DEAN KUTCHER

My parents had finally reached the end of their rope. I’d been booted out of college by that ASSHOLE Dean Kutcher and my mom and dad refused to let me move back home before I got a job. All they saw was a long-haired stoner with nothing to look forward to, but I blamed the Dean. He’d been gunning for me since I’d shown up in his office Freshman year. He was an old school man who “didn’t get washouts like me.” So, after I’d been caught with weed in my dorm, he booted me from school, and I was now royally fucked . . . and the first thing that had to go was my hair. Wasn’t going to get a “respectable job” looking like this. Guess Dean Kutcher was right . . . I was going to be forced to grow up.

COACH ESKEW

I never thought I’d ever know what it felt like to be a REAL MAN. I was just an awkward teenager who couldn’t build muscle if I tried, and I had . . . trust me. It was also hard being the kid who was picked on all the time. Not only by the jocks and other bigger guys, but by the PE teachers and coaches as well. One in particular, Coach Eskew, loved to give me a hard time. He was always pushing me to do better and try harder. There was a part of me that hated him, but another part of me that wanted to know what it felt like to be a cocky, alpha male like Coach Eskew.

SECOND CHANCE

I’d been teaching for over twenty years. I’d gone through a wife. A full head of hair and had a couple of kids who more hated me than treated me like their father. It wasn’t the life I’d dreamed of when I left college. I thought I was going to change the world, but I was an idiot. A teacher. What the hell was I thinking? I should have done something more, I don’t know . . . exceptional, fun? But it was too late.

I sat at my desk, the room quiet as I watched my high school class finish a pop quiz I’d sprung on them at the last minute. Honestly, it made me happy to mess with their perfect little lives. I looked up, Jeremy Goldstone covering his paper so the jocks couldn’t cheat off him. This kid was your typical High School train wreck. Brilliant. Awkward. Class President mostly because nobody else wanted to be, and he had no idea what to do with the girls . . . not that any had any interest. He acted like a mini-adult, wore ties and made straight A’s. He was a lock for Valedictorian and living at the bottom of the high school food chain. It was a story I’d seen play out a hundred times, and even though he had ZERO clue right now, he’d grow out of his awkward looks and become a handsome rock star in college. I envied him and all things he had ahead of him.