I brought Brandon and Jake to my room, and the three of us crowded around the magazine.

“Hang on,” I said, flipping the pages. It was the August 1997 issue of Gamepro. I’d gone the past few months without Gamepro, asking my mom to buy this for me when I spotted it in the college bookstore. What caught my eye was the mention of Mortal Kombat 4 on the cover, but that wasn’t why I brought Brandon and Jake to my room.

It was what waited inside.

“Here,” I said, smoothing out the magazine on my bed. “There she is.”

In letters section of Gamepro was a fan-submitted drawing of Caitlin Fairchild. She posed with her arms behind her head in a black bikini bottom, shirt pulled up to her chest. Every muscle, every curve, drawn from a male’s deepest dreams.

Jake picked up the magazine.

“Don’t,” I said. “You’ll rip it.”

“Wow,” he whispered.

It’s rare that eleven-year-old boys were left speechless, but the drawing of a comic book woman accomplished just that. I don’t remember if the store sold Playboys but we weren’t buying those on our own and my mom sure as hell wasn’t buying any. This was the next best thing.

We stared.

We were in band camp at Tennessee Tech. Our band director had gone here and Ms. Pam used her alumni connections to secure us rooms as we learned the fundamentals of marching band.

The worst part was, I didn’t even want to join band; that was my mom’s doing. She forbade me from playing football, telling me I’d end up with a broken neck. Band was her choice and here I was, playing the trumpet. I started out playing the French Horn, Pam’s old instrument. She teared up when she found out and looked betrayed when I switched to the trumpet. I couldn’t play the French Horn and I wasn’t much better at the trumpet. In a couple weeks, I went from second chair to last, all while Pam watched coldly from the podium.

She looked like someone who life had betrayed. There was a haunted sadness in her eyes, as if she’d given up something big to come teach music at a smalltown school. For all I know, she had. Band directors aren’t the most well-adjusted lot and in a profession where many can’t, Pam couldn’t. That’s why she taught.

Tennessee Tech wasn’t a large school like UT-Knoxville, but it was still a college. Here we had a degree of freedom we hadn’t known before. All my life I’d heard it: you’re going to college. Little questions, such as what for? or how am I going to pay for it? waited ten years down the road for answers. I was going to college and here I was, in a college, and it was great to see what it was like.

We had band camp with the high schoolers. Midvale combined high school and junior high band, with junior high band sticking to the junior high football games and high school covering their side. It was a huge change from K-6 Midvale Elementary. There was a lot of pomp to it; we had a sixth grade graduation ceremony, where my homeroom teacher cried. It was a big deal, moving from the elementary school to The High School, and my mom thought band would ease the transition. A lot of temptations awaited at The High School. Listening to my mother, I’d gathered they were girls, gangs and drugs, ranked from most dangerous to least. Band camp was our introduction to this rapidly approaching teenage world and we practiced marching in hot, humid weather.

We did push-ups when we messed up.

Brandon started to turn the page.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I thought you were done.”

“No.” I wasn’t aware of what I was doing, only that here she was and I felt a feeling I hadn’t felt before.

“Do you think she’s real?” Jake asked.

“It’s a drawing.”

“No I mean is she a real person?”

“I don’t know,” and I didn’t, not until several months later, when I read the text below identifying her as a comic book character from a series called Gen 13.

“Can I have it?” Jake asked.

“My mom bought it for me.”

“Then can I borrow it?”

I let Jake borrow the magazine, Han Solo’s words from Return of the Jedi playing in my head: I have a funny feeling I’m not gonna see her again.

The older boys told us to avoid milk in the morning, it would make us throw up. So when we grabbed breakfast from the cafeteria, much bigger than our K-6 cafeteria, I stuck with orange juice and found my seat with Brandon and Jake.

“Hey where’s the magazine?” I asked.

“In my room.” Jake ate a spoonful of Fruit Loops. “How long is Ms. Pam gonna make us march today?”

We didn’t know. There was a certain grace to marching band, and not only did we have to march gracefully, we also had to play well, and both only came with lots of practice.

“How’re we doing this morning?” Mr. Thompson asked. He gelled what little hair he had left and his daughter was a grade ahead of us. She played the Tuba, an instrument bigger than she was.

“Good,” I said.

Jake and Brandon concurred. Mr. Thompson held up his fist.

“We’ll have a good day today,” he said, while fist-bumping us. His fingers and knuckles were coarse and calloused. I was the last to fist-bump him and I rubbed my knuckles.

“Good luck,” he said, and went to the next table to offer encouragement.

“I just hope we don’t have to raise our instruments above our heads again,” Brandon said. “I almost passed out last time.”

“Listen to you,” Jake said. “Poor fools with your instruments that you have to hold.”

I played the trumpet, Brandon the trombone while Jake had it easy: he banged on the drums. While we were marching around holding our instruments just above chest level (but not above shoulder level, God help us) Jake had his drumset looped over his shoulders. He played by swinging his wrists, merely sweating while the rest of us suffered.

“Me and Brandon play music,” I said.

“What? Drums are music.”

“Drums,” I turned my fork around and started tapping the handle on the table, “is like this. See?”

Jake tried to snatch the fork and I pulled it away.

“The drummer’s the most important part of the band,” Jake said.

“You just chose the drums because you can’t play anything else.”

“I like the drums.” Jake wolfed down the rest of his Fruit Loops and raised his tray.

“What’re you doing?”

Jake ignored us. Jake was one to go his own way. He’d always been like that, from kindergarten to band camp, and the drums were just part of who he was. We chose our instruments late in sixth grade and Jake Wheeler picked last, choosing what no one else had picked.

He drank his cereal milk straight from his tray. I looked around to see if anyone else had noticed. Mr. Thompson was at his third table, encouraging a few girls to not give up, no matter what. I looked back at Jake. He slurped that part of his tray clean and gave me a big, satisfied smile.

“You’re gonna barf out there,” I said.

It was hot outside and it only got hotter. My mom had packed three bottles of sunscreen for me but I’d given two to Jake; his parents hadn’t packed any.

I only went to Jake’s house twice. First, to pick him up for my birthday party the year before. Second, to trade video games with him.

“You’re wasting your time,” Jake said, rummaging through his pile of cartridges. “Ultra 64’s coming out in April and no one’s gonna care about the Super Nintendo anymore.”

“I won’t have it until Christmas. Why? Are you getting one?”

“My big brother said I could play his.”

Jake’s brother was away at college, leaving Jake with his parents. They were old. That’s my only impression of them. I know when you’re small everyone grown-up is “old”, but Jake’s parents were old in some acute way no number could define. They looked old, they walked old, talked old, acted old, like they’d gone past their expiration date.

“Did you find it yet?”

“Hold your horses. Jeez.” Jake lifted the cartridge: Illusion of Gaia. A ribbon on the cover artwork said it was Only for Super Nintendo.

“You got yours?”

I handed him my game, Killer Instinct. I had no one to play with at home — my sister didn’t like video games — and Jake liked to play it at the arcade, before the arcade closed down and became a Foot Locker.

“Jake!”

Jake cringed at the sound of his name. His mother was calling him.

“Jake!”

Killer Instinct fell from his hand. He went running out of his room. I followed.

Jake’s mother was standing in the bathroom, hands on her hips. There were several layers to Jake’s mom, and she was wearing a nightgown with stains.

“Did you leave it in here like this?”

“Sorry, I just thought — “

Jake’s mom acted like she was going to grab him, and then her old, haggard eyes fell on me.

“You didn’t tell me we was having company.”

“Sorry.” Jake turned to me. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I hurried out of the house. My mom had been waiting for me in her car the whole time. She asked me what was wrong. I told her nothing.

The Midvale band marched in three different formations: butterfly, anvil and pelican.

None of the formations looked like their names. We switched formations and butterfly to anvil was the easiest switch; we’d nailed it the first day.

It was anvil to pelican that earned us punishment.

“Halt!” Ms. Pam yelled. “Instruments up!”

My arms were already sore from carrying my trumpet all morning. We raised our instruments and Pam walked the rows, inspecting us like a drill sergeant.

“You have to stay in formation,” she said, sweat pooling on her forehead. She stopped at the trombones. “What’re you doing? Are you going to pass out?”

“No,” Brandon said.

“It’s not even that hot out here. I — “

She went on talking while I tried my best to keep my instrument eye-level. A slight droop could earn us ten more minutes. We were a team, the Midvale band, and if one person screwed up then we all suffered.

“What do you mean you’re tired?” Ms. Pam said from behind me. “You play the drums.”

“I feel sick,” Jake said.

Ms. Pam sighed. She did that a lot. It wasn’t a normal sigh either. It was a deep, contemptful sigh, full of her regret over giving up her French Horn dreams to come teach music at a county school.

“Water break.”

We set our instruments aside and ran to the coolers. Jake had trouble getting his straps off. I helped him and I ran ahead as he trailed me.

I slowed down to match his pace. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah I’m fine.”

“What do you mean? You said you feel sick.”

Jake laughed. “I was just tired of hearing her talk.”

#

The older kids got water and Gatorade first. I watched Jake take two long drinks, and he trembled.

“Are you gonna be okay?”

“Yeah I’ll be fine. Hey, wanna see this trick I learned?”

Jake poured some Gatorade into his cap and downed it in one swallow.

“So? What’s so special about that?”

“I can do it without spilling any.” He drank from the cap again. “See?”

We were all staying on the dorm’s basement floor. That in itself was awesome but what made it better was that the chaperones were staying on the floor above us. We weren’t completely on our own, but close enough and to an eleven-year-old a slice of freedom is as good as the whole pie.

Jake skipped dinner. I asked him if he felt hungry, but all he did was stay in his room, with my Gamepro and the drawing of Caitlin Fairchild.

Brandon and I weren’t tired, and curfew wasn’t for another hour. We decided to explore campus. Ms. Pam and the chaperones hadn’t told us not to go off on our own. What’s more, they were all busy on their floor.

We went upstairs and passed through the common area. A leg was hanging off the couch. I went over to see who it was.

“Whoa shit,” said Greg. This year was his senior year and he held first chair for the trumpet. He played a nice silver model that he kept well-shined, emptying the spit valve into a Kroger bag he carried everywhere.

With Greg was Kelsey, a thin blonde girl, same age as me. Her face turned red.

“Hey, me and Brandon are going to walk around. Wanna come?”

“No,” Greg said. He was breathing hard.

“Okay,” I said, and left them alone.

Outside, Brandon asked, “Do you think they were doing it?”

“Where everyone can see? No way.”

“I’ve heard my parents doing it before.”

“Gross.” My older sister had a boyfriend, and the thought of them doing it was more than I could bear. There’s a time in a man’s life when he can’t picture the females in his life as women who have all the normal desires that women have. Most men never grow out of this phase and though my sister today has three kids, eleven-year old Robert couldn’t conceive of his sister as the object of someone’s sexual desires, like say, Caitlin Fairchild.

“Do you think we’re going to make it?” Brandon asked.

I turned. “What kind of question is that?”

“It’s really hard. Ms. Pam’s really mean.”

I had no doubt Ms. Pam was really mean, though how mean, I’d yet to find out. At the time I thought she was just being hard on us because she was passionate about music. She wanted to put on a good performance for the Friday night football crowds and though we may suffer now, when all eight of us junior high band members were out there playing for the few parents hadn’t gone to concessions, it would all be worth it. Midvale wasn’t a big school back then and it still isn’t. Ms. Pam took band seriously simply because she had nothing else going for her in life. This, a handful of high schoolers and junior high students marching under Friday night lights, this was as good as it would get for her.

Not me, and not Brandon or Jake either. As my mom said, I was destined for greater things.

“It’ll be okay,” I said.

We walked around campus with no destination. Just boys seeing what was out there. I promised myself we wouldn’t go too far, but promises to eleven year old boys tasting freedom are far from binding. Brandon and I were far from the dorm, we were close to another dorm. Girls were talking.

A window was open.

“I can kind of see in there,” I whispered.

“Where?”

I motioned for Brandon to keep his voice down. I pointed, my eyes wide like a stage mime.

Brandon saw it and he blushed. He whispered, “I don’t know.”

“We’ll just take one look. If they start getting naked, we’ll leave.”

The dorm faced a small grove. I climbed the tree first, helping Brandon up, and from behind the branches and leaves that smelled of summer we saw the girls.

They were college girls, holding up different shirts. One would comment, the other would try it on. She lifted up her shirt and I couldn’t take my eyes off what I saw: a purple bra. Caitlin Fairchild’s pose, continued to its natural conclusion.

I stared even after she put her shirt back on, hardly aware of where Iw as until Brandon poked my arm.

“Can we go?”

I shook my head. Words were hard to come by.

Brandon poked me again.

“Okay,” I whispered as the girls moved away from the window.

I didn’t speak much on the way back. I thought of Jake and how he’d missed that. Caitlin Fairchild was pretty, but she had nothing on those two.

“Don’t tell anyone,” I said as we rounded a corner. “We…”

I froze like I’d been caught stealing. Mr. Thompson was leaning against the wall, smoking a cigarette, and he also froze like he’d been caught stealing.

“Smoking’s bad for you,” I said.

“That’s right. You shouldn’t do it.” He dropped the cigarette and stomped it out. “Where’d you two go?”

“Just around.”

Mr. Thompson looked me over. He knew I was lying, and he also decided that it didn’t matter. I could have been doing anything, from smoking to watching college girls undress. Mr. Thompson blew out some leftover smoke.

“Ready for a big day tomorrow?”

We nodded.

“Don’t tell anyone else this, but…” Mr. Thompson checked our surroundings. Coast was clear. “Pam said if ya’ll do good, there’s some ice cream in it for you.”

I came close to telling him we weren’t four anymore: ice cream wasn’t a treat, especially after what we’d seen tonight. If you really want to make us happy…but I knew it was better to humor him.

“Sounds great,” I said, and Brandon nodded.

“Where’s my Gamepro?” I asked Jake the next morning at breakfast.

“Under my pillow.” Today he’d poured more milk in his fruit loops and that was all he had on his tray.

“That’s all you’re gonna have for breakfast?”

“I don’t like that other crap they’re serving.”

That other crap I had on my tray, and I agreed: it was awful. Still, Ms. Pam’s first rule of band camp was Eat Well. The days were long and we were going to burn a lot of calories, especially when we had to hold our instruments at eye-level because one person couldn’t properly do the shift from butterfly to pelican.

Jake slurped the milk.

He didn’t eat the cereal. He just slurped the milk. I watched him slurp it empty, a few stray Fruit Loops falling over the edge of his tray.

“Why don’t you just fill all your whole tray with milk?” I said.

“Milk sucks without cereal.”

“Well if you add cereal then you’ll be fine.”

The lightbulb flashed above his head, an idea blooming in his eyes. I had meant it as a joke, but off he went, to the cereal first. Then the milk. When he sat down, some milk splashed out of his tray. Some girls at another table were looking at us.

“I’m pretty sure she likes me,” Jake said.

“Who?”

“Beth.”

“She won’t like you after you’ve barfed your guts up.”

Jake slurped from his tray.

“C’mon man, you’re not really gonna drink all that are you?”

“Watch me.”

And Jake did. He slurped his whole tray clean. Beth and the other girls laughed and stared. Once his tray was dry, Jake pushed it away and burped.

“Gross,” Beth said.

I just shook my head. “You’re a real idiot, you know that?”

Jake shrugged, milk mustache dripping onto his shirt.

Marching drills took all morning. I noticed nothing amiss until our third water break; Jake looked pale.

“Feel sick yet?”

“A little.”

I grabbed a Gatorade. “Maybe you should go tell Ms. Pam you feel sick.”

“I don’t know.”

“Well just go tell her.”

“But then she’ll get mad. I’ll ruin our formations.”

“Who cares?” I said, and I meant it. I still do. To Ms. Pam Giles, former French Horn maestro, marching band is life. To the rest of us, this is it for music. When we graduate we’ll never play another instrument in our lives. Ms. Pam was doing something inconsequential — band could disappear tomorrow and no one would care — and that’s why she acted the way she did. She’d pissed away years of her life. Had to justify it somehow.

I would have years of my life ahead of me, to think about all this. Ms. Pam called us back to formation and I jogged behind Jake, noticed the trouble he had slipping the drumstraps over his shoulders and when Ms. Pam called us to attention I whispered, “I hope he doesn’t get sick.”

Jake held it together, skipping lunch, and when we were back in our dorm I knocked on his door to check on him. He was leaning on the trashcan, clutching the rim.

“Jake?”

“What?”

“You got puke on your shirt.”

Jake noticed, squinting, and he took his shirt off and tossed it in the corner, with the rest of his dirty clothes.

“Stupid shirt anyways.”

“Is everything okay?”

“I’m fine man.” He reached under his pillow and pulled out the Gamepro. “Almost done reading.” He flipped to the page featuring Caitlin Fairchild.

“You’ve had it for a few days.”

“I told you I’m almost done.”

I raised my hand, and Jake pulled the magazine close enough to kiss it.

“Alright but tomorrow you’re giving it back.”

“After dinner.”

“After breakfast.”

“What’re you gonna do? Fold it up and put it in your pocket when we’re out there marching around?”

“Fine,” I said, watching Jake enjoy my magazine. “Dinner.”

Conversation dominated breakfast the next morning, as the rumor of ice cream had spread around the whole band.

“This is retarded,” I said. “We’re not little kids anymore.”

“Everyone likes ice cream,” Brandon said.

“I know I could go for some right now,” Jake said. “What?”

“You forgot your milk?”

“No.” He ate his Fruit Loops dry, plucking one loop at a time and dropped them in his mouth.

“What gives?”

“Felt sick yesterday. Don’t want to feel sick today.”

“At least get something to drink.”

“Not thirsty.” Jake caught the next Fruit Loop on his tongue, rolled it up and swallowed. He bowed to Beth, and she rolled her eyes.

“Hey,” Jake leaned in close, “do you think she likes me?”

“I don’t know.”

“I think she does. Can you go ask her?”

“No.”

“Come on.”

“No. I’m not going to go ask her if she likes you.”

“C’mon Rob.”

“You go do it.”

“Please?”

“Eat your Fruit Loops,” I said, noticing Mr. Thompson’s approach. “We got company.”

Mr. Thompson came to our table and gave us all fist bumps. His hands were sweaty, and I wiped my hand with a napkin. Brandon did the same.

“You boys ready to kick some ass?”

We said we were.

“Alright, now remember: do your best, and,” He leaned in like a conspirator and whispered, “there might be some ice cream in it for you.”

He left. Jake crushed a Fruit Loop between his finger and thumb.

“Who needs ice cream when you have Fruit Loops?” He sprinkled the Fruit Loop crumbs in his mouth.

It was hot and we marched all day, breaking for lunch. At lunch Jake hardly touched his food. He looked pale. I asked him what was wrong and he told me he was fine.

We screwed up four times.

The pushups were hard, raising our instruments worse. Again, I thought that at least Jake didn’t have to hold his drums up.

That night I knocked on Jake’s door twice before calling his name.

“Alright, coming in, ready or not.” I pushed open the door. Jake was curled up in bed, puke on his sheets.

“Jake?” I ran to his side. “What’s wrong?”

He said something. I couldn’t understand. He was slurring his speech.

I called his name again, as if by doing so he would snap out of it and be his normal self again. He did not snap out of it. He lay there pale, his room stinking of puke. I called his name again.

I didn’t know what to do. They’d told us before band camp that we need to drink enough water, and I knew vaguely about heat stroke, not enough to understand the symptoms, just not enough.

So I ran to the vending machines upstairs. I passed Greg, and he asked me why I was running.

“Jake’s sick,” was all I said. I used some change to buy a bottle of water from the Coke machine and I ran back to Jake’s room.

He hadn’t moved. I offered the water. He shook his head.

“You need to drink some water.”

He slurred something else. He closed his eyes. I forgot the water, and placed the back of my hand on his forehead. He was burning up and his forehead was dry, his hair as slick as Mr. Thompson’s.

“Hang on,” I said.

I ran to Greg’s room and pounded on his door.

He opened it a hair. “What?”

“Jake’s sick,” I said. Greg had no shirt on. “I think he needs to go to the hospital.”

“Then call 911.”

“But he’s sick.”

“What do I care? Look, get him some water or something.”

“I don’t know.”

Greg tried to shut the door. I shoved it open. Greg backed up. Kelsey a was on his bed.

“What the hell are you doing?” Greg said.

“I think Jake had a heat stroke.”

“He didn’t…” Greg mumbled “fuck” under his breath and stepped into the hallway, pushing me.

I led him to Jake’s room. When Greg saw Jake, he said “fuck” again, this time not keeping it under his breath.

“Where the hell is he?” Greg was running the halls, me right behind him. We were looking for Mr. Thompson.

“He might be outside…” I stopped.

“Outside? What? C’mon.”

“Nothing.”

Greg sighed and went running down the hall. I turned around and headed upstairs.

Mr. Thompson scooped Jake up and put him in the back of his car.

“You’re not gonna call 911?” I asked. Greg was beside me, still shirtless.

“Hospital’s right over there. It’s quicker this way.”

“Let me come with you.”

“No need.” Mr. Thompson started his car. “You stay here. Jake’ll be fine.”

He sped away.

First day of seventh grade we all gathered in the gym. From there the principal welcomed us and the teachers called out our names in alphabetical order, handing us our homeroom assignments.

Homeroom was supposed to be where you went first in the morning but it didn’t matter much to me because I had band. We had an hour and a half to rehearse our songs and go out onto the football field and practice marching. Practicing at school wasn’t so bad. Band camp had seen to that.

I never played at a football game. My mother pulled me out of band. The others stayed, Pam stayed and the people who were nice before, I became public enemy number one.

Jake’s parents didn’t care.

That’s what stands out to me even today. By the time Mr. Thompson got him to the ER, his brain was swelling. The nurses were surprised someone had waited this long to bring Jake in. They weren’t sure he was going to make it.

He did make it, after several days in the hospital. We continued with band camp as normal, marching in the morning and sometimes in the afternoon, but with precautions. We took more breaks. We drank more Gatorade.

They acted like nothing happened.

Jake did not come back to band camp. He stayed in the band and his parents were mad at Mr. Thompson. I talked with Mr. Thompson, this several years later, and the man told me that Jake’s parents were angry he’d taken their son to the emergency room. Turned out they didn’t have health insurance.

Ms. Pam was mad too. The incident brought unwanted attention to the band, which was her playpen, and the prospect of real authority bringing the hammer down must have been nightmarish. She acted like nothing happened, snubbing Mr. Thompson whenever the two were together.

Mr. Thompson’s daughter graduated that year, so there were no more band camps for him. I was pulled out of band and they started the very same day. Juliet, an junior, walked by me in the hallway. I smiled at her.

She glared at me. “You are such a fucking loser.”

I couldn’t believe what was happening. These were people who last month were my friends. Now they hated me. And for what? Because my mom made me quit band?

Well . . . the band was full of junior high and high school students. Add in the immaturity and the cult-like atmosphere…and perhaps some official sanction.

Did Ms. Pam, a college-educated woman who was charged with helping guide young people’s development, did she tell them to do it? No. But, did she know? Yes. Did she give it her tacit approval? Yes. Remember, what else did she have? Band was her life. I had just walked away. How can you just walk away from something life or death like a twelve-person band playing barely coherent noise? Walk away? From band?

What a loser.

Me, Jake and Brandon stopped hanging out. I was adrift in a sea of newly forming cliques, a prelude to high school. For eighth grade, I was attending a different school.

One thing did happen though. On field day the school became one day-long recess. It was right before the last day of the year, a half-day, and I already knew I wouldn’t be returning to Midvale for eighth grade. Perhaps the band was more powerful than I thought.

Jake graduated high school, not without his share of problems. He barely got into community college and flunked out his first semester. He still lives in Robertson County, doing odd jobs. He’s on my Facebook but we haven’t spoken in years. We never talked about what happened.

It was hot. I was walking past the baseball field and Jake was coming my way. He gestured for me to follow him.

We went behind the dugout. He didn’t say a word. He pulled something from his back pocket and handed it to me and walked away. I unrolled it.

It was the Gamepro.

I didn’t see what was inside until I got home. I opened the magazine, and something fell out.

It was a picture of the three of us, Caleb, Jake and Brandon, August 1997, always eleven, always friends.

THE END

April 5 — April 14, 2016

San Diego, CA