Cheater by Michael Laser

Karl. It’s just a fact of life. Your parents aren’t bad people—they’re normal. Cheating is just a quick, efficient way to reach your goals. There’s no room for purity and virtue once you get a job. Name any career and there are compromises that go with it.”
    “Doctor.”
    “I didn’t mean name a job , Karl, I meant it’s a universal thing. But okay, since you don’t believe me—let’s say you’re Dr. Petrofsky, and you know that your sick patient, Mrs. Bobo, needs to stay in the hospital two days, but the HMO says, Sorry, outpatient surgery. Next! You argue, you protest, but in the end you do what you’re told, because otherwise you’re out of business.”
    He doesn’t know if she’s right or wrong. How could he know? The only job he’s ever held was scooping ice cream last summer at Baskin-Robbins, and the only compromise he had to make was when an entire soccer team came in: a couple times, he didn’t dunk the scooper between flavors.
    “I don’t understand why you should be lecturing me about how the world works. It’s not like you’re five years older than me.”
    “Probably it’s because you spend your life in a garage. This is all common knowledge, Karl. My dad used to say how funny it is, the way people talk so nobly and meanwhile there’s all this thievery and backstabbing going on. He said, ‘The ones that preach the loudest are the always the biggest crooks.’”
    He wishes he could disprove everything she’s saying, but he can’t.
    “Personally,” she adds, “I think it’s cool that your mom’s boss built those extra floors. That’s nerve.”
    Grimly studying the garage floor, Karl notices the silvery flecks left over from painting his first thermosensitive shingle. Those were the good old days.
    “Hey, Edison—don’t pout, it makes your mouth look weird.”
    She prods his skinny midsection (you can’t really call it a belly) with her index finger. He fears the long, sharp nail will pierce the skin and draw blood.
    “Question,” she says. “Did school suddenly get less cruel and unfair than it was yesterday?”
    He shakes his head gloomily.
    “So let’s be honest, since you like honesty. You got scared because you almost got caught. Really, if you peel away all the talk, this is about fear, not lofty principles. It’s about nerve—so get some! Like your mom’s boss.”
    A long shelf covered with dusty tools and doodads travels the length of the garage, shoulder high. Karl stares at the jug of blue windshield washer fluid—clinging to it like a shipwrecked sailor bobbing on the waves, just trying to hang on and survive.
    She plucks a chocolate crumb from his collar. (Must have been there the whole time, a souvenir of his after-school Mallomars.) “Changing the subject slightly, do you agree that it would be a good thing to act on your desires once in a while, instead of giving up in advance because it’s scary and you might get in trouble?”
    “I guess I can agree with that.”
    “Good!”
    She leans back against the top tube of his bike, smiling mischievously. Her silver satin shirt shimmers.
    She’s waiting for something.
    “What’s going on?” Karl asks nervously.
    “I’m giving you a chance to practice.”
    Karl is roughly as scared as he was when Mr. Watney called him to the front of the room. “What do you mean?”
    “Uh-uh-uh. That’s a delaying tactic. You know what I mean.”
    Because he lives on a cul-de-sac, there’s not much chance that a car, bike, skateboarder, or knife-wielding psycho will pass by. He has no excuse whatsoever to look anywhere but into Cara’s eyes.
    She shifts her weight, crosses her ankles the other way. She seems willing to wait indefinitely.
    “I don’t understand all this,” Karl says.
    “Yes you do.”
    “No, I don’t. I mean, why are you doing this?”
    “Ohhhhh. You think I’m . . . using you.”
    Karl turns his back to her and visits with Goofy. The situation is unbearably humiliating. He