We spent a lot of our conversations struggling towards the twinned affect

of misery and detachment, quoting Elliott Smith and looking quickly down

after any eye contact we could construe as meaningful. He was possibly gay,

he said, and peered at his feet through long blond hair dyed black. I claimed

that I had a suicide note hidden on the family computer for when the time came.

We both picked so intently at the warping linoleum that by the end of the

year they had to send the custodian up to re-tile our little spot.

The age difference and intrinsic shame of our friendship prevented anything

beyond mumbled, dramatic confessions; when I saw him in the hallway, I sometimes

nodded and sometimes ignored him. As I sunk further into my delusional isolation,

he entered high school among a crowd of appealing misfits, who were quickly and fairly

recognized as really cool. He formed a band; they signed with a label; they recorded a

song (about an 8^th grade girl) and played at big New York clubs when he was just 15.

He was thick as thieves with my younger brother; one time, when we were in the elevator

together, Oliver kidded (on the square) that Cam was the best Riley.

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