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The day I, Charles Taylor, blew up

I can still remember vividly the day I first step foot on Lavender University. It had taken months upon months of my previous summer vacation, begging on my hands and knees, to even convince my adoptive father, Ivan Taylor, to even let me lay a singular toe on the establishment. Each attempt being shot down with one of three responses.

Those responses either being:

1.) Chucky, we were already given scholarships from the local universities, why would do you want to go to somewhere else and pass up on these opportunities.

2.) These colleges here can provide for you the same opportunities as this one does.

And the classic...

3.) Remember when you punched through that one wall at Wendell's house, I cannot be there to cover you if you were to attend a "normy" University.

It took some doing, but with enough begging, as well as discovering that the college credits I earned in Highschool could be transferred over to this University, I had finally done it. I could not contain my excitement as we drove into one of the last available parking spaces that faced the commons building. The building, in question, had looked exactly like it had in the brochure. A large, brownish-beige box that sat down on its side, with three sets of windows looking into something that appears to be the game lounge. The box also being connected to a large, cylindrical, slightly less orange-beige, structure that looked like a giant table (or a flat-headed jelly fish, you decide). I had felt so excited to step through those front doors that I almost did not hear my father's warning to watch out for that other guy's car as I opened my car door.

I felt my father's hand guide me along the path toward the door as I took in all the sights. Not many people were on campus, of course, most were already inside the building, ready to get F.O.C.U.S week over with (a week for college students to tour the campus before school starts, just in case you didn't know). During our trip to the front doors, I began to daydream about all the neat experiences I would experience while on campus. I can distinctly recall those thoughts now: dreams of sitting around outside with friends while studying for the next exam, playing football games with a couple of those friends during the fall, getting into snowball fights with them before Christmas break, and maybe, just maybe, asking a girl to the Homecoming dance before we eventually talk about our future plans together, (actual academics not even being a subject that crossed my mind at all).

We made our way to the front door of the ballroom where everybody was waiting to get in. As we all stood in line in front of those two giant wooden doors, I had time to notice that out of all tall people who stood with me in that line, (I am rather short compared to most people, there I said it), not one of them seemed to share in my level of enthusiasm. Sure, you had the occasional joke being cracked amongst a group of friends, but most of them either looked tired, bored, or dead inside (or in this one goth girl's case, a dramatic combination of the three). I must have been jumpy during that waiting period, for I felt my Dad's guiding hand on my shoulder as he tried to prevent me from rocking back and forth. I then turned to notice his face as his eyes darted back and forth across the room, wearing that same old forced nervous grin he uses when trying to assure other around him, and possibly, even himself, that everyone was alright. Having already lived with him for almost all of my life, I knew that this could only mean one thing, it was time for the three questions.

After giving me a hand gesture to come closer, I stood next to him, and he began whispering to me.

He asked me, "Chucky...if you are having any problems, ANY problem at all"?

Without hesitation, I whispered back "I'll call you on my cell phone and wait for you by the nurse's office".

He then nodded and continued, "If you are lost on campus and do not know where to go, what should you do"?

With a sigh, I replied, "I will check the signs around campus for guidance, and if I am still lost, I'll ask someone who knows their way around".

Ivan then did another quick search before edging closer into me, as if simultaneously making sure absolutely no one heard this, and to make sure that this point hits home the most.

"If you feel like punching something...anything at all..."?

Even today, he could still not let go of the Wendell incident.

I took a deep breath and then answered him, "I'll just punch something like a pillow...repeatedly if I have to".

That must had been enough to satisfy him, for I saw his round, pudgy, face relax a little as if he had avoided stepping on a bomb. Ever since last year when I had finally talked him into letting me come here, he had given me those same questions, every day, before breakfast; my responses becoming more and more automatic every time he would ask me.

To you, I know it must sound like he is just being overly cautious, and that he should probably give me space to become my own man, but he is just doing what my psychologist had told him to do when I had first told her that I wanted to go to a "normal" school. He does not mean it to be mean, he is just doing it because he believes he is doing what is best for me.

The doors eventually did open to the conference room, and we all filled inside. Dad had always instructed me, ever since I was little, to always take the center seat, whether it be at movie theaters, pep rallies, or presentations, and we did just that. Despite how crowded and noisy the room was, that was the moment when Ivan felt the most relaxed, letting all his fat spread out from his belly and face. At that moment, everything seemed to be going perfect.

And that was when the unspeakable happened....

Through the darkness, bright yellow light poured into the room as three sets of double doors slowly opened, bringing in rows upon rows of happy cheering people in grey slacks, black shoes, and purple shirts. All of them clapping their hands while shouting and laughing as they entered the stage. Though it was mostly dark from where I was sitting, and I could not see anyone's faces, I could tell that at that moment, any amount of joy anyone had had coming into this room had just suddenly died.

And then they started singing.

Oh God!

Their singing!

Their song went like this:

"People wanna know"!

"Who we are"!

"Striking from up above"!

"So we tell them"!

"We are flying Squirrels! We are flying Squirrels"!

My dad must have felt my pain too as he rested his hand on my shoulder, as if to communicate with me through Vulcan mind-meld:

Just don't blow up!

Just don't blow up!

Just don't blow up!

They then laughed, and laughed, and laughed, and laughed, even though their bastardization of the Kellogg's Frosted Flakes jingle was not that funny. Then after that, the school's superintendent came up on stage and introduced herself. She called herself Miss Carol, she was a dark-skinned woman who had a posture most other women would fight over. Her dark, navy-blue suit contrasting greatly with both the uniformed members of the pep rally behind her, and the super casual dress us in the audience wore. She then went on to describe how we would all be split up into different groups based on the area of the room we were sitting at, those groups, in turn, would each take their own route around campus, each group led by one of the crazy happy people on stage, before heading off into an assigned dorm that I assumed would be a test run for as to what dorm living was really like.

We were then each divided into different groups. Being assigned to group B, I then joined each of my fellow soon to be classmates by the door at the right side of the room. The tour guide for our group tuned was a gentle giant of a man. He had tan skin, a tall, stocky, body with large, wide arms and legs. He had long, curly, auburn colored hair that was tied into a bun, revealing tinny chocolate eyes that sat upon a giant nose connected to a wide face, with a goatee surrounding his mouth. He had mentioned his name, along with the other L.E.A.D members when they were first on stage, but I was too stoked on what was to come to listen.

As the doors began to open to formally begin the tour, I felt my Dad's hand on me again, only to suddenly back off. From his concerned face and nervous quivering lip, it looked like he might have wanted me to answer him those three questions again, but, maybe it was because of my body language, or how he did not want to embarrass me in front of my future class mates, he must have felt, then and there, that I was finally ready.

"Whatever you do, just don't blow up.", he spoke softly, a slight nervous twitch in his right eye.

"I'll try...I mean...I won't".

Letting out a slight nervous giggle, his smile now becoming more confident, he then lifted his hand off of my shoulder to now let me go on my own wild adventures, both of us not even being aware of how wild those adventures will turn out to be.

Our first stop on our tour was the college of business, an admittedly boring looking building with its only saving grace being the large glass windows that practically showed anybody who peered through it, the college's first floor. On our way there, I, for whatever reason, was enamored by that one goth girl I found at the waiting line. She had the bodily build of a skeleton, wore a My Chemical Romance T-Shirt (the one with the man and the woman about to kiss each other, you know the one), and the kind of messy, unkept, bed-head hair that one gets when they look at themselves in the mirror and think to themselves "ehh".

I then tried to keep my distance as I tried to figure out what exactly was the sticker she had on the cover of her notebook, (which knowing me, must have not been in a very subtle fashion) as we entered the building and awaited roll call.

After said roll call, our gentle giant of a tour guide then urged us to take our seats in the giant conference room to the right of him, and we all took our seats, giving me the opportunity to sit next to the goth girl as I pulled the desk out of the side of my chair and brought out my notes.

It was when she had finally opened her purple binder that I finally noticed what that sticker was supposed to be, it was of Inuyasha and Kigome. Full disclosure, I am, or was, a huge Inuyasha fan and had watched re-runs of it ,every night, on Adult Swim, whenever my Dad did not already lay claim to the television to watch documentaries on Walt Disney, Chuck Jones, or bootleg episodes of Unwrapped on YouTube. I even got a chance to meet Inuyasha in person back at a convention where I used to live. At that moment, I knew, then and there, that this was it. That with this potential common interest between us, I will make her my very first college friend. And all it would take is for me to make my first move.

I was about to lean in, ready to make a joke about just how many Shikon jewel shards there actually are, when the professor of that classroom walked in suddenly, causing me to shift back in my seat; my left arm sliding across my desk in the process.

As the professor went on and on about the many amenities of this specific building, as well as safety procedures we already knew from the online program we were all forced to complete before we came here, I had noticed a slight bit of pain underneath my left arm. Lifting it up, I had noticed that one of the corners of the desk is chipped, with a long bit of wood jutting slightly at the top.

"Oh God...please no!" I distinctively remember thinking as I turned my arm over to finally see the damage, my anxiety rising in the process.

As expected, a piece of skin did get ripped, but nothing too major. If you would have looked closely, you could have seen a slight tuft of dirty blond fur poking through, nothing that noticeable to worry about. But here is the thing, I did not think that calm and collective back then, meaning that for the remainder of the lecture, I could not stop worrying about people finding out the truth as I tried, as hard as I could, to control my emotions for the rest of class.

After that meeting, I hastily joined up with my group, keeping close eye on my speed so as not to emit a streak of flames from my seat to the front doors. As we waited outside for our guide, I checked my arm again.

"Okay, it's not that bad", I thought to myself as I slowly calmed down.

"Not that bad!", my anxious Chucky-You-Know-We-Can't-Afford-To-Fix-Mrs. Higgins-Windows-I-Told-You-To-Watch-Where-You-Play-Baseball voice, "Just look at it"!

"Well people have hairy arms, just look at that guy over there".

"Exactly...Hairy Arms...Not the piece of fur you could find in the page of a fuzzy felt book! It's only a matter of time before they find out"!

"I can't just leave to go talk to my Dad now, think of all the life-long connections I can still make by the end of the day, that website did say the best way to make connections is during the first day of school".

"Yeah sure, connections. Just think of all the connections you can make when a line of students forms outside your dorm room door asking you where their little sister can meet Minnie Mouse"!

Suddenly, I felt a tug at the bottom of my shirt. I turned and saw it was from that goth girl. Her dark eye shadow combined with her genuine look of concern giving her that ghostly minion-who-has- just-witnessed-her-demon-master-command-an-army-of-pickle-jars-to-take-over-the-world look.

"Are you...okay?", she asked, her voice trembling.

Trying to keep my dignity, I. of course, responded in the calmest way possible.

"... YES"!!!

After my accidental outburst, she continued:

"...You...wouldn't stop moving...during our meeting".

I had my head down, my fists clenched as I knew that I had almost exploded. She must have seen the tear forming in my eye for then she said:

"Hey...hey...I know it's the first day...it will get better...probably".

I then picked myself, up and took a deep breath. Looking back, I could have responded in a myriad of different ways. Maybe a "Thank you, I needed that.", followed up by either a "It's my first day at this kind of university so I am really nervous.", or maybe bringing up that Inyuyasha sticker so we can finally hit it off.

Instead, I chose:

"Did I just seem unstable to you"?

Raising her one visible eyelid and rearranging her face in a way that could either mean abject terror or genuine concern, she replied "No...I reacted the same way during my first day of high school...My Mom and Dad had home schooled me as far back as I could remember...I thought that...you know...you were homeschooled too".

I took a breath of relief as I apologized and explained to her that no, I was not homeschooled, and instead, I was used to a different kind of schooling entirely (one that had an entire class on the history of slapstick comedy, but I did not tell her that).

"...What kind of school...would that be"?

I then tensed up a bit. I think I spent up to a minute pondering what other schooling systems existed out there that could explain my behavior before settling on:

"Catholic! I come from a Catholic school...small classes...not as many people"!

That must have been enough to satisfy her as we remained silent throughout the rest of our journey to the other buildings on campus.

If I could sum up the rest of the tour that day, it would have to be that it was a repetitive slog. Sure they talked about the various amenities and classes featured in each school, and that I would have a chance to get a taste of all of them through this one required class called Core, but like our meeting in the business building, it was the same "Respect people's personal space.", "Be mindful of others.", and "Call x number when you see y going on." speeches we all had to sit through during the required sensitivity training. The only thing that shook things up was when I had accidentally wound up in the wrong building, and had to be escorted into the school of arts, where they performed a show about respecting other's personal space, being mindful of others, and calling x number when you see y going on.

Things did start to pick up again, during the end of our tour for the day, when we were finally led toward the dorms we would be sleeping at for the night. It was a large brick building that was half as tall as the main building, with a large, glass window at the bottom showing what looks like to be a cafeteria with food already prepared for us. Since it was getting late, I was about ready to eat, march up those steps, take my shower, and prepare for bed. That is, until, I overheard a large group of people say that they were going to go play volleyball.

At first, I was against the idea for two reasons:

One, I am not the best at volleyball.

And two, I wanted to wake up the next day feeling recharged for what was likely to be the same old meetings as yesterday (topped with a fun activities fare at the end that I saw as my reward for this journey of monotony).

I was on my way up to said bed until I saw a group a of students behind me who were already heading toward the court, with the gentle giant saying that he was going to perform the first serve.

"Welp.", I thought as I marched toward the mass of people, "When in Rome...".

We were all in position, six on one side, six on the other. Everyone on my side waited in anticipation to take any necessary action as we awaited the first serve. The gentle giant then raised the ball high into the air as if he were showing off a divine artifact for the gods before he spiked it toward my position. Using my intense focus, I had my arms ready, anticipating the ball to make first contact. The ball came closer...

And Closer....

And Closer...

AND CLOSER...

Until Suddenly...BAM!!!! Another student, (I think his name was Pablo, but I could be wrong), had body checked me, causing me to tumble sideways onto the sandy floor.

Of course, everyone came to my aid, looking for any signs of serious damage. Asking me the typical, "Are you okays"? and "Are you hurts", with me assuring them, every time, that I was fine, a little bruised toward my left side, but fine. We played the rest of the game as normal, I had noticed that the ball did not often go toward my position, but I had assured myself that it had nothing to do with them wanting to cause another accident and was just, instead, because of bad placement (at least I hope not, I have had a huge past of people taking pity on me as is). My team and I had lost the game, we all decided to head back toward the dorm, ready to eat some dinner before we crashed in bed for the night.

AND THEN I HEARD A SCREAM.

As we entered the building, I turned to see one of my teammates staring at me, finger pointing toward the side of my body where I had fell, bug eyed and mouth agape as if a monster had just appeared from there.

I looked toward to where he was pointing, and almost dropped dead.

Immediately, I booked it upstairs, my mind too much in a state of panic to gauge how fast I ran. My Dad's trademark catch phrase, "Don't blow up!", pounding in my ear drums as I searched for...well...anywhere lonely and quiet to see the damage. My first thought was to just go straight to my dorm room, but I had remembered my Dad telling that I would be sharing one with another student, so that was out; I then decided to find a back-door exit, but I could not find the fire escape. With nowhere else to turn, I then found a bathroom and ran inside of it. Seeing a wall next to the sinks, I immediately sat down, Indian style, and tried to get my breathing back in control.

After a couple of deep breaths later, I then decided to look around the room to see if no one was around, (I should have done that before, I know, shut up.), and willed myself to look in the mirror.

Sure enough, my fall at the volleyball game had made contact with the hole I had made earlier, and it had caused it to expand all the way toward my armpit.

"Okay Charley...", I thought as I tried to put a positive spin on the situation, (a tool they taught me in therapy), "this hole is easily coverable, I'll just take my shower, change into my other clothes, ask the giant if I can call Dad, and everything will be fine. It's not like anyone else had time to notice the light brown, spotted...r-r-ROWS OF FUR CASCADING UP MY ARM AND TOWARD MY NECK, SHOWING OFF THE BOTTOM PART OF MY MUZZLE"!

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH"!!!!!

Oh God, I bet joggers from two blocks down the road could have heard how loud I yelled before I put my hands up to my mouth to stifle the rest of it. Not only had the tear, made its way to my armpit, but a stray rip had formed up my shoulder and across my neck, revealing a bit of a canine's jaw line. Not only that, but because of my outburst, my black and white cartoon eyes exploded out my green fake ones, meaning I now looked double the unusual as I had before.

I then slammed myself against that same wall, my muffled screaming turning into crying as the realization of my actions had finally dawned on me.

I could just hear Dad's voice now:

"Chucky, how many times have I and Mr. Andrews asked you whether your skin suit felt tight! Now people will start questioning things..."

"I know!", I mentally screamed at my trademark inner Ivan Taylor voice "I know"!

I then started to sob some more as more of the situation had dawned on me. Here I was, a cartoon hyena wearing a human skin suit trying to prove to everybody that he could make it in a normy university, only to have it all destroyed because I did not duck out and call for help when I had the chance. I then remembered that one Spongebob episode where Spongebob had wanted to give up his fry cooking job and run wild with the jelly fish, only for nature to attack him every step of the way.

_ "That's you!" _My inner angry voice told me.

"You are the sponge who is trying to live in a place where he does not belong".

"Just give up Chucky, go back to Bouncy Valley where you belong. There is no way you can make it with these people"!

Suddenly, as if out of nowhere, our gentle giant of a tour guide had slid into the entrance of the bathroom, his eyes immediately fixated on me as I just sat there, like a deer in head lights, cowering like the low-ranking hyena I am.

"Oh God!", I thought, "He's seen everything"!

We then stared at each other for what seemed like half an hour, his eyes and mouth open in a less intense version of the kid from earlier, until suddenly, becoming more and more calm as time flew by. I could have said anything during this whole situation, maybe a "Its not what it looks like..." followed up by a "please don't tell anyone.", or maybe I could have not said anything at all and just made a quick exit.

But instead, I chose:

"How many people do you think heard me scream"?

Without changing his facial expression, he replied, "A few...rooms...nothing major".

We then circled around each other, each sizing up the other as if we were two alien species discovering each other for the first time. I did not know what to say during this situation, what could I have done? It was not like I could just lie and say this was a rare skin condition, like the so called "wolf- people" you hear about in Ripley's Believe it or Not, for those people are more hairy than furry. I knew right then and there that I had to tell him my entire story, to give him the full explanation as to who I truly was, and hopefully get him to understand that this needs to be kept secret, for the sake and privacy of all toons.

I then stood firmly still, and was about to give him, what I thought, would be the biggest reality bomb of his life.

But then he said:

"Do you want me to take you to Lucky Luke's Disguise Shop"?

If it were not for the fact that a bit of my suit was holding my mouth in place, my jaw would have literally hit the floor.

"On second thought...", the giant continued, "we should probably go see Mr. Andrews first, I think the shop is closed at this hour".

The giant then gave me a hand gesture for me to follow him, to which I was too numb not to obey.

We then made our way down the oddly silent hallways and down the stairs into the parking lot to his his rustic, red, Ford pickup. Before thoughts of stranger danger even entered my brain space, he then urged me to get in.

We then drove out of the parking lot and into the streets where, for a while, we just sat there in silence; the more I sat there, the less this whole situation made sense.

My Dad, my uncle Upchuck, and my therapist had warned me against coming to this university, because of fears of getting caught and having our secret revealed to people who may take things to far. On that advice, I had assumed that no accommodations existed out there for people like me who would want to learn among non-animated humans, at least none that I can find through research.

"How-How do you...", I stammered

"...know when someone really needs help.", the giant had replied, eyes still fixated on the road, "That's just what members of Lavender University's L.E.A.D group do".

"But-but-but...", I stammered, "no one is supposed to know about this".

"Trust me, I know what it's like to be in your situation Chuckles".

I then stopped moving completely as I tried to comprehend this new bit of information. How did he know my actual birth name? Dad had made it explicitly clear that the reason he had originally wanted that one animation cell from that one unfinished Baby Chuckles Show pilot that had ended up being mixed up with my adoption certificate was that almost no one had ever heard of the original 1960's Bob Dwight Chuckles Mc Hynney shorts (unless you were one of those people who knew about the one controversial short about migrant workers). Also, what did he mean by "knowing about my situation", was he secretly a member of the Animated Character Movement and Education Enterprise program? Did he also have a member of his family that was also a toon? Was this just one thing that all team L.E.A.D members were trained to handle.

Before, I could even ask any of those questions, we had arrived at some simple, one story house that was located right across from a pizza shop. Just by looking at how messy the front yard is, and the giant Van Halen poster stuck on the garage door, I knew right away we were at Mr. Andrew's house. We both walked toward the front door and rang the doorbell. After a few audible footsteps from the other side of the door, as well as a bit of swearing, Mr. Andrew emerged from the doorway, decked out in pjs with yin/yang symbols printed on his pajama bottom.

"Hey Terrance Ter-a-Bull!" Mr. Andrew said, still blinking the sleep out of his eyes "It's been a while".

"Please, call me Travis" the giant had said as he shook Mr. Andrew's hand, "I was wondering if you can possibly help my little friend here, he could really use some help".

Mr. Andrews then took a good look at the left side of my body and a smile formed across his face.

"He-he, what was the thing you told me during our last meeting at the shop 'No, Mr. Andrews, my suit does not feel tight, I don't need it replaced'".

"It-it-it didn't.", I replied, still too stunned from all the things I went through in the last ten minutes, "I... fell down and scrapped it".

Travis then explained to him the whole volleyball situation, to which I also brought up what had happened during my conference in the business building. All the while, Mr. Andrews leaned back beside the edge of his door frame, giving off the air of a stoned cowboy who really wanted his next fix.

"Well..." Mr. Andrews said as he slowly lifted his hands out of his pockets and into a shrug, his face looking less and less sarcastic in the process "I wish I could help you, but you know the rules, the shop closes after 10 pm".

"Come on man", Travis pleaded, "It's his first week at the university. You wouldn't want him to miss those activities at the tent tomorrow".

Mr. Andrews then picked his ear while looking as straight faced as possible. He had always been the kind of person who wanted to be everyone's friend and seeing me there all obviously exposed with nowhere to turn to must have triggered an inner conflict with himself.

Travis then took a deep breath before continuing, "Remember how I was during my freshman year of college, always trying to keep my cool around other people while trying not to get provoked at red".

Me and Mr. Andrews stared at him as he continued.

"I had bumped into things, scrapped things, and had even one time accidentally popped the school's football when it hit the tip of one my accidentally exposed horns.

A smile then formed across Mr. Andrew's face and he started to giggle, "You told me the coach called you a demon".

Travis then nodded before continuing "I knew I would have not made the friends I did if I had begged my parents to drive back to Vibrant Heights, would you want him to miss out on all those experiences too"?

I honestly could not remember the rest of what they had said, for my entire world view was wrecked at that very moment. Previously I thought I was the only toon on campus. Before I sold my Dad on the idea of me coming here, he had went on and on about all of the dangers that could happen: how I might be captured and experimented on, how I might hurt myself and others, or how I might even destroy the school. Yet, here was this calm and collective example who had not only managed to survive keeping his secret a secret, but was willing to go the extra mile to not only help me, but to help others fit into a society they might not feel they belong in.

After a couple minutes of convincing, we all ended up driving to Lucky Luke's skin shop. On the way there, Travis had informed me that everything was going to be fine, how in the morning, members of ACME were going to wipe any student's mind who had saw the exposed part of me with some device ,and how this repair would not take that long. However, I did not listen to all those details as I looked outside the window and visualized what I was going to tell my Dad when F.O.C.U.S was over. In my mind, I pictured him driving up to the front of the building in his Simpson's Pink Sudan. I would enter, we would both sit in silence for a while as we drive out of the parking lot. He would then ask me how my time was there, I would say that it was fine, and he would probably reply that it was really boring for him sit through all of those meetings, to which I would agree. And after a couple more moments of silence, he would then ask me the most important question:

"Did you blow up"?

To which I would respond "A little, but I made some valuable friends because of it".