Ali was super confused, more than he had ever been the whole week. The question Jeremiah had asked was taking a wrong turn in his head; he wasn't sure he had the right answer to it. Heck, he wasn't sure he had an answer to it at all.
Why would you like Lyca Apparently, he wanted an answer and Ali was going to have to give him the first thing that popped into his head.
"I don't know, man, she's pretty."
"Pretty!" Jeremiah exclaimed in horror. "Do you think she's pretty? Do you think Lyca's pretty? Are you really serious right now?"
"Yes, Jeremiah, please stop shouting; this bathroom is echoing," Ali grumbled.
"Look man," Jeremiah began. "I don't mean to be a sourpuss or anything, but you can't like her. She's turned your mind! She's a member of the club too!"
Ali was enraged, saying, "No Jeremiah, you look, man. I might let this club tell me what to do during our meetings, but I won't have them tell me how my life should go, ok?" With that, Ali stormed out of the bathroom, leaving Jeremiah shocked to the ears.
He didn't talk to Jeremiah the rest of the day in school and avoided him whenever they accidentally bumped into each other. He was mad, but he wasn't exactly sure why he was mad or who he was mad at. It could be because Jeremiah called him his best friend and had the guts to tell him that, or that Jeremiah was actually letting that club control his life, or that the club existed, or even that Charlie existed. Maybe if Charlie didn't exist, the club wouldn't exist and Jeremiah wouldn't have said that to him.
Everything pointed back to Jeremiah for dragging him into that club without his permission. In two days, he had gotten tired of every single rule in the club. There were so many rules that Ali wasn't sure when liking a member wasn't allowed was part of the rules.
The best thing about his avoiding Jeremiah was that he wouldn't have to see him till Monday. Maybe it would give Jeremiah the time to reflect on what he said and apologize.
When Ali got home, his dad was in front of the house chaining what looked like a bicycle.
"Hey Pa, you're home early. Did you come home to cook?" he immediately asked.
"Very funny Ali," his father, Jack, said without looking up from his work.
"What's that? Is that a bicycle?" Ali asked. Not that he cared, although he did wish the bicycle was his. His last bicycle was crushed by a moving van. Yes, the moving van that was supposed to be helping them move.
"Yes Ali, it's a bicycle, and please put in some swag and call it a bike for Christ's sake. No one these days calls it a bicycle."
Ali's father, Jack, had always complained about how nerdy his son could be sometimes. Some may even call it a shame that his teenage son wasn't like other people's teenage sons who were handfuls.
But, as usual, none of the things Ali's Dad said to him mattered.
"Where did you get it? Did you buy it?" Ali went on.
"No, the neighbors gave it to me," Jack grumbled. To avoid any further questions you're going to bother me with, I'll just say how it all happened.
"Ok, sounds good to me," said Ali, getting ready to hear whatever story his Pa was about to tell him.
"I was on my way to work today," Jack started, "and the lady that lives next door was throwing out a few battered things she didn't need anymore, and I saw this bike and asked her if I could have it and give it to my son."
"Wait, what next-door neighbor?" Ali asked, skimming past the most important thing, that his father had wanted the bike to give to him.
"The one to our right, Ali," said Jack. "You know, no one lives in the other house to our left."
"I thought no one lived on either side of our house, and more importantly, why did she have to throw away good stuff? Why didn't she just have a yard sale or something?"
"I don't know Ali," Jack snapped. "Maybe you can ask her, she wants to meet you anyways."
Ali went into the house, not because his father said something about meeting his neighbor-who visited their neighbors anyway-but because he didn't want to be around his father for a long time.
Ali hadn't told his father what he felt about the big house next to theirs. He thought his father might be hallucinating, maybe from all the work he was doing, because there was no way anyone lived in a house that had mold on the brick wall and grass growing on parts of the roof. It didn't look habitable.
What Ali couldn't explain though, was where the bicycle came from. He would do a further investigation when he was done with his weekend assignment and didn't have anything to do with his life again.
On Saturday, Ali was done with all of his assignments and was bored. He sat on the sofa in the living room, staring at the blank, stupid TV.
The TV was broken, so he couldn't watch anything. He didn't have any friends, so he couldn't call anyone and ask them what they were doing for the weekend. Worse, his father was right outside checking for any faults with the bicycle.
"Ali!" his father called a few minutes after Ali went to his room to see if he could find what to do. He didn't want to answer but felt he might as well just answer. Maybe it was something that would take the boredom away.
"Yeah Pa, you called?"
"Yeah, I called," Jack said, grinning, to Ali's shock. "I checked the bike out and it's all right. It almost makes me wonder why she wanted to throw it out in the first place. But I don't question this kind of thing; I just accept it. So, what do you say, Ali, want to take it for a spin?"
"No Pa, I'm not in a bicycle mood," Ali replied. He knew he was bored, but riding a bicycle around the street wasn't a good way to kill boredom.
"Well... what do you want to do then?" Jack asked, disappointment clear in his tone.
"I'm not sure, Pa. I was in my room trying to figure out what to do before..."
"Alian!" Jack interrupted Ali, "Go the hell outside and spend the weekend. You can't stay cooped up in this house and expect to just find something to keep yourself busy with."
"Well, what do you want me to do then?" Ali muttered.
"I don't know Ali, do what your fellow 18-year-olds are doing. They're getting high, Ali, they're getting girls pregnant, having sex wherever and however they want, they're being fathers, Ali, and you're here being you. "
There's the shame. The shame is that Ali wasn't a handful.
"Pa," Ali smiled, "you realize that half of what you just said was disgusting? I'm not going to do any of that. I'm fine like this, Pa."
"If you're not going to ride your bike, then I guess you can go say hi to the person that gave it to you."
It wasn't what Ali pictured when he thought his boredom would disappear, but it was something, something that he wasn't going to do no matter how bored he was.
"I'm not going to meet some neighbors, Pa., no way!" Ali said stubbornly.
"I wasn't asking politely, Ali," Jack declared, "it's either that or I'll find something that'll keep you busy." Ali didn't like how those words sounded.
"She said she has a daughter your age," Jack continued, "and she goes to your school too, so she can be your friend at home and school. At this rate, I don't even care as long as you get a friend."
"But—" Ali protested. He wasn't ready for another girl in his life. Millie was trying to get him to talk to her, and Lyca was gone.
OK, he exaggerated on that Lyca part. She wasn't gone, at least that's what he wanted himself to think.
"There are no buts, Ali, just move now!" Jack said wearily and led the way out the door and to the creepy house next door.
The front door had a brass knocker, which Ali thought was typical. Old house, brass knocker. If his father wasn't a jerk, he would have bet with him that they had a grandfather clock inside.
Ali expected that after his father rang the doorbell, an old lady would appear at the door. At least that would have explained why they were throwing good stuff away; maybe they were dying.
But the lady he was gawking at wasn't old at all. What's more, he wasn't gawking at her young face, he was gawking at her hair.