B.A.D.D.

Mr. Pritchard's office had a kind of pretended cool about a decade and a half past relevant. The Cure on a poster to the left of a visiting student, The Fresh Prince on the right. Jeremy figured in three or four more years he'd have a DragonBall or All Your Base poster right in time for noone to get the joke. For a guidance counselor, Pritchard was too eager to be a friend to of much guidance or counsel.
He was drumming a pencil while explaining to some parent the benefits of foreign language education over the phone. Jeremy looked out the window. Past the Fresh Prince, and into the interior of the school's atrium. Banners extolling the new virtue -diversity- hung listing in the current of air conditioning. It was an Indiana March, but the AC was on. Awful. Pritchard was wrapping up the phone call. Jeremy wanted a cigarette.
"Is this about my writing assignment?" Jeremy thought he might as well jump in. He should have known better than to submit a piece about zombies to Mrs. Waters. She'd come from ivy on the East Coast, rumored from Church ivy. Pritchard opened his mouth, grey mustache dancing.
"Not specifically." Took a breath. "How are you doing, Jeremy?"
"Fine, I guess."
"You sure?"
"Sure. Why not?"
"Well, your father"
"What about him? He sucked. He left. Finally. As far as I'm concerned it's an improvement." Pritchard put the tip of his pencil to his lip. A bell rang and students started noising though the halls.
"Look. He's a drunk, useless. He didn't beat us, didn't scream or yell, just sat around collecting disability and drinking Jack Daniel's. Mostly he just took up space. He took a swing at mom once, and she clobbered him. Told him if he wanted to hit her, she'd fight back and he'd wind up getting his ass handed to him in front of his boys and the whole neighborhood. Dad went to bed and there was nothing else about it."
"Your mother is a very strong woman."
"Strong? Nothing to do with it. She just knows what she needs to do."
"What about Jake?"
"I get it now. He ran off and you want me to tell you where. Sure, half of county's looking for him and Deke. Well, like I told them, I don't know." Jeremy took a breath of his own. Thought about where he'd smoke after this. Pushed back the heat and wet at the corners of his eyes. "The last time I saw him was in December, right after he got busted with the booze. Dad took us out in the car. It was the Sunday evening after, like, four or something. We get on these back country roads and the old man cranks up to like, seventy. Tells us he's been drinking Jack and Coke since noon -which is bullshit. He'd been drinking since '91. But his hands are steady. Car's going fast but totally in control, and he's telling us if we're going to drink we gotta keep it cool and stay collected -like he's trying to pass on some alcoholic's wisdom. The whole time Jake's just looking at him, not like dad was crazy, which he was, but like it confirmed something for him. Answered a question that never got said out loud. Then this deer comes flying across the road, and there was this thump -I guess the mirror clipped its tail or something and dad slows the car down. We sat, totally silent for a minute. The I just started laughing. Came out of nowhere. Couldn't stop. Pretty soon dad and Jake are cutting up real hard too. We must have sat there on the shoulder for ten minutes busting our guts, tears running down our faces. The more the laughing hurt, the harder we laughed. Finally dad gets out something like, 'I love you boys' and Jake just stops. Gives dad this look like he wants to believe him and maybe even does. Says he wants to go home. We drive home, speed limit and stop signs and silence. Jake was gone in the morning."