I was in a good mood for once, I really was. It was the last day of school before spring break and all. And I was just excited to come home… until I did and my mom started waving a big white envelope in front of my eyes.

“What is this, hm?” my mom was talking as loud as hell. I mean, how was I supposed to know what was in that goddam envelope? And how was yelling going to help? My mom was touchy as hell sometimes.

“I’ll tell you what it is,” she said. For chrissake, if she was gonna tell me, why did she ask in the first place? “It’s your report card.” I froze. She ripped apart the envelope that was already open and shook my goddam grades in my face. I couldn’t read it because she was moving so damn much, but I knew it wasn’t good. I mean, she was as angry as hell, she really was. Eventually I just tuned her out. I already heard it all before. It was strictly for the birds. All the while, I was thinking what a goddam prince the mailman was for putting the goddam report card in our goddam mailbox out of no goddam consideration for me and ruining my spring break. What a lousy way to start it off. When my mom was done ranting, she shoved my report card, or what was left of it, into my hands and sent me to my room.

All of a sudden, I felt really depressed. I knew my grades would be bad, but not this bad. I was flunking most of my classes. You know, it really was all her fault in the first place. She was always trying to get me to do some phony extracurricular activities. So I joined the track team, which was moronic because I used to smoke a lot and I ran out of breath real easy. Track took up so much goddam time that I had less time to concentrate on my grades. I didn’t even manage a decent grade in English.

I was pretty angry until I thought of Phoebe. I promised her I’d do well. I promised Allie, too. I said that once I got out of that goddam institution, I wouldn’t get the axe anymore. I’d go back to school to be a good student; I’d come back home to be a good brother and a good son. Phoebe made me pinky promise her. She refused to believe me unless I pinky promised. She kills me sometimes. So I walked into her room and she was doing her homework, I guess. I didn’t want to bother her but I wanted her company, so I just laid down on her bed. I sighed… and it must have been a really loud sigh. Phoebe momentarily stopped writing and said, “You’ll do better next time.”

I told you, she kills me sometimes. She really does.