He had stopped taking his meds because they made him feel weird, tired and kind of disconnected. He didn’t feel manic on them but he didn’t feel right. So he stopped taking them, sure that he’d be fine. He had been fine before, and now. What was to stop him from being fine?

When Joey asked if he was taking them he’d nod or say yeah in that gruff way that meant stop asking. Joey wouldn’t get the hint, though. He asked him almost every day about the meds. And every day he’d lie.

As the meds began to leave his system colors got brighter. His thoughts began to go just a little bit faster, and things seemed a little more possible. Things seemed a little more complicated, but in a good way. In a challenging way. He hadn’t felt challenged on his meds. He’d felt concussed. This was who he was, this was how his brain worked. Maybe it wasn’t a sickness, a disease. Maybe it was…him.

Did Ashley know he was off the meds? She liked to ask about it, too. Did she look at him suspiciously when he started to talk a little more and a little faster? When he couldn’t sit still? When he stayed up all night writing songs and planning things, his life and hers, in intricate detail?

No, no. Ashley didn’t know and Joey didn’t know for the simple reason that he was fine. He could handle it without the medication. So there was no need for anyone to worry…about anything.

The school year was almost over. Grade 11 nearly done. He shook his head in disbelief. Bounced his legs up and down as he waited for Ashley to return with their sodas. He was in her room, sitting on her bed. He liked her room, filled with all her secret and precious things and all color coordinated.

“Craig,” she said, smiling, breathless. She held out a bottle of coke to him and he took it, felt the cool wet glass against his palm.

“Hey,” he said softly to her, gazing at her. She was so beautiful. So alive and real and everything he’d ever wanted. He could feel how lucky he was, could feel it like a layer of sweat on his skin.

“Guess what?” she said, tilting her head back to swig her soda.

“What?” he said, feeling willing and open to anything she would say. Feeling that they were on the same plane, the same level. That he’d finally reached that place with someone, and it was her.

“My dad got a job in England,” she said, and her voice was still excited but a note of fear had crept in it, too. Craig squinted at her.

“So?” he said.

“So it’s at the BBC and he said that maybe, well, he might be able to get me a job there, too,”

She looked at him with her steady gaze. He couldn’t stop his legs from bouncing up and down, couldn’t stop the avalanche of thoughts that came with this announcement. Did she mean to go to England? Did she know how far away England was? How far away from him?

“Really?” he said, hoping he sounded sort of interested and not panicked and pissed off like he felt. How much could she tell just by looking at him? How much of his soul was he constantly revealing?

“Yeah, well, nothing’s definite yet. He just said he’d try,” This was clearly to cushion the blow. But he accepted this as what it might be…the truth. Maybe she wouldn’t go away and desert him like everyone else had.

“That’s uh, it’s great,” he said, his voice cracking on this sentence, and he lowered his gaze.

“Hey,” she said, trying to get him to look at her, “it would be a great opportunity. It would. But I wouldn’t want to leave you,”

“I know,” he said, almost meeting her eyes.

“Do you?” she said, leaning in close to him, her lips grazing his. He closed his eyes and kissed her back, for real.

“Hello?” He was finished his second soda and the caffeine maybe hadn’t helped. He was rocking back and forth, unable to contain all the energy. He held his sliver of a cell phone to his ear. It was Joey.

“Craig, listen, can you do me a favor?”

He closed his eyes, felt Ashley tugging on his jeans, pushed her away.

“Yeah, I guess. What?”

“Look, Caitlin needs a ride at the station. I said I’d pick her up but I’m stuck here. Can you pick her up?” Joey was at the car lot and reception was poor, he was talking through bursts of static and silence.

“Yeah, no problem. What time?”

“Close to now,”

He had walked to the car lot and got Joey’s car there. Headed over to the T.V. station, the music on and loud, his thoughts racing along. Ashley going to England tried to intrude on his pleasant thoughts of marrying her and writing songs and becoming famous as a musician. Having kids with Ashley someday, and he’d be such a good father. Better than his father. Then he thought of Manny and her pregnancy and the abortion. He scowled, remembering her telling him now was not someday. That’s what Manny didn’t understand. Now was all you had, all you got.

Smoothly he pulled the car into one of the slots reserved for one of the T.V. station executives. He headed for the glass doors and went in. He knew which studio room she was usually in and he headed down the dark hall. The lights got brighter as he approached the filming area and he stopped dead when he saw Kevin Smith.

Kevin Smith. “Clerks”, “Dogma”, “Chasing Amy”, “Mallrats”. Jay and Silent Bob. He was Silent Bob. But he was also a writer and director and Craig loved his shit, especially “Clerks”. When he saw that movie the first time it was like getting this glimpse of what was possible, of what was real and what was art and not Hollywood cookie cutter bullshit.

Caitlin was interviewing him. He peered at her, not quite able to tell if she knew who he was. Kevin Smith. Craig felt rooted to the spot he stood on, his mouth open.