Once upon a time I went to college. Since I wasn’t stupid, I lived in the dorms instead of at home with my parents. Since there had been a few murders on campus, there were student security guards at the doors to make sure that only the people who belonged there went inside.
I knew a few of these student security guards. They were called Desk Attendants, because they sat at a little desk outside the door. One of them, Bernie Lewis, had directed the student orientation group that I was in. He was short, blond, barely had to shave, and affected a goth/punk look that severly clashed with his privelaged preppie past and inner self. I thought he was kind of cute. He called himself Blew. I think he called himself that so he would get blown more often.
My friends and I sometimes hung out with Blew at his table to keep him company. Blew was infamous for drinking on the job. One day he got in trouble for playing poker for money when a campus police officer walked by. He didn’t get busted for drinking, though, which was good as he was only eighteen, three years under the legal drinking age. (oops!)
One night I was up very late hanging around in the lobby of my dorm complex, hanging inside with the insomniacs, hanging outside with the smokers, and drawing in my sketchbook. I was sitting on the bench by the vending machine nook, minding my own business when from down the hall about a hundred feet (the acoustics in there are fantastic) I heard Blew say: “Hey, man, come on outside! I have something to show you!”
I got up from my seat, pulled a stick of incense and a lighter out of my pocket, headed outside, and lit up to mask the truly nasty smell of all that damn cigarette smoke. I found myself a cross-legged seat on top of the trash can and watched. Thirty seconds later, Blew and his friend come busting out of the doors giggling at the tops of their little male lungs. I made myself really really quiet and watched more closely.
Blew and his friend scuttled down to the nook in the outside of the building where the picnic tables were, where they were out of sight of the vast majority of the smokers, who were huddled in the nook where the doors were, out of the cigarette-killing wind. The wind carried the commentary to me.
“See?” Blew said, dragging something out of his backpack that was indistinct in the dim orange light.
“!!!” his friend said.
“Yeah, aren’t they?” Blew said. “I saved them from the Fourth of July.”
“!!!!” I said to myself.
“Got a lighter?” Blew asked his friend. “No, wait, I got one in my pocket.” He produced it, planted the sticks of whatever it was he’d saved from the fourth of July in the snow and gravel, and lit the fuses.
They were loud, they were bright, and they were colorful. All the smokers stopped smoking for a moment and looked. “Dude,” one of them said, “those were fireworks!” He looked appalled for a moment. “That’s not
Blew and his buddy circled around by way of the bike trail and walked up the stairs to the entry by way of the parking lot. “Man,” Blew said, “do you know who let off the fireworks?”
“Nope,” we all said, including me.
I kept my seat on the trash can, inhaling my incense and doodling in my sketchbook. When the police car showed up three minutes later with lights flashing and sirens blaring, I looked up from the book in startlement, registered the presence of the police car, and returned to concentrating on my drawing.
I was tapped on the shoulder. “Good evening, Miss,” Officer Krupke said.
I pulled my head out of the sketchbook. “Huh? Oh, hi.”
“Seen anything odd lately, Azure?” he asked.
I blinked twice, looked down at my book, around at the smokers, back at him, blinked again. “Smokers?”
“Thanks anyway, Azure,” he said. He nosed over to some of the other smokers. “Evening, guys. Seen anything, any disturbance?”
As the stoner related in Technicolor detail the exact specifications of the fireworks, I shivered, yawned, pinched out my stick of incense, folded up my sketchbook, and decamped from the trash can. “Hey Jennie,” I said to my best friend in the dorms, “wanna come inside where it’s warmer so I can draw you?”
“Just as soon as I finish this cigarette,” Jennie said, and blew a cloud of smoke in my face.
I walked back inside and immediately noticed the smell. Any kind of fireworks smell like this. I glanced over at Blew’s desk. Blew’s friend was cracked up, bracing his head on the table as he laughed. As I watched, Blew’s friend toppled out of the chair and started rolling around on the floor.
I looked at Blew. He was practicing signing his name. In the air. With a sparkler.
It was at about this time that Officer Krupke and his backup walked into the building. I stood there, eyes wide, staring in well-manufactured horror at Blew, who was misspelling his own name.
“I see something odd, Officer Krupke,” I said.
“I see something odd too, Azure,” Officer Krupke said.
“Oh God,” said Officer Krupke’s backup.
“Mr. Lewis?” Officer Krupke said. “Mr. Lewis, could I please have a word with you?”
“Oh shit,” Blew said. He looked at Officer Krupke, looked at his friend who was still ROTFL, and dashed out the emergency door, leaving a trail of sparks behind him.
Officer Krupke and his backup dashed after him.
Jennie walked in as the emergency door slammed shut. “Okay, Azz,” she said, “draw me.”
“Okay,” I said, and I sat her down and posed her. “Now hold really still....”
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