"Yeah, he's just this ugly stripey slug color. He's like the biting champion of the slug world."

I guess it actually wasn't possible to completely forget that she had decided to die. Because the whole time as we were talking, it was in the back of my mind and it was stressing me out a little bit, the idea that Rachel was close to the end of her life. Or not stressing me out, but just kind of weighing on me and making me feel a little short of breath.

Eventually, Rachel said, "How's your latest film coming?"

"Oh, the latest one! Yeah. It's pretty good."

"I'm really excited to see it."

Something about the way she said this made me realize that she knew about it. I mean, it was stupid to think she wouldn't find out.

"Yeah, uh . . . Hey. You should probably know: It's for you. Like, it's sort of about you, and uh, yeah."

"I know."

I was trying to be cool about this.

"Oh, you knew that already?"

"Yeah, some people told me."

"Oh, like who?" I was talking kind of loud and high-pitched. I actually sounded a little like Denise Kushner at that moment.

"I don't know. Madison told me about it. Mom sort of mentioned it. Anna, Naomi. Earl. A few people."

"Oh," I said. "Uh. That reminds me. I have to go talk to Earl about something."

"OK," she said.

Earl and I had never been in a fight. That was mostly because I am cowardly, and also partially because we had a pretty good working relationship with well-defined roles. The point is, I had never really gotten angry at him, and also I am terrified of conflict. Especially with Earl, because of the windmill kick to the head that he can do.

But I was p.i.s.sed that he had told Rachel. So I went over to his house to yell at him.

Even just writing about this is giving me sharp stabbing armpit pains.

The whole time on the walk over I was kind of muttering to myself. Specifically, I was rehearsing the stuff that I was going to say.

"Earl," I muttered to myself, "the foundation of any good working relationship is trust. And I can no longer trust you in any way. By telling Rachel about this film, which was supposed to be a surprise, you have betrayed my trust."

I was lurching through the streets of Earl's not-so-great part of Homewood, moving my lips, making semi-coherent noises, walking faster than is graceful for an overweight person to walk, and emitting maybe a quart of human sweat.

"I don't know if I can work with you again. You will have to earn my trust back if you want to work with me. I don't even know how you would go about doing that."

I was on his block, and the sight of his ramshackle weird house jacked up my heart rate even worse than it had already been jacked up.

"You're going to need to convince me that I can trust you." That was another inane thing that I said.

I walked up the walk where I had broken my arm, and stood there, no longer muttering. Somehow I was terrified to ring the bell. Instead, I sent a text.

hey i'm in front of your house But before Earl came out, Maxwell wandered out onto the porch.

"f.u.c.k you want," he said, although sort of casually and unthreateningly.

"I'm just waiting for Earl," I said, in my new loud middle-aged-Jewish-woman voice.

Earl appeared in the doorway.

"Sup," he said.

"Hey," I said.

We were sort of silent.

"You gonna come in?"

"No, I'm good," I heard myself say. I had rejected a normal invitation to go into his house. This made it clear that we were about to have an argument.

"O-ho," crowed Maxwell.

Earl went from Mega-p.i.s.sed to Genuinely Mega-p.i.s.sed and Not Just in Default Mode.

"The f.u.c.k's your problem," he spat.

"Uh, I was talking to Rachel, and she told me you told her about the, uh, the film."

All Earl said to that was "Yeah." Maybe he was just pretending that he didn't know this was a big deal. Maybe he was so p.i.s.sed that he wasn't even registering it.

"It's just," I said, babbling, "you know, I mean, you told Rachel about the films in the first place, and then you brought them over to her, without asking me, and it's just like, you'll tell her anything, like, it doesn't even matter what I want, I'm not saying she shouldn't, she shouldn't know, or get to see them, I'm just saying, I wish you had asked me, first, I wish-"

"You know what? Just shut the f.u.c.k up. Shut the f.u.c.k up."

"I just-"

"I'm tired of this s.h.i.t. I'm really f.u.c.king tired of it. You gotta quit with this s.h.i.t, man. Because I'm about to lose my motherf.u.c.king s.h.i.t with this."

Briefly I contemplated lecturing Earl about trust. I decided pretty quickly, however, that that was not going to work, and might also bring about the apocalypse. Also, it was becoming increasingly difficult for me to say words. Instead, I stood there and-there's no good way to put this-attempted not to cry.

"Naw, shut the f.u.c.k up. You care so f.u.c.king much bout what other people think, you gotta be secretive as s.h.i.t, gotta go round sucking errybody's d.i.c.k pretendin like you they friend cuz you care so much bout what they think, lemme f.u.c.king tell you: n.o.body gives a s.h.i.t about you. n.o.body think s.h.i.t about you. You ain't got no friends. You ain't got n.o.body who give a f.u.c.king s.h.i.t about you."

"Oka , kay."

"f.u.c.kin n.o.body. Errybody at school could give a s.h.i.t about you, man. Errybody you all friendly with and s.h.i.t could give a s.h.i.t. You all worried bout what they think about you, man, they don't give a f.u.c.k. They don't give a f.u.c.k if you live or die, you p.u.s.s.y-a.s.s b.i.t.c.h. They don't give a f.u.c.k. Look at me. They don't. Give. A f.u.c.k."

"Oka ay. J Jesu , us."

"Man, just shut the f.u.c.k up, because I can't be hearing no more of this. Yeah, I f.u.c.king told Rachel about the films, I f.u.c.king gave her some of them dumb-a.s.s films to watch, because she like the only person that do give a f.u.c.k. Yeah. She don't have big-a.s.s t.i.tties, so you don't f.u.c.king care, but that other b.i.t.c.h don't give a s.h.i.t about you and, and f.u.c.king Rachel do, and you don't f.u.c.king give a s.h.i.t cuz you're a dumb little b.i.t.c.h."

"I d , d do."

"Stop your f.u.c.king crying, b.i.t.c.h-a.s.s."

"O, Ok kay."

"G.o.ddammit stop cryin."

"OK."

Did I mention Maxwell was there for this? He was enjoying it. I am pretty sure his presence was making Earl more crazy and aggressive than he would have been normally.

"Now go on get the f.u.c.k outta here. I'm tired a lookin at your p.u.s.s.y a.s.s. Crying and s.h.i.t."

I didn't say anything or move. This caused Earl to get up in my face.

"G.o.d d.a.m.n I'm sick and f.u.c.king tired a watchin you treat this girl like she some kind of, some kinda burden, when she the closest thing you f.u.c.king have to a motherf.u.c.king friend and she about to die on top of that. You know that, right? You dumb motherf.u.c.ker. She home now cuz she about to die. That girl lyin there on her G.o.dd.a.m.n deathbed and you come to my house all whinin and cryin and s.h.i.t about some irrelevant bulls.h.i.t. I want . . . to kick your a.s.s. You hear me? I want . . . to beat the f.u.c.k out of you right now."

"Go for it."

"You want me to?"

"I don't ca , care."

"Motherf.u.c.ker, you want me to?"

I was in the middle of sarcastically but also tearfully saying, "Yeah, Earl, I f.u.c.king want you to," when he punched me in the stomach.

So. There I was, for the second time in a month, lying in the Jackson front yard doubled over in pain, with a diminutive warlike kid standing over me. But this time at least it wasn't a kid with a socially unacceptable word tattooed on his neck. He also wasn't repeatedly slapping my face as I attempted to relearn how breathing works.

Instead, he was muttering things like, "Man, get up," and "I ain't even hit you for real."

Maxwell chimed in a few times with "Yeah! Hit him again!" and "BUST HIS CANDY a.s.s." But his heart wasn't really in it. I think he was disappointed that our fight was so lame. In fairness to us, the notion that we would have an interesting fight is absurd. It was like expecting a good fight between a wolverine and, I dunno, an animal made out of marshmallows.

Eventually, Maxwell went inside and it was just the two of us out there, and if Earl was still angry, it didn't seem to be at me.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n, you a p.u.s.s.y. Get hit once in the gut, act like you dyin. G.o.dd.a.m.n."

"Unngh."

"There you go. Walk it off, son."

"Jesus."

"Come on, let's go to your place. Get to work."

"Unnnh s.h.i.t."

"That's right. Come on. I'll help you."

For Plan E we didn't even use Dad's camera. We used the low-quality camera on my laptop. We were inspired by YouTube. G.o.d help us.

Like whiny boring people all over the world, we decided that the best way of expressing ourselves was just to stare into the camera and talk. No script, no camera movement, no special lighting. We decided to strip all the effects away and see what was left.

Was this a terrible idea? Please stand by while I forward your question to the President of Yestonia.

INT. GREG'S ROOM - DAY GREG.

So. Rachel.

EARL.

Sup Rachel.

GREG.

We've tried, uh, a bunch of different ways of making a film for you, and uh, none of them have really turned out the way we wanted.

If you don't script your dialogue, first of all, you're going to pause and say "uh" at least a billion times. So for starters, you're talking as though you've just suffered a semi-serious head injury.

EARL.

We tried to do somethin with sock puppets, and it didn't seem to be very relevant to your, uh, situation.

GREG.

Uh, we had everyone at school say get-well wishes for the camera, but uh, you've already had a bunch of get-well cards, and we, uh, wanted to do something more uh personal than that.

EARL.

We tried to do a doc.u.mentary about you. Uhh GREG.

Uhhhhh EARL.

There was a shortage of material, to, uh, work with.