How I Made the FBI's Most Wanted

How I Made The FBI'S Most Wanted

Jamie McCullum

Mad Youth Press

Copyright © 2024 Jamie McCullum

Revised Edition

All rights reserved

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

Title Page

Copyright

1 Hacked

2 White Clay, Delaware

3 U.S. History Survey

4 The Pool

5 Off to Party at X’s

6 X’s

7 Robin

8 Jacquie calls

9 Building Forts

10 Joey Wrecks HIs Shit

11 Roll In The Clover

12 The Abyss

13 First Party at the Benches

Part II

14 September Surprise

15 Shocked and Awed

16 El Diablo King for a Day

17 Tim

18 M.I.A.

19 Auntie Vanessa

20 Candidate Dickhead

21 Hey Buddy Can You Spare An Aspirin?

22 Secret Agent Busser

23 Donuts and Storm Troopers

24 Osborne Explodes

25 Manna From Heaven

26 Only Human After All

27 Cecil B. D’Thornton

28 Epiphany

29 The Doggy Pound

30 Snap Back

31 Pulling My Butt From the Fire

32 The Return of The JR

33 Baconators

34 So Much For Sterling

35 A Hug Is Not Just a Hug

36 Mischief Night Comes Early

37 The Rebels Strike Back!

38 A Day At Blood Beach

Part III

39 Beatdowns R Us

40 A Life That Could Have Been

41 Blood, Daggers and Joey

42 Brothers In Death

43 In The Belly Of The Abyss

44 Meet The Candidates

45 Just When You Think You’re Out

46 Not Done With Us Yet

47 Fucked

About The Author

MAD YOUTH PRESS

1 Hacked

If I have to write one more YA news story, I swear to God, I’m going to—

Not a novel, Joshua! Just five paragraphs and a lead, move your booty! yells my city editor Jacqueline Guild from across the newsroom floor. You have three minutes!

It’s six p.m Friday of Memorial Day weekend and the setting sun blasts me through the floor to ceiling windows of our offices atop Rockefeller Center in New York City. Deadline for tomorrow’s early edition just expired.

I look over from my desk at Strump’s mug floating across the layout editors’ monitors, the 72 point headline for tomorrow’s front page screaming, THE DICTATOR STRIKES BACK. THE LAST PRESIDENT WE WILL EVER ELECT. CAN BLAZE SAVE THE REPUBLIC?

Now that’s the Red Meat I’m talking about—stories worth coveting, stories worth covering, not this baby pablum sh—

My desk chimes— One…two…three rapid-fire text notifications. I turn back and reach for my phone. Must be urgent. Wonder if my mother’s favorite uncle passed? He’s been in hospital under a DNR order the past week.

My phone unlocks and…caller name 44687?  6:01 pm, 6:02 pm, and 6:02 pm. What the hell? I check the filter heading—KNOWN. No, no, not known. I sure as hell don’t know anyone named 44687!  Chime again. A fourth pops up. 6:03. I check my desktop time. Fri May 31 6:03 PM

6:01—Dear Mr Thompson…I work at Delmarva State Police HQ…Operation Cobra set for next school year…need your help, every high schooler in the state needs your help…

6:02—The greatest sin…abuse of power.

6:02—Accusation is not proof…conviction depends upon evidence…We shall not walk in fear…into an Age of Unreason…

6:03—Will call tonight at 8:15.

JOSHUA!

In a minute! I toss my phone to the desk, lock in, and type.

While their father announced his surprise candidacy for president today, Mayor Blaisedale’s three young daughters stood offstage and decried the bid. Nine year-old Antonia scowled, Let someone else save the country! We want our daddy home. Six year old sister Danielle seconded the motion, Home, and making pancakes." Four year old Margaret hugged her Winnie the Pooh Bear tighter and started balling —

I push send.

Jacquie gives a thumbs up from behind her screen. Finally, she shouts.

I grab the Starbucks by my keyboard and gulp down what’s left—cold, bitter, sludge.

Four years of Columbia Journalism School and I’m interviewing little girls and teddy bears! Where’s Snowden? Where’s Xi? Where’s Jennifer Lawrence!

When I graduated last year and the New York Post-Examiner ran my senior project—an expose on human trafficking and sexual exploitation of Manhattan’s runaway youth, I was on top of the world. Jacquie even came to my graduation and offered me a job while I was still in cap and gown. Flash forward twelve months as Youth Beat editor, and now platform diving off the George Washington’s lookin’ pretty good—Jacquie stops at my desk on her way out. You missed a quotation mark, she says, Otherwise outstanding. We scooped everyone in town.

Jacquie, when… When are you and the chief going to throw me some red meat?

When what, Sport?

I sigh. Low man on the totem. Nothing. Have a nice Memorial Day Weekend.

Thanks Sport, I will. Any plans?

A.C. with friends I guess.

Well win big, just know when to fold em! Good night, Joshua.

Night, Jacquie.

The elevator doors ding open, the elevator doors ding shut.

Alone in the newsroom now, I gather my phone and revisit the impossible texts again.

Impossible because this is my personal phone for family, friends and Jacquie. If your number’s not on that list, you’re deemed an unknown sender and go straight to the Unknown Senders folder, notifications for that folder have been turned off, so I never hear those chimes, but more impossibly, how can an unknown sender end up in the known sender folder as KNOWN, ergo the chime?

I sit down again, check iMessage preferences and my contact list again to make sure I’m not going crazy.

Yes of course I’m not. Every toggle is right and correct. There is no 44687 in my contact list.

Was my phoned just hacked!

I go back to the texts.

Delaware I know. Operation Cobra I don’t.

Greatest sin is the abuse of power.

That’s nice, but so?

An Age of Unreason.

Every journalism student knows this one. It’s a quote from Edward R Murrow, the father of broadcast journalism, about McCarthyism trending at the time.

Operation Cobra is the only thing that peaks my curiosity, that and the plea for help, but how can the editor of the Post Examiner’s Teenybopper News help every highschooler in the state of Delaware, except maybe to suggest a better zit cream?"

Think! Who could this unknown sender be? I have no family, no friends, no acquaintances, no foes in Delaware. No one here at the paper far as I know has any connections or dealings with the state police there. The sender must be a stranger then.

Delaware. Delaware. Wherefore art thou Delaware?

Bethany Beach. Blue Claw Crabs. The first state to ratify the Constitution. Great place to incorporate. No personal income tax. No sales tax. Oh and retired President Biden. Wait, isn’t that abuse of power quote his? Yes, it is.

I draw a blank on anything else, having been to Delaware only once in my life during Spring Break and—most of the time, sloshed.

But more important and puzzling right now is how did the sender get my private number? I’ve never made it public anywhere on-line or in my by-line description and all us reporters use the Post-Examiner landlines for communication with the outside. I guess if the sender can hack my phone, my unlisted number would be cake.

I glance at the menu bar of my I-Mac. Fri May 31 6:44 PM.

An hour and thirty minutes till 8:15. I’ve just enough time for three Manicotti’s with meat sauce, breadsticks and a salad from Caruso’s around the corner.  Oh and one Heineken.

Well maybe two.

The unknown sender, hacker whoever on the other end of the line doesn’t even give me a chance to say hello.

Thank you for taking my call, Mr Thompson, a woman’s voice says, the timber strangely amped, almost if it’s being altered electronically. But then again, maybe she’s just a high talker naturally.

Thank you for your texts, I say, Miss—?

Is this call being monitored, recorded or listened to by others.

No.

Is your phone on speaker?

No. I’m using AirPods.

Good.

I have some questions first too, I say.

Go ahead.

May I ask how you obtained my unlisted phone number?

You may ask, she says.

The line is silent and its meaning—not going to tell you.

Cloak and dagger okay. I can dig it—for now. I pull over a note pad and pen and scribble Peep Throat. This…this help you need—I’m assuming it’s journalistic. And you’re not going to tell me your name?

I can’t. Yes. Investigative, she says.

I see. Let’s get on with this then. Blackjack tables and free alcohol await. Why contact the Post Examiner, why me? The Wilmington News Journal is an excellent paper, wouldn’t they—

The Journal’s too close to home, and might succumb to political pressure. So I thought an out of town paper.

Okay, understand. But why me specifically?

Because I read your newspaper series on runaway youth.

You read that?

I bought two copies of every issue the installment appeared in. I was very impressed by your tenacity and fearlessness, living on the streets for a month, and surviving, but even more impressive was how your writing showed a real empathy and concern for those street kids. You should have won a Pulitzer or at least the Murrow Award.

Have you ever thought about of being a literary agent, Miss?

She chirps like a Cardinal, which I assume is a laugh.

If she’s trying to butter me up, she succeeded.

Well thank you for the compliments, Miss, but I still don’t understand what relevance—

I’ve seen your byline photo, Mr Thompson.  You look young enough to pass for a high school student.

I don’t understand what that means. Pass as a high school student?

"Mr Thompson, I work in the Juvenile Narcotics Division, my position I must keep secret.

"We plan a series of undercover operations for the coming school year across the entire state. Young looking police officers will go into high schools, pretend to be students, attend classes, make friends, gather intelligence and execute arrest warrants. I know the officers involved. Their tactics and attitudes are dangerously reckless, their oversight insufficient, their contempt for the rule of law appalling—our work has degenerated into mere entrapment scams for publicity and increased federal money.

"Two minors entrapped by a similar operation earlier this year, were coerced into making confessions and are currently serving sentences in our adult prison in Smyrna. Both boys come from low income working class families.

Someone needs to observe these operations first hand, detail how the undercover officers are abusing police powers and violating the civil rights of these students. So I thought, you could—

I process silently…Oh I get it. It took a few seconds. Pose as a student to see what’s going on for myself.

Yes. Isn’t that what you did for your homeless youth expose?

But I’m twenty three years old, hardly a high school teenager, and—

But neither are our undercover officers. They do it, they pass, so why can’t you? By and large they’re older than you, by five or six years.

The students don’t catch on?

These are fourteen, fifteen, sixteen year old teenagers, Mr Thompson, pre-occupied with girls, boys, sex, sports, hair, clothing, music, video games and Tik Tok. Hardly Einsteins. And the investigative targets, not only deal, but also use, which affects judgement and acumen. They’re all very easy to fool.

You sound as if you’ve done this before. Are you an undercover narcotics agent?

Please don’t ask me such questions Mr Thompson, I don’t wish to lie to you, but I can’t tell you the truth either. I must remain opaque to protect my identity. I like my job and need my job and want to continue serving the People of Delaware, and if my superiors knew I was talking with you, I’d lose everything.

I still wish she’d tell me her name. Hasn’t she heard of source confidentiality? The Supreme Court has.

Mr Thompson? Are you still there? Did our connection drop?

No, no, I’m still here. I’m thinking.

Well, what do you say then, Mr Thompson? Are you interested in proceeding further with this conversation.

I say…I don’t have a clue about how to do this. How would I even enroll in a high school? And then there’re the legal issues—

Don’t worry, I can help you with enrollment. It’s not as difficult as you think. The most complicated thing will be that you’ll need an older looking adult to play your parent when you register. As far as the legal issues, do you wish to see such injustice continue? The fraud you’d commit is only a misdemeanor. Lives are being wrecked here, innocent lives, and no one in government seems to care, so it falls to us the People, she says, quoting a line from my homeless youth series.

The quotation hangs in the dead of the call.

Let me check with my editors, I say finally, and I’ll get back with you. Miss, Mrs, Ms…? Oh sorry, forgot, can't ask.

I’ll call you again after the Memorial Day holiday, Mr Thompson, thank you for your time, Happy—.

Wait, wait, please don’t hang up just yet.

What is it Mr Thompson?

How do I know you are who you say you are with the Delmarva State Police?

Are you online?

Yes.

Then go to the DSP website and scroll down to News Room.

I type into the address bar, Delmarva State Police. Google search results appear, I click on the website link scroll down to the News Room section. I’m there.

Good. See in the middle column, the article about a traffic stop resulting in a drug seizure?

Yes.

Take a snapshot of your screen.

I hold down Shift, Command, 3. Done.

Come back in five minutes and compare the text. I’m going to remove the hyphen from the suspect’s age. Instead of thirty hyphen one years old, it will just read thirty one. It will remain so for sixty seconds. Do you understand?

Yes.

Then Happy Memorial Day, Mr Thompson. Till our next conversation.

Call ENDED.

2 White Clay, Delaware

One hour and nine minutes before dawn at exactly 5:00 AM, the clock radio on the night table of my one bedroom sublet shouts the call sign, WMMR, 93.3 FM.

"GOOD MORNING DELAWARE VALLEY! THIS IS FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH AND WELCOME TO THE MORNING ZOO.

I’M JOHN DE BELLA WAKING UP TWO MILLION SLEEPY HEADS IN THE PHILADELPHIA, JERSEY AND DELAWARE TRI-STATE AREA…

I open one eye, open the next. From my sheets and pounding hangover I reach out into the red tinted darkness and slap off my clock radio alarm.

The blinking LEDs fly away.

A Walking Dead corpse crash. I look down. My landlady’s wobbly, doily covered night table is on its side. Clock radio, reading lamp, Stephen King’s latest, my cell, AirPods all strewn across the parquet floor like airplane wreckage.

I collapse back into bed, the invisible vice locked around my temples doubling down. I’ll be swiffering my brains off the walls any moment now.

What the hell did I smoke last night? How much did I drink! These parties in the woods are killing me.

I revive enough to stumble from bed to hallway to galley kitchen and start Mr Coffee. I head for the shower.

Aussie rainforest shower heads are the greatest human invention of all time! I stand under the gentle deluge and let nirvana soak in.

I make the water hotter now, soap up and shampoo. My mind grows clear. I step from the shower squeaky clean and renewed.

The migraine has left the penthouse.

I wipe the bathroom mirror with my towel, then apply the towel to myself, finishing up with a detangling comb to my long, damp hair. It’s grown out nicely since May and is well below my ears, except that the sides flip. I hate that, but my locks resist any attempt to tame them. Fortunately it’s the age of Tik Tok Hair, when every day’s a good hair day.

I feel my chin for whiskers. I find a few and buzz them away with a cordless hair trimmer. Good thing I never had a heavy beard. My uncles rib me about it every family gathering. One uncle, Uncle Richie, likes to joke I don’t need a razor to shave, just a thirsty kitten and milk on my chin.

I finish drying off and wrap the towel around my waist. The other good thing I bring from NYC, from jogging the 6.1 mile loop around Central Park every morning, rain, shine or snow, is the six pack I earned back in high school, my first time around in high school when I played soccer and wrestled. How many years ago was that? One, two…Jesus, five years already?

A final check in the mirror. With my shaggy hair, bright complexion, zero gut and fair skin…gees, Peep Throat is right. I really do pass as a high school student, and my classmates and teachers at White Clay Senior High all seem to concur, though they don’t know they’re concurring.

I offer my reflection a little victory flex. My nose tells me coffee’s ready. My MacBook Air awaits. I hope the notes I wrote under the influence last night make sense this morning. I must remember to watch the time and not miss the school bus again.

It’s a long, three mile walk to homeroom.

3 U.S. History Survey

Imissed the school bus.

But the walk through meandering suburbs does me good. The pumping of my legs and the sunny air in my lungs help dispel last night’s toxins as does a Caramel Macchiato with double expresso shots from the Pacific Coffee on Main Street. A perfect caffeine moment for a perfect morning, the only thing missing are some Tunes. I left my iPod in my locker at school and must remember to take it home with me.

I take a nice long sip and reflect on the town before me.

The town of White Clay, Delaware, established in 1694 grew out of a now extinct statewide cornfield, becoming a quaint middle-class college town home to 30,000 locals and 23,000 out of town U of D students.

New York City is two hours north, Philadelphia forty minutes, and Washington, D.C. two hours south.

My city desk editor, Jacquie Guild, had come down from NYC to play my mother when I registered at school and said White Clay reminded her of a TV show from her youth called Mayberry RFD.

That had been a hot, humid Thursday in August just three weeks ago. She had taken the Metroliner down from Penn Station. I was already in town signing the rental agreement on my condo, and with lease and receipts in hand walked over to White Clay’s small commuter station to meet her. 

At two-thirty in the afternoon, she climbed down the pull-out steps of the Washington bound Metroliner, the conductor’s hand in hers. She stepped onto the narrow strip of platform, he tipped his blue Amtrak cap. Jacquie was the only disembarking passenger.

The conductor made a notation in his leather station book. He blew a whistle, boarded again, and cranked up the steps behind him. Springs squeaking, train wheels sparking and squealing the twenty car Silver Capital rolled out of town. I called to her from the shadows of the gothic tower and overhanging shaker roof.

I thought you were supposed to meet me, Sport.

Aren’t I meeting you?

I meant on the platform as I arrived, I was afraid this wasn’t the correct stop. She slapped at a buzzing fly, cursed when she missed it. Doesn’t Bo Dunk Ville here believe in breezes? This place is stifling.

There’re lots of shade trees on the way to the school. You’ll be cooler soon.

We exited the station into a neighborhood of old Victorian homes.

Where’s the Uber? Jacquie said.

Busy until five. So we’ll have to hoof it. It’s a short fifteen minute walk.

In this heat no fifteen minutes of anything will be short, Jacquie said, and we started down the sidewalk, the concrete pushed up rudely here and there by roots of the forty foot tall Maples lining the street. The summer cicadas serenaded us from the tree tops.

Where’s the condo you rented, and costing the paper twelve fifty a month?

You mean condo cubicle. Two miles away, in the opposite direction, where the more blue collar working class neighborhoods are. This used to be a big Mopar town, they built Chrysler mini vans at a major plant by the train station. The plant closed down twenty years ago. You may have noticed all the abandoned rail lines when you came in.

I did. What do they do for freight now? You can’t run freight trains on high speed tracks.

Freight trains run on the north side of town, on a single line passing through a wooded area behind all the neighborhoods I mentioned. I heard the whistles last night and went over for a look this morning. I didn’t know you were interested in trains, Jacquie.

My father worked for the New York Railroad his whole life. So what do all these out of work blue collar workers do now?

I’m not sure yet, The only major industry I can see here is the University of Delaware, and Dupont Chemical.

All white collar jobs.

Except for janitors, security guards, landscapers, cafeteria staff and the like.

Jacquie made a hmmm sound.

What’s that mean?

Just hmmm.

We walked in silence the next few minutes and entered the grounds of the U of D campus, pausing occasionally to admire the Georgian Revival style architecture and the two hundred year old Oak trees lining the campus mall.

The mall led to Main Street, where the Revolutionary War architectural theme continued. We passed the post office building reminiscent of Jefferson’s Monticello. I’m surprisingly charmed, Jacquie said. This quaint place is something out of Mayberry, RFD. I half expect Andy and Aunt Bee to step out of that diner over there.

Mayberry R F what? Andy and Aunt B who?

The title of a network television show and names of its two main characters set in a rural town in North Carolina circa 1970, Jacquie said. She stopped me and turned me into the full glare of the hazy sun, My God, you are young. She gazed back to the street. And I am old.

I laughed. No you’re not, Jacquie, you’re one of the youngest people I know. Age is—

No cliches please!

Okay, but what I said is the Truth.

How much further?

Not very, the school is at the end of Main Street.

We continued down the street passing a Walgreens and local favorite Happy Harry’s drugstore, White Clay Newsstand a long narrow store that sold major national and international newspapers and magazines, a red brick hardware store, coffee shops, barber shop with rotating barber pole, pizza and deli shops, a bicycle store and skateboarding shop called Wooden Wheels, Lee’s Oriental Market and Health Food Co-op, a gothic styled Catholic church with bell tower spire, and White Clay Bakery—the scent of confectionary sugar sweetening the air every time the front doors opened. Five teen aged girls in skimpy bikinis and pool towels burst out, carrying several white paper bags. They bustled me and Jacquie off the sidewalk and a few yards later, climbed into the cargo bed of a double parked blue Toyota pick-up loaded with similar aged boys. As the truck careened away, the girls, giggling and gawking, hung over the side for a double take.

You’ve been noticed, Jacquie said.

I know.

That reminds me, Joshua, she said looking in the direction of the pick up,  there’s something we never discussed concerning this expedition of yours. Don’t ever underestimate—

Jacquie, I’m interested in women, not teenage girls.

"Temptation. Yes, you may be able to control yourself, Joshua, but life doesn’t always give you a chance to.

On this point as your editor and employer, I must be absolutely clear, and you, Joshua, must be absolutely sterling, not just a white knight but a platinum knight in blinding armor whenever you deal with your young, female quote unquote classmates. You are a handsome young man just barely out of college, who will be surrounded by precocious modern day teenage girls of mating age, each with their own strong willed ideas, and ironically child like vulnerabilities.

Jacquie, you don’t have to worry about me in this regard.

I’m not worried about you, Sport. It’s The Male Hormone I’m worried about.

The assortment of businesses soon ended, upscale town homes and large clapboard houses with porches made a resurgence on both sides of the street now.

It’s been more than fifteen minutes, Sport.

I know, but I thought it might help with edits if you knew the basic layout of the place and experienced the atmosphere firsthand. Anyway, we’re practically there. One last thing I wanted to show you. I pointed up ahead to another Georgian style church, with flag pole flying a US flag, and stone walkway and neat, edged lawn. There’s the Death Star—White Clay Police HQ.

Their police station is in a church? Jacquie said.

A converted Episcopalian church. They removed the pews, added a second floor for more office space, beefed up the basement for holding cells, drunk tank, finger printing and line up rooms.

It must be a small force.

Only four squad cars, a half dozen uniformed officers, a couple of detectives, and Chief of Police Thornton. They rely heavily on back up from the Delmarva State Police.

They’d need to.

Jacquie and I pressed onward and after more minutes of vinyl siding homes, winding sidewalks and dead end cul-de-sacs, we arrived at a little park with swing set, Monkey Bars, picnic tables, wire trash bins full of drinking cups and junk food bags. We crossed freshly cut Bermuda to a four lane avenue, and just on the other side, a burnt sienna colored brick building, three stories high with attached auditorium and gymnasium rose into the grey sky. On the gymnasium bricks were embedded the steel letters--White Clay Senior High School,  and down the sidewalk leading to the double glass doors of the main entrance was a marquee sign with the cartoon depiction of the school’s mascot, a fierce Yellow Jacket in boxing gloves. In white plastic, changeable letters, the marquee read—Classes Begin Tuesday August 29th. Welcome Back One and All!

I guess police posing as students qualify as part of the all, I said.

Construction and layout right out of the Brady Bunch era, Jacquie said, my era, the era that gave us the Vietnam War, the assassination of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, Kent State, Watergate— all the reasons I became a journalist.

I looked at my phone. Perfect timing, it’s four twenty. The office closes in ten minutes. Traffic’s clear, we can cross.

Not so fast, Sport. Let’s see how you look first. Jacquie had said,  and had held me by the shoulders, studying my face. Sweep the hair behind your ears and straighten your polo shirt and collar. Here I’ll do it, now that’s better.

Thanks.

Jacquie had become gravely earnest. Don’t lose yourself in this Wonderland, Joshua, and be mindful of the Abyss.

Wonderland I get, but…the Abyss?

Nietzsche. Google it. And always remember who you are and who they are, and though you may fool them, you must never fool yourself.

Yes, Jacquie, I’ll remember.

Jacquie's visit fades now as I enter school and trudge down the first floor hallway. I have no idea of the exact time, but know it's still First Period.  I don’t carry my cell. I’m not even supposed to own one. The cover story is that my Old Lady’s too cheap..

I make each corner turn quietly as possible as not to arouse any Advisors who might be lurking the halls like the zombies in WWZ. I see the open door of my U.S. History Survey classroom finally. The coast looks clear. I glide in.

Josh, you’re late, says a young teacher, perhaps late twenties, hair coiffed in a modest Afro, his threads the flyest of any teacher in school, except maybe for Dr Macintosh the principal.

For real? I plunk down in my seat, the third seat in the first row closest to the door.

Thirty-four bored looking teenagers watch my every move, happy for the interruption. I know the feeling.

Our high school classroom has seven rows of chrome, Bakelite faux marble topped desks with attached seats and underneath grill book shelves, the seats soft as granite.

I’m being probed—well my left kidney is, by toes in a sock.  The kid with blond spiked locs sitting behind me is sticking his foot into my left side. Any second now he’ll—Ow! Shit—! grind for China. I reach back, find his sock and pull it half way off.

Yes, Josh, forty minutes late, Osborne says, The end of period bell’s about to ring.

Oh. Sorry Mr Osborne. I couldn’t help it. I barfed in bed and my Mom made me wash the sheets.

The class breaks up.

Alright alright, quiet down. Do you have your late slip from the advisors’ office?

My late what? I say.

He’s new, Mr O he don’t know these things, the kidney grinder says.

I snap my Juicy Fruit gum and twist my index finger in the button hole of my trucker jacket. You want me to go get a pass?

No, Osborne says, And don’t chew gum in class, either swallow it or spit it out in a tissue.

I don’t got a tissue.

Osborne points to the Kleenex box on his desk. "We were just going over our assignments for