I changed and hurried downstairs. When I went in the kitchen to grab eats to take to F2, Momz was there.

"I made chocolate chip cookies. Did you get the letter from your Dad?"

"Yeah." I scowled. "He won't tell me where to find the key to the Blue Ox."

"Well, that's a good thing. You couldn't ride it if you had the key. You can't get licensed for a bike until you're 18. And.."

I interrupted. "And you don't want me riding one, I know. You made that clear plenty of times. I just didn't understand that you thought a bike came between you and Popz until you showed me the book with all the pictures of him on the Blue Ox."

"The bike wasn't what split us up. It was just a symptom of the problems we were having."

"Whatever. I know how you feel and for whatever reason Popz is supporting you." I grabbed a hand full of cookies. "I'm going out to my crib. That's a man cave to you old folks."

"Did you do your homework?"

"I did it while I was tutoring my homies." I intentionally threw in the slang for friends because I knew it would get her goat. She still wasn't sure if she wanted Jake and Marlow to be my homies, so I was rubbing her face in it. "Do you want me to get it out of my backpack and show you?"

"No, Wa... um, CW. You don't have to show me. I've always believed you before. I don't plan to stop now unless you give me reason to."

"So getting drunk and graffiting your world wasn't reason enough?"

"Well, at least you were being honest about your feelings."

"I suppose. Anyway, I'm outta here."

"Keep your phone on. I'll text you when the lasagna is ready."

"10-4."

I took my laptop out to F2. I logged in and played around on a few sites, but I wasn't into it. I was still bummed about the letter from Popz.

I finally got out the manual for the scroll saw. There were some pieces of board laying around. I thought maybe I could make something for Popz. He said he made me something. Uncle Clarence would have to tell me how to get it to him. He said he couldn't take anything in, but evidently he could bring stuff out if Popz made me something and was going to send it with Unk.

Uncle Clarence! It had totally slipped my mind that he was going to see Popz, like yesterday. With all the drama at school, I'd totally forgotten. I texted him. "rut (are you there)?"

I didn't get an answer. I was sure I told him to call after he saw Popz. Maybe he could shed some light on Popz letter.

I typed in "cm (call me)," and went back to the saw.

I fooled around for a while, learning how to get the saw to do what I wanted it to. It wasn't all that easy. I finally did manage to make the letter P. My plan had been to do Paul, but I kept messing up. I decided the P would do for now. It could stand for Popz or Paul. I sanded it and stained it with a sort of honey colored stain I found with the paints. I had just finished when my phone dinged. I grabbed it, hoping it was Uncle Clarence. It was Momz. "Come eat."

I went in and made nice, but as soon as I could, I took my plate to the dishwasher and headed up to my room. I sent Uncle Clarence another message. This time I got a reply. "not home - work thing-plans 2m (tomorrow) - ttu (talk to you) Sunday."

"Unk is getting old," I thought. "He needs dashes in his texts. At least he didn't spell all the words out and put in punctuation, like Momz."

I wasn't getting help from him any time soon. I took the letter out and read it again, hoping maybe I'd got it wrong the first time. I hadn't. It still sounded like my old man was on Momz side. I put it away and picked up the fantasy novel I was reading. I was in another world when Momz knocked on my door and hollered night.

Saturday when I met the guys at laser tag, I was still in a funk over Popz sellout. That put me in a mood to fall in with Jake's plans to stick it to my old homies. I suggested we play in teams of three, pitting one team against the other. Naturally, the three dorks chose to stick together, leaving Jake, Marlow and me as a team. That way Jake's idea was implemented but with no stealth involved. It insured that they wouldn't get pissed and go home before refreshments at my place. Since it was my celebration, anyone who hit me got two points instead of one. To even things out, BJ was selected as the double point target on their team.

No one team had an advantage in the arena. We'd all played there before and knew the layout. We were all dressed for laser combat. Everyone wore black shirts, jeans and shoes. Jake and Marlow even brought black gloves with the trigger finger cut out. He and Marlow also secreted small vials of black face paint. They slipped me one and told me to find a place to hide and apply it before starting the hunt. Jake had texted me before I left for the arena. He had some invisible ink that would only show up in black light. He was going to try to mark BJ and the other two "nerds" near their right shoulder. He wasn't above making sure we had an unfair advantage.

Once the teams were settled, we geared up and headed into the dark. For the next hour, we moved through the maze looking for the green light that indicated someone from our group was within range. The marks Jake had put on the other guys were small places where he'd managed to swipe their shoulders, but under the black lights they were easy to spot. When I saw them, I knew to shoot but if I spotted someone that lit up green without the mark, I held my fire. It didn't take long for the other guys to realize they were marked, allowing them to identify their own teammates, but we still had the advantage. We were harder to find.

When our guns powered down indicating our time was up, we met to get our scores.

Nick immediately demanded, "Hey where'd you get the grease?" pointing at our faces.

"We came prepared for battle," Jake sneered. "We're special ops."

"Special ops like the Seals pledge to serve with honor and integrity. They'd never mark the opposing tem in a mock fight," Nick said.

"'Failure is not an option' was their unwritten code long before some do-gooder came up with a formal code all about honor and integrity," Marlow said.

The guy with our score sheets interrupted the verbal sparring. Our team had more than double the points of the other team.

"We want a redo," BJ said. "Whatever you used to mark our right shoulder, mark your left ones. Give us some grease paint for our faces. That way no one has an unfair advantage. Let's see if you can beat us fair and square."

"Sure, dude," Jake said. "No way you're going to take us." He took out the bottle of ink and marked each of our left shoulders. He handed BJ his vial of face paint. "There should be enough there for the three of you," he said.

When I stuck my hand in my pocket to take out my vial, Marlow put his hand on my arm and shook his head. The other guys were focused on Jake and didn't notice. He took his phone out of his pocket as though checking it. He typed something and then nodded at my pocket. I took my phone out. We all had them on silent while we were inside. We didn't want our phones to give our positions away. I had a text from Marlow. It said, "the face paint can cover the ink"

I also had a text from Mom. She wanted to know when we were going to be coming to the house.

"starting round 2," I sent back. "hour-ish."

The guys scraped all of the grease paint out of the vial, managing to cover most of their faces. When we got back inside, we showed our glowing shoulders to the other team. We melted into the dark once more. "We'll leave our shoulders marked," Marlow whispered. "After a bit cover yours with face paint. A kill on you is worth twice as much as a kill on one of us."

After I had been hit three times, I hunkered down behind a wall where I knew I could see the vest lights for quite a distance. I took out the face paint. My mind warned, "You're no cheat." I argued back, "I'm not cheating, just using the resources at hand." Still, somehow it felt wrong. I compromised and covered half the mark.

About halfway through the fight, Marlow snuck up beside me. "You didn't get the whole thing covered," he whispered. Before I realized what he was doing, he wiped a finger across my shoulder and then disappeared back into the maze.

When the hour was up, we met to get our scores. We still won, but this time the scores were much closer.

"You must have been practicing, um," BJ hesitated, "CW. You weren't hit nearly as much as the rest of your team, and you got more hits, too."

"Nah," I said. "Luck."

"At least my kill rate was skill," I thought. "Or was it? If they couldn't see your mark, you could go in for the kill easier," my traitorous brain offered.

When we got back to the house, Momz had chocolate cake, chips and dip, cookies, queso and scoops, and a ice chest full of cokes set up on the patio.

"Hi guys," she said. "I made warrior food. There's a tray of mini-pizzas in the oven."

"You make the best minis," BJ said.

"Thanks, BJ." She grinned at my other old homies. "Nick, Dave, welcome back."

Then she turned to my new homies. "You must be Jake and Marlow."

Jake stuck out his hand, "Jake." He actually turned red. I couldn't believe it.

Marlow shook her hand, "Marlow, ma'am."

I thought my ears were deceiving me. I'd told the guys to make nice, but ma'am? I figured Marlow would choke trying to get that out.

"You don't mind if we take the eats to F2, do you Momz? I want to show the guys my setup."

"Sure thing." She waved her hand as she turned towards the back door. "Enjoy. I'll bring the pizza when it's done."

Jake and Marlow took the handles of the cooler and headed to the shed. They other guys all loaded up, quickly moving the spread indoors.

"Hey, CW," Jake said, once we were inside, "you got any brews in your fridge?"

"Like Wicked would allow that," Marlow sneered.

"Who's Wicked?" Dave asked.

"Momz." 

"You didn't tell us your Momz was a hot cougar," Jake said. "She almost caught me ogling her."

"Is that why you turned red when you shook her hand?" I laughed.

"Yeah, but it doesn't matter if she's eye candy. She won't let you have any fun," Jake added. "Did you know she outlaws computer war games?" he asked the guys.

"Yeah, we know," Beej said. "We always had to play those at my place or at  the arcade."

I put Mario in the Play Station. "I've got four controllers," I said. "We can take turns."

"How bout we keep our teams from tag," Nick said. "Each team will play and the winners from the two teams will play off for the championship."

It was a go. While we were playing, Momz brought out a couple trays of pizza. We hit pause and chowed down then got right back to it.

BJ won for his team, and I won for ours. The two of us went head to head with our team members shouting encouragement, pointing out where we could make mega points and steering us towards shortcuts. It was intense and loud. At one point Momz came to the door to check out the racket. Nick saw her and waved, but she just shook her head and left.

I managed to squeak out a win. Jake and Marlow high-fived me. Then Jake pulled a flask out of his pocket. "Hold up your cups, gents," he said. "Take a shot, and we'll toast the winner."

Marlow held out his cup. I offered mine. BJ and the other guys sort of looked at each other, unsure what to do.

"Whassup?" Jake asked. "You dudes weenies?"

"Nah," BJ said. "Our Moms have warrior noses. We'll have to make it a virgin toast."

"Weenies," Marlow said.

The guys just shook their heads.

"To freedom for CW," BJ said, holding his cup aloft.

"To freedom," the other guys echoed. We drank up.

"How about another contest?" I suggested.

"I gotta book," Nick said.

"Yeah," BJ and Dave chimed.

"You're the champ," BJ said. "Maybe another time."

After the other guys left, Jake said, "Man, I'm jonesin'. I gotta get a nic fix. I haven't had a drag since we got here."

"Yeah," Marlow said. "The one I smoked on the way here from laser tag wore off over an hour ago."

"Try my e-cig." I reached for my backpack.

"Nah, man. I need the real thing," Jake said. "We're gonna bounce before we have a chance to mess up the good impression we're making on Wicked. See you on Monday."

"K." I started stacking up the empty dishes. The guys had wiped everything clean.

"We'll help you bring those inside," Marlow said. He winked at Jake. "Get a few more brownie points from Wicked."

When the back door banged shut behind us, Momz came into the kitchen.

"There you are, Mz. Braisford," Marlow said, setting the cooler down by the door while Jake and I piled dishes on the counter. "Um, do you want us to help with those?"

I was sure Momz couldn't have missed the daggers Jake's eyes lobbed at Marlow.

"That's okay, boys," she said. "I appreciate you helping CW bring them in, but I'm sure you'd rather be gaming."

"We would," he admitted, "but we gotta book. We was just helping CW out before taking off."

"Well, thanks for the offer, anyway." 

Jake and Marlow escaped out the back door. I could hear Jake saying, "You dunce."

"I'll just go get the rest," I said quickly.

Momz was smiling. "Sure thing."

I went out and picked up the trash and brought the last of the dishes back to the kitchen, turning out the lights and locking up F2.

When I got inside, Momz was loading the dishwasher. She was grinning.

"I have to give them kudos for trying." She laughed. "Jake looked like he was about to murder Marlow for offering to help with the dishes. I almost said yes, just to see what he'd do."

"Yeah, he was ready to go." 

"I imagine he was dying for a smoke." 

"Why'd you think that?"

"Their clothes reek." She ran her tongue over her top teeth. "And their pearly whites aren't so pearly, what with that tell-tale stain."

"Well, at least they're trying." 

"I'll give them that. I still don't much care for you hanging out with older guys like that. They obviously have some problems, and not just in the grade department. Tutoring them is okay, but I'd rather you didn't hang out with them socially on a regular basis. You know that nicotine is addictive. Second hand smoke is just as bad for you as smoking. And smoking can lead to other things."

"Not the addictive personality lecture, again." I rolled my eyes. "Smell my breath, Mom." I huffed in her face. "I haven't been smoking. Just because I have friends who are smokers doesn't mean that I'm a smoker. Give me some credit."

"I do." She sighed. "I just worry. I've been an adolescent. I know how invincible you feel. I know what peer pressure is like."

"I'm good, Momz. If I'm going to go off the deep end, it's going to be over this thing with Popz, not some kind of peer pressure."

"And Jake and Marlow will be there to encourage you." She slung some silverware around in the dishwasher, taking some of her frustration out that way.

"They're my homies, Momz." I put my hands on my hips. "They're not some bums I dragged in out of a crack house. They're trying to graduate, and I'm trying to help." My fists were clinched now, and I knew my face was turning red. "Don't you trust me?"

"It's not a question of trusting you." She reached a hand towards me, palm down. "It's a question of trusting them."

"Well, if you trust me, you have to trust me to chose my friends. Obviously you can't do that." With those words, I turned and bounded up the stairs.

"She deserves the name Wicked," I thought.