Fuck Homework!

That's all he would say.

"Fuck Homework".

He was rockin his ing-bing.

He didn't know at first that I agreed with him, later it was a given.

I was responsible for the after school homework program at the multiservice center for families in crisis. This was at a city you have never visited, inhabited by folks you'll never meet. The names have been changed because I respect confidentiality. I shall modify the slang colloquilisms to avoid any obvious regional dialects. (See the Glossary Below for assistance)

"C'mon lefteye, you have this stack of paper to finish. Get to work."

"No, fuck homework."
He was smart enough to tackle the material he was tasked with. Lefteye was the smart one in a terrible twosome with Biscuit. They roamed the hallways of the building after curfew. Nobody ever said a thing to 'em. Biscuit was touched. Liked to scoff, almost all he would talk about. Some murmured that Biscuit was Lefteye's Angelina. I knew better.

Lefteye wielded his charisma like a weapon. When he was in a good mood he would naturally light up a room with little effort.
Bis was rockin the Lenny angle. He tasted it and it tasted bad, five more licks and he decided OK, time to stop. Followed by five more licks. He was charming though, in his crazy wisdom. Reminded me of Mullah Nasruddin.

Fuck Homework.

It took a while to get it out of him. He didn't want to relinquish the power of having an adult ask repeatedly.

At school, in the two & a half hours he was there he got into it with his science teacher. To him we are all straight bums on the plush.

She called him an asshole under her breath and he heard it. She was one of the very few teachers he ever tried to please. He didn't care too much about that, it was easier to hate her, less work.

The social studies teacher liked the science teacher. The kids knew it. They talked, teachers and students alike. After the run in with her, the SS teacher loaded up the assignments on Lefteye. Shit other students didn't have to do. Shit was coming to a head for Lefteye.

I asked and he finally answered.
" I'ma clout". I know his mom is a snowbird blister. You would know too. Passin her in a bag of stampers, she stood out. He was facing sleep in the clubhouse. I think somebody at his school had the ear of the town clowns. He thought more drama and they were gonna beef on him. It'd be his cherry.
Someone was fomenting his bull horrors. "Mr. Block", my super, could arrange for kids to sleep a spell in the crowbar hotel. Never saw him do so though.

Moms didn't give a fuck, at least in front of others. Behind closed door's, who knows? June fucking Cleaver for all I know.

He told me his drama, and I kept trying to give hime advice. None of it caught his attention, he just kept bitching in a full and floridly descriptive manner probably not appropriate for the other three people in the room. All of whom younger than the two of us.

It kept coming, nonstop. Til Supertight walked by, a looker-a real number. No crotch crickets there. The mostly empty vending machines are just beyond our classroom on the third floor. Just bored fat rent-a-pigs and giggling children feeding their sugar highs pass our door.

Supertight.

He was gone in a flash. Came back only after realizing he needed me to supply the pass. He could leave at will, go to another floor, go home (the studio they live in here at the center), just couldn't hang on this floor without a pass. This is ostensibly to prevent playing in the halls, distracting the "good" kids who were there to do their work. Yet the only vending machines that worked, kind of, were outside our door. Everyone came there and nobody ever had to show a pass but the poor bastards in the homework program I was supposed to supervise. Fucking useless house dick. Only seemed to muck with the kids tryin.

Nothing I ever said changed a fucking thing. Supervised?

Supertight. I saw her too. I understood his need for a break. She was alone and thirsty, who'd wanna jaw with me.

Supertight!

I lie. I didn't understand. I was pissed he wasn't taking my advice. Writing down every priceless word I uttered for his benefit.

Everyone else was charging thru their homework like champs. Glad for the break.

He returned, licking his wounds but satisfied with the attempt. She plays, he said. She knows he is the one with access to the alki. Leftover henny bottles, stolen from the crib. He could produce quick-like a jorum of skee for the honeybee. Juju's were nothin special, everyones holdin here, everyone.

Fuck homework, he said with a smirk.

He had to be there cause his neighbor would play him a patsy. SHe looked out for his mom. No one else for him. His uncle Ant was a loogan. 86'd from the building. He's building stacks with his bottom bitch. No time for Lefteye.

I gave him the lay. Homework. He's makin this harder than need be. I start my peaching bout others he knew not cutting it. He needn't be in the same category. I keep bleating.

Fuck homework.

Ten more minutes of this and I start to ramp up the rhetoric. Why couldn't he pipe to what I was spilling. I thought to put the screws on.

Then Biscuit and Braids. Braids was a sick little dancer. This kid owned the stoop. I wish I had a fraction of his ease. Moved like a master.
B-Boy reborn.
Folks kept their shit tight around him. He could copperfield a key before you finished saying hi.

Lefteye had to go. He couldn't without my approval, I could fuck with him if I wanted and he knew it. I wasn't done inspiring this little bastard, why can't he see that.

Somehow, I let him go. I'm trying to get him to reinvent himself, look at himself, see what's important, accept my valuable guidance, turn his life around avail himself of my resources.

He was gone.

I was happy to get back to my reading.

I ranked him upon his return. I could smell the muggles. He wasn't out on the roof, just a little buzzed. No rummy stiff, this one. I was blowed in the glass to him, or so he said.

Something changed. A few minutes hustlin, a break with benefits. He had his primary reinforcers.

Suddenly homework was no big deal, life goes on. None of his drama was gonna matter in a few days.

He stared at the stack of papers. Five minutes before he touched his pencil.

One hour later he was done. An hour left before I go home.

He did this. On his own.

Alright.

I got no kick.