Disclaimer: All characters, settings, and music belong to their rightful owners. I just own the words between. :)
Stella Hale © 2010
Fang stumbled into the house, his hair wild, his eyes bloodshot, with his hand placed firmly on the frame to hold him steady. His blurry eyes scanned the scene of the living room. Max held Angel in her arms, peacefully watching the scene on the TV come to life. Nudge, Iggy, and Gazzy were playfully mimicking the opera-style singing that rang from the screen.
Max looked over at him, her eyes furrowed. "Were you…drinking?" she asked, startled.
"Uh-huh," Angel said blandly. "He was invited to a party. You were too but he didn't tell you," she said tersely.
Max's eyes zoned in on Fang, making him want to crawl under a rock and die. However, he tried his best to stand up straight and slurred out, "Don't…tell mes…what to do."
Nudge looked up, her brown eyes glaring at Fang. "She can if she wants. You obviously can't control your 'drinking problem,'" she said, calling on his random comment as Angel of Music started to play from the TV.
Fang shook his head furiously, making the world spin wildly. He blinked to try to make it stop spinning.
"Someone catch him!" Angel said.
He started to fall forward but he stepped forward and caught his weight before stumbling over to the couch and flopping down in between Nudge, Max and Angel. Nudge pinched her nose, smelling the alcohol on him. "You reek, Fang," she complained.
To their left, on the loveseat, Iggy looked in Gazzy's general direct and grinned. "Get the video camera," he whispered to the Gazzy. "This will be on Youtube forever!"
Fang turned and looked at the screen blankly, watching Christine go towards the Phantom. He recoiled into the couch, nearly flipping it backward, in horror. "Don't go to the creeper!" he shouted at the TV.
There was a loud beep as the camera started recording, and Gazzy and Iggy snickering at Fang's outburst. "This is gonna be good!" Gazzy snickered, turning the camera toward him to give a thumbs-up before turning it back toward drunken Fang, still staring at the screen in horror.
"Why the hell is she singing?" he asked Nudge, who simply shrugged.
"Maybe it's because it's a musical," Max said grumpily, while Angel stared at Fang in equal horror. "Meaning people burst out in songs at random parts."
"You wouldn't," Angel hissed, seeming to ignore Max's comment on musicals.
Unexpectedly, Fang started to sing - Fang, the great brick wall of emotions, the shadow, the everything else that doesn't have color, or an emotion, or is described as lifeless, started to sing Christine's part of the Phantom of the Opera.
Max's eyes went wide as she slowly turned to look at him, her mouth gaping open like a fish. Gazzy and Iggy were trying not to laugh hysterically while Nudge glared at Fang, telling him to shut up so she could listen to a better, not so slurred voice.
"What do you know," Iggy said, "even when he slurs he actually has a nice voice."
Finally, they were moments away from the part everyone had been dreading. The last notes - the loudest, highest, glass-shattering notes that everyone knew Fang couldn't hit even if he tried. Angel slowly covered her ears muttering something under her breath about Fang destroying everyone's eardrums. Max saw Angel's movement and quickly covered her own ears.
Nudge whacked Fang's arm furiously, and then gave up trying to get him to shut up quickly. She stood up abruptly and went into the kitchen, followed closely by Angel and Max trying to get as far away from Fang as possible.
Iggy and Gazzy sat on the loveseat, holding the camera at Fang, grinning from ear-to-ear. In Iggy's mind, he wondered if he'd be able to afford those wires for the bomb he was building - almost as powerful as the atomic bomb. Gazzy was busy thinking about how Fang would get at them when he sobered up.
Finally, a piercing sound came out of Fang's mouth, but it wasn't horrible. If anything, it was actually kind of soothing, in a glass-shattering way. Iggy's eyebrows went up. "I repeat, even when he slurs he does have a nice voice."
Gazzy looked at Iggy with a cocked eyebrow. "I doubt he sings half as good when he's sober."
"Well, yeah," Iggy agreed, watching Fang climb the scale of octaves as Christine did on the screen in front him. Then the decisive moment came, the last ear-piercing note. For Max, she was surprised that her mom hadn't shown up yet, but with her on those new sleep meds, she guessed she shouldn't be too surprised. Then she saw a dark figure move towards Fang menacingly. Max moved to stop them but then recognized her.
The note came, just as graceful as the rest. It was cut short when the woman herself clasped a hand over his mouth, her eyes red and her hair wild. Dr. M. took her hand away from Fang's mouth, glowering at him.
"Hey, Mrs. M.," he greeted drunkenly as Christine's note finally cut off.
Dr. Martinez looked up at the rest of them, furious. "Where'd he get the vodka?" she demanded angrily.
"At a party down the street," Angel piped up. "He didn't tell any of us where he was going. We thought he'd gone to bed."
Fang looked down at the screen again and recoiled as the Phantom moved closer to Christine, and this time Fang flipped the couch completely backwards onto Dr. Martinez's feet. She howled in pain as Nudge, Max and Angel moved to help while Iggy and Gazzy howled with laughter, the camera still recording.
The dark haired boy scrambled to his knees and looked up at Dr. Martinez, and said, "Oh, my. Are you an angel?"
With a red face, wild hair, and bloodshot eyes, someone would have thought she was a banshee, and nowhere near an angel.
Dr. Martinez looked up at Gazzy and Iggy, furious and snapped, "Get his butt to bed before I strangle him!"
"Can we videotape him puking so he'll never do it again?" Gazzy asked, handing the still recording camera to Iggy who accidentally pointed it at Max who glared at it before crossing the room to snatch it away from Iggy. Max powered it down before whacking Iggy and Gazzy upside the head.
"Don't blackmail him!" she snarled. "He's your older-"
"Non-biologic," Iggy interjected.
"-brother, so show him some respect!" Then she paused and started laughing at herself. "You know what? He pretty much ruined movie night, so do me a favor and post that video. Oh, and make sure you edit out after he flipped over the couch." Max handed the camera back to Gazzy and added, "Oh, and do it before he sobers up, or he'll do everything in his power to erase that video."
Gazzy nodded seriously before departing, leaving Iggy with the task of somehow getting Fang to bed.
Before long, Fang had puked, and then crashed up on his bed. Iggy looked in Gazzy's general direction as he entered the boys' bedroom. "Do you think Fang will be mad?" Gazzy asked.
Iggy's eyebrows furrowed. "Uh, yeah. But who can he blame besides himself? He let himself get that drunk, and dude, how many hits do we have?"
"Right now…five hundred," Gazzy said, recalling the number after an hour of posting the video. "Don't you think it would have been ten times better if he was singing Miley Cyrus in that video?"
"If you mean 'better' as in 'more humiliating' then hell yeah," Iggy grinned.
"I can't be taaaamed!" Gazzy shrieked, mocking Fang's singing.
Iggy was trying to hold back his laughs; if Fang woke up then they'd all be dead. Gazzy crawled into his bed, pulling the covers up to his chin and smiled. "I can't wait to see his face," he mumbled as Iggy crawled into his.
"Neither can I," Iggy grinned, closing his blind eyes.
Max was serving out the bacon when Fang emerged from the bedroom, his eyes thick with sleep, the circles under his eyes like bruises, and he walked with his shoulders hunched over.
"He looks kinda like a vampire," Nudge said to Angel, who nodded in agreement.
"G'morning," he mumbled, sinking down into a seat next to a ruffled Dr. Martinez. He looked at her through narrow, bloodshot eyes. "What's up with you?"
Dr. Martinez said nothing as she took a quick, pointed bite into a piece of toast Iggy put down for her. Max was buzzing around the table, handing out the dishes that Iggy had expertly made. "Enjoy!" he said cheerfully.
"Thank you, Iggy," Dr. Martinez said stiffly while Fang cradled his throbbing head in his hands.
Finally, once breakfast was over, Max turned on the TV and flipped to a news station. A large caption scrolled across the screen. "FANG OF THE OPERA."
"The known bird-children uploaded a video onto the web late last night," the anchor said, "and the description said this, 'We have finally got him, bwa-ha-ha-ha,' with a smiley face after it. Here's what the bird-kids do on Saturday nights," she said, holding back a laugh.
The video of Fang singing kicked on, and Fang visibly paled. He just stared at the screen until the couch flipped back onto Dr. Martinez's foot, and he winced. "Ouch."
"Oh, it hurt," Dr. Martinez growled, putting her hand on Fang's shoulder. He visibly stiffened. "Do you want to explain why you were drunk?" she asked.
Fang quickly shook his head.
"Fang of the Opera?" Max commented. "That's not very creative, Gazzy."
"Neither is Max for a name," Iggy pointed out. "Did you know that the most common household pet name is Max?"
Max's face turned bright red. "My name is Maximum, not just Max," she defended while Fang was scolded by Dr. M.
"Hey!" Angel yelled, putting her finger to her lips. "I'm sorry, Nudge, what did you say?" she asked.
Nudge looked at Fang seriously and said, "Dude, if you become famous, can I ride in your limo?"
Fang blinked. "I thought we already were famous. Hence the 'Bird Kids' name." Suddenly, something occurred to Fang and he swiveled around to face Gazzy and Iggy. "They just said it had gone viral, so therefore, for every hit it's gotten, I'll give you ten," he snarled calmly through his teeth.
Iggy looked down at his wrist, pretending he was wearing one and that he could see it.. "Oh, what do you know? It's getting late and we gotta go," he said as he and Gazzy made a break for the door. Fang went after them, a calm rage inside of him.
Max just watched with her mom, staring at the boys as they took to the skies. "Men," she scoffed. "Violence won't fix anything."
"It seems to make them feel good," Angel said thoughtfully and then snorted. "I dunno why though."
Max shook her head, looking at her mother. "I really wish they'd figure out it won't solve anything sooner," she sighed.
"Their brains will come in once they hit twenty-one," Dr. Martinez reassured. "Or at least, we can only hope they do."
Angel shook her head. "With those guys? They are all going to be late bloomers."
THE END.
Authors note: Hey everyone! Most of you probably have no idea who the heck I am. If you're from fictionpress, then you may have stumbled across a few of my stories (I have my other link on my profile somewhere). If not, welcome to my second attempt at fanfiction. The last one didn't end too well, so we're not gonna show it. XD
Anyway, as you probably saw above, my name is Stella Hale. Everything else about me you don't need to know.
Please do me a favor and review. Well, you don't have to, but it'd make my day. So, please do/don't/you're awesome. If you got that, you're awesome. :)
~Stella Hale