The poodle sees me first but finds more interest in the spinning wheel of the bike, enough to initiate a chase.

The dog's owner is a probable health nut from the headband to the running shoes. She orders the dog in half European, half English, calling it by a difficult name but the dog is on a revolt and a mission to catch the spinning wheel of rubber tires.

The woman looks defeated and let down. I think mum has shared the same emotion when she told me not to go out without a breakfast or giving Dad a proper weekend send off.

I fly through the cross which is keeping the reputation of a lazy Sunday. The bike's wheel screech around the sides of the pavement and the metal bell rings no alarm as a guy jerks his feet out from the stretched bench.

He yells at me to get off the sidewalk and the newsstand guy sparks a mutual interest by repeating something similar.

I am the 8 o'clock terror of Middle Market.

I slice through Arcadia, Palladium, Dwarves's parking lot where the lost Wednesday nights of eating sandwiches and scoffing ice cream used to take place.

Because of adrenaline or hatred, I don't think of Jackie or Clay long.

The chain screeches in set schedule and every half pedal, there's the common ballad of a cat being dragged through endless sheet of glass. I bite my lip in agony since the right thigh is already giving in the exercise of pulsing up and down.

I can see the side view of Elvis Ridge, slowly craning in to view like a monolith of answers and serotonin.

Without a second thought, I hit the curb, slowing down for a mere second before the tire wins the battle of arch and slides on through the pavestones. I haven't learnt from my previous experience of riding bikes on curbs.

I can tell that the yellow sweater has been in the wardrobe for a while because its neck kissed mine and gave me an irritating rash as a romantic present.

I donate one hand to subside the pain of itching it, giving it a good scratch even though I know the fact that, skin diseases and rashes should not be itched under any condition.

I loose footing for a second but the squad of women in front of me has already judged the danger related to me since they disperse like bonfire smoke.

My sweater is a giant caution signal. I am grateful.

I reach the incline of Elvis Ridge, which is geographically inaccurate because though this side of the town is tilted up top, it isn't enough to be considered as a ridge.

I ride along the brick walls of meth heads, broken beer bottles, polythene beds that are either covering homeless people or corpses, tilted garbage, wall graffiti that could be considered as art to someone, somewhere.

I scan the nearby vicinity for a piece of evidence of Ms. Eden's presence but there's no sight of an out of control Sedan or a Red plumbing family wagon anywhere.

I eye the other side of the ridge where the brick wall ended and the blind alley that we used to disperse one night is sitting like an innocent bystander.

A pair of cops in uniforms are as concerned as me about the polythene bags since they are kicking the sides, pulling open the hoods, calling out unimaginative names like Mister. Because of the sudden grey skies, their outfits blend in on the other side.

I wait for an immoderate scream that can only mean a brutally murdered corpse and Jack the Ripper's resurrection.

All I have to see is the backlight of station wagon to understand that she's here.

When my sprint is on full as the bicycle chain screams out in pause to support my enthusiasm, I peel around the corner of the local dinner house. I see the battered bumper, the worn out skin of the Red Station Wagon through the offer of 'Fish and Chips' on the display window.

I do not dwell on silly things as how should I act or if my first move should be welcoming, joyous, grateful for being called or straight up interrogative.

I heard her voice through the landline as my mother was also trying to do the same thing.

"Can . . . you come-uh . . . where do you think . . . we could meet up?" She said, disregarding the excessive buzz and crackle of the telephone line that made me think that she was crying.

"Ms. Eden . . . um where are you?"

"At a pay phone. Near Elvis." The receiver laughed a breathy row, too breathy for comfort.

"Is that where you live?" I inquired, intrusively.

"No . . . no. It's just-can you come down? Maybe . . . no wait, maybe you shouldn't. It's too early. Yeah, it's too early. You don't have to come. I'll give you the news on class. I'll get over it by then. Hopefully."

I think of calling out, like we do when we meet each other on the playground where a glorified list of nicknames fire out with zero shame and one hundred percent juvenile laughter.

The squeal of the bike is slowing down, like the end of a thrilling opera.

From the closed distance, I spy the driver seat window, the passenger side where no image of Ms. Eden or any human being is present.

The man near the diner has been busy with the beating of the entrance carpet but the timed punishment isn't being handed out.

I look back at him to find him looking at me with aware eyes which are probably wondering if I look too young to be a carjacker.

I lob a silent smile towards him and carry on with my search of the vehicles. He doesn't see the dilemma of a carjacker with a bike since one becomes a liability during the crime.

I press my face on the driver side mirror and the view inside tells a silent tale of lack of cleanliness.

The batch of unmarked papers with ant sized printed words, a paper bag full of pencils from which the pens and a ruler broke away, a tube of lipstick that looks like a bullet shell and packs of little snack bars are also on the littered list.

"Ms. Eden." I bellow, not thinking what I aim to accomplish from the trial.

"Ms. Eden Lindenburgh." I sound like Mrs. Muhr, taking the labs roll call to check if anyone's flanking her Formalin smelling class.

"Ms. Ed-"

The throaty note passes through the car and onto the other side.

My eyes broaden from familiarity but the amount of unforeseen mysticism turns it back into a squint.

This is one of her characteristic traits I think, when I spot the suggestion of a human being on the other side of the car. The black outline is pressing her back on the window of the middle rows, creating the horned implication of edgy shoulder blades.

She's too into literature, too into drama. Her mind is probably a worshipper of writing fictions and creating moments that can only happen in a book.

She can turn around any second and actually reveal her identity but instead lets a croaky din scoop around the car and onto my ear.

The outline's shoulder blades jerk forward then back on the glass.

She's probably struggling to keep the giggles in, from the glorious entertainment of fooling me.

I gently press the bike's handles on the side door as I take a few calculated steps around the corner.

Just to find that 'High expectations' is still one of my regretted traits as I catch her crossed arms first, then the disturbed hair and splotches of messy make up on her cheeks that disappear from her neck.

The strawberry red patches of frozen blood on her nose bridge and the crimson implication of disturbed mental statue are resting in her eyes.

I wait for a discovered howl, a childish jump scare, a shove or a friendly punch in the neck.

But the joke has no punch line.

"Hello." My fingers fail to form a wave or a fist or anything.

There is no reply and no donated acts of body language as her posture swivels around to the other side.

This time, the lighting and the absence of musty car windows provide me with a good view of her back. The shirt underneath is struggling not to suffocate as the back brush of the collar is peeling out.

"What . . . what happened?"

"You didn't have to come."

"But you called."

"Yes, then . . . then I said that it was too early. Then I told you . . . shouldn't come."

I have heard enough post crying voice in my life, of mum whenever she was stuck on a block with no words to please her. Pixie, the future model for Vogue magazines and professionally body ashamed, once cried whilst she busted out of the cafeteria door. Later we found her on the backlot, near the garden, hurt more by her tears than anyone else.

"I needed to get out of the house. I wasn't asleep . . . we are early-"

"Early birds, I know. Your mother made that point very clear."

Her deep inhale sounds like those high tech converses with extra tractions that always squeak too much on clean floors. A hand is let free from the crossed stance as it wastes a few seconds before she smoothens her distorted hair.

The bundle gives out.

The air is filled with the background, minute noises of bins being dragged, carpets being beaten, a sudden blip of a police car before it dies. And in those intervals, little sobs of crinkled nose and held back tears.

I recapture all the things that I have learnt about condoling.

Condolence without being aware of the cause works only so much and gives the silent implication that, the incentive of an apology isn't 100 percent. People during funeral are so strict and auto monas, mainly for this aspect of human nature.

I think I should help Ms. Eden to cover up her tweaks of muffled wails. Clearly, she doesn't want me to know about the fact that she is tremendously upset about something. But, this could be an invitation, a double encryption since she is standing just in front of the side view mirrors.

Letting a hazy image of her inflamed cheeks, swollen eye lids and occupied fingers bounce off of the glass.

"I--" I thread in an interval because of the presence of another possibility.

According to mum, it is important to address the problem, rather than dance around it and give it space to become a large conflict. Even though, currently, Julia isn't following that bit of social moral but I must follow the idea and not the people.

This is a game of chess, something that I am worse at than anything else in the world.

"What's wrong?" My voice is switching frequency like an out of date radio. I sound in-confident, uncommitted.

"Nothing's . . . nothing's wrong."

"Oh . . . well, if anything is-"

"Nothing is, alright?" She juts away from the side view mirror, with no glance back. I know she has spotted me spying on her through the looking glass.

"Well, we should talk about writing . . . since we are here. I mean . . . Elvis Ridge isn't the place to have the mood. The drunks and the smell give it away, mostly."

This should be enough to contradict her into taking any actions since I am not actually pushing aside the problem or fully admitting it.

I sense a reflexive smirk on my mouth.

I feel like a sociopath.

"No . . . uhm-not today, maybe." When she crosses in front of the car, the windshield gives me a clear view of a pulsing throat and a line of throbbed vein in her forehead. It looks fat, like a badly placed guitar string.

"Right. Well, it's a good thing that I came. I needed to . . . uh-needed to speak with you." Though it troubles me, I gloss over the fact that I uttered "Need" rather than "Want" which increases the craving more.

My subconscious is at the helm. I should be scared but strangely, I am not.

"What . . . what about?"

Her skinny posture almost disappears behind the front side of the car, leaving an ethereal mark on her voice. As if I was speaking out to the Ridge and the Ridge was speaking back to me whilst it tried not to scoff any more sobs or breathy, croaked tunes.

"Nothing particular. Things haven't been easy lately." I don't have to breathe in long enough for it to become a sigh. In the last one and a half day, I had a lot of practice.

"I have been nowhere. I spent a whole day in bed." When spoken aloud, truth sounds as heavy as a death sentence or the news of some dearest's death.

"I am very dissatisfied with mum." This is the last bait.

I take it as a success when I see the left side of her face peak out from behind the driver seat. The tinted window and the lack of sunshine are making her face more clay color than red.

"Your mum sounded nice."

"She is. Till you get to know her."

"I would have never guessed it."

"Now, you know."

"Thanks . . . for the heads up. This is the kind of information that can change someone's life."

Momentarily, I feel stumped which resembles the same emotion that I experienced at the annual school hurdle race which I finished last because I was in the big boys league who utilized their long legs whereas mine wasn't stretched enough, a biological disadvantage.

"I thought I can help myself by talking it out with you."

These are example sentences that she can use.

I slowly tread around the car, nonchalant and not crouching since she is clearly monitoring my motions.

"Uh-huh." She grunts before she changes her stance back to the shoulder of the car.

One of the easier ways to get something off of your chest, is a social group. Much like AA meetings which my mother constructed and carried on during her social years. She even has a few photographs from time to time, of an open room which looks too much like a classroom without the desk.

The picture was taken at a candid moment which really spreads on mum's assurance since the young Julia Newell is standing in the middle of a pale faced, off white skinned bunch of teens. The flash must have been on since mum's profound hand gesture was the highlight.

The basic of social confession excludes the shame, brings in the unity of bearing each other's burdens and mistakes.

"Dad is leaving again." I start, slowly. I can spot her flinching before she looks away to the edge where the water is looking like the bad combination of spirit and handful of unknown chemicals.

"I have been keeping count. He stayed for 14 days. It's the most in '97."

"What does he do?"

"A doctor."

"At where?"

I pause. It seems as if I am lying but actually, I have forgotten what is written on Dad's medical ID.

"Everywhere."

"Sounds tiring." She sounds impassionate. I try not to feel too hurt but there's no compensation in the trial.

"We sit at dinner tables. Then we talk about heart bypass till we finished our dinners. We never talk about me."

"Tough."

"What?" I spot the edge of a difficult geometrical shape on the horizon of my eyes. I think of heart bypass surgery and the grossest video tape of that I have seen with my father, just so I can escape the sticky embarrassment of crying.

"Sounds tough. Sounds like a cliché. So common and yet so hard to understand, isn't it?"

I don't have to scan through her crossed arms that strain against her chest and the crank of her straight eyes which look far from formal or compassionate.

"A . . . wha-"

"My mother doesn't love me. Dad is always out. Isn't that the story of every teenager's greatest misery?" She chips a smile that doesn't go far from her lips and fails to develop into laughter.

I wait for her to announce that she's kidding. I wait for the old Ms. Eden's frantic laughter that leaves a ring in the ears after it ends.

"As your teacher, I advise you to be a little more . . . imaginative. You aren't going anywhere with . . . that kind of generic story of kids and mommy issues."

I can't tell what's going on but it's certain that her attacking posture is the fruit of something.

She looks proud, regretted and hateful.

"You're very . . . "

"What? Mad? Angry? Upset?"

"I was going to say distressed."

"Thanks for the label."

Without warning, she pulls open the driver seat door and the blur of a black sweater disappear behind the grey seat covers.

The driver side door shuts with such a loud thump that I can spot a layer of loose rubber lining that peels off a little.

The engine scoffs, coughs, screeches out in pain and desperation which sounds like the end of a friendship.

From now on, she would not talk to me when I see her at class. She would leave the papers on the desk, rather than hand it to me. She wouldn't ask what I have been up to or make a joke whilst she stands near the window during class.

She would address me by roll numbers, she wouldn't try to explain why I should be more attentive to short stories other than novels because novels are too intimidating to amateurs and short story can let you leave anytime you want.

"I'm sorry. Please . . . tell me what's wrong." I nook my head towards the driver seat window which is stuck halfway up.

I must look extra pathetic because she stops her wrist breaking twist on the ignition key and imitate a look that can be considered humane.

"I wasn't . . . judging. I-I was just looking for an adjective."

I let grammar take the fall, on this incident. Unlike me, grammar isn't losing his friends faster than the speed of light.

She chaps her lips then swallows them inside her mouth. She might actually considering me as a friend, as a companion, a person you can share your secrets with, without being bogged down by the thought of insecurity.

"I guess you don't know about it, do you?"

"About what?"

"Of course you don't. How could you really? It's not like the world revolves around what I do. It's of no importance at all."

"What is?"

"I showed them the rest . . . of the script."

From my arched axis, the backbone starts to ache a bit but I don't complain.

"They said . . . they didn't like it."

"Who said?" This is muddier than the mystery of an Agatha Christie novel.

"They said it was off. They liked it before. . . now they don't."

The edge of her neck stiffen till it doesn't rise. Bitten lips and tight grasps on steering wheels are silent battles against crying.

"Then . . . and then, they liked someone else's. They said, they want theirs . . . "

I see the lovechild on the passenger seat where the fat folder of considerable 79 pages of murder, bloodbath and deception that is also known as 'Home Invasions'.

I think of saying something, something so magnificently assuring that the entrance of the sentence can solve every problem in the world. World peace, Hunger, Endless wars will be no match to my assurance.

"I'm sorry." I condole.

I feel underwhelmed by myself.

"Well, they might be right . . . right? Who cares about anything? It's not good. They said so. Then it must be true. It's-it's no good."

She's huffing as if she has just run a marathon from her seat in the car.

"It's alright. I mean . . . it's not the end of the world right? It's just the end of my 3 weeks. It's fine, right? 3 weeks? 3 weeks are nothing!"

"Ms. Eden-" I try to butt in but the door latches to an open, hitting me on the knees.

"Now I know, Frey. Now I know. I'll get back to school and then maybe learn something . . . Hell, I will just stop this mess. I'll stop writing. "

She unhooks her seatbelts as her hand coaxes the folder into her arms.

"I'll get into some college. Yeah, that sounds like a plan. I'll study social or that jaw dropping economics, like Dad wants me to."

She doesn't even close the door when she walks away from the car which leads me to understand her lack of sensible thinking.

The folder hangs on her tight grasp as she steps closer, overcoming the unmarked parking space, past the bins, onto the concrete then the paved rocks of the bricked wall.

I think of rugby tackling, aiming just above her waist to dislocate her hand so that it cannot follow through with anything but its too late.

Since a few loose papers try to saunter away as the folder reaches for the moon, hanging heavily in the midair. Then, flying down to the Ridge.

I follow suit.