it tasted like fetid stains of sweat coating his uvula in saltiness and in bitter and in a sense of hurried regret. or like condensed chicken noodle soup, only the thin broth remaining. and as he swallowed, wet trails of a similar hue ran down the pulsating sides of his forehead.

it’s funny how pulses can either signify good — as in his shaft when he lost it to some unnamed, red-tressed, sweet-skinned princess last week at his first party as a man, his first party where dad didn’t have to drive him home — or bad — as in this case.

and the laughter only grew louder. there was a time. he was eight, and chubbier then. he had slipped in a dark mud puddle that hadn’t dried over after the rain cleared. his forehead and elbows squished deep into the warm, moist clumps. he would have drowned in it had he not faced the shit the worstest day of his life the everything that would affect him until death … and lifted his head. a fresh nightmare. even mr. nguyen hid a snigger.

and the punishment wasn’t over.