Kicked Around

"You look tired."

"I am," Erik said. "I'm very tired."

"What are you doing tonight?" Jessica asked.

"I... I'm not sure..."

"You want to hang out tonight?"

Erik looks at Jessica. The question surprised him. "What?"

"Do you want to watch a movie after dinner?" Jessica asked.

"With me?" Erik asked.

Jessica eyes him curiously. "Yeaaaahhhh?" she draws out.

Erik pauses, staring at her, realizing that he didn't acknowledge to himself just how beautiful she looked, like he did every other day he saw her.

"Yes," he finally says nodding. A dark cloud finally lifted inside of his brain after hours of haze. "Yes I would. I really would. I would love to. I mean... Yes..."

Jessica started to crack a smile. "Your room? After dinner??"

"Yes... I would love... Yes... Yes..." He sounded like a broken robot, nodding as he spoke.

Jessica wrote down her cell phone number and handed it to Erik. "Text me, so I have your number," she said. Then, she turned around as class started. Erik finally stopped nodding as he looked at the paper. Erik grabbed his cell phone and texted a smiley face to Jessica and put his phone down. Now that class had started, Erik's mind slowly descended back into oblivion. Jessica's leave from the conversation along with a lack of an objective to keep his mind busy returned Erik's haze. The darkness filled Erik's head again, and he zoned out. The class was over before Erik knew it.

At the end of class, Erik and Jessica stood up and walked out together.

"So, what do you want to watch tonight?" Jessica asks.

"We're going to watch a movie right?" Erik snapping back out of his stupor.

"Yes, what movie would you like to see?" Jessica persists.

"I like movies...," Erik says.

"Great, what kind of movie do you want to watch?"

Erik's eyes darted back and forth. He wasn't sure what to say to Jessica.

"I like movies... I like... All kinds of movies... Umm like the one with the idiots who run everything in the future."

"OK," Jessica said. "Let's watch that one."

"YES! The idiot democracy!" Erik said. "Or yeah, whatever you want." Erik was now just saying the things that came into his mind. His internal filters were torn down, and he had no control over the words that were coming out of his mouth.

"OK....," Jessica said eyeballing him curiously. "Lexi has one of those movie stick things where you can watch brand new movies. Maybe she can let me borrow it."

"I have one of those...," Erik said. "I like movies...," he said again.

"OK...," Jessica started back. "Great. I do too. Let's pick one from there."

"Yeah!," Erik said raising his voice. "I didn't know you like movies too. We should watch movies together." He stared at her smiling, eyes open wide, like an inmate at an insane asylum.

Jessica was confused, and she stared back at him, trying to figure out why he was acting like he couldn't talk like a regular person. "... Yeah, that's... Whatever. Here's my cell phone number." Jessica hands Erik a piece of paper. "I'll see you tonight."

After dinner, Erik was cleaning up his room at a snail's pace. All day, his brain had been fired off in several directions at once. He texted Jessica his room number and started to clean his room. It was a roller coaster 24 hours, and although he really liked Jessica, he didn't know what to do or what to say to her when she arrived. She was due to come over in the next 15 minutes, but Erik was so mentally exhausted that all he could do was clean his room.

Erik managed to finish cleaning his room just before Jessica arrived. Erik's TV was on, and the movie stick was on the search page. The door was open, and Jessica walked in. "Knock, knock?" she said.

"Hi," Erik said in a tired voice.

"Hey," Jessica said. "So, you ready?"

"Yeah."

They both took a seat on Erik's foam, two-person foldaway couch. Jessica picked out a romantic comedy. The two sat and watched as the movie started. Jessica kept glancing over at Erik who was sitting quietly, not doing anything. His eyes were heavy, and he looked like he was not interested in the movie. Jessica decided to try and curl up next to Erik.

Jessica first attempted to put her head on Erik's shoulder, but Erik was too far away. Jessica squirmed on the couch, trying to find a comfortable position as she moved closer to him. She wasn't able to find a position that brought her closer to Erik and felt cozy for her. She would adjust and then put her head on his shoulder. Then, lift her head up, adjust again and repeat. Erik didn't know what to do. His eyes widened in confusion, as they darted around the room. After a minute of moving around, she finally found a position that felt satisfying. However, after sitting still for a few moments, she found it to be unpleasant. Jessica tried to maneuver herself in a way where her legs ended up half hanging off of the foam couch, and her head and shoulders were riding up Erik's chest.

Erik's face started to crinkle in confusion. "What is happening?" Erik said to himself, unsure of what to do. In this position, Jessica was trying to force Erik to put his arm around her, but instead, he continued to stay in his fixed, statuesque position. Despite the challenge, Jessica persisted. She couldn't get comfortable or achieve her desired goal, so she continued moving around on her side of the couch. Erik remained unsure of what to do, so he just maintained his current stance. Jessica tried to turn once more, and she fell off of the couch onto the floor with a thump.

"Are you alright?" Erik says looking at her curiously.

"Umm, yeah...," Jessica said. "Can we unfold this thing or something? I can't get comfortable."

"Sure," Erik said standing up. Erik unfolded the foam couch so now it acted as a bed with a backrest. Erik and Jessica sat up against the headrest, but before Erik could put his right hand down, Jessica slammed into his side to claim her spot next to him. Erik winced slightly.

"Oops," Jessica said. "Sorry."

"Uh, no problem," Erik said quickly. He was holding his arm up unsure what to do like he had a question in class. Finally, he started to bring it down to Jessica's back and shoulders slowly. Erik was totally clueless and didn't realize that this is what Jessica was trying to get him to do this whole time. He was nervous and was ready to lift up his arm if she showed any sign of discomfort. Instead, she smiled and leaned her head against his. Erik smiled too, and his worries washed away. He was now very comfortable with Jessica.

Erik felt great. He wasn't even paying attention to the movie. Having his arm around Jessica, feeling her warmth up against his body, smelling her sweet hair, this was bliss for him. Erik was in a complete state of relaxation. He was so comfortable that he didn't notice just how tired he was getting. The movie played on and Erik was falling asleep on the couch.

Suddenly, Erik jolts awake snapping his head forward. He had been leaning backward over the headrest. His mouth was dry, and his neck was sore. There was daylight coming through the window, and he was alone. The TV was off, and he was still wearing the same clothes from the night before. "What the fuck?" Erik thought. "What just happened? Did I dream all that? Was she really here? Where did she go?" Erik looked around the room for Jessica. That's when he saw the time on his alarm clock and realized that he was going to be late for class.

Erik hurried out and ran to class. Erik's mind started racing again. "She's going to hate me," he thought. "You fell asleep on her dipshit! She curls up to you, you have your arm around her, and you fucking fall asleep! Fuck! Yeah, she probably thinks you're fucking pathetic. Way to fuck that one up Erik!"

When Erik arrived in class, Jessica was already there. She sees him wearing the same clothes as the night before, and she cracks a smile, but quickly looks back to the front of the class avoiding eye contact. Erik took a seat behind Jessica and was just about to talk to her when Professor Hand started class. Erik thought, "I'll tell her I'm sorry after class. We'll watch another movie; everything will be fine."

At the end of class, Erik gathered his things and was about to begin talking to her. Suddenly, another student who sat right beside Jessica starts talking to her. "What the fuck is this?" Erik thought. They walked out the door together and chatted as they made their way down the hall. They continued talking at the bus stop. When the bus arrived, they took seats next to each other and continued their conversation. All the while, Erik was standing behind them with a look of bewilderment on his face, trying to find his opening so he can interject and say something to Jessica.

Just before their stop, Jessica gives the boy her number, and as soon as the bus stops, they walk off and part ways. Erik exits the bus and watches Jessica walk away toward the girl's side of the dorm. "FUCK!," he screams in his head. "This... This right here... This is why you can't have nice things... Cause you have no idea how to care for them... A hot girl asks to watch a movie with you. She throws herself on you. And what do you do? You fall asleep on her and don't say shit about it the next time you see her. You are pathetic."

Erik walks back to his room, sullen. He showers and then he sits down at his desk. He's looking downward, still feeling like he fucked up something that could have been special. He glances over and sees the USB stick that contains Lara's files. "Fuck it... I've got work to do," he says to himself. The thought of finishing Lara's site was enough to block out his negativity and do something else.

Erik goes into his closet and pulls out an older laptop. He opens it and then inserts a CD in the drive to boot into a Live-CD environment for virus scanning. Then, he plugs in the USB stick that has Lara's website files and starts a scan.

Next, Erik goes back to his main laptop and logs into Lara's website to start a new restore task. Just before he began the restore, he fixes the plugin's bad code and then loads the full website back. Erik changes all the admin passwords and the API account password. Then, he looks at the Live-CD laptop and it's done, showing no viruses or malware detected. Erik takes out the USB Drive and plugs in another one that contains Lara's laptop files. Again, Erik runs another scan on this data.

Erik turns back to his main laptop and plugs in the USB drive. Erik uploads the image and video files back to Lara's restored site. Next, he restores the database on the USB Drive to a database on his laptop and begins to search through records on the database. He's able to extract a list of videos and who is tagged on them. He puts that information into a spreadsheet and saves it to his laptop. "This is going to take a lot of time to go through each video and tag the right user," Erik thought. "Wait... Fuck it... Let her do it. If she wants it back up and running so badly, she can take the time to do the tedious work."

Erik then opens up a free file hosting service account and uploads the spreadsheet. Erik began setting up sharing access with Lara's email address, and he starts to write her a message saying that he restored the videos and images on the site, but she will need to re-tag the correct users in the videos. Just before he was going to send the message, he noticed that it was time for his next class. Erik saved the message and left for class.

Erik rode the bus to his next class. As he walked into the classroom, he noticed that Jessica was sitting there already. "I'm not waiting this time," Erik says to himself. Erik walked by Jessica and sits down behind her. As soon as he puts his backpack down, he leans forward and taps her on the shoulder. She looks back slightly.

"Hi," Erik says.

"Hi," Jessica responds.

"Look, I'm sorry about last night."

"It's fine."

"OK, well I had fun, and I'd like to watch another movie with you again if you would like to."

"Are you well rested now," Jessica says sarcastically.

"Yes. Again, I'm really sorry."

"I'm fucking with you, Erik."

"Oh, yeah... OK."

"You free tonight?" Jessica asks.

"I wish I was," Erik said. "I have this one last thing I need to do for work and then... Well... I guess work is pretty much done for me then."

"Then maybe some other time then?" Jessica asks.

"Yeah, how ab...," Erik starts just before the instructor enters.

"Good afternoon everyone," the instructor says. Let's get started."

Erik leans back in his chair as the instructor begins class.

During class, Jessica gets a text message. She pulls out her phone and responds. Erik can't see what the message was, only that she was responding to it. She put her phone in her bag and continued paying attention to class. Erik kept thinking about how he would ask her about getting together again. He thought about it the entire class.

After class, Erik goes up to Jessica again. "So, hey how about tomorrow?" he asks her.

"What?" she asks not understanding what the question is related to.

"For another movie? Does tomorrow work for you?"

"I don't know. Maybe. I'll let you know tomorrow."

"OK," Erik said. "You going back to the dorms?"

"No," Lara said. "I'm meeting someone from dinner."

"Oh, I thought you were free tonight," Erik said curiously.

"I was," Lara said. "Now, I'm not. I'll see you tomorrow Erik."

"For a movie?"

"For class," Lara said as she turned and walked away. Erik was confused, but decided not to read too much into it.

Erik took the bus back to the dorms and rushed back to his room. Erik looked at the Live-CD laptop and saw that it was finished scanning. There were a few files cleaned and others that were removed. Erik picked out all of Lara's Documents, Music, Videos, and other files that she would probably want and uploaded them to the file hosting service account that Erik created for Lara.

Just as Erik started the file copy, he received an incoming call on his cellphone. The screen read "Mom." Erik answered the call and held the phone to his ear.

"Hey, mom."

"Erik? Are you ok? Did something happen?"

"What are you talking about?"

"I received a letter in the mail about insurance coverage for a doctor visit at the university emergency room. Wh.. happen.. .. .. ok?" The phone was cutting in and out.

"It's nothing mom. I tripped."

"What?"

"I took a spill."

"What???" Erik's mother kept getting louder, so Erik got louder as well.

"I... FELL..."

"WHAT????"

"MOM! I FELL DOWN!"

"HOW????"

"IT'S A LONG STORY"

"Why are you yelling at me?"

"I'm not. I just..."

"Oh my God, I knew this was a bad idea. I'll be right there to pick you up."

"No wait, mom!"

"You're coming home so you can heal. We'll figure it all out next semester. Just hang on baby, mommy's coming to get you!"

"Mom!"

"Erik, I ..."

"MOM!!! Stop!"

Erik's door swings open startling Erik. Erik's mom rushes into the room. "Alright baby. Mommy's here." She gives Erik a big hug. "Where does it hurt? Oh, my poor baby. I'm so sorry. I should have been here. This was a bad idea."

Steve and Bret walk up to the open doorway and see Erik's mom hugging him. Steve gets an interested look on his face and starts to walk into the room with a suave-like swagger. Bret grabs him by the shoulder and shakes his head "no." Bret walks back down the hall toward his own room, out of view of the doorway. Steve stands there in the doorway and his facial expression changes as if he has something to say. Just as Steve opens his mouth, Bret's hand reaches out and pulls Steve by the shirt, dragging Steve away from view.

"Mom!", Erik says to stop her from hugging him. "I'm fine. I broke my nose when I fell, and I went to the hospital to have it reset. It's healed now. I'm OK."

"Are you sure? What do you need? Do you need food? I'll go pickup food."

"No mom, seriously. I'm fine. Thanks for coming, but I'm fine."

"I was worried sick when I read the letter."

"Why didn't you just call me?"

"Well... I did... but you didn't pick up."

"I only saw one call from you just now."

"Then let's get you a new cell phone, so you can always get momma's calls."

"Mom! I'm fine. Seriously. You shouldn't have come all the way here." Erik's mom looked a little hurt for not being able to "save the day."

"Alright baby. I'm sorry. I'll go home now. Just next time, tell me when this happens."

"OK, mom." She gives Erik a big hug and a kiss on his forehead. She walks out the door and turns to walk to the elevators. Erik's mom walks down the hall and passes Bret's room. Bret and Steve are talking outside.

"Hello Mrs. McMurphy," Bret says.

"Hello. Bret right?"

"Yes. It's good to see you again." She looks at Steve.

"Are you the guy that lives at the end of the hall?"

"Yes ma'am," Steve says with a huge smile on his face.

"I've got my eye on you," Erik's mom says to Steve holding her hand up, point to her eyes and then pointing to Steve.

"Right back at you," Steve says, still smiling. Erik's mom looks him up and down with a cautious eye and then walks to the elevators. She walks into the elevator and then steps out and makes the same motion, pointing to her eyes and then pointing to Steve. Steve does the same motion back.

Bret and Steve head down the hall to Erik's room and walk through the door.

"Saw your...," Bret started.

"Dude, your mom is fucking hot!", Steve says cutting off Bret. Erik spins around and sees Steve with an intense look and a large smile.

"Fuck you!", Erik says to Steve.

"Does she have a boyfriend?", Steve asks.

"Fuck you!", Erik says louder.

"Put in a good word for me," Steve says.

"Fuck!... you!", Erik says slowly.

"No I won't fuck you, but her... Damn..." Steve looks up as if he's daydreaming about it.

"ASSHOLE!", Erik yells at Steve.

"Well yeah, if she'll let me, sure. Is she into that?", Steve asks. Erik walks forward and Bret steps in between them.

"Oh, Kay! Let's go have dinner!", Bret says.

"Man, I would love some aged oysters and clams," Steve said turning around to walk out the door. Erik goes to lunge at him. Bret holds him back.

"Don't encourage him," Bret says to Erik. "He's trolling you. Just... let it go."

After dinner, Erik tells Bret and Steve he has more work to do. Erik heads back to his room and gets back to Lara's website. Erik sits down at his computer and writes up instructions for Lara so she can set up the upload plugin on her laptop along with all the information she needs to manage her website. He added this information to the message that he started to write before his math class. Erik copies all the passwords he has for the website and stores them into a secure password manager file that is password protected. Erik uploads that file to the hosting service as well.

Erik takes one last full backup of the website and uploads that to the file hosting web service. Erik continues to write the instructions for Lara to take backups. In the message, Erik recommends that she take backups at least once per week and upload them to some remote file hosting service. He signs off the message with:

I can't be your web guy anymore. I'm sorry.

I wish you the best.

Love,

Erik

In the end, Erik had written Lara a good technical guide for what he did to restore the site and manage it. Whether or not Lara would understand any of it was not Erik's concern. He did his job, and that was enough for him to feel like he can walk away from the situation with a clear conscience. The emotion of letting go for the final time left Erik feeling very uncomfortable. He sat there looking at the unsent message. His mind began to wander. "What if Marvin has access to her email?" Erik thought. "If I send this, he'll know who I am, if he doesn't already. Fuck, I just want this to be over... I'm running this over to her."