March 5, 2008
- Jamie's been on the bus for a day, and he's finally starting to recover from his post-meth nausea.
- He slept for a while and had a dream about Torris Stone, his roommate at Buckner, and a tough dude who could do more pushups than anyone.
- As for Jamie, he was a less-than-stellar cadet. All the new boys were supposed to get their stripes before Christmas break, but he definitely wasn't going to get his, because he wasn't good at rifle drill.
- Torris Stone was the only person who felt sorry for him and helped him practice. It didn't help, though.
- Buckner was a firestorm of bullying. A Pakistani kid got bashed in the head in his sleep just for not being white. Yikes.
- Jamie ran away in the middle of the night and hitchhiked, ultimately scoring a ride with a guy named Carson Block, who was headed to Vancouver and drove him all the way to Portland.
- Regarding P's question about what he wants to do with his life, Jamie has no idea. When he was a kid, he thought he wanted to join the army like the Major, but now that's a big no.
- Jamie knows only two things for sure: He's eventually going to learn to play guitar and start his own punk band, and he's not going back to Cincinnati—he's sick of how the Major verbally abused their mom.
- What finally drove him to leave Buckner was the knowledge that his family was coming for parents' weekend, and that they were already disappointed in him, having gotten the news that his grades were bad and he couldn't do the rifle drills.
- Before he met up with Carson Block, he got a short ride with a guy named Steve. Steve dropped him off at Pittsburg, Kansas at Pittsburg State University, where he scored a free meal in the dining hall and chatted with a girl named Margaret while he ate.
- Mags told him he was beautiful in an androgynous kind of way and would probably appeal to both sexes, which enraged him. He didn't tell her that, though. He just asked her to lend him five bucks, which she did.
- The next person to give him a ride was a guy named Alan Skymer, a uniformed meter reader who turned out to be bad news.
- Long story short, Alan got a room at a Motel 6 and forced Jamie into accepting a blowjob.
- After it was over, Jamie went out to sleep in the car. He considered bashing Alan's head in, and even went back to the room with his trusty alarm clock, but Alan woke up and his plan was foiled.
- Alan dropped him off on the western edge of Kansas the next day; Jamie declined another night in a hotel.
- Fortunately, this was where he met up with Carson, who was frighteningly obese, but a good guy.
- Anyway, about that androgynous beauty thing: Jamie's really concerned about the fact that puberty hasn't hit him yet. People are always mistaking him for a girl, but he's not gay.
- The bus driver makes an announcement that they're close to the stop in Idaho. Jamie's ready to get off the bus and eat something.
- He can't believe P is dying, and begs him not to.