Bullettime by Nick Mamatas Page A

his nose and inhales deeply, then mocks: “Maybe I have resources you lack,” he says, his chin against his collarbone, his voice an octave deeper than usual. Dave props himself up with his elbow and the rim of the toilet, winces, and falls again. Oleg reaches down to help Dave to his feet.
    “Thank you, Tigger,” Oleg says.
    “Thank you, Tigger,” Dave repeats.
    The door to the boy’s room bangs open and the whooping and howling begins. “Hey, they’re in the stall together!” Lee announces to nobody, his smile wide like a horse’s. “Suckin’ cock, no doubt.” Dave steps out of the stall and stands next to Oleg, his mouth a scribbled line. “Damn, you’re bleeding again, guy,” Lee tells him.
    Dave walks up to Lee, beelining for the door, almost hoping for a standoff, but Lee steps out of the way and raises his hands. “Uh oh, AIDS blood comin’ through,” he says as Dave strides tall into the hallway. The door closes, Dave’s knees buckle, his hands move to his wound, and around the corner comes Vice Principal Fusco. In the muffled distance, Oleg squeals, “Hey quit it!” and Lee laughs. The fedora rolls on its sharp edge out of the bathroom and into the hall. For a moment, all is a blur.
    “. . . and this time, I was just,” Dave says, “poked.”
    “Poked?” Fusco is a small mountain behind his overburdened desk. Dave doesn’t know many men with beards, he realizes. Fusco’s white whiskers suggest Santa Claus and the precision of some laser-guided razor available only via late-night TV infomercials at the same time. “With what?”
    “A shiv.”
    “What do you mean, ‘a shiv’?” Fusco’s hands are up, his fingers twitching around the word.
    “A pen.”
    Fusco takes a note: “A penknife.”
    “No, just a pen.”
    “Just a pen. First you bit your tongue, then you were stabbed—”
    “Poked.”
    “—with a pen.”
    “Yes.”
    Fusco says, “It’s not been a very good year for you so far, Mr. Holbrook, has it?”
    Dave shrugs.
    “Who is—” Fusco glances down at some notes, “‘Tigger’?” The hands shoot up again. Dave swallows a chuckle and winces from the glued stitch in his side.
    “Oleg Broukian.”
    “Is Tigger some sort of gang name?”
    Dave can’t help but laugh at that, but shudders from the pain. “Heh, no. He calls himself Tigger because the wonderful thing about tiggers is that he’s the only one.”
    “What on Earth is that supposed to mean, Mr. Holbrook?” Fusco asks, a volcano rumbling.
    “Honestly, I have no idea. But I’ve met, like, three Tiggers online, and they all say that they’re the only one.”
    “So,” Fusco says, “you spend a lot of time ‘surfing the web,’ do you?” His fingers go up and the conversation descends into hell. Parents are called, and in my old home Ann sleeps through fifty-seven rings. She always hated answering machines. Oleg’s folks actually show up, looking like fire plugs that had eaten other fire plugs, and hustle their son away. His hair waved in strands on the breeze as he was pushed by meaty shoulders and clasping hands into a grey beater Volvo. Nurse Alvarez comes and frowns at the Krazy Glue holding together the slice of skin on Dave’s stomach, while Fusco in the other room harrumphs at the district attorney over the phone.
    “He should go to the hospital,” the nurse tells Fusco.
    “I’m not going,” Dave says.
    “Yes you are.”
    “No he’s not,” Fusco calls out from the interior of his office. “We can’t send him anywhere without parental permission.” He walks out and looks at Alvarez. “Except home. Which we will—” he turns as if he had been practicing with a mirror in the other room “—for one week. You’re suspended, Mr. Holbrook.”
    Dave starts, then winces again. Alvarez puts a hand on his shoulder. Tamed, Dave asks as calmly as he can (though his hands are clenched into fists; he hopes the stance will pass as pain and not rage). “Why am I being suspended? What