I don't know why I told Meredith to hide in the closet, of all the most fucking obvious places in the world. All we were doing was sitting on the bed, more specifically Jacob's extremely comfortable Tempur-Pedic mattress, talking about Alice Cooper records. Not his albums, but the actual plastic records, which I had a bin of in the garage. Or, more specifically, Tucker's bin, in my dad's garage. But Tucker passed the bin on to me, in spirit.

She didn't know who Alice Cooper was, or what a record was, so I was telling her about both, and why they were so important to me. We were working on a project for our fine arts class. It was about classic rock music. I didn't know why, for the life of me, I was taking a fine arts class, when I was already in drama. At the rate I was going, I was closer to Broadway than the major leagues.

At the beginning of the year, I had stupidly tried to make my course load as easy as possible, but I got tired of it within the first nine weeks. It didn't feel like I went to school anymore. I went to a fucking summer camp, with one arts and crafts project after the other, making paper snowflakes and singing about Jesus, then sitting through an hour long chemistry lecture once a week. I failed Spanish when I was a freshman, so I was taking that again, too.

They forgot to give me a history class. The school fucking forgot to give me a history class, and I didn't even notice until two weeks in. Then I didn't remind them, because why would I? I wasn't going to college. People asked me what I wanted to do after I graduated, and I would say, "California," or "girls," because I was that mindless and senseless and stupid. But the school didn't fucking give me a history class, and they should've known better. Not I should've known better, they should've known better, and Meredith should've known who Alice Cooper was, and I should've stayed with Penny, and Ricky shouldn't have come into my room and nearly scared me half to fucking death.

And when I heard him knock on the door, I nearly shoved Meredith off of Jacob's extremely comfortable Tempur-Pedic mattress, which we were sitting on instead of my old thrift store one, and I hissed, "Get in the closet!"

She didn't ask why. She was used to being the other girl. She wasn't the kind of girl who got cheated on, she was the kind of girl you cheated with, and then regretted it. Or, you didn't regret it, but it really wasn't worth it, because she didn't stick around for very long. I knew all this from the beginning.

Ricky must've heard all the fumbling around. He got impatient, and picked the lock, a skill he learned from Jacob, who we've already established was unashamedly nosy. Jacob made lockpicks out of bent paperclips. Not the kind you read about in preteen magazines, but the kind that actually work. He used something else for the hook, too. I wasn't sure of the exact science behind it, but he had a 100% success rate in walking in on me when I had other girls in the room. He didn't teach Ricky how to make them, because Ricky yielding that kind of power would've been incredibly dangerous. Almost as dangerous as Ricky actually going by his full name. He would've been absurdly confident, incredibly dangerous, and utterly unstoppable.

"Hold on a second!" I called to the perpetrator, who I didn't know was Ricky yet. I thought it was Penny, even though I had no reason for thinking that. She never came over, even though she was invited. We could've watched crime dramas on the couch, and eaten fruit roll ups with milk, because apparently that was the only snack food available in my house. Anyway, there was no way it was Penny, but I thought it was, and I was panicking.

Ricky didn't answer, like a normal person. He was rattling around with the door, and then I figured it must be Jacob. Then I realized I had dug myself into a deeper hole, by telling Meredith to hide in the closet. I almost told her to come out, but not before Ricky got the door unstuck, and barged in my room, like he was entitled to be there, outraged at not having his own personal key.

"Dude, it's just me. Calm the fuck down. What are you doing?"

"Working on a project."

"Why are you just standing there like a fucking idiot?" It was true, I was just standing there, in the middle of my room, raising further suspicions. "Oh, I'm the fucking idiot," it dawned on Ricky, and I didn't know where he was going, but I agreed with him. "You have a girl in here, don't you?"

"Kind of."

"Kind of. So you have a cross-dresser in here? Or another bisexual, like you?" Ricky was offensive, but I couldn't fault him for it, since he truly didn't know any better.

"No. Ricky, just get out of here. Okay? We can do something later. Whatever it is can wait."

"I wanted to toss a ball around."

"You and I both know that's never going to happen. What are you really here for?"

"To see what you were up to. And I'm glad I did. Shit, Cal, it's been like, what, three weeks? And you're already cheating on Penny? I thought she was the one for you, or some fucking dumb romantic shit like that." We were cursing more than usual, and I didn't know why. Maybe we were short on humor that day, or maybe emotions were running high. "I think it's fucking hilarious how incapable you are of a monogamous relationship."

"You don't even know what the word monogamous means."

"You don't even know what the word relationship means," he shot back, and for once, I took what he was saying seriously. I knew he wasn't trying to chastise me for my actions, like anyone else would've. He was just acknowledging them, and turning it into comedy material.

"Who's Penny?" Meredith pushed open the closet doors, and Ricky started laughing hysterically.

"Meredith? Cal, you have got to be kidding me. You have got to be fucking kidding me. This is a fucking gold mine. You can't convince me you weren't doing anything in here, just now."

"We really weren't," Meredith said, with a disgusted look on her face, like maybe she had wanted to be doing something, and I was the one standing in the way of that something. "We were talking about some rapper I had never heard of before. Do you mean Penny Shapiro?"

"He does. The Jewish bitch, with the nose. You might be thinking, Ricky, we all have noses. But this one has a nose."

"She's cute," Meredith observed, which was a high compliment, coming from her breed. She wasn't one to compliment other girls very often. "Should I be jealous?"

"He's taking her to homecoming," Ricky informed, like I was incapable of speaking for myself. In that moment, I was, because my mind was going a thousand miles per minute.

"Well, I'm taking a guy from public school to homecoming. His name is Declan. He's my boyfriend." When I didn't react, she followed up with, "just kidding. He's not my boyfriend. But he is a friend, who's a boy. I have a lot of those, but I like you best. We'll secretly be going together, won't we?"

"We weren't doing anything just now," I told Ricky, not even listening to the words coming out of the girl in my room, the short, brunette one, who was still wearing braces, a tell-tale sign that she was too young for me. "Please don't tell Penny we were doing anything."

"Like I talk to Penny," he snorted. "I've always hated that bitch."

"Why?"

"She's loud. And annoying."

"I think you're describing yourself."

"Cal."

"Ricky. Please." And for once, I think Ricky showed a little restraint, because he could see how much it meant to me, and that it was the only thing that mattered in that moment, besides getting the fine arts project finished, and getting this short brunette girl who's name I kept forgetting out of my room.

"Why did you hide her in the closet then?"

"Yeah, Cal, why did you hide me in the closet then?"

"Because Penny and I had an argument about sex the other day. And I said it didn't matter."

"You said it didn't matter?" Ricky said that, but it could've been either one of them, because they were both regarding me so incredulously, since sex was the only thing that mattered. Ricky didn't get a whole lot of it, but his whole life was a quest, and I think if he had gotten more sex, he might not have cared about it so much. It was the thrill of the hunt, and of not knowing when or where it was going to happen next. It was always sort of an accident, with him. No girl ever had sex with him on purpose. The ones who would've, he blew off.

"Cal, you need a girl who knows how to have a good time," Meredith said. "And I'm your girl."

"She's your girl," Ricky agreed, practically drooling.

"Come on, Meredith, we need to finish this project."

"What is this project?"

"On Alice Cooper. Come on, I'll get the records out of the garage. Dad's garage. I mean, my dad's garage. We can listen to them for inspiration. You're not going to tell, are you, Ricky?" And Ricky was a horrible person, through and through, but he saved my ass, because he was also my best friend, and that's what best friends do.