It didn't take much time for Craig to get home. As he unlocked the door he realized this day had been one of the best since he started going to that school. His mediocre results in P.E and all those boring classes seem like nothing for the first time. He had finally made a friend and nothing could break his spirit now.
His home was quite simple. As he entered he saw everything as it had always been: some furniture here and there with some photos on and a carpet on the floor. Craig looked at one of those photos. There he was with his parents. Unfortunately for Craig, he was a single child. He had always wanted siblings but his parents didn't want any other kids as they had such busy lives already. They did have a point, Craig admitted. They were both workaholics and barely even noticed Craig. Looking at the emptiness and silent tone of the house, Craig deduced that none of his parents had arrived yet. That was not surprising. His mother was probably going to work late as always and his father was busy on a business trip to Germany. That probably meant he was going to have dinner alone, again.
Coming home really wasn't as satisfying as it should be. Usually after his lonely days filled with failure all he ever wanted was spend some time with his parents and yet he was rewarded with even more loneliness at home.
Craig shrugged it off. He wasn't going to ruin the rest of his day with the same old depressing thoughts. So he went upstairs, headed towards his room. Everything was just the way he left them earlier that morning. His bed was made, his desk was tidy and the floor was clean. His mother might be a workaholic but she could be very strict and incredibly annoying if Craig's room wasn't as tidy as she wanted.
He dropped his bag on the floor beside his desk. He stretched his arms as he felt free from the weight. Then he remembered about Sam's "gift". Why had he taken it so eagerly? No, it would have been rude to decline it. After all they were friends and it's not like he was forcing Craig to smoke it. Still he shouldn't have taken it so eagerly. He didn't even know what to do with it!
Reaching his pocket he took it and gave a clear look at it. It was funny how Sam was so obsessed with that stuff. It looked so harmless and insignificant but yet so strange and tempting. He couldn't just throw it out, even if he had no interest in smoking it. So he opened a drawer to keep it away from his parents' eyes. Before he put it in the drawer, curiosity hit him so he sniffed the joint. "Oh yeah, it really smells good..." Craig mumbled. He almost felt guilty putting it in a drawer. Why was he doing that? Joints are for smoking, not to keep as souvenirs. Still he kept it in there. He closed the drawer and proceeded to take out the contents of his other pocket: his mobile phone and... a piece of paper?
Craig looked confused at it but then he became excited. Feeling hopeful he thought "Maybe it's about my uniform!" However it turned out to be the exact same note that had been placed on top of the uniform he had been wearing all day. "I hope you like this Craig!" was the only thing written. He didn't even remember keeping the note but that didn't bother him much. He decided to keep it, nonetheless. Who knows, maybe it could give him some clues in the future. So he once again opened the drawer and placed the note there. He then closed the drawer again. He was never the kind of person to have many secrets and now hiding things in his room seemed to be so unlike him… but he found it easy to stop worrying about that.
He went to the bathroom just opposite his bedroom. Craig suddenly realized that he really needed to take a piss. It took him a while to relieve himself and after he finished he looked at his penis. He found it to be surprisingly bigger than he remembered it. Craig couldn't help but smile a bit. He had been self-conscious about the size of manhood. It just seemed small when comparing it to the other guys from his class. It seemed that this day was giving him some more good news after all.
As he washed his hands he looked himself in the mirror. His hair really had grown a bit and seemed lighter than it used to. "I should really have noticed how big it’s got. Guess I need to have it cut off." he thought. His skin looked different as well. Craig didn't know if it was the light in the room but he looked a bit darker than his usually ghost white skin. It made him look healthier and handsome too. Craig smiled to the mirror. He was looking better so he spent quite some time admiring himself. He then looked closer at himself in the mirror. He saw some hairs coming out above his lips, on his chin and at the sides of his face. He was 18 years old so he already needed to shave some of the few hairs that appeared on his face but he just needed to do that once or twice a week. He had already shaved two days ago and it looked like he hadn’t shaved for a week! His facial hair was growing faster and more numerous than they usually did! Craig didn't see anything bad in it, quite the contrary. It was a sign that he was growing up. There was nothing wrong with that.
He grabbed his razor but as he looked at himself he was quite enjoying his coming beard, so he skipped shaving and went downstairs towards the kitchen.
He was hungry but there were only some leftovers that he didn't really enjoy. As there wasn't any alternative he just ate them despite his distaste for peas that seemed to flood his plate. “Yuck” was all he said as he took the plate from the microwave.
It all tasted very bad but his hunger spoke louder than his taste buds. When he finally finished that dreadful meal he placed his plate and cutlery in the empty washing machine.
No sound could be heard afterwards. Everything was silent as ever. Sighing, Craig went to the living room to watch some telly. He'd always wanted to have T.V in his room but his parents never allowed him. They wanted him to study and not waste any time watching some unimportant programmes. Their dream was for him to go to college and become someone important but despite their attempts, that didn’t seem to motivate Craig to study more.
As he watched television he kept changing channels, not even sure of what he wanted to watch. Eventually he found something interesting. It was a music channel and a song was on. It was being played by Sublime. Craig had never listened to any of their songs or had even heard about the band but he found that he liked the song. It was catchy and although it had a certain reggae style to it (which Craig had never been a big fan of) he found himself enjoying it.
He felt himself getting calmer, his mind emptying. Those were some good tunes...
His mind seemed far away now so he never noticed that he changed channel right after the song ended. On the screen were some men smoking pot and laughing.
"Oh man, that looks cool." he found himself thinking or saying, he wasn’t sure which. His head started to hurt and so he tuned the T.V off and went upstairs to his room not really thinking much about what he was doing. It was like he was on autopilot.
As he entered his bedroom his headache got worse so he sat on the end of his bed while he grabbed his head with both hands.
He couldn't even think anymore. He almost felt like bumping his head against a wall to get unconscious. However a sudden look at his drawer made him think of something else. Maybe that could help him. "It couldn't make things worse, right?" As he thought this his headache got even more severe. "FUCK!" he screamed in agony.
He opened the drawer and took the joint. He smelled it again and his pain seemed to fade a bit. However, something strange had happened. Above the note that he had kept was a lighter. It was decorated with green marijuana leaves with a black background. The paper was almost mocking him with the same message: "I hope you like this Craig!”
"What the..." tried Craig to think but his head hurt again and he almost fell on the floor while he grunted in pain.
He didn't know what else to do so he got up and looked at the joint on one hand and the lighter on the other. He couldn’t think of any logical arguments at the moment. His head felt like it was going to explode. So, not thinking anymore and just wanting to end his pain, Craig lit his joint and without a thought he took a puff.
Craig Reynolds didn't remember much afterwards.