over the past years and the school and skating stuff and the occasional-too many for my taste-fights between your mother and me, well, I just want to be the first to say I'm sorry for any grief we've caused you. However, I cannot tolerate or condone you being mean and sharp tongued with your mother who has nothing but love and good wishes toward you. Don't forget, you are her first daughter, and that alone makes you entirely unique to her. When you and her clash it hurts her deeply. Some nights she even goes to bed crying saying, "My daughter hates me, Larry. She hates me." And I cannot tell you how much it tears me up to hear that sweet woman sound so brokenhearted."

I was stunned he. Corners me under the table, terrifies the snot out of me, and drags me into his office to chat about my head on collisions with Monique. I'm sorry he's tore up over this but I'm not alone in this. She has some responsibility too, right? Takes two to tango or something? Now my mellow has totally been harshed and I'm getting steamed. It's bad enough I have to rumble with Monique, now Larry-dad is playing the biased referee?

"Ya, well I, uh-"

"And one more thing. Please restrain your pot smoking around the house. You do have your siblings to think about. Don't want them to be picking up bad habits before their time."

Holy pasta fazzoli! Now he's giving me the pot smoking lecture? Yikes! And I totally thought I was like sly Sheila. Evidently not. I suppose it would be pointless to deny it and stuff. Yeah dude, like it wasn't me. I don't think that would work here. So I just have to suck it down and bite it.

"Oh. Is that all?" I said, trying to smooth talk my way into and out of this. "I thought you wanted to talk about something horrible."

Standing back trying to be all casual with my hands in my pockets I looked over at him to see if I could gauge his reaction. His face was as placid as the Sphinx. Geez! Tough negotiator.

'I'll try with Monique though she's not the easiest person to get along with, as you already know. And the pot smoking? Well, I thought I was being pretty low key on that but I messed up. Maybe I'll go back to toking in the park or something."

"Look, Kyrie. I do really want you to try with your mother. It is more important than I think you realize. So try hard, okay? And I do really not want you to be smoking pot as I know it's not going to help you accomplish anything. But at the same time you're old enough that I know I can't stop you. So I ask for your cooperation in keeping it to a reasonable level and presence. I don't necessarily want to banish you to the parks and into the hands of the law. Your mother would definitely not agree with that. But when you get high and start cranking music and dancing upstairs with such a rumble that your mother starts fuming, it makes me concerned at your ability to navigate the intricate details of weaving the pot smoking life into the straight life. In other words, I have cause to question your judgment on at least two grounds. One, that you're smoking to begin with and two your seeming inability to control your indulgences as regards your behavior in your room tonight. Now don't get me wrong. I totally believe in your ability to get yourself under control. I just would like to keep believing that. Whether or not I do is entirely up to you."

This was totally slapping me upside the head. Here was my step-dad talking to me all hush hush like he was my father and partner in crime and while I appreciated his calm even tone it was as weird as having a horse talk to me. Shouldn't my mother be having this type of conversation with me? And speaking of Monique, is she on board with all this know-you're- smoking-but-stay-under-control stuff or is this like some secret mission Larry-dad was on? With all he'd told me there were many questions he left unanswered.

"Does Monique...uh, mother, know you're having this talk with me?"

"No. This is entirely my idea. I hope not to involve her unless absolutely necessary. She's got a lot on her plate right now. And we're a team. I think she's even entirely oblivious to your little adventures of wasting away in marijuanaville. She had a rather strict upbringing. I feel if I appeal to your sense of reason and compassion you'll see the value in cooperating. Of course, if you'd prefer I get her involved-"

Get Monique involved, the queen of overacting flip-outs? I don't think so. If she's none the wiser, cool.

"No. No. That's okay. I'm good."

"Fantastic. Well then. Enjoy the rest of your evening. And you'll forgive me if I say I hope to not be speaking to you about this again anytime soon. All right?"

That was the most uplifting, empowering feeling I ever got from a total wham bam smackdown. How he did it I'm not entirely sure. One minute we were facing off on opposite sides and the next we were partners in crime. On some level I still felt it kind of creepy that my step-dad was having this somewhat intimate conversation with me. Intimate in that it involved my private life, a private life that was apparently more public than I thought. I felt like a shaved cat. Or like I'd left my panties hanging in the community bathroom. Yeah, these kinds of convos in the right context left me feeling buck naked with nowhere to hide. Maybe that was the point. Total submission of the enemy.

Being soft tongued and nice to Monique was the toughest part of this assignment he had given me. I mean, wasn't it natural for mothers and daughters to clash around my age? Like it was part of the natural cycle that prepared mothers to let their daughters grow up and leave the nest, so to speak? Like their daughters ticked them off so much they WANTED them to leave? Sounds pretty brutal but made perfect sense. Not that I'm saying being nasty with her was okay. I will definitely try to go light. Become the angel she always wanted me to be.

It will be maybe the hardest thing I've had to do in a long, long time.

*****

My Be Nice To Mother plan goes into action as I decide for starters to talk to her about things in general. I totally want to come in with my skating stories but this is a sore subject so I leave it alone. In no time at all we're on the fast track to communication. Geez! I guess when you're parched like desert scrub only a few drops of water will do. Mother thinks we're bonding. She says it is an important thing for mothers and daughters, especially at my age. Like my age today is more important than my age yesterdays and yesterdays ago. She evidently has not kept up on her Know Your Teen literature.

"When I was young, my mother and I always talked."

"When you were young?"

"Oh yes, I was once. Believe it or not. But today-"

Her eyes go all steamy as she drifts in through the hazy front door of "good old days" land.

"There was this guy I used to have a crush on who had the biggest," she looks away all ashamed and blushes, "Muscles."

Okay. So we're supposed to be talking, right? Bonding? But you can't bond with someone who is so old and your Mother. Especially when she tries to cover up what she really wants to say about a big, SOMETHING, and instead says muscles. I am not stupid! I know what she was going to say. I reply in the only way a mature bonding kind of girl would.

"EEUW!"

She rolls her eyes and shakes her head as if she caught a shiver.

If I told her about Tag and his big "muscles," she would shit a Buick! Little girls should not say these things to their mothers. Clearly Mother does not understand the cardinal rule of bonding: there are no rules. Unless of course your bonding moment includes an admission of having the hots for your BFF's BF. That is a definite no no. But I think boys and their boy things discussions have been happening between girls since like, uh, forever. I mean, from the first time a girl sees a little boy's thing, after appropriately saying EEUW! and thinking "I'm glad that thing is not hanging off of me," from that point on she is oddly fascinated by it. Though it is not something she thinks about for a long while after walking in on her five year old boy cousin in the bathroom. When she gets older it's something she thinks about quite a bit. Maybe obsessively so. Even so, it is not something a girl my age, especially THIS girl, wants to talk about with her mother.

"Some frozen yogurt?"

"What?"

"Frozen yogurt. You want some?" She's trying to pull me back in. Maybe she has read some Know Your Teen literature. If talk doesn't work, try food."

"We got some?"

"No. I just saw this place near the mall, Pinkberry? There's a big line of kids so it must be good. I thought we could go."

Pinkberry serves a not ice cream, not yogurt concoction that is fat free-girls love this-and loaded with sugar. No one really knows what this stuff is made of. No one seems to care. But if you want to get one of these treats and join the cultural horde as it jams the trend train, you'll need to stand in a line of hundreds of people to get one.

Amelia of course finds no end of joy in this silliness.

She even went so far as to get one herself to see what all the fuss was about. Not surprisingly she decided it wasn't so hot. But the crusher came when she dropped some on the carpet. Cleaning it up, she found it had bleached a spot where it had fallen.

This is a moral dilemma moment. Do I be quiet, and go with her to Pinkberry to fulfill her bonding urges? Or do I tell her what I know, "nobody really knows what's in that stuff and it bleaches your carpet!"

Neither.

"No. I'm not hungry."

"Uh, okay. I just thought-"

She drifts off again into high ceiling stare space, looking genuinely hurt.

"Maybe I'll just go anyway."

My brain kicks into savior mode.

"Uh, mom. Are you sure about this Pinkberry stuff? I heard it's like loaded with sugar, and, I don't know if it's so good."

She starts looking around like she forgot something. No, like she's lost.

"Of course it has sugar, honey. It's ice cream. I mean if you don't-"a little tear forms in the corner of her eyes. "Maybe I'll just sit down or something."

What just happened there I have no idea. So I change gears and bring Monique a Coke and a MoonPie, her favorite. She tears into it, happily back on her South Carolina childhood porch. Satisfied I've done my good daughterly deed for the day I slip away and head out to somewhere. Anywhere but this mother/daughter bondage place.

*****

Freedom. The entire spectrum. Freedom. It was this concept that remained most attractive. Everywhere else was just another degree of pain, commitment, compromise. But when I was on my board, flying through the air, grinding a rail, landing a perfect trick, the electric current of freedom ran though my veins.

Sometimes I felt so electrified I couldn't sleep, could barely think. At other times my attention was completely on Tag. Who is this odd boy who had come into my world, a boy with some undefined magic about him? Okay so it was like I'm living in the Heart song Magic Man. Yeah, mama, he's a magic man. A casual glance would betray nothing more than a tousle haired denim wearing skater boy. Unlike Patch whose appearance and manner was of a gruff Sammy Hagar, all flared bundle of curls and belligerent swagger.

Yet Tag withheld more than he gave, a sense of which I received each time we were together. The last time we were together, he had gone on a rant about life, destiny, the Karmic wheel. And as much as I tried to follow him, I got lost along the way. He seemed to be a deep thinker, not just a regular dude. Discussions of universal cosmology, chaos theory, deterministic philosophy spun off his tongue and whispered to me. Every thread of conversation wove a widening web displaying trapped stars of intellect, so much so that I knew I was in the presence of a great mind. Only for me did he display this side. In most other places, he was tight lipped as a cowboy. Though I received the full thunder of his passion at those magical moments of sexploration. My enjoyment of these moments bordering on obsession, caused me to question my priorities. Was I as interested in Tag and skating as I was in the sensual mysteries Tag answered, or had I crossed a borderline from which there was no return? Tough questions.

Hey, I deserve to enjoy these sexplorations. I'm young, excitable, and present.

Tomorrow never knows, but today is certain as sin. Still, the thought is not taken lightly that I might be addicted to sexplosion. Truth be told, I was stupid in love.

My favorite part of day is the end of it. Sunsets. Skating into the reddening sky like a modern day cowgirl. It's very romantic. Amelia says I'm too romantic. Says my head is always in the clouds. Always on guys. But Amelia, never one to hold back the scathing observation, says head in the clouds is not my biggest problem. She says my head is in a place much lower. Good old Amelia. Ever the quotable quip. She pops them out so quickly you don't have a chance to come out with a response. In the west they say there is only the quick and the dead. I guess Amelia, being the fastest draw, has her share of the dead notched on her belt. I'm glad she's on my side.

The sun has dropped below the horizon and it's time to pack it in for today. We'll go out for chili dogs and Cokes. Then we'll go to the skate shop to look at some new gear. I love looking at the new gear. It's so shiny and new and dream inspiring. I could stay there all day. But I can't do that. Not only do I not have the time for it, I don't have the money!

My trucks have been acting kinda wonky lately. I may have to replace 'em. The new ones coming out have more durability than the old ones. So these new ones should last awhile.

Just need to throw down the Johnny cash.

According to some skaters they go through three or four decks a month. Three or four decks a month? Not wheels or trucks but entire decks? I couldn't do that unless I had sponsors like they do. Another reason to get a sponsor as soon as possible. Every competition is an opportunity. One should be coming up real soon.

*****

The D-Boyz and I were spending a bunch of time-did I say a hell of a lot of time? - giving due diligence as they say, preparing for the local amateur skating event that could put me on the map so to speak. The D-Boyz were already on the map. Had achieved local legend status long ago. But we all understood that in the land of Hell-A and Borange County, LA and Orange County to the straights, you were only as good as your next showing. So when we weren't going to kick ass concerts, Dogwood transformed into the Dogwood Raceway. And with the Seaside competition on the way we were busy as bees.

Foo boy was working on perfecting his 360° Backside, while Chug was attempting with relentless determination the Transfer, changing from rail to rail or ramp to ramp. I was sitting on the sidelines for the moment tweaking my trucks and watching the Boyz chase the dragon. Patch of course was as always playing the role of stern taskmaster. He was not in any way the gentle smooth breeze of Billy Zee. In Patch's world there was no concern of "styling," his was all about flow. And he was not unwilling to critique.

"Dude! Flow dude. Work the flow!!"

Chug sailed over the lip with a tweak, flipping him off on the turnabout. Patch snorted and shook his head like a weary mule. "Yeah, you go ahead and flip the bird Chuggy Bear. But if you'd listen you'd already have that shit down."

"Chuggy Bear? What the fuck is this, Starsky and Hutch? Dude, get a clue," shouted Chug from the safety of across the bowl.

"Don't MAKE me come over there, Chugly"

"Right-o, Patch hole." Chug started busting up, turning red with laughter, slapping his knees, spit flying from his mouth. "Damn I'm good...Patch hole. That is SO you!"

Watching the Boyz in their natural state was instructive and entertaining. As a team they had their own language. And yeah, they could be kinda funny.

Unfazed, Patch stepped forward. "Listen up, little boy. It's time to watch the master blaster at work."

With that, Patch placed his skateboard on the half-pipe coping, dropping into the bowl and up to the lip, and executed a flawless 360° Backside, back down and across, then up again to a Rock & Roll variation, Rock to Fakie with the 900 thrown in as a crusher. He carved a few turns before finishing with a gale of freestyle acrobatics to boggle the mind.

Whoa, he was good!

Foo boy stood frozen to the ground with open-mouthed admiration. Chug sneered, "Fuck you," and grabbed a Coke. Patch swaggered up in full scale Skater's Intimidation. "That's how it's done when you flow, little boy. Listen up and you'll go far."

Responding in kind, Chug blasted a fire hose of beer directly at Patch's feet.

"I'll go in my car to the bar and be a star in my own way, Mr. Gay. Don't need no lessons from you."

"Why go to the bar when you got hooch right here, dude?" said Foo boy, seemingly oblivious to the whole slapdown incident.

"Didn't say I wasn't goin to have the hooch TOO," said Chug. "Chug be the name, chuggin' be my game."

"You're scary," said Foo boy.

"Yeah, scary. That be me!"

This was so totally weird. I felt like I was ringside to a traveling performance troupe. They all seemed to have their parts and knew their lines like they were scripted. Maybe they were always like this when they skated. But it was a new thing to me.

"No dudes. Really," said Patch, finally glancing over at me. "We gotta get our sets kickin so we can totally dominate at this competition."

Heads wagged YES. Mine too.

"Let's do a doob and get crackin"

"You holdin dude?"

"No. Thought you might be."

"Damn, Foo boy. Always the mooch."

"Hey...give some, get some."

"Seems to me you do mostly getting."

"That's cold dude. Cold as this Coke," said Foo boy with a gulp.

"Coke I brought. With hooch, of course," said Patch.

"Thank you very much," said Chug, in pure Elvis Presley voice.

"Since we got no doobage, let's get crackin before we're too hammered to do piss."

"Speaking of which, nature calls," said Chug heading for a tree.

"Good idea. Pith time..."

"Stay away from me, gay boy."

"My daddy always told me 'don't stand behind a man with your dick in your hand.'""Like I said. Stay away from me, Donkey Puncher"

This was something I would have to get really used to real fast. Whether or not I was here they would take nature's call without shame. All I could do was look away.

"Hey dudes," said Tag, cheerful and bright as the three guys turned toward him and nearly spraying each other. "Remember, we have a girl here so...well...you know."
"OH CHRIST! We should be all genteel and stuff?" griped Patch.

"No, I'm just sayin'."

"Yeah, yeah. Nice of you to bring her by to watch." Then as if it just now occurred to him. "Oh, right. She's on the team now. Look away, Krazy. The Boyz are in town."

Since my Motorslam performance Krazy had stuck. We all had to have our skater handle. I thought mine was pretty cool. Though it kinda bugged me that Patch seemed to forget I was now on the team. Wishful thinking on his part maybe?

Well, at least the idea Skeeter had brought up had ALSO stuck. Our name is now DB&G. I'm surprised Patch agreed to it. But then again, I'm surprised at lots of things with this team.

I learn something new every day.

*****

Does it bother you that you missed your high ollie?

Was there any Firestorm or AK trick you wanted to do but didn't?

Did you need to do your Frontside 180 to switch many drop?

You said you'd never again do the gap to backside wallride again. Really?

What was the worst injury you ever got?

No one likes to read contest articles and I have not met anybody who admits to like writing them.

With the Internet being an instant source of information, contest articles have become completely obsolete. Why I am telling you this is not because of a contest article. In fact it is not about a contest at all. More like an exposition or demonstration as Billy likes to say. You see, he understands the power of the Internet, the massive interest in skateboarding, the still relative novelty of girl skaters, and the near domination of You Tube. He has been cataloguing me in full-on action cutting my jam in pictures and video and doing semi-formal interviews to accompany them and the next thing I know I have a totally happening video on You Tube. He called it a Sponsor-Me video.

"Show your best moves and try to work something unique in so your video doesn't look just like the same ol same ol of videos skateboard companies receive. Most skateboard companies have information on their Web sites about who you contact and what to send."

Looks like that advice worked. Something like 50,000 hits in two days? Now I'm kind of a celebrity or something. You would think that is a good thing. What is there to complain about? Nothing and everything. I'm getting all kinds of questions in person and over the email. Little kids run up to me and ask me to sign their decks. Shirts. Heads. Billy smiles like he's done me some big favor. My mentor guru. Like he's the good fairy and I'm Cinderella. I'm afraid midnight is just around the corner. But I don't like all this attention. I'm exposed. Naked. My cover is blown, as they say. Accidentally wearing my new pair of Van's today was a big mistake. Bad luck. A jinx. Now I'm getting it both barrels.

Seems like anytime I skate a gap or set of stairs I get black-and-blue hips. I am unable to walk for days after that. The good part is that when I stick the trick I go away totally stoked. Still I will not do the gap to backside wallride again. It is pure maniacal evil.

Elbows take the most abuse in skating. Anyone who skates knows about swellbows. Dude, what's up with those elbows? I've been pretty lucky I guess on that part. Have had my share of shinners though. Nobody gets out untouched. Weren't my safe days of Barbie doll universe just yesterday? So maybe it's time for me to get out there and talk the talk. There are some benefits I suppose. I get email form skaters I know only from the mags: Adam Taylor, Matt Field, Guru Khalsa, Danny Garcia. Awesome! All this attention makes me nervous. But I'm not like them. A pro skater. I'm just a little girl who happens to be a boarderchick. Billy tells me I'm more than that. I'm a role model, he says. Do all role models feel like they're not worth a bag of wheel sludge?

I was on Main Street looking down the street. A circular ramp went up to the stores above. A woman was walking up the circular ramp. She had her hand wrapped around a little girl's wrist. Dragged her along. The little girl kept screaming, "Stop it. Stop it." Kept tugging at the woman's arm trying to break free. The woman finally let her go. ESCAPE! The little girl sped away, leaving a dust trail behind her.

Right now I WAS that little girl. The You Tube video was the woman. Dragging me along. I didn't want it. Didn't ask for it. Billy Zee's idea. "Good to get yourself out there."

Kids ran down the circular ramp. Women dragged them back up the circular ramp. Their only crime: having too much fun.

No sponsorship offers have come through...YET. Billy says they most assuredly will.

A bit of caffeine jolt was on the Kyrie hit list so I rolled up to the Bucks and copped me a steaming mug of Joe. Later I'm standing outside Café 211, sippin' my joe and layin' low, when out of nowhere, Vanessa Torres rolls up to me like, "Yo. You're crewing up with me real quick. Let's go!"

I've never met her before. Only read about her in the paper. Easily recognizable though with that beanie and Outlaw tat on her forearm. I have no idea what "crewing up real quick" means. I followed her across the street. She starts talking about how some skank-ass chick slapped her while she was in her car. So we roll down around the street and this fat girl is pumping gas and Torres pushes this girl like, "You wanna touch me?" Pushes her then takes her board and dents the shit out of her crappy Volkswagen.

SLAAM!!!

Perfect wheel and truck imprints on the fat chick's car. Then they cuss each other out and we roll back to the Café. But the chick follows us. Torres and the girl start swinging. Then like ten of Toress's homies roll out. We're talkin skate homies, Gold's Gym homies, big man-chick homies so big their sheer size is terrifying. The fat chick must have shit her pants. She was told basically "leave or die."

I think me and Vanessa are buds now that I "crewed up" with her. Another benefit of the You Tube vid. She says she saw my video. Knew who I was. Where I hung out. Rolled in and crewed me up. I had only read about HER in the paper. A pretty big deal. She's like the new up an coming wonderchick to keep an eye on. She's totally kicking B-utt. She can even slide her skateboard down a stairway handrail where someone has welded knobs to prevent skateboarders from sliding down and totally dominate. Like who cares about stupid skate stoppers? Thudda-thudda-thudda, she goes, like: "Are you kidding me?" She's so triple wow insane!

When weird stuff like that happens, it's totally unexpected. Let's me know I'm on a Rollercoaster to Zootopia and I'd better get screwed down.

I know I sound like a five year old, complaining and all. It seems lame. What really is so bad? Who gets to meet like totally cool skater dudes-directly from the primo skate mags-and run into an up-and-coming wonderchick skater, get crewed up, stand ringside at an almost humongous brawl, and live to tell the tale like it's an everyday event? Pretty damn primo stuff. And just think; maybe one day I can get paid for this!

*****

Tag asked me to meet him at the Bucks, for a mochiato something or other. Like my total fave Macchiato, but different. Evidently the hot neo-trend coffee suicide drink. Sounded like a Poe story, "My Mochiato!" Good thing my name is not Fortunato. For our morning coffee escape I wore a skirt so short that Monique would think she saw something there, but she would be afraid to ask. There are a lot of questions Monique does not want answers to. Still, better if she doesn't know.

What she doesn't know can't hurt me.

I left the house before she could wake up from whatever drinking-making-up-with-father-girls-gone-wild night she may have had, by slipping out the rear door. I swear my life is like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, all shrouded in mystery, except my 'rents are far more clueless. Of course, Buffy only has a mother, at least that's all you ever see. In a way, again, kind of like me, Mother is always around and father is, well...NOT! And when they are in the same place at the same time there's talking and drinking and fighting and making up. EEEUW! Those four things always go together. It doesn't make any sense to me.

The rules of adult romance are very strange.

Though speaking of strange I wonder about myself. I think of things sometimes, things that seem so out there, so what the hey is wrong with you that I figure I must be either a genius or a wacko. A fine line separates the two. Like this morning I was waking up from my oh so hot almost BF dream when I spied my longboard across the room. Then my mind got to reeling. Wouldn't it be so hot cool to do it on a longboard while cruising down the boardwalk? Sun, sea, screaming birds and parents as the too real for Discovery channel scene played out in front of their reality TV saturated eyes. Maybe I'm not a genius just a sex maniac. Too much repression. But a longboard is longer, wider, stabiler-is that even a word?-and so...so...

Yeah it sounds so much better than just plain sex. But I've never had sex so what do I know? So maybe I'm not a genius but just a virgin dreamer.

Okay. Enough is enough. Get up, get dressed, and splash some cold water on yourself.

I don't know. My life is crazy and kinda wild and full of the joyness of being me. People don't get me. Really. At school I'm simply the weird girl who even the weird kids consider weird. How I ended up friends with Amelia is still a mystery to me. Perhaps she was outcast as well. She's like top of the weird fashion trend suicide girls' guild. So we totally click. So maybe it's NOT a mystery why she's my friend.

We belong together.

Two freaks in a pod.

Amelia sat back lazily in her green lawn chair. Wearing striped black SKECHERS, a white belly shirt, and loose khaki shorts, she looked like every schoolboy's dream. The boys must be preoccupied with dreamland as they were not coming forward into the world, her world, where boy meets girl and couples are made. Looking cool was all she had to keep her warm. That and her leather biker jacket.

"I was thinking. What's up with the school thing," she said as I looked up from my book. "I mean, with all these neo Nazi rules? Don't eat, don't think, don't breathe."

I looked at her in mock amazement. "Who said don't eat, don't breathe and stuff?"

Amelia blinked her eyes in an I'm-so-tired-of-life manner. "You know. Gross food served in the cafeteria, shut up and listen, do as you're told, worship your teacher. That stupid new school standards manifesto."

With one thing, I wholeheartedly agreed. "I know, like YUCH! I don't think they know how to serve any other food than that gray tasteless mush."

Amelia was the last of the old world freedom fighters. Any social injustice was primary in her mind and met with maximum rage. Even if that injustice was only perceived injustice. 'Perception is reality.' But where school was concerned, everything was a social injustice.

"I hear they are mandated by design to squash the spirit out of us. Especially if you're hyper-aware. Like spirit sucking vampires from Analtopia," said Amelia.

"Wow! Like a bad horror movie."

"Totally."

"Maybe we should..."

I was tired of this Amelia rant already. Why are we talking about this when it's like summer? So I threw a peanut at her. She adjusted her position trying to catch it in her mouth. She missed. The crafty peanut instead hit her chin.

"Heaviosity bomb. I know. Kyrie's first rule: no heavy topics before noon. It's just sometimes I think that nobody feels the way I feel."

"I feel the way you feel, dear," I said, batting my eyelashes like a psychotic butterfly.

"Oh shut up!"

I sideswiped the subject with a backhand sweep. "Now when we get back to school-and I'm not rushing things here-if we could just take care of Blodgett."

Mr. Blodgett, or Blodgie, was our science teacher, the only teacher who taught science in ninth grade. Short, wide and bald with a nose like a baboon, he took it upon himself to bludgeon his students with Science. His motto, 'I vow to command you with science,' was the torment of everyone. Bill Nye the Science Guy he was not. Entertaining with science was not enough. He was a bit on the scary side.

But his type of antics just added fuel to the ever growing bonfire. I was having a difficult time last year. Not like in junior high where everything was ridiculously easy. Maybe the freshman year was payback and sophomore year would be better. I wanted to pay it forward. Pay it forward to the end of my high school days. Just that far. Although I wouldn't mind putting payment off to the end of time. That would be great!

"Maybe Blodgie needs a girlfriend," I said. "He's single, right? I mean, I don't know, like-"

"Nurse Chalmers?"

"That old prune? Ten gazillion pounds of makeup later she looks almost human."

"Wearing it like greasepaint."

"Like the circus."

"Circus Horrible."

"Grosso the Clown."

"Okay, maybe not her."

"Love may not be in his cards," said Amelia. "How about we take some modeling clay, roll it into a ball and press a bunch of nails into it so it becomes the spiked orb of death. Launch it at him when he's sitting his bald psycho self at his desk."

My face must've lit up like Times Square on New Year's Eve, my cheeks felt totally hot, I was laughing so hard I was doubling over and grabbing at myself. "Oh my god. You're gonna make me pee!"

"You know you can get meds for that. What do they call it? Immature Bladder Disorder?"

"Real funny. This hurts you know." I felt a thunderous waterfall on the way.

"Then go to the ladies, girly. Bring back some snacks."

Amelia said this to my back as I retreated, still laughing clutching and limping along like a mangled Barbie.

"Hey! Don't forget some drinks!"

*****

Now I'm tearing up the pavement. Kicking up my jam. Throwing in the moves that until recently I had been unable to grab. I really think that being part of a team has made the difference. Like it's some kind of psychological thing. Gives me a completely different edge. It is so cool and satisfying to see a plan coming together in ways I could only before imagine.

Some difficulties loom on the horizon though.

BFs.

They are a lot of work. I used to think about boys, sure. Used to think about them to exclusion of all else. Even wanted a BF. Seems I was stuck in the wanting part for a long time and dreaming about the perfect guy before I got one. Thought it would give me something I didn't have. What I didn't realize is it would also take a fair amount of something I already had.

Time.

It's kind of like that story about when you're up to your ass in alligators it's difficult to remember that your original objective was to drain the swamp. Well that' how it is for me now. Alligators all around. Not a siphon in sight. So today Tag wanted to go the movie. A horror movie. His favorite. It's a good thing I enjoy the occasional horror flick or we'd have a failure to communicate. But at the same time, movies aside, I need to log a certain amount of skate time each day. It's part of the dedication. If I skate every day, my skating stays fresh and edgy. If I take even one day off, there' a difference. I'm not talking earth shattering difference. Just a noticeable difference. Like last week I was just getting my 360 down and on the final day it was coming to me pretty easy. Then I stopped for not one but two days. Figured a break was a good thing.

Big mistake.

When I came back I might as well have been peg leg Louie. Skated like I had just learned to walk. The taunt kept repeating in my head, "Hey, been walking long?" So I have found that even a small layoff can have an impact. Tag calls me obsessive. Says I should give myself a break. Take more time off between sessions. Maybe he thinks I'm stupid. He only wants me close so we can do more, uh, fuzzy wuzzy things together. Just today I said to him, "So, what do you wanna do." He kept looking at me with these moony eyes like he was trying to tell me something. When I couldn't take the 'please be a mind reader' game anymore I asked him again, "So, what do you wanna do."

Then he spilled, "You know what I wanna do."

"I know. I'm ignoring you."

This is one of the parts of having a BF that becomes tiring. If I spent all my time with him doing what he wants to do we would need lots of cold showers. The kissing part got my motor running enough. I was not really ready to take that next step and although Tag didn't push it I know he wanted me to leap in there with my eyes closed. I mean I totally like the kissing and hugging and close contact stuff and this seems for right now to satisfy me. When and if that changes...well, that's then. And since I'm talking about tiring distractions, it also would mean my skating would not only take the back burner, it would be entirely off the stove. Cold cooking. I can't understand how I can reach my goals that way. It's not possible. The more I apply myself to my craft, the faster I can reach my goal of mastery.

There's a theater downtown that specializes in old horror flicks. It costs only three dollars a ticket. The compromise we reach is that we would go to a movie. No short skirts and tight tops today. Three layers on top and jeans on the bottom. This will at least discourage him. Although he's not one to give up easily. He's probably thinking that once he warms me up with a movie I'll be ready to go with him to someplace more private. Oh, the games we play. But the more I run this through my mind the less chance there is of this happening.

On the boards. Down the streets. To the theater. Line, ticket booth, in we go. We steer our way through the crowd avoid the snack bar and beeline for the seats. At the back of course. It would be a few minutes before the movie so I get up to use the restroom. Tag looks up and smiles at me. I make quick business in the restroom and get back to my seat in time for the previews.

The movie, "Blood Beast From Hell," starts and the screams begin. This is always the same at this kind of movie. Like it's the same crowd each time. Professional screamers. I think some of these girls go just so they can scream. I'm not one of them. The movie goes on in the expected pattern, beautiful girl, hunky guy, big suspense, big mystery. In no time the monster arrives and it's run run run don't go in there you stupid girl that's where the monster is but they never listen. We know it's stupid and that it always ends the same way but we go anyway. Clap clap, cheer cheer, boy gets girl monster gets stomped. The movie's over and we all leave. Tag is just so much of everything I've ever imagined in a dude that it's very difficult to not give in to my animal lust. But I'm staying the course.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not unhappy with his over attention to my details, and trust me; he goes after my goodies like a bull deer in rut. It's just that a girl to has to have her principles, right?

*****

You know how sometimes you think of something you've only ever known as a concept, an idea, a thing that is so wispy and out there it's almost like a total dream and then one day out of the blue clear sky it drops down and thwaps you upside the head with a recognition of something like totally major happening, seismic shift major?

Yeah, well that's what happened to me today when I met Ned, or Nedward, the bio-dad who has existed in my thoughts only for so long I forgot whether he really existed at all. I thought maybe my childhood memories were mistaken. You know, like they say memory is not a reliable witness? Well, I'm here to tell you, he's real, he's alive, and right now I'm not sure if any of these things is a good thing.

When I look at pictures of the days of stoner beginnings, like the '50s or '60s, I see dudes with long hair, open or no shirts, jeans, sandals, and an overall slouchy walk. I've always thought that was just something for those times. Only. Not something that carried over into the present. But then again, even in the '70s the stoners kinda looked like that, like the next generation.

The point being when I met Ned and saw that he looked exactly like dudes did in those old so last century stoners I felt like I had tripped through a wormhole and stepped into another dimension.

It seems old Cuppa Joe is the collection point for the old time stoner crowd. Didn't know this till Tag took me here. News to me. So you can imagine how I felt when out of the blue this dude is at the counter talking to the barista, talking life stuff, talking heavy stuff, and he whips out his wallet and shows a picture of his kid, a girl, a girl that looked a heck of a lot like me. Now, I wasn't like all stalker I'm-on-ya-like-white-on-rice but he was real close to me and it was just a look to the left when I saw the picture in his hand. I must've turned three sheets of white. After all this time THIS is how we connect?

"Hi. My name is Kyrie."

I mean, it was like freaky weird. I was so stunned that I must have looked like a total 'tard. But I couldn't help it. The moment had finally arrived and caught me with my hand in the cookie jar.

He looked at me and shrugged, "Cool. Got me a daughter goes by that name. It's wild that I-"

"Dude! Ned! I'm that girl, your daughter. That picture you got in your hand is me. You don't remember me?"

Now he looked scared, panicked, like I'd just accused him of rape. He bristled, shook his head, ran his hand over his face like he was trying to wipe away the cobwebs then looked me straight in the eyes, real deep like. And in that moment I think he came to himself.

Things MIGHT have went down that way but here's what really happened.

I was strolling into Cuppa Joe looking for my usual macchiato blast. I took a seat at the counter and dug into my luscious cuppa brew. At a corner table were a group of guys, maybe three or four, and one guy, a lean scraggly haired I guess you could call him "scruffy dude" was standing with his back to me his arms waving his mouth wagging stuff to the group like he was delivering a lecture. Like a professor.

I tuned them out and sipped my cuppa fantastico and was feeling muy bueno. Totally drifting into my dealio. But the words kept creeping in. Didn't want to listen. But the words kinda demanded it.

Don't know why. Just did.

"The baboon has the same total sleep time and total REM sleep time as the guinea

pig. The long-living elephant has one of the shorted sleep times whereas the long-living bat has one of the longest sleep times. So I'm thinking we have a paradox in their disparity. My theory doesn't mean that significant things don't happen in sleep - it just means there is no vital universal function for sleep."

Yeah he was professor sleep talker. Talking about sleep and sleep patterns in like monkeys and bats and blah de blah de blah. This dude sure loved to hear his own voice.

Thought he was gonna launch into some deep Einstein theory like "E=mc Wasted" which might help him mellow out a bit.

The music had relaxed into the kind of set that if you were already tired would put you out cold. But after getting recharged with a good cuppa I was ready to rock.

I got up and took off toward the door and I don't know what happened, could never have predicted something so corny and goofy, my pigeon feet crossed and suddenly I'm a pigeon doing a face-plant into the windshield. Only this windshield was Mr. Professor's back. OUCH!

"Hey, hey. Are you okay? I'm sorry I must have been moving into your way and-"

"Ned? DAD?? What are...wha...wha...Oh my god!"

I went into total meltdown and he just backed away like I was a killer. And in that simple action this scene went from OMG incredible to WTF is going on.

But that didn't happen either. I walked in and recognized him and we hugged like we were disaster rescues then held each other at arm's length with expansive gazing followed by big sighs. You might think it's kinda weird I just went right out and hugged this guy I hadn't seen in like 10 years. But I knew. The minute I looked into those eyes, that face, that jaw line, a face so familiar I knew it like my own, there was nothing holding me back. Nothing. He was a bit shocked when this cute young girl comes out of nowhere and starts hugging him and chattering away. Maybe he thought he got lucky.

But reconnections do not go as smooth as they show on TV. There was still so much ground to cover. So I let him do the talking since I was too blissed out to say anymore. I only asked him about two things I had always wanted to know. His answers were straight from the hip and not fit for the kiddies.

About Monique:

"I really loved her. The most all around beautiful lady I know. You should've seen her in the day. Smokin' baby! You know it. To all them other saps who fell into the poison pond I say, sucker now man. I'm sure she still looks great."

About any women and possible unknown kids/sibs for me:

"I'm just gonna tell ya straight so if you're easily offended I apologize now. I got around but I was no lounge lizard. Just took 'em as they came along. So, yeah, maybe. Who knows? I mean. There's probly some out there somewhere. It was the seventies, man! Wild times! Guys and girls just kinda took it light and boogied along. Hell, hangin' and bangin' were totally connected, ya know? Couldn?t have one without the other. Just the datin' scene in the poisonous Disco days. So many chicks just up and disappeared, took off, trippin' in the tulips of lulu land. I remember this one chick, strange mind trippin' chick who loved to screw like no tomorrow until one day she picked up her Gibson acoustic and high tailed it to India. She says to me with a mournful droop to her eyes, "Maybe we'll meet again." I just looked at her and said "I hope not." Guess that killed any possible come back arounds. Is there a kid in there? Maybe. Don't know. Can't say. If you ask me what I think I say HELL YEAH there's a kid in there. Why the hell else would you out of the blue split with some "goin' to India to find myself" bullshit! Yeah, she was looped but not totally stupid. If I wanted to find her I suppose I could. Yeah, go surfin' bigtime on the infobahn. I suppose you kids call it the electronic highway. Dig it!"

Okay, so in a few quick news reels he spills about loving Monique, compliments her "great looks," then red light district rewinds for me his grubby love life acting oh so casual about dumping my mother when she was pregnant with me then going forth to multiply who knows how many times.

I think bio-dad is a total DOG!

"So you just up and leave my mother when you found out she was pregnant? What's up with that?!"

He's looking at me like I just slapped him with a baboon paw. Jaw hanging open and everything. Yeah, it's cliché but totally him.

"When I told you about those chicks takin' off to who knows where for who knows what so mysteriously without another word? Well, she was one of them. By the time I knew you were toddling around. Man oh man it was a real trip. My daughter from mystery land. Dig it!"

"So why didn't you stay then?"

"Whoa! Look, man. That wasn't my bag and Monique knew it. Having kids was something I, uh, wouldn't say she set out to do but she wouldn't turn away either if she found out she was pregnant, you know? Like she was heading there the whole time. But she knew I had other plans. Traveling with my band and all. My world and kids did not gel. So, there it is."

"Even after you saw cute little me toddling around you didn't like totally melt?"

"Oh, I melted all right. Melted like a soft serve cone then melted right out the door. I've been melting away ever since. It took me the longest time to forgive her."

OMG! He might as well spear me and stick me with fork. I thought seeing him after all these years would help to set the record straight on what happened with him and Monique causing them to part ways and all. And I guess he did clear me up on that. But not at all in any way I'd expected. So Monique got preggo, took off, and the next thing he knows I'm a toddler? Whoa! This had gotten mucho heavy.

"I don't get the 'forgive her' business."

"Oh. She left out a few parts of the story. Short and sweet; yes we were together, yes she took off, but NO I did not know she was pregnant till she found me and popped it on me so many years later. Now how do you think that felt? Hello Ned, say hello to your daughter. Talk about buzzkill."

From buzzkill to soul crusher. What a monster compression of my whole life. This has not been a banner day in the life of Kyrie Elias. Evidently he and Monique had a "don't ask, don't tell" relationship. Just maintaining eye contact with him was incredibly difficult. I was disgusted by his weakness and really happy to see him.

Tears pressed at the corners of my eyes and my stomach felt ready to cut loose. In a few short minutes the joys of reconnection were bludgeoned into misconnection. Looked like this connection was lost in transit.

"Hmm... sucks to be me," I choked out, trembling like a scared bird. "Time for this buzzkill to party on. Later...much."

Didn't even get to question number two, other women in his life and step-sibs. But really, after the meltdown turned smackdown I had with him I can't say I care too much to know anymore. One thing for sure: I won't be coming to Cuppa Joe again.

*****

Swing low sweet chariot. Having someone in your life who's not in your life suddenly come around and go face to face with you and almost toe to toe, you're never really sure how to feel. This is like my dad, my real dad, aka bio-dad. Now Nedward monsterly blew me away with his doggish ways but still he's my dad, right? Cut him some slack.

But still, short leash is best.

My life has never been anything short of crazy and is probably about to get a whole lot crazier. I'm currently living hoping and praying I might actually get into a competition soon. Although it's not looking so likely.

So the Nedward moment of horror put me into a taking-stock-of-self mood. I'm seriously obsessed with macchiatos, Mexican food and Panda Express mmm (haha), instant gratification, and having a plan. I over-plan and over-stress about everything. Sometimes I don't know how to relax, but most of the time I'm pretty laid back.

I love skating, my friend, and scary movies in the dark! I talk WAY WAY too fast; I use the word "LIKE" so much it's obnoxious.

I truly believe that all things happen for a reason and confidence is everything you need to get you anywhere you want. I've recently learned that trusting everyone and being too nice is never an option; I'm extremely motivated to succeed in life.

I will do all I can to put this "oh so skanky" meeting with bio-dad behind me. Way behind.

If I was looking for a reason to get totally bummed in a big way, old bio-Ned got it done. Did I even matter to him? Was I just some inconvenience that one of his "oh so lucky" girlfriends brought home like so much cabbage? If I died right now I would leave behind a world of nothing, a world that barely remembers me being here. Kyrie, the girl nobody wanted.

Oh happy day.

*****

The next day I can't stand myself anymore and decide to go outside. Take a walk through the neighborhood. Do something. Anything. Long drawn faces in the mirror have worn me out.

I think Henry's got his nephew or grandson or someone visiting him. I keep seeing this like ten year old boy wandering his front yard, examining leaves on the juniper bushes, scooping up dirt and generally-from the looks of it-content in his isolation.

In my quest to be a kinder gentler me, I walked over to him to say hey.

"Hey, my name's Kyrie. I live down the street. I just thought I'd-"

"I like trucks."

I rolled with it.

"Trucks. That's cool."

He looked at my feet then scanned up to my shoulders then looked around my head then into and through my eyes.

"My mother sends me postcards."

Geez this kid's all over the place. Too much sugar?

"Postcards. Wow. Is she traveling or something?"

"Lots of holes. Lots of holes. Truck digs lots of holes."

I was beginning to feel like I had crossed a time portal and was being mocked in the 4th dimension by little people just like this kid. Maybe stopping was not one of my greatest ideas. I'd change the subject.

"So is like Henry your grandfather or something."

He stopped, actually stopped fidgeting and looked at me intensely like he was seeing me for the first time. Suddenly I felt scared. Was this kid going to like attack me?

"Ha ha, ha ha, ha ha...."

His eyes lit up and he started laughing like a loon. This kid really cracked himself up. Unless he was laughing at ME in which case I would smack him! Sometimes taking the "I'll be nice" way is not so wonderful. It looks like I'd have to ask Henry about this kid.

"Oh, I see you've met my grandson, Benny," Henry piped in from the porch. "I was hoping he would make friends while he stayed here and now he's met you. Great!"

"I like her Grandpa. She has big mountains."

I didn't consider myself big at all. In fact I considered myself a bit unfairly lacking in that department. But to Benny I suppose I was what, the Grand Tetons?

Henry's face flushed and his eyebrows shot straight up.

"No Benny. Do not say she has big mountains. You say she's a nice girl."

"She's a nice girl."

"Now tell her."

Benny walked closer to me and with a blank face so open and innocent he looked like and infant said to me, "She's a nice girl."

"No, Benny. You tell her-you're a nice girl."

"You're a nice girl."

"He takes commands quite well. Like a little robot."

This comedy duo was odd but somehow intriguing. It was obvious Benny was not all there but I wasn't sure if asking just HOW he wasn't there was the right thing to do. Then as if reading my mind, Henry began speaking as if continuing a conversation in progress.

"Yes, Benny is a special child. A very special autistic child. A child lacking the ability to distinguish the social cues we take for granted as well as meeting people and the appropriate and inappropriate behavior. You've probably heard people rave about how children are so totally honest? In the extreme it's not entirely desirable. We don't have to be cruel and totally blunt, but we have to convey information honestly. The paradox here is that if you are 100% honest and blunt, like Benny tends toward quite naturally, you will not be a popular person. Honesty is the best policy. But it's not a perfect policy. Of course, I cannot teach this to Benny in such detail. I have to give him object lessons so that when he responds inappropriately I correct him by telling him his response was incorrect then provide him a correct one. It's a lot of work, I know. But it's worth it. He's really a sweet kid."

"Sounds like it. A lot of robot training work, ha ha. Does he go to school around here?"

"No. He and his mother, my daughter Nita, live in Portland. With her so busy with her international translator work she has precious little time to provide Benny with the structure he desperately needs. He's enrolled in a very fine resource program for special needs children back at home. He's with me visiting due to a scheduling snafu my daughter ran into with her caregiver. A very sweet French lady. So, Benny will be with me for a week or two."

"That's cool I guess."

"I'm happy to see my grandson in any case. Skating today?"

"Don't know. I think so but I'm just getting going today. You know, just hangin' around checkin' it out."

"Marvelous! Since you seem to be in no rush to go anyplace, how about joining me on the porch for some ice tea? It's not often I get company. Besides Benny that is."

"Uhm, I don't know it's just-"

"You know me well enough by now to know I don't bite. C'mon!"

Henry stomped his foot on the porch in marching tempo to accompany my steps up into porch land. And like robot boy Benny, I picked up the rhythm, marched in left right left time and suddenly I was up on the porch looking downstairs at the little boy having his front yard adventures. The neighborhood looked crazily different from up here. Like everything that had become so familiar and near invisible day by day now looked oddly foreign and menacing. This is the street I walk skate and run along every day? Maybe the air was drugged up here.

As if magically a sauna sized pitcher appeared and we were swigging it down like it was going out of style. I had forgotten how refreshing a sweet ice tea was on a hot day. Like getting a waterfall blast on a desert afternoon.

"So, you say you're just moseying along today. Sounds very 'casual' as you say. And relaxing. Taking a break sometimes is good. Then you'll be okay with me needing to beg off lessons for a week, maybe two. It's well...you know. Grandson here, little time. I just need to be here when angel needs me."

Aww, how nice. Calling Benny his little angel. I could tell by the way he looked at his grandson that he loved him like a pigeon loves a french fry. If he was telling me we'd reached the last performance of this play, then fine by me. I went off a long time ago with Billy Zee anyway and I was learning some major stuff so no big. Really.

I've got a lot of sorting out to do.

*****

After spending some time with Henry and his rather interesting grandson Benny, I've become so majorly aware of the oddities in children's growth that usually go unnoticed till it's maybe too late.

Looking at half-sib Jackson playing with other half-sib Molly, paying close attention to his stiff robotic movements and listening to the thing I usually find hilarious except today. When he tries to get his mouth around saying his name he says Dakson. And I don't forget to remember he started speaking only something like three months ago. Now I don't know for sure but that sounds a bit late to me. Like delayed development? Like maybe we have the beginnings of Benny II here?

Wow! I'm just hypersensitive now to something that may be nothing at all. Not that I'm gonna run off and shout it from the rooftops or go around telling Mo and Larry. Just a little "stay close" thing I'll keep to myself for the time.

Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk.

Enough time dealing with other things that have nothing to do with getting me prepped for the Seaside which was in something like two weeks. I mean mostly I'm good just need to spend more time working on my flow, my street jam, and overall tranny variations. If I mix it up enough I might actually have a winning routine. The words of Henry pop into my head, "routines, routines, routines." Learn them like I was a trained puppy. I guess that's just his way. Leave nothing to chance. I can dig it. To a point. I still like the random off the lip variations that happen all on their own when you've got enough board time behind you. Feeling pretty good there. Still, never can be good enough, right? The Seaside is going to pit us locals against a whole slew of not locals who will definitely give us a run for our wheels.

Now that I'm actually on the D-Boyz team I get to hang out at the D-Bowl and kick it up with the boyz direct like. Last time I came here I got in a quick fly around with Skeeter who for all his goin'-to-see-the-Wizard-for-a-brain antics sure can cut it up like a master jammer. That went well too. Real well. Chug even jumped in for a few go rounds. And it stayed pretty smooth until the master of disaster, Patch, showed up to spread his dark cloud of grim reality. He barked and chided and mocked and challenged and essentially did everything in his power to break us down. That's how I saw it. For all I know he sees himself as the General Patton of skate.

Today's boppin' and poppin' skate session is brought to you by Foo Boy, Asian wonder boy of the silent tongue. You never quite know where you stand with him. The first time I met him he didn't say much. Now he says even less. Still, when he gets down to business there's no doubt of his killer skills. Better to just stand back and watch him fly. Kinda accidentally taught me a thing or two just by watching him take the lip. A matter of hugging in real tight pulling up your board and spinning smooth for the turn around. Typically I did a variation of that that was not flawless in execution. A bit floppy and sloppy. But with this new technique-which may not be so new but NEW to me-I've got a better handle on my lip work.

You know, a young skater girl can learn a lot from slightly older skater boys. I've made it my mission to learn as much as I can from these guys just by watching. Already my flow is riding solid as rails. And there may be a few things jumping into this easy slider girl personality. Tag, that's one of them and Tag again, and then finally...uh...Tag again? I think Kyrie girl is obsessed. What happened to the Kyrie girl obsession with boards? Missing in action?

This is me thinking this telling myself to take it light but I know I'm insistent on doing things my way so it will be a long struggle. And just the fact that I'm doing this makes me ask myself...When did I start talking to myself?

Okay, I admit I've been distracted. Totally. But my jam is way high wire. Staying on the lay-low does not take me out of the game. I'm in this game now, and will stay in it till I get the celebrity the sponsorships the traveling the TOTAL SKATER GIG. Go right on in and crew up with my skater girl compadres. All those who have arrived there before me. And this I'm no entirely sure about. If groups of skater girls are as bad as or worse than groups of skater guys, then territorialism is rabid and raging. So on that approach I'll wait and see. Still, I do dream of getting to the top of this sport that is more than sport to me but a philosophy of unrivaled freedom.

I've been talking with Tag about our lives, our dreams. One day I'm going to have a massive skate commune where everyone hang, jams, parties, puts on tribal makeup and dance around in grass skirts and shirts made from flowers. Total peace and harmony where we make like Snow White and commune with nature. Talk to birds and bees and ride on the backs of Dolphins. .I don't know if we can find such a place, but it sure keeps our motors running.

Tag and I will have our own room and sleep in a sleeping bag made out of local plants.

Or we'll stay living in the city and hang out at all the parks and go total like celebrity hoity-toity look at us we're great skaters and take advantage of the perks of celebrity. Like free gear, invitations to great parties where people actually bring things beside themselves, wild road trips, rallies where we throw ourselves behind causes for the skating community and it actually means something because we're like HUGE, mondo kisses from major cute guys that Tag won't mind because he's the only one that leaves with me.

Or maybe, everything will happen at once in ways so random and off the lip we'll be caught entirely by surprise and that too would be cool. I guess I'm just impatient for life to get off its butt and move this party along.

*****

A big change of life couldn't have happened quickly enough for me with my unexpected bio-smackdown. I guess I was so stunned I lost track of time.

Suddenly there I was. The sign ups for Seaside Competition were in process. Forms had been passed around and each contestant needed to put their names-their birth names that is-on the forms with parental signature for minors. Being that some members of DB&G were minors, a stamp of parental approval was needed. For some of them, the particulars of forms and standards were more of an interrogation. Parents had already signed and the boys were just now adding their information.

It was a bit of work to get Monique to agree to sign the forms. She was pushing herself to jump on my train. I mean, this stuff was not for girlz, right? Step dad Larry of course was a big help in this. He smiled at me, put his hand on my shoulder and said, "Good Job." I wasn't quite sure what he was referring to so I just smiled and said, "Thanks." I wasn't going to rock the boat.

"This is such bork! Why do I have to put my 'birth name.' Nobody calls me that," said Patch waving his form in front of him like trying to swat a fly.

Skeeter grabbed the swatting hand and looked at the form. "Oh, you mean no one calls you Jeffrey, Jeffrey Winkleman?"

A chorus of hah hahs invaded the surrounding air. "Let me see your form, smart ass," said Patch. He grabbed a form from the pile. "This is your form, Skeeter. I can tell by your kindergarten style writing. Or should I say, Claude Crapper."

Now the reading of forms turned into a game of hard-edged mockery. Hands flew in every direction seizing forms in an effort to stop intruding eyes. A sort of football pile up happened. None of the boys were happy with their birth names, so the adoption of 'street' names. Happier less at the prospect of hearing their birth names blasted over the PA system.

"Maybe Tag doesn't mind so much. With a name like Mick Reynolds he sounds like a rock star," said Chug, a.k.a. Harley Squirrel.

"Yeah, it's cool," said Mick. "But I still like Tag better."

"Looks like we're skaters with totally dork names," said Skeeter.

"And don't forget about our new skater girl, Kyrie Elias," said Chug. "Now that there is a totally happenin' name."

An event official walked into the room and conversation screeched to a halt. He looked at the inquiring faces peering at him as if we were trying to understand what manner of man would make a skater provide his birth name. Whether or not we were thinking this, he wasn't sure. But he had been there before. Street riders were very protective of their 'real' names.

Grabbing the pile of forms, he looked them over quickly, no doubt making certain that all information was complete. He held up one form and waved it at us. "Who is Edward Balls?"

Muffled laughter erupted. I held my tongue still feeling like a stranger to this crowd. A rider from another team tentatively stepped forward. "I am," he said.

"I guess someone else but us drew the short straw," mumbled Chug.

The official had indeed been here before and took great pleasure in turning the screws. "Well, Mr. Balls, is it? It would seem the parental signature field is blank. As your birth date places you below the age of emancipation a parental signature is required."

The boy looked at him with a hangdog expression of defeat. "I know, but they won't sign. They say I...well...-"

"Whatever the case may be, Mr. Balls, no signature, no competition? Please remove this form from my sight," said the official, stuffing the offensive paper into the boy's hands. "Whoever may be members of the team wherein Mr. Balls is part, be advised that you must now submit a change in roster form to the judging committee."

Skeeter leaned over and stage whispered to Patch, "This sucks, man, bagging on that dude like that. Mr. comb-over gay mustache is a total asshole!"

"Don't worry," said Patch. "I'm on it."

"Hey, Mr. whoever. All this dude needs is a sig from the 'rents?

The official looked at Patch with a question mark face. "A sig from the rents, did you say? And what precisely does this odd construction mean?"

"Oh sorry," said Patch. "You would say, 'parental signature,' sig from the 'rents to us."

"Yes. All this 'dude,' Mr. Balls needs is a parental signature to complete the form. And you are?"

With a smirk and a pfff Patch said, "I am a skater. We are legion."

"Whatever and whomever you are, if you wish to take up with Mr. Balls that's yours to bear. Have the completed form returned by noon tomorrow or Balls is out!"

Skeeter started chuckling. "Balls out. You gotta admit that shit's funny."

"Yeah, it's funny, dude. But not the way our new bud here was treated. Mr.....uhm, what is your name anyway? Street name I mean?"

"Street name's Shred, on account of it rhymes with Ed, my birth name. I used to be called Ed the shred, now it's just Shred."

"Okay then Shred," said Patch. "Let's see about getting this form signed."

Patch went over to the sign in table and grabbed a pen. "So which parent's name should we put on this form?"

Shred looked perplexed. "We can't sign this form. It needs to be my parents. I mean-"

"Look dude. They didn't sign it right? If you want in just tell me which name to put. It's all good."

An uneasy tension settled in the room as Shred debated the grand decision. It was only too obvious he wanted to be in the competition. But without a parent signature he was out. The moral complexity must've weighed on him like a Mack truck. He looked frozen in fear. Like the big hand of terror was grabbing him by the throat.

I could see Patch was losing his moment of generosity. "Look, dude. Out or in?"

In a flash the decision was clear to him. No turning back. "Yeah, sign my Dad's name. Tadmore Balls III."

Chug leaned in and whispered a bit too loud for privacy to Tag, "The III even.! Three poor saps!"

This business of the muy embarrassing names would without a doubt linger in the record books of D-Boyz history, trotted out repeatedly when a good example of it could be worse was needed, followed of course by a rousing session of gut busting laughter. Mockery was an art form with these guys. A genuine treasure trove of respect inspiring smack downs. When a smack down session began, somebody was going way way down, badly burned into red faced shame. Okay, this was ruthless BS. But these were boys, D-Boyz. And Boyz will be Boyz.

And Girlz will be Girlz cuz we rule! Yeah, go get 'em DB&G!

*****

A crack echoed across San Diego's Seaside Skate Park and was absorbed by the crowd. The usual assortment of contest types was present. It was easy to spot the skaters as they walked around with a posture and attitude that spoke of irreverence. In the crowd were the all too typical laughers, squealers, shouters, and cheerers. Then there were the expected skateboarding groupie types or 'skate skanks' as boarders would say. I had no interest in any of this extraneous goings on.

I was there to skate.

The Seaside Competition was in full stride, going down like capitalist clockwork. Pepsi was sponsoring the event, as were three other large corporations. Plenty of advertising opportunities to their target demographic. Everybody on the team was sporting the appropriately emblazoned sponsor specific advert clothing. Some riders complained that the shirts were too nerdy, not skateboarderish, not crazy and wild. Others stayed quiet, untrue to the unwritten skateboarder mantra of "IN YOUR FACE!" I fell somewhere in the middle; not quite caring for the shirt, or outfit, but happy to be part of my first competition, which I was told would not be considered just any competition but a regional competition. A regional? Already? This was HUGE! I don't know. Am I good enough for this? With dreams as big as mine it took a lot more than a stupid shirt to burst my balloon.

But a regional?! Ohmigod!

By the time the competition began in earnest, the general feel of the event was of a circus on drugs. A hyperactive sea of wide-eyed young fans and media heavy advertisers erupted in a powerful tsunami, each ripple at one side met by an equally strong counter ripple from the other. A real physics lesson.

Like Mr. Blodgett taught.

As my performance time approached I found I was becoming nervous at the prospect. Performing in front of all these people, and on TV, was a bit more intimidating than performing in front of the skateboarders I hung out with. I thought if I could just maintain I would have a chance at placing. But with each passing second it seemed a bigger and bigger IF.

Trying to center myself, I remembered back to the time I first got on a board and could feel the excited fear that ran through my little body. Going forward to the present here I was in the midst of a big, really big competition. I was again the terrified and excited little girl. Maybe remembering this right now was not a good idea.

Is this how Rodney Mullen felt when he started?

The questions collapsed and would go unanswered as the names were called.

"And now, appearing for the first time with team DB&G, KYRIE ELIAS!!"

A stunned silence ran through the crowd like wildfire. Guys looked at me confused; girls gave shrugs of "whatever." This was a momentous happening, this girl rider skating in a field of boys.

I sailed into the pipe in a fog. At the outer perimeter of my consciousness I could hear the murmuring and surprised sounds coming from the crowd, a few boos thrown in too. But mostly I just felt numb and lighter than air as if nothing could stop me. Up and over, up and over. Each flip catching more air. My free styling was explosive. When I went up for the vertical back flip with a tweak the crowd cheered. It felt like seconds had passed when I was suddenly blazing into the end of my routine. Whirling into the pipe I finished up with a Backside/Frontside 360° Kickflip in honor of Rodney Mullen. Then I bowed, carved, and skated into oblivion.

What happened next was a blur, a running film where speed was erratic. I would remember only that I was excited, enthralled, exasperated. And stunned.

When I saw Patch sail into his final vertical, look directly at the cameras and grab his crotch, I thought I was hallucinating. But no. Not a hallucination as Patch would later tell me:

"That was one for the man! He can bite me!"

Typical Patch, rebel without a pause. So his little message to the straight world did not go unnoticed and the message from the judges was given with swift prejudice.

"Because of Jeffrey Winkleman's obscene and unsportsmanlike act he is disqualified. First place goes to Kyrie Elias!"

What?! In one fell swoop I was taken from a barely on the map 2nd place to a firmly on the map 1st first place. In a simple act of defiance my first win was achieved.

I wasn't sure whether to jump for joy or be sad for Patch.

"It's cool, babe. You nailed it. They can still BITE ME. One day we'll own our own team! These corporate bloodsuckers are killing the sport. We have to take it back!"

Seeing Tag, thinking Tag, anything Tag had been causing me to go into a whirl. I had been fine before, a little lonely maybe, but straight up and focused. Now my world had again tilted on its axis. What to do next I was unsure, didn't spend a lot of time thinking about it.

All I could say is my life is crazier than it had ever been.

Time flew fast as a bullet train. Already, since my win at the regional, Peralta was approaching me about sponsorship. My mother was handling the particulars, haggling with the attorneys, you know, the boring adult stuff. But I just laid back, toked on a doob and let it all set in. I had made an impression on the skateboarding world. What were they saying? Skateboarding's Joan of Arc, the tireless warrior, an icon for all girls?

I didn't see myself as any of these things. There were other female skaters, Lyn Z Adams, Elissa Steamer. And girls are being born every day. They're out there placing their pretty bodies on boards of all kinds; flying through the air, crashing down, competing, and killing streets, pools, and pipes-just like the boyz! I'm just a girl with a dream. Nothing special.

When asked by a reporter for the Los Angeles Times what I considered my edge, my secret to success if you will, I said, "Oh, I'm just doing my thing." Humble as a bunny, they all said. I guess it was this humble demeanor that evidently endeared me to the world. After this interview it was mentioned again and again. Most people would think that after a major milestone like being the top rated new female skateboarder and competing to take 1st place in the Seaside would be enough to make anybody's head swell like a helium balloon. But not me. I had big dreams, no doubt, but not a big ego.

This was the event that set things in motion. Many performances followed. Some big, some not so big. In fact, my oft repeated, "Just doing my thing," became my career catch phrase, was slapped over all merchandising, shirts, boards, shoes, the works along with my likeness in some key instances. The bullet train was in motion. Another grand event where I pleased all by just "doing my thing" had a regular musicality to it.

It was said of me that mine was a wisdom hard won by logging vast amounts of board time. Questions found their way to me like always, and my answers were by now so typical of me, I guess, the media termed it classic Kyrie:

"If a little girl who idolized you wanted to be a skate pro just like you, what would your advice to her be?"

"Push with your back foot and bend your knees; don't stick your ass out."

Yet amongst all the easy smiles, good will, and generosities, I also have the unenviable chance to despair of darker happenings:

But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.-James 3:8

In an online blog I posted: "Haters come out of the wood work! They spread hate about you, your family and your friends like mad. That is a very new to me. I just can't figure out why people hate on people they don't know."

*****

Local Skateboarder Dies after fall at Skate Park

By: The Daily Pilot

Huntington Beach-Popular skateboarder Mick Reynolds died from a head injury he suffered when his helmet fell off during a California demonstration. Mick (Tag) Reynolds, 18, was demonstrating a maneuver to a group of young skaters at 3 p.m. Saturday when he fell in the skating bowl, an expanse 10-to-12 feet deep. "Reynolds, who was wearing a helmet at the time, either did not properly secure the strap on his helmet or was wearing one that did not fit," said Huntington Beach Police Chief Henry Fromm.

The helmet came off during the fall, causing massive head injury.

Reynolds lost consciousness shortly after the accident and was flown to UCI Medical Center, where he died Monday.

Jeffrey (Patch) Winkleman, a skater friend, said many of Reynolds' peers in the skating community wanted to find a way to memorialize him.

"He's definitely large in the skating community," Winkleman said. "We're going to miss him. He was pretty responsible for growing this sport in Huntington Beach."

The accident is the first death at the 30,000-square-foot Thunderpark, which opened last August.

*****

When it finally sank in that my one-and-only-made-my-world-spin BF had died, the sky did come tumbling down. I was Chicken Little running for cover. The sadness was so powerful, so deep, so all consuming I didn't know if I would ever recover. Even looking at my board, thinking about anything 'skater' brought the darkness in so strong I couldn't breathe.

Looking in the mirror I saw a hollow broken little girl that used to be a very different me.

I threw myself into-read that dove into-my bed and hid my head under my pillows. Maybe I'd be found dead. Like Sylvia Plath.

A big huge major can't-even-say-for-sure-how-much part of me had died with Tag. All we had, our love, our dreams, our...everything. There was just no way over or out of this place. Monique tried her best to offer me words of wisdom that for her I'm sure said it all. But even this extreme counseling failed to do anything but make me feel more cold and alone than I have ever felt.

Misery thy name is Kyrie.

Every breath echoed in my empty heart. When Amelia found out what had happened, she was as helpful as she could be I guess. Sitting with me, holding my head as I cried, crying with me sometimes, comforting me in ways that only a true friend could.

Death stuns and confuses the fifteen year old mind.

For days I moped around the house. The poster child for teen angst. My drawn face and droopy eyes looked as if I had near died of starvation. I kept looking in the mirror to gauge the effect.

Yep. Looked like shit!

I continued along shrouded in my cocoon of crisis misery. Father was obliviously glued to sports TV and Mother remained glued to Zelda, our suddenly rescued from the street cat. I roamed from room to room, the specter of death, a revolving scene from Dawn of the Dead.

I went to my bedroom window and looked out. Next door the twins were playing swim games with a trash can. They would fill it waist high then climb into it. Then they would jump and splash and hoot like monkeys. Their cheerfulness was annoyingly cheerful. I kept my face pressed against the window hoping they would see me and stop. No such luck. They did give me and idea though. What if I filled a trashcan, a big gazillion gallon one, with water and...

Oh puhleez! That's pathetic. You're going to drown yourself in a trashcan? Why not the traditional bathtub drowning? Better yet, why not flush your head down the toilet. Yeah, all stupid ideas. But I was desperate.

I'll take a triple serving of melodrama please for 200.

I remember the time I had been at a lake by our cabin in the mountains and watched a girl drown. She flopped and splashed and carried on like she was having quite the time. By the time she decided she was drowning and started to scream, a choked, terrifying kind of scream, people started running over flapping their arms and calling to her. How stupid can you be? By the time one of the assembled brainiacs decided it was serious and somebody should go in after her, she had disappeared under the water. An eerie silence stuck like crazy glue. Murmurings, cussings, recriminations, action. Time slows to a crawl in a crisis. It might have taken only minutes to drag her lifeless body from the water but it seemed like hours. I sat frozen to my spot as if nailed down. The girl was reduced to a bluish something that barely looked human. Death by drowning was ugly.

Not for me.

What could we possibly do to make things right again? Amelia tried. Monique tried. We all tried. But after they left, feeling that for sure I had turned a corner, I dropped right back into the slump that told me in no uncertain terms, "You will never be free!"

Now I wear black because that's how I feel inside. This describes me and appeals to me. Black is my color of choice. If somebody comes up with a darker color than black, I'll wear it. Black goes with everything.

By Monday I am still in my Sylvia Plath Dawn of the Dead mode but I feel good enough to drag myself out of bed and go outside.

Of course I have to first go through the parental gauntlet.

"How do you feel today honey?"

"Fine."

"What's wrong with your eyes?"

"Nothing."

As if I didn't feel bad enough. Look. When you don't leave your room, don't bathe, eat your meals in there, lay about in slothful slump, after a couple of days the place becomes smelly. As much as I loathe admitting it, smelly was following me everywhere. Not a brother. Not a BF. Me. My own personal stench cloud. Like Pigpen in Charlie Brown. I swear the paint was starting to peel from the walls in revolt.

So, into the bath. Sink. Hair products. Makeup. Clothing. A new me was born. Popped out of the makeover toaster. Did I look any different? I don't know. Can't be the judge of that. Though I did feel different. Somehow.

Amelia saw the difference and gave me the double thumbs up, a full mouth smile thrown in as a bonus.

"Cool shoes. You just get those?"

"What-ev. Like they're old as dust?"

"Oh. Still cool though. Maybe you should wear old stuff more often." She sounded genuinely pleased with her observation.

Sitting on a park bench in Central Park, bundled tight against the chill autumn squalls, warm in Tag's favorite hoody, I felt a small bit of relief. His scent was still fresh on his favorite hardly-ever-removed-it piece of clothing. Wrapped up like this I felt like I was once again in his arms, the hollowness of his departure not as sharp. But still there were things that would not allow me peace. A massacre of crows scrabbled in front of me, hammering beaks at scavenged bits of trash. Even the commonplace things brought grim reminders today.

If my soul were expressed in colors, it would be coal black.

The world of reverberating polyurethane wheels ripping along the pavement and shouts of joy piercing the sky was reduced to a silence more deafening than any I had ever known. Laughter seemed a distant memory.

Tag had been more, more to me than I realized. A first love was not supposed to be so immersive, so complete, so perfect. Yet it was and now it was gone.

A cruel twist of fate had intervened.

I resolved that this was the way great loves were intended to be. Powerful, swift, and fleeting. A love so intense it would flame out and die if subjected to the daily drudgery of everyday life. Heartbroken, I chose solitude over community. In myself I saw the image of a blossoming young woman crushed beyond repair, maybe never to return.

The clouds raced across the August sky making their way to darkness, a darkness that was to be my only comfort.

Time crept by...

*****

"Baby, I'm just cleaning up the garage and I found some stuff lying around and it looks like something you might want. A necklace or something? I don't know. I'll just put it on your bed and you can have a look at it."

Monique was in one of her might-as-well-clean-house-while-I'm-home moods, a state she drifted into pretty much always since being laid off. Sometimes she just sat around and stared at the wall as if the answer to her employment problems were written on the wall. Or she was mesmerized by the clouds in her coffee like she was looking for enlightenment or something. I'd rather she stay cleaning 'cause that other stuff just PO'd her in a big way.

So she had a chance to see a lot of me since I self-grounded myself and pretty much stayed indoors anymore. From the living room I could look out the windows if I wanted to and see life go by. But I didn't. Wasn't interested. Instead I lay around, ate peanut butter and ice cream, and swallowed my pain in front of the TV watching lame sappy shows.

Everything on TV seems so easy, no matter what. The biggest dramas would happen in major emotional explosions but by the show's end all was back to normal. I wish someone would write a show for my life and make everything go back to normal again too.

Sometimes I read poetry, something I haven't done for so long I it seemed like forever. I've never seen a wild thing feel sorry for itself. A tiny bird will drop frozen dead from a bough never having felt sorry for itself. That was D.H. Lawrence. The same guy who wrote Lady Chatterley's Lover. I've read the poem before, read the book when I snuck it out of Monique's library. And she tells me I read nasty stuff. Maybe this kind of junk makes her feel good or something.

Yet I go on looking at the world darkly even though the sun shines brightly. Just call me shadow-kissed. New day, same slump.

I'm starting to get bored with myself. No matter what I think of it always ends up like a total major downer. Even if I see a smiling baby on the TV. Suddenly I burst into tears because it is so sad the baby will die one day. OMG! I should slap myself silly.

What has it been? A week? A month? A year? Don't know but it feels like a million years ago. Many lives ago, many different people ago. Who I was then in the long ago I have no idea. So it looks like I'll just have to lie around and eat myself into maximum density until I figure it out.

Or until my clothes explode.

Meanwhile, stuff is building up on my bed as the cleaning continues without a pause. I think she must have found stuff I'd forgotten about ever having. Makes sense. One thing comes in and replaces the other but the 'other' never actually leaves the house. Just lingers and drifts further down in the pile. Like sediment layers. I suppose maybe one day an archeologist type person can go through my rat packing layers and get and idea of who I was, this person who couldn't bear to throw anything away.

Since most of my past life seemed to be spent coming and going from the house I left things laying all over, mostly in the garage, my pit stop place. So if Monique is finding remnants of me there it saves me remembering this stuff one day and having to flip out looking for it.

Last night I had to push everything off my bed to sleep. Now my floor is a major disaster. It can wait. I'm learning to be quite nimble as I tiptoe around the junk piles. Maybe it'll help me stay coordinated.

But then why should I care about staying coordinated at all? I don't know if I'll ever board up again. Really. In the skating world I'm like total Greta Garbo. Up and disappeared after a run of major fame.

Looking back now it seems like another lifetime ago when I was the skater girl. The hell bent for danger and fame type. Flowing through traffic, timing lights, shooting reds, dodging pedestrians ... I just had the streets so wired. Now I'm just a girl. A regular old sit-around-watch-lame-shows-eat-tasty-but unhealthy-food kinda girl. Some days...it almost feels natural. But most days it feels like I'm from another planet. The planet where bad things happen to young girls and they lay down and die.

This is what happens when you're watching too much melodrama. You become one of the dramatics. But that group is already overloaded at school. Don't wanna join 'em, thank-you-very-much. I've started my own group. A group of one. The Shadows; because I'm only a faint likeness of what I used to be.

Maybe one day I'll meet that girl again. The girl who was determined. The girl who was passionate. The girl who stopped at nothing when going for her dreams. I remember that girl as a very driven, confident person. A girl that anybody would be proud to know. Yeah, I kinda remember her. If I'm good and GOD stops hating on me I might even earn the right to meet her again...someday.

*****

My room had become my haven. My sanctuary. Much like Quasimodo running along the parapets of Notre Dame de Paris I sought only the comfort of a fully comforting world of absolute unconditional acceptance. For some reason this is the feeling that grabbed me by the throat and strangled me into submission. I craved comfort. Forgiveness. Understanding that within this weave of conflicting ideals forgiveness of self was key.

Though I didn't know what I should be forgiving myself for. What did I do? This question lingered and jumped with glee onto the slag heap of emotions I was trying to uncoil.

My thoughts had become so dark, so deep, so meandering that just reeling them back in was in itself a major task. But I simply let them go their way believing they would return. Too much thinking. Mabye way way too much. I was receiving no relief from this major "alone time."

"Meow...meooowww!!"

Zelda had wandered in and was rubbing herself against my legs. She purred and shimmied and got my attention with her carryings on. I picked her up and held her close to me.

"Are you here to make me feel better, girl? Yeah? Oooh...you're so CUUTTE!!"

I scratched behind her ears and she purred even louder. Her warm body pressed against me brought my emotions to the surface and they exploded in a big way. Tears began streaming down my face. And the more I cried the more she purred. As if she felt my pain and was trying to soothe me. It's amazing how this street cat bonded with me so quickly. So thoroughly. This was the cat Monique had rescued from the street but Zelda seemed to gravitate right to me. I felt like this was the friend I always needed. One who listened more than talked and knew just what her friend needed without her friend saying word one. Yeah, this was like the perfect friend.

Okay. Now I just found one thing to forgive myself for. I had just in one quick stroke replaced Amelia for Zelda as my BFF. Nature is cruel just like on Discovery channel. I hung my head and silently apologized to Amelia, hoping she would understand. Immediately my eyes flew open because I just knew she would not understand. Amelia was not known as the great forgiver.

"Okay then. This will be our little secret. You can keep a secret, right Zelda girl?"

She wriggled against me like she understood completely. And at that moment. That exact moment, I looked out my window at the falling rain and a blast of godlight blazed across the sky. I rubbed my eyes thinking I was hallucinating. But when I looked again it was still there. I shook my head in disbelief.

"Did you do that girl? Huh? Sure seemed like it."

Zelda purred loudly and I felt like we were communicating. Either that or I had totally snapped.

Since she had become my good luck charm so to speak I continued hanging with her every day figuring the more I kept her near me the faster everything would be better. But I wasn't so interested in predicting the future. All I know is it sure felt good with her near me. And feeling good sometimes sure beat feeling good none of the time. It looked like I had made the Zelda connection.

*****

It was that Zelda connection moment that concluded weeks, then months-two months to the day-of zero visibility darkness. Then that magical moment opened my eyes and the first storm cloud made its way for open sky, letting a blazing passion of heavenly light into my world. Amazing how when you think the light at the end of the tunnel will never appear it appears out of nowhere catching you totally off guard.

Next thing I know I found myself passionately digging through my stuff that Monique had uncovered in the garage. Lots of stuff. So much had I stockpiled in there I forgot about most of it. So it was like Christmas day for me. Then my eyes caught glimpse of something shining from the heap; a simple token of romantic love between boy and girl. A medallion on which was engraved, Kiss the Sky.

Throughout the skateboarder's legion the constant cry had always been "touch the sky." But from Tag to me, in a nod to what he termed "the divine feminine," the gift of a medallion that contained my own personal mantra, Kiss the Sky.

"Your smile puts the sun to shame, babe. We dudes can touch the sky. Yet to you alone the sky extends a kiss."

Why I had tossed it into the garage I didn't recall. Probably racing to go somewhere and tossed it in there kinda spacey like. My days had been so crazy I'm not surprised.

I kissed Zelda and flew from the house like a girl possessed.

I had been away too long and I knew it. The board felt alien in my hands. But my heart felt finally at a crossroads, a place I had fought for with all that I had. Words flowed from me in poetry like I had never known. The park was empty as if for me. I stumbled then regained my balance. A sparkle of hesitation rippled through me as I approached the edge.

Yes, my time away had been long and ragged. Now the time to settle all debts had arrived. The medallion hung low around my neck, talisman against all opposition. I would sail from the edge, race into the half pipe, and speed up the opposite side. A Backside/Frontside 360° Kickflip, practiced with Tag to be my signature send off move.

"It's been done before. But never with as much grace and beauty as you bring it," he had said.

Racing around the outer rim I brought my speed to dangerous levels. This was my plan, a fly or die strategy. Once off the edge there was no turning back. I would come back large or crash and burn. One concentric circle upon another I went, spinning a web of power with each successive push off. With one final breath, I made for the edge and was up, airborne, feeling like a hawk. My style I imagined was pure Elias, my form perfection, the world turning on axis as I made my final ascent. Up I went, faster and faster, taking the lip in a cacophony of clicks and clacks as wheels gripped and spun. I could see myself as if outside my body, sailing skyward as I performed my 360° Kickflip, hair flying in melodies. A picture of radiant charm and angelic peace, a girl at one with herself and the universe.

In response the sun broke through the cloud layer shining forth in devotions. Then I saw Tag, I know I did. He looked at me with the blush of pure love that only I could understand. Yes, he was there with me! My BF eternal! Ohmigod, love was as beautiful as beauty itself!

A rush of power surged through me. His hands cupped my face. And as I reached the peak with arms spread wide, I leaned my head back and planted a sugary kiss to the sky. Sweet warmth bathed me in its glory. This was an epic moment.

I would swear to anyone and everyone, that at that moment of reaching my triumphant Kickflip pinnacle, it was not the sky but Tag I had kissed.

My return was now complete. The words of heartfelt love becoming my salvation.

*****

I was feeling so suddenly alive, so rejuvenated, I was maybe moving too fast into things I should have taken a bit slower. If I were thinking wiser, smarter, more in control, I might not have been finding myself here at Dogwood staring into the bowl planning my assault. This was a major like "If" that was not going to be.

I charge into the bowl. Reel off a few 540s. A couple of 720s. But not yet a 900. Maybe another time. Blasting through a wild run releases some pent up energy and clears the waters a bit. I spin into the flat and land a few tricks. Then head up the vert for one last 720.

As I spin my last rotation and head down, I feel overextended. Like I'm leaning too far back. Something's gone horribly wrong! I'm looking at the sky, looking at the clouds, looking at a world of hurt as I stomp it. Falling falling falling falling. Then I SLAAM in a big quake that registers on the Richter scale. It can't get any worse than this. Going for the big set and slamming like a dork.

Big mistake. Huge!

"Whoa! You okay? You dumped it huge!"

I try to turn my head to look. But I know who it is. Only one voice that cuts through you like a chainsaw. Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse what happened but Patch is on hand to witness by biggest, gnarliest, most humiliating slam EVER! I want to turn and look at him but the pain is already setting in. My neck feels not good.

"Eurgh!"

"What?"

He's shouting to me from across the bowl and I'm not sure he can hear me but I give it my best.

"Eurgh...ah...eurgh."

That's' all I can manage and it doesn't sound very encouraging. From the periphery of my sight, I can see him fly over the steps and into the bowl. Things are moving at hyper speed. A blur of color and image. A kaleidoscope of the unreal. I'm feeling a throbbing heat and an insistent cold in my joints. Next thing I know he's kneeling next to me and speaking real soft.

"Can you move your legs?"

"Eurgh."

"Just try."

I shimmy my butt around and push. My legs evidently start to move because he looks pleased.

"Good. Arms?"

I take this to mean he wants me to move my arms. I try one. Then the other. They are stiff and my elbows are sore, like they've been pummeled by a mallet and scoured clean. I'm definitely getting swellbows from this fall. But my arms do move. Creaky, painful, but moving.

"Okay. Good."

He slides his arm under my neck.

"Hey," I finally manage, gliding past the eurgh and ah part. "What are you doing?" Okay, well past.

The snappish abrasive Patch would respond to any questioning of him with a fierce growl of fuck off. But he doesn't answer that way now.

"Oh. Legs move. Arms move. You even turned your head. I'm gonna help you sit up."

"Is that a good idea?"

"Well, brain stem and limbs seem to be on speaking terms. We gotta try."

"Uhm...I don't-"

"Look. Don't worry. I've done this before. If you start to hurt too much, let me know and I'll stop. Okay?"

I feebly shake my head yes but I can't really be sure.

His strong arms lift me from behind my head and back simultaneously. I feel myself lifting up. He supports me so well I feel like I'm being raised by a machine. I can see the vert where I launched from and my board laying on its side like a wounded animal. I can safely say I feel its pain. Miraculously, I'm in pain but not excruciatingly so. Not yet anyway. That will come. But here I am. Worst fall of my life. Hopefully my last. And the last person I would expect help from swoops down like an angel of mercy. I can't help getting all gushy at the look in his eyes. Such intense care. Such intense shall I say "love" that I can't help but feel that this is how his little sister feels when he picks her up from her childhood scrapes. If she feels half as loved as I feel right now she's a very lucky little girl.

Now I'm sitting up.

"How do you feel now?"

"Uhm...sore. But not too bad I guess. I mean, I almost bought the farm."

He smiles a full tooth smile like the radiant sun and chuckles. "Well, maybe not bought the farm. But put one hell of down payment."

This is so darkly funny I cannot stop myself from laughing. That is a big mistake.

"Ha...Ow...Ow...ha, ha...OUCH!"

"Oh, Christ. Sorry. Let me help you up."

He wants me to stand up already and I'm not sure this is a good idea. But at this point, I am entirely in his hands you might say.

He gets behind me puts his hands under my armpits and lifts.

I can feel the pain begin to ripple down my body like a xylophone being pinged. Soreness will be my companion for awhile. Definitely. But at least I'm alive to know it. Like my grandpa would say, "It could be worse."

Now that I'm standing I try to turn. The full tide of slamming pain grips me like a vise. I start to buckle like a limp noodle. Then my hands are on my knees as I sink to a crouch. I wonder if this is how I'll end up, crouching and limping like a gimp. For the first time during this ordeal, I am scared. Patch zeros is on my distress.

"Whoa, little sister! Too much too soon. I just wanted you to stand, not do gymnastics."

For the second time I start to laugh and receive an instant invoice of pain. Immediate payment due. Again, a mistake.

"Ha...OUCH....Ha...ow...ha...ow...ha...ha...owwwww...."

He quickly tires of my laugh cry serenade and has me drape my arm over his shoulders to help me walk, limp, over to the stairs. After carefully helping me maneuver a sit down, he steps away.

"Don't go anywhere. Okay?"

"Like I can," I manage.

"Right. Going up top to get my medical kit. You stay right here."

I nod agreement, pathetic though it may be, not intending to move anyway. A moment of deep reflection sets in as he ambles up the stairs and into the park. Life in its ever-mysterious way continues to amaze me with turnabouts that could pass in a simpler time as miracles. I skate. I slam. A guy I would have thought to be my undeclared enemy becomes my only salvation.

There are surely none among us who can claim to understand the ways of life. It's too big. Too mysterious. Too miraculous wondrous. That I'm even here right now to appreciate this is among the miracles I have today witnessed. A girl. A guy. A fall. A dream.

"Here you go darlin. Medicine for what ails ya." He says this as he passes me a Coke. "And a snap of primo herb to seal the deal."

The Coke is refreshingly good, but when he said "medicine" I thought it would taste, well, different.

"Hey, Patch. Don't want to seem ungrateful, but isn't this Coke missing something?"

He looks at me like I just spoke in Chinese.

"Missing something?"

"Yeah. Like your famous 'spike' medicine."

"Oh, yeah, yeah. What that fuck am I thinkin. Here, pass it this way."

I hand him the thin, sweet but not lethal Coke as he reaches into his back pocket and whips out his flask. The infernal flask from Dr. Jack Daniels.

What a gentleman he's become. Maybe he was always this way. Was I too blind or something? Too locked into trying to fit in that I closed my eyes? My first sip of the new improved medicine suddenly slams open my eyes as if I have actually been freed of blindness and struck deaf. Did I just miss something he said? Oh, right! That marvelous phrase.

"Wow! Darlin. No one's ever called me that before."

"Yeah, well. It's a good ole boy thang."

"A good ole boy...how'd you say it, thang? Like the south?"

He gets a big grin like I just caught him at something.

"You got me. Guilty as charged. I'm originally from Georgia. A transplant. Georgia soil to California surf. Though I hide it pretty well sometimes my southern manner slips through."

"As far as I'm concerned it's a very nice manner. Makes me feel like I am somebody."

His brow wrinkles in concern.

"What? You feelin like you ain't somebody?"

Now I've opened up a snake pit not sure if it is such a good idea. But once opened, why not dive in and wrangle em down.

"Well, since I started skating around here, at Dogwood, I haven't exactly felt welcome. Then Tag..."

I get all choked up and have to stop. The tears are welling up.

"Then...he was here...then gone...and ever...since I've...felt so...alone..."

The tears race up to my eyes and start to pour. Patch reaches over to hand me a bandanna.

"You don't have to go on, you know."

He is being nice. Kind. Maybe uncomfortable with my tears. But I feel it's time to face this demon and take it down.

"I know," I say weakly, squeaking more than talking. "I carried on, continued to skate, decided to push the envelope in a big way. A big way more scary than the day I first jumped on a board. Then. WHAAM!! The slam from Hell. And who's here to save me. You of all people. I was so sure you hated me. Absolutely hated me. Like you hated, I don't know, the man."

Patch shakes his head and runs his hand through his hair. There must be some big thoughts bubbling through his brain because he looks suddenly troubled.

"Oh yeah. The man. Fuck em. But I did wrong by you. Wrong by Tag. It weren't right. I-"

I cut into his sentence. "But.-"

His hand goes up in the flat-palmed stop gesture. Evidently he needs to speak his piece. How rude of me.

"I should have would have could have been a much more agreeable guy. Instead, I doubled up on the ornery old cuss sombitch routine. And the next thing I know, my bud Tag..."

Now he stops short. His voice breaking and his eyes glistening with tears. To know him as I have before today, seeing him now choked up and uncharacteristically emotional brings my inner self to its knees. I had forgotten that despite being big on the swagger, he was still just a youngster. I had forgotten that despite everything he is still human. I had forgotten to consider that as much as I miss Tag, as much he meant to me, he had been a bud to Patch for a lot longer. I wasn't the only one who lost someone when Tag died. The grief process is so immersive and un-inclusive.

He rubs his hand across his face, slaps his hands on his knees and continues.

"So...Sorry is not near enough to make right what's been made wrong." He dips his head a bit and looks down, an act of contrition, extreme humility, or both. "But it's all I got. I only hope you can accept my apologies."

I felt myself getting teary again.

"Uh...uh...course I will," I say, choking back the tears.

A faint but hesitant smile comes to his lips.

"Allrighty then. I'll make nice. You be who you are. And can you please pass me that doob you been holdin?"

*****

I could end with a nice neat wrap up putting everything to bed nice and cozy like this is a script I'm playin by. But that's not the real deal. Being who I am, Kyrie Elias, otherwise known as Krazy, the easy way is not the way for me. So, in my effort to boldly go where no girl has gone before, I decided that since I was like officially on the D-Boyz team, had won some competitions and stuff, had got the respect of the group, and Patch had shown me a different side, it was time to dig a bit deeper into what makes Patch tick.

And this whole Z-Boyz connection.

Since getting an entirely altered view of him my curiosity has been raging. You gotta see it makes total sense. I boldly told him I had heard through somebody or other that he was like connected directly to the Z-Boyz and their entire legacy through Jay Adams. He squinted at me real hard like he was trying to figure out what my game was. I guess he figured I was safe enough.

"Oh. The old Z-Boyz gig. Okay. I'll give in. Yeah, what you heard is right, minus some parts I'd rather not go into. Buts it's like-"

"Look...uhm. I'm not trying to cause no guff. I mean a skater girl like me comes along and find she's connected with a skater who's somehow part of a larger than life legend and her mind goes all skewy with questions. I mean like WOW!"

"It's cool. I owe you at least that much for all the shit, none of it yours, I threw your way."

"You don't owe me nothing, but thanks."

"So, I always wanted to get a great band going. That's where it began for me. Had one for awhile. But the dudes just started bailin when they found out it was work. Took work before you got your jam on. Before you could wail those panty droppin vocals. Before you could wail triumphant those panty droppin solos. That was my role. Axe man of the damned. Did I wail? Hell yes! Did those panties drop by the bushel? You know they did and please excuse me for sayin. Yeah, I suppose for awhile I DID know what it felt like to be king. Until life let me know it had other plans for me. Ah, fuggit. Whatzit matter anyway."

"That sounds totally cool."

"Yeah so what? Nobody gives a flyin turd. Just another piece of shit wannabe on the crap heap."

"But it's not-"

"Hey. That's in the past now. The distant past. Three years ago seems a lifetime. Skatin is the only way for me now. First and most important, you should be your biggest fan. If you believe in yourself, other people will too. Could be a trip to the top. If you play your cards right. Top of the money heap that is. But that shit's just sellin out, man. Like old Slag. He sold out. Sombitch! He was one of the D-Boyz first wavers. Me and Skeeter are the only originals left. Some of these dickheads-they know who they are-keep blowin smoke up my ass. "Dude, you're the original seed. It's all you. They should learn to live with their broken dreams."

"The Z-Boyz are like so...so...everything a skater could want. It's not everyone who becomes a legend."

"Humph. These fuckers don't know how lame they sound with that original seed shit. Everyone in the know has got it straight. Only ONE original seed: Jay Adams. One of the boyz in the day. Yeah, wild treacherous times. 1975-1977. A fuckin zoo and old Jay was the original. Tore ass on anything he skated. Attacked it like a rabid beast with somethin to prove. The gnads on that dude were outta time. And these a-holes try telling me I'm the original seed. Maybe to their blind ass selves, yeah. But anyone who says that is lost in his own dream world. Although I can't complain when that particular story reels me in a fine piece of tail. Yeah, I sometimes reap the benefits but I still diss them jumpin-someone-else's-train losers."

"Don't know anything about your band and stuff but your skate is kickin!"

"I skate like Hell's comin to breakfast every day. Go all out. There are opportunities. Sponsorships available. Money to be made. But if you go that way you lose the thrill of conquer. You sell out to the man. The green machine. You do that you become another Slag. Dumbass. Used to come around at the competitions with his posse and his board bitches hangin all over his ass. Like he was too good for anyone. Maybe he got to play that game for awhile. And maybe he got what he wanted: bitches, car, gear, drugs, whatever. Must have been good for a while. Until he took that face adjusting fall at Mitchikaibo. Mitchikaibo. I'm sure that episode became like his Flying Dutchman. The sponsors bailed on him one by one, rats from a sinking ghost ship. What happened to old Slag I never really knew. Never talked about it. Talkin about anything to do with him we understood to be a jinx. Then one day he shows up at Dogwood with his tail between his legs, lookin for all get out like the cat who corked your bitch. Skanky and ratty. Yeah, you could say he totally looked like shit. But the glamour had been stripped from him. He was just a regular old dude again. We skated together for a bit like the old times. Then out of the blue he disappeared. Some passed it around that he bailed to Australia. Sweet skatin there. Course that particular someone passed it around as he passed me a monster doob at a total smoke-out. Never could get a straight story. So I don't know if it was the true story or a stoner slide, a doobie dream. Anyway, never saw him again. Then another dude said he heard Slag was doin time in Mexico. Story goes a federale had asked him for a light. Tryin to be the nice American, Slag was pullin the lighter from his pocket when a small bag of pot fell out. Slag insisted it wasn't his bag, but they hauled him in anyway. That sounds so Slag stupid. Right on the mark. Still, this particular tale has gotta be for sure doob inspired."

"Must've been some serious bud, like Hawaiian gold."

"Nah, it was skunk weed. Here's some advice for them law dawgs. Try not to steal marijuana from suspects. Make pot brownies with your wife and then eat so many of them you wig out and call 911. Ha!"

This was so much stuff to absorb. I mean like I had no idea. The history just kept growing and growing like a weed patch was blooming right in front of me. A whole lifetime of stuff he just played out for me. I gotta say when Patch busts loose and goes on the giving cycle, he's as unstoppable as when he's withholding nice and going double down on the mean.

"So after all this stuff. Whaddya do?"

"Me? I'll just be kickin it, tokin a doob, thinkin while I can. Okay for instance. We just turned up at the Long Beach Jam and like you just asked, "Whaddya do?" Well, I suppose we just carry on like nothing happened. But something DID happen! Something BIG! Had all kinds of sponsors runnin around signin up anything that skated. Man I tell ya things can get crazy real quick. That's why I've got my place staked out. So I'll keep kickin it. Keep it simple. Keep it real. Raise my crops, toke a doob. Sell some for the bucks. Keep some for top dawg. A steady gig. Better scratch than any band gig ever got me. And sponsors? Fuck em. Don't need em. Old Patch here will just keep kickin it. Cause old Patch knows like always: Pot=Us, Booze=Them. And while Patch may dabble in the booze, he specializes in the herb. Every toke makes the division clearer. All the clearer...all the cl...all the...cough, cough...clllllllllllllllll..."

So Patch's words fluttered by as he finished by talking about himself in the third person, wrapping up a most phenomenal spontaneous interview. And as we sailed away into a stoner's bliss my mind swam free in a universe where all mysteries were explained. However, the universe in its infinite intelligence held something back. It knows I won't remember any of those explanations five minutes from now.

All part of the universal plan.

*****

You know I had to go home, right? No way...no freakin' way was I going to escape the overpowering concern of Mother. I've stopped calling her Monique now cuz like Larry-dad told me it's not respectful being she's my mother and she's kinda earned it. So even though I pointed out to him that calling her Mother seemed totally harsh and maybe disrespectful, he said no it is not cuz that is after all her proper title.

Geez! Adults get so hung up on this "title" business. Yeah, so like he was holding that "I'll keep quiet to your mother about your stoner activities if you agree to treat her properly" stuff over my head so my hands were kinda tied. Still, does this kind of stuff sound normal to you?

Evidently, I looked worse than I thought. Maybe the torn shirt, pants, and limping creature I had become gave me away. Dawn of the Dead. When Mother saw me she jumped out of her seat as if Death itself had walked in the room. Guess who's coming to dinner, Mother? I don't believe I'd ever seen her in such a state of alarm. Such a state of motherly intensity.

"Oh my god! What happened?"

"Uh...nothing. Just fell while skating."

"Just fell? Just FELL?! Skating???!! That, that..."

She couldn't spit out the condemnations fast enough. Mother was not one given to profanity. Listening to her right then as she took up against skating, you would have taken her for a well-seasoned vulgarian.

"To the hospital. To the hospital. Let's go!"

Caught in her real life Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman moment, she scooped me up-not literally of course-got me into the car and raced to the hospital.

I kept my eyes peeled and stared out the window, certain I would soon see flashing reds and blues. Mother was by no means a plodding driver. Something she took great pride in relaying this. But on this night she had the pedal to the metal to make Mario Andretti proud. Maybe it was free donut day at the local donut store. Not a law dawg in sight.

Once again, things were moving too fast for me to register. Across town, to the hospital, squealing to a stop, orderlies rushing forward, wheelchairs being rolled out. Like I was royalty. I don't think I've ever seen emergency teams move so fast. A bit of slowdown occurred as we checked in, you know; name, age, weight, shoe size. Then we were whisked away to Ms. Doctor. This particular doctor a rather slim, young, Asian woman looked me over with all the appropriate chin rubbing and head nodding. Then bingo bango. Tests, X-rays, meds, see you in a week.

"Stay off your feet for a few days. And definitely off your skateboard."

In one brief utterance, Doctor Young-Slim-n-Cute had become my mortal enemy. Without awareness she had given Mother all the anti-skating ammo she needed to complete the case she'd been building against it from the start. A piece of ammo that by itself bore the indelible stamp of authority.

"You see, honey. Even the doctor says no more skateboarding. I mean I KNOW I should never have signed that approval form for that competition. And everything else I've done for you and your skating since then. What was I thinking? If I only hadn't-"

Mother went on and on cursing herself for ever agreeing to ANYTHING having to do with that horrible sport of skating. If she's kicking herself so hard over this, the Doobie Disaster Drama would put her right over the top. No doubt. I can imagine the story she would tell, "My girl used to be involved in this horrible skating and that led her right to marijuana!"

Of course, Dr. Y, S, and C, didn't say "no more skateboarding." Not in spirit anyway, though she may have thought it. She had merely followed S.O.P. (standard operating procedure), doctoral instruction of "stay off your feet for a few days" with the "off your board" part thrown in to address the particulars of my case. To my ears, a few days off your board went together, meant stay off your board for a few days. That is not what Mother heard. She heard a wide brushstroke of condemnation of the concept and practice of skating, i.e. skateboarding, dovetailing nicely with her own views. When life throws a flaming curve ball your way, it sometimes comes with unexpected satellite flame balls in tow. The "SLAAM" was the flaming curve ball. The "stay off your board" one satellite. The second that Dr. Y, S, and C was young, not some well beyond and crotchety older doctor. One more authoritative stamp.

"See. Even the young doctor knows that it's stupid to be on a skateboard."

As if my life was not rocky enough I now had in store an endless string of match and rematch events with Mother about the skating issue. I could already hear Don King announcing the upcoming event:

"Tonight the Dogwood Stomper meets Mother Destroyer. A fight that promises to throw the W.W.F. into a spin."

So the doctor said I should take it easy, and not be concerned if I felt strange tinglings and such as my spine reset itself. In other words, expect neurological episodes. Thankfully, my X-rays showed no breakage. My muscles and tendons however moaned and cried like a barrel of banshees. Which makes me wonder how much of the Patch crush emotions I'm experiencing are neurologically relevant. I mean, according to strict scientific views, love and romance notions spring not from the vicinity of the heart but from the frontal lobe of the brain. Meaning it's all in your head. Now with that unspectacular and unromantic view it seems the scientific thinking person could never allow themselves the romantic joys freely given to the commoner. I imagine the strictly scientific person lives in a small narrow world. A globule really. A little globule that rolls along through the arctic tundra. I don't care much for cold weather so this sounds hideously horrible.

Yes, this does sound cold and unappealing. Of course it doesn't sound anywhere as bad as the view of medieval writers who regarded woman as "a temple built over a sewer." Talk about "buzz kill."

I definitely think that slamming into a massive wall of hurt knocked something loose in me. Not something physical like, but something else. Like the universal spinning wheel was knocked into motion. It's just that in the last few days it seems like some big kind of "thaw" has happened between Mother and me. Like we're seeing each other for the first time and I am like totally happy for it.

Maybe I AM having a neurological event.

But she is my mother, right? It's only natural that we get along? Just like she's always telling me? Don't know, don't care. I can totally say that getting majorly slammed has turned things around. Maybe it's just turned ME around. After initially beating herself up for ever agreeing with my skating, everything settled into a calm sea after a raging tsunami. I saw her in a clear light as a really caring, loving woman who only wanted what was right for me. Only wanted what was best for me. And it took me all this pain to realize this? Was I like suddenly growing up?

Selfish thy name is Kyrie.

It was so bizarre I knew I slammed and was reborn. Had to be. I mean I know people change all the time. But this was like an alien world for me. We were talking. Really talking! The things we talked about were beyond heavy. Were so unreal yet felt so right. Like they were things we should've talked about long ago.

"I don't know. Sometimes I feel like you don't love me and stuff cuz you don't go along with things I like. I mean like skating. It's what totally defines me."

"Kyrie, my baby. I'm scared for you. Skating is very dangerous. And then, as if to confirm my fears, you lose your boyfriend in a horrible skating accident. I can't feel sorrier for that, believe me. But you need to understand, I'm your mother, the person who carried you in her belly for nine beautiful months. You will always be a part of me. Loving you is never in question because I am the person who will always love you no matter what. You are my-"

Mother sniffles and begins crying up a storm and suddenly I am too and we're both hugging, and back-patting, and going, "It's okay...it's okay," like long lost friends. It feels like we were on a big hellacious journey across a relentless wilderness. A journey so big it seemed it would never end. A journey that brought us to a place of knowing. Knowing that if we can make it through that hurdle it's downhill from there. Not bombing or slaloming downhill. Just a gradual descent. Enough slam for me, thank you very much.

I can relate this entirely to skating. Of course, I do know by now that falling is a huge part of skating. So it's a matter of finding the best way to slam. The one that causes the least amount of pain, something you improvise when starting your descent. I know now that my landing has come, and with my mother on board our descent has been reduced to a glorious glide.

*****

One week. One whole week. A full seven days it takes me before I can feel put together enough to hit the board. And when I say put together enough I MAY be giving myself a generous helping of "teen spirit." My knees were swollen. Elbows resembled small tomatoes. And my back, when it did not decide to lock up, worked pretty well I suppose. But I was not going back on the board to perform any radical tricks, extreme maneuvers, anything that would push me too far. No. I was just going back to shift and glide around the board, work my flow, get my groove on.

Recapture the feeling I was sure I'd lost after I slammed HUGE!

Aside from feeling a bit creaky, I did rather well. Even rolled up and down the bowl a bit at a fair clip. Amazingly my body kicked right into its natural rhythms. My flow was in good stead.

I sat down on my board and looked at the sky. The air had a bit of chill and the cumulus, a familiar sight, was gathering from seashore to mountaintop. Rain was threatening, but in Southern California rain meant a run through the sprinklers at best. Not the buckets of rain the East coast is known for. As I drank in the glories of nature and felt my body healing, I pondered the significance of the last week's events.

My crushing defeat had brought with it a new perspective. A view that appeared cleansed and wiped clean like a long overdue dirty windshield. Clear vision. Forward and back. Yet something bubbled and gurgled at the periphery. Because suddenly, as if for the first time, I found I was given to daydreaming. I replayed the week in my mind, a film in high speed reverse. When I came to the part where I was laid flat in the bowl, I stopped the film and reversed direction, clicking forward at a snail's pace. If I was going to gain understanding it would take many moments like that. In a freeze-frame I saw myself laid out. Kneeling next to me I saw Patch. And I became dreamy, swoony, felt myself floating. I was developing all the textbook symptom of a crush; nervous stomach, long stretches of daydreaming, an inability to remember what he looked like. Now, one would think I knew what he looked like well enough from all the past experiences I had with him. But this was different. A different view. For on that day I had seen Patch in a way I had only just vaguely glimpsed before. His entire being now appeared in a soft red-orange glow, an appearance of peace and tranquility where before there was only rebellion and anarchy. I can see his shirt, his curls falling over his eyes, but his face is a blank, and I fill it in with anonymous skater boy details: soft eyes-even though it is his fierce eyes I remember best-sun baked skin; rough hands of a fighter; strength of a lion.

When I see him again I know there will be an initial twinge of disappointment. This is what all that internal ruckus was about? Then I'll find something to get excited about again. The fact that he talks to me at all, his rough-hewn charm, his southern manners. And between the first and second meeting a whole new set of myths will be born.

The daydreaming leads me down slippery slopes. I'm imagining in tiny detail the entire course of our relationship, from first meeting, to first kiss, to...Then I realize there's nothing left to actually happen. I've done it all. Lived through the whole relationship in my head. I've watched the film on fast forward. Now I've got to rewind it and watch it all over again in real time. And that's where the problems will begin. Like what happened with Tag. We went from first meeting, to first kiss, and then everything went into fast forward overdrive. You know, I even feel guilty for not doing the ultimate with him? Like it would have helped something? Like it would have stopped the clock and kept him here? No, I don't think so. Really. I think it would only have made things a lot worse. It's bad enough that I'll compare every other guy to him from now on. Throw the bump and tumble in there and it's like a major huge mountain of stuff that no guy could live up to. It's enough that Tag was just Tag, a boy who enjoyed skating, hanging around, lying around, and getting stoned. I don't recall ever talking about things like where our relationship was heading, what we wanted from it. But then at 15 we considered those types of conversations the kind 'old' people have. Like on the reality TV shows. Talk, talk, talk, then the relationship crumbles anyway. Like they talk it to death. Anyway, we essentially stood by each other as if we had always been doing just that. As if predestined. Maybe that's why I never questioned it. Everything just sort of clicked into place. Real natural like.

My first and maybe my last true love.

I'm tripping I think. Imagining all of these wonderful, dreamy scenarios with Patch and suddenly Tag is pushed into the background competing for me. And it's all occurring so mega-speed I can't track the steps. One minute my head is all Tag, the next all Patch. They're like becoming one composite OMG! Maybe it's just my hormonal urgency. I mean, since Tag I've been, uhm, alone? Then someone pays attention to me, someone of the skater boy persuasion, and I'm immediately a bowl of JELL-OOOOO.

*****

"Hey Kyrie. How's it hangin?"

I look up from my shoelace tying adventure.

"Uh, Okay, I guess. I mean, you know. Hanging? Isn't that like a guy thing? I don't think girls get to be anywhere near hanging until they get much older."

Skeeter looks at me like I've blown a gasket. Maybe he got lost in the stream of babble I unleashed.

"No, uh, not, you know, hangin hairies," he says, making appropriate and acutely graphic hand and arm gestures. "Like, how you doin."

Now I feel like a moron. The dude is just treating me like I'm one of the guys, one of the crew, what I've been working so hard to be accepted as, and I throw his hello back at him like a) a smart ass, b) a moron. "I'll take b) for $200, Alex."

"I know. Sorry Skeeter. How I'm hangin is good."

"Cool. Wanna plunge the bowl?"

A surge of laughter surges through me from my toenails up to my scalp follicles.

"Dude! That's hilarious. Plunge the bowl? I hope nobody flushes."

"Flushes?"

"Yeah. The bowl? Flush the bowl?"

"Oh right," he pumps out, stutter laughing and sounding like a faulty engine. "The 'rents don't like it when I flush bowls. Did it once when I was a little dude. Fucked up the toilet so the old man had to pull it loose and rebuild it. My dad said he would let me slide, though. ONCE!"

"Wha?"

"Yeah. They say I should just rinse em and put em in the washer."

"You lost me."

"Bowls. Right? Wash em don't flush em?"

This is one of the bizarre misconnections of mind and logic that makes me feel like I have wandered in during recess at the loony bin. I could expand and question if he means clothes washer or dishwasher but I don't want to encourage him. Skeeter is a nice guy. Really nice. Mostly. But talking to him is like taking a massive injection of amphetamines or heroine depending on your point of view. I decide to give up on the bowl metaphor.

"Yeah. Let's charge the bowl."

"You're strange dude. Bowls don't have no money."

"Strange is as strange does" mangling a Forest Gump expression.

So into the bowl we go, plunge, charge, or soar in depending on your preference. I prefer soar into. Association to flying implies staying airborne as opposed to plunge which implies plummeting.

It appears that now, one week after my almost near fatal but mostly humiliating plunge-there's that word again-my body is responding well with accompanying soreness moans and groans from all affected body parts. Knees are stiff and a bit resistant. No duh! But they're not all "rubber knee" scared. A possible reaction to any massive injury. Elbows are, well, swellbows. No other possibility exists. There is very little of arms swinging and waving in my run at this time. The best advice is to get right on the board and back in action. Along the lines of the "hair of the dog that bit you" principle. The difference being that if you don't face the demon right off, the demon takes over and you risk never returning. Control the demon or the demon controls you. So, creaking, groaning, pains and all, a "no pain no gain" philosophy works best here. Neurological episode alert, giving in to the easy pull of aphorism and cliché laced description. Note to self: cut it out!

I'm cruising and gliding and flaming and grinding beating the hell out of the bowl's lower quarters but not yet sailing long and fast up the vert. That's a problem. The fear is gripping me. I knew to expect it. I knew from the beginning. But no matter how prepared you think you are, it's just an illusion. I'm no better prepared than if I didn't prepare at all. And now that I'm here at my personal "Ground Zero" the fear is drilling into me, putting lead in my shoes and sand in my joints. Maybe it IS too soon to return to board central.

I make my way over to the steps, jump off my board and sit down. Skeeter meantime is racing away, jamming to his own drummer. He's even singing along to the tune. It is not too long before he realizes that his one time companion is sitting on the bench with the "B" team.

"Tuckered already?" he says, a look of vacancy on his puppy dog face. He answers his own question. "Yeah. Figgered you might be. After a slam like you had."

Geez. I guess I made the Dogwood Headlines. Or worse. Maybe Jessica is hiding around here.

"How do you know about that?"

He shakes his shaggy dog head and fixes me with such a confused look of endless depth I feel momentarily "out of my depth."

"Uh, Patch? He was here, right? In the moment? Johnny on the spot?"

"Okay, okay. I didn't know he was like the clearing house for all things Dogwood."

Again he shakes his head at me. If he keeps this up it will shake off its hinges.

"Oh, yeah. He's always been. Ever since the Z-Boyz days."

"The Z-Boyz? Dude, they were like 30 years ago. Patch is not that old."

The shaggy dog shakes become the shaggy dog chuckles.

"I know that. I didn't mean he was with the Z-Boyz. I meant he's like an almost direct link to one of the Z-Boyz. Jay Adams. Know him?"

"Okay. I know who Jay Adams is. And who doesn't know about the Z-Boyz. But I don't understand how Patch fits into this."

I am stretching Skeeter. I know it. And I feel for him. But he can't open a puzzle box and expect me to leave it alone. He looks up at the trees for an answer that might magically be waiting there.

"Okay. Jay Adams, Charlie T, Patch T. Jay buds with Charlie. Charlie gets a babe. Has a son, Patch. Almost direct link.

I think I'm putting it together now. I'm a bit fuzzy after my slam. Jay and Charlie are Dogtown buds. Charlie hooks up with whomever, becomes Patch's father. But still...

"So Charlie got married-"

"No no. Not married. Shacked up with some chick and had Patch." He gets a wistful look as he says this. "It was the 70s, dude. People did that kinda shit."

"Then Charlie, Patch's father-"

Hand up. He shuts me right down.

"Whoa! Forget the stuff about Patch's father. Maybe he's dead. Maybe not. Patch don't know and don't care. Patch has been playin father and man of the house since the dude bailed."

"Wow. That's so...so. Does Jay know where Charlie went? Can he get a hold of him?"

"Forget about Jay. Nobody's seen him neither. Maybe he and Charlie ran off together. As far as Charlie, like I said, it's a don't know don't care to Patch. If I were you I'd never talk to Patch about the Charlie/Father thing. EVER!"

"Okay. Got it."

Oh the twisted webs we weave. Gives me a whole new appreciation of why Patch walks around with a chip the size of Texas on his shoulders. No wonder he's pissed. And he's not much older than me. Two or three years at best. Or more? I really don't know. Who would have thought that I would come this close to meeting a legend in the skating world only to find out that it's a meeting that might never happen.

Not through Patch anyway.

But still this intrigues me. The tortured soul I've known as Patch the Ripper is a demon with a heart. The load on his shoulders I can only imagine. It's one of those moments when I understand with chilling razor sharp clarity the extent of "it could be worse."

Damn!

Me complaining about anything in my life is like a crying baby. A baby from HELL! If I were the parents of that baby I'd just want to strangle it to shut it up. Oh, great Kyrie. Won't win any Mother of the Year awards. Might get awarded a longer than the end of time sentence or the golden electric chair though.

I'm big on headline issues, how about this:

MOTHER STRANGLES BABY: WOULD NOT STOP CRYING

If a lynch mob didn't get me first, the judge would lock me up and swallow the key.

After braving the meandering and trench-like world of Skeeter-speak, I felt ready for anything.

Almost anything. The anything I choose is a soaring assault into the bowl and a maximum blast up the vert. That Skeeter is a strange and somehow fascinating dude. He seems dumb as a dirt clod sometimes and other times he's so in tune with everything that you're sure you've missed something all along. I mean, how can someone go from zero to hero in a snap?

If I thought about it too long I'd start to wonder about myself. Maybe his twisted way of assembling his universe is a genius that is easy to recognize but difficult to describe. From plunging the bowl, to dishwasher or clothes washer, to Z-Boyz and runaway father's he covered a mass of wide and wobbly ground. And when I said, "Got it," his eyebrows wiggled and went up in cartoon fashion as he nodded his head toward the bowl. As if we had unfinished business there. Was his strategy to baffle and tangle me in mysteries so I'd get fed up and decide that any possible pain from skating is preferable to brain cramps? I don't know. It is probably best to leave the reading in between lines alone on Question Mark Island. Whether by design or synchronicity my soar into the bowl would reward me with a sparkle to my former skating sheen. Like I was a dusty rusty lamp. Except I was a lamp with a genie inside. A powerful one. Or maybe Skeeter was the genie. Or not.

Whatever!

I came, I saw, I conquered. And I must say it felt good. Real good. Back on board and kicking butt. Right on time too. During my recovery, that long, ghastly long week, I had caught word of a local competition coming around. Easy to catch word when your coach tells you. He looked at me with a bit of concern but he patted me on the shoulder, said, "OUCH! You'll be okay. Buck up." And that was that. When that contest arrives week after next I'll be ready. All the rotations and spinning I had been doing when I slammed was purposeful. This was an effort to perfect those tricks before the next event. But mostly just for fun, of course. Always a good idea to throw something random and unexpected into your run. A random 540 or 720 is as unexpected as they come. Not as unexpected as the 900. Sure. But if I ever did a 900 it would be so unexpected I'd surprise myself. Something about going from the 720 and adding that extra 180 sounds and feels ginormous! But hey, it has been done before. Not by the many, but the few. Like it's a trick from the Marine Corp of skating handbook. Yet maybe one fine day it will be mine. If I decide that staying familiar with the 720 is not near painful enough it will be time to make a run for the 900.

And when that day comes it may be more than Skeeter in the loony bin. Because the day I decide to fly the 900 is the day I have surely cracked! It's not that I'm scared of the 900. I'm terrified! I'd be cracked if I wasn't. But you know, face the demon, just throw down and face the demon. In the west we are familiar with western law, there's only the quick and the dead. It follows that I should keep my skills sharp and meet this particular demon at high noon, sun to my back, ready to draw on command. This day I'm sure will come.

One day, 900, I will call you out. And you will go down!

****

Two weeks later:

WOW! A contest sure takes it out of you. Let me tell you true on this. You're all hyped, tuned, ready to roll. The crowd cheers. Sometimes boos. Whistles blow. Bells ring. Run after run is taken. Scores are tallied. And then the shrill and fading day closes and you're left with a couple of rankings and the memories:

Best Verts:

Patch-1st

Skeeter-2nd

Kyrie-3rd

I guess you could say it was a Dogwood sweep. A triumph for DB&G! But I've heard there are other girl skaters who will show up when the event and prize money is bigger. Must be pro.

Anyway, I should have figured out long ago the Z-Boyz connection. Dogtown, Dogwood, Z-Boyz, D-Boyz. The apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. And I know that Peggy Oki skated with the Z-Boyz but was never pulled in as a Z-Girl or Z-Boy, right? So I'm not following true to form I since I was not only offered membership but was the reason why the name was changed from D-Boyz to DB&G. So this is like progress. One for the girlz, yeah! Did they decide to change it because of me, really, or for Tag, or for who knows what? Don't know. Don't care. I'm just happy to be accepted in the group. Flying under the banner of name pulls fame along with it. Fame is not the only thing I'm after but I'll take it. Just as long as I get the chance to skate as much as possible. And unlike Patch I'm not against sponsorship. That's when the free gear rolls in.

And bucks.

I may have to work on turning our prize anarchist around on his "no sponsorship" views. Remember, I have more than fleeting acquaintance with the Dogwood crowd. I skate with them, was girlfriend to one, had my life saved-sounds more romantic-by another who may one day become D-BF number two. If this fact makes me a skank to them I don't know. I hope not. But then I'm past the hopefully expectant stage. Which by itself is the only engine romance needs. But I have no plans to pursue anything. Today. Tomorrow speaks for itself. All I know is Tomorrow better run its thoughts by me before striking out on its own.

