Disclaimer: I do not own any part of the Lost Boys.
October 2, 1985
7 p.m.
The air was turning colder outside; silently it would seethe through the cave in sudden bursts, dimming the candles and choking the fires that burned in oversized, rusted barrels. Winter was a lazy time for the Lost Boys. With the summer gone, there were no beachside parties, no bonfires, no hundreds of tourists flocking around the boardwalk, open targets and easy prey.
No, these months were harsher with an agreed on limit to the amount of live victims they could have within a single week. The locals here could grow few and far in between and with too many of them missing… well, Max said it would likely cause a conspiracy theory big enough to rival Area 59.
Whether this fact was true or grossly overstated, David and the boys had complied. Though, living on only one human a week was starting to grow rather… stressful.
They could steal blood packets from the Blood Bank or they could earn them from Max by working nights at his video shop. Paul had been fired five times, Dwayne wouldn't speak to the customers or help them with their purchases, Marko stole money from the register, and David refused to help all together.
With no work ethic, morals or blood, the boys tried to live as normally as possible.
The coffee was cold and tasted terrible.
Groaning inwardly, David forced himself to swallow and stare sourly at the mug, trying to decide whether it was the fault of the cheap, battery-powered coffee maker or Dwayne's who, for whatever reason, when given money to go shopping for the gang, always returned with only the absolute, basic needs. All, of course, the cheapest the store had to offer.
Instead of Folgers, David got REGULAR COFFEE, in what appeared to be a spray-painted blue can with a slightly torn and water stained top.
The groan continued as another sip of the cold, tasteless substance was taken. The paper was sprawled out across the table with evidence that Paul had been there already, stealing the corners for joint papers. How the hell he could keep affording to buy weed, though couldn't scrape up enough to buy more rolling papers was something that baffled David.
And speaking of being baffled…
Glancing up for a single second, David caught the sight of Dwayne passing through the shadows in the cave. The man's eyes were on fire as his hair swept about his face as though there were some static current traveling through the air. It took a second longer to realize what the man was pissed about.
His boxers.
With Dwayne everything was simple: white boxers kept washed and in neatly folded piles in a dresser that resided at the back of the cave along with several other tokens of humanity that the man still clung to in his dying, human age. Upon waking, there was little need for a robe or any sort of confinement and normally he would stride through the cave wearing nothing but those tight whites, performing his evening rituals.
But tonight was different.
Instead of wearing his boxers, the man had them clutched tightly in a fist and stood naked before David, flinging around certain things that the vampire truly didn't care to see.
"Who the hell has been doing laundry this past week?" Dwayne snarled, staring pointedly at David for a few moments before eyes cast to the other shadows that were gathering about the cave.
David tried his best not to lower his paper, but curiosity got the best of him and flipping down a corner, he instantly saw the problem.
Pink.
The man's boxers were a bright, cotton-candy pink instead of their usual, tidy white. Shifting uncomfortably in his chair, David refused to answer or look head-on into the accusing eyes of his brother. It was too early for this shit.
Denied a fight from David, the man's anger immediately turned to the others that were starting to work their way through the cave. Eventually, it landed upon Star who, unlike the others, had gotten an early start to her evening.
She was a vision in modern, so unlike her carefree, gypsy self in the summer months. Wearing tight, black pants that graciously hugged the curve of her hips and thighs, she had borrowed one of Paul's long-sleeved Grateful Dead t-shirts and a jean jacket that did little to hide the band's logo.
Still a half-vamp, the winter months were hardly a challenge as she went about her way, stealing blood (or so the others figured) from animals that she and Laddie could catch around the pier and the various houses that let their poor, unsuspecting dogs and cats out for the night. Feeling Dwayne's intense stare, she jerked from the magazine she had been flipping through and stiffened angrily.
"What makes you think I did it?" she asked, incredulous.
Dwayne was silent, trying his best to come up with a good reason while David snuck a peek from around his newspaper. It took the winter months to bring out the biker in Star and not-so-guilty fantasies were beginning to form in his head.
"You're the one who usually does it, aren't you?" Dwayne spat.
"Yea, and every time I do, your boxers usually come out white, don't they?" she fired back.
It was logic so practical and astounding that it left nothing for the man to do but shift uncomfortably and look around for another person to blame.
He wouldn't have to wait long.
"Oh man, I knew it! I just fucking knew it!"
Paul. Aside from Star he was the earliest of the night breed to wake and had been roaming the caves for a good hour or so before the others had managed to rise. Normally, these hours were spent with loud music or guitar practice that shook the whole cave and had an early evening snacks arriving in the form of police cruisers that had heard the ruckus. Tonight however, the stoner had been unusually quiet. Which was always a bad sign.
Paul was as naked as Dwayne. Nothing but blonde hair, pale skin and white-err, pink tube socks that stretched up hairy legs with black and red bands that nearly met at his knees. This time, there was no resisting as the paper lowered slowly and David studied his youngest brother with something close to a sickening fascination.
Standing next to Dwayne, the man wasn't anything special above the waist but below it…
The paper immediately flipped back up and trembled slightly as he tried his hardest to finish the article he'd been reading for over twenty minutes.
Dwayne, only mildly unsettled by Paul's nudity, took a step back from the beaming blonde stoner.
"What the hell are you talking about?" he asked.
Paul smirked. "Naked Thursdays? Man, I knew you would warm up to the idea. There's nothing like sitting naked around a bonfire and getting blazed."
It took a moment for realization to set in upon them all. It's was Paul's new thing: Naked Thursdays. Since the parties had died down to nothing, the young one had been looking to spice up the nights with corny traditions that to him were the greatest in the world while to the others, they bordered on insanity. Leave it to a child of sixties parents to enjoy sitting around in the nude amongst his fellow brethren.
Letting the page flip back down, David couldn't resist…
"Paul, how many times did you get dropped on your head, again?" he asked, amused.
The stoner didn't even bat an eye or come close to realizing the insult.
"Three, why?"
David nodded, flipping the page back up while Star turned around to hide her smile and Dwayne grumbled, putting on his discolored boxers.
"Whoa, whoa! What are you doing, I thought…" Paul stumbled as he watched Dwayne pull up his pink britches. The look of confusion and sadness overtook the fledglings eyes and for a moment, he was filled with something that was close to pity and guilt.
The feelings didn't last long.
"No way, Paul. Sitting around a bonfire with another naked guy and getting stoned… it seems a little…" he started, stopped short as the confusion continued to grow on the others face.
Dwayne shook his head. "Look, I already made other plans. Go ask Star."
Paul's eyes lit up. The prospect of seeing a naked woman was far more interesting than Dwayne, no matter how impressive his body was. Unfortunately, Star was already moving towards the entrance of the cave. Her face gave away that she hardly felt any kind of obligation or pity when it came to Paul. There were too many nights where she had woken up and found the stoner snoring and curled up in her bed with last nights meal still smeared around his face.
Not to mention, a hand that might have been groping her.
"Forget it, Paul. I don't smoke," she said.
Put off by this, Paul couldn't help but sulk and look towards David with a helpless stare. "So I have to get stoned by myself again?"
"Jesus Christ, someone call the 1970s and tell Paul to give them their socks back." Echoed from the shadows as the final member of the Lost Boys stepped out.
To call his entrance unusual would have been a drastic understatement. Marko simply appeared out of the darkness, missing only the crash of symbols and the puff of smoke like the late Houdini. Unlike the famous magician, however, Marko was a far cry from anything that passed as normal, especially early in the evening at the cave.
The mop-top of golden curls were wound up within several dozen pink curlers around the vampire's head. If that weren't enough, an overly large, black t-shirt with white (now pink) lettering that read BITE ME was sprawled across the creatures chest with matching pink boxers, made even more ridiculous by their originally tasteful, white flower pattern
His eyes twitched at seeing Paul before they fell somewhat confused to Dwayne's pink boxers and finally to David who sipped his coffee in disgust. He and Dwayne both knew of Marko's hair-care habits but, being stoned all the time, Paul had yet to remember how Marko kept his hair so curly. Let alone the last fight they'd had when Paul couldn't stop laughing.
Already the stoner's face was twisting in amusement, though David gave him credit for trying to keep himself under control for as long as he did.
It was enough to allow Marko to shift between their gazes, confused as he stared at Dwayne's underwear before noticing his own pink clothing.
"What the fuck-" he started before Paul burst out laughing.
"Dude… dude…" was all the stoner could gasp as he held his sides causing his curly haired brother to tense.
"Who the hell was in charge of laundry last week?" he hissed.
"That's what I was trying to find out," Dwayne echoed.
It took no more than a second before both sets of eyes fell to the giggling stoner that had managed to clamp a hand over his mouth, though his gaze still danced with mirth.
"What? You think I did it?" he said in between the bouts of laughter.
"It has to be you," Marko snarled, hands tensing into claws while the glint of the candle light revealed fangs that were starting to work their way down.
Managing to control his fits of giggling, Paul held up his hands in defense.
"Fuck, it wasn't my turn to do laundry last week! I was helping Max in the store, remember?" he said, causing Marko to hesitate and Dwayne to frown. Unfortunately, Paul was right. He had been at Max's store all week, getting fired and then rehired over and over until Max banned him all together. He wouldn't have had the time to do any laundry.
"Besides," Paul continued. "I know how to separate the loads. Hasn't anyone ever noticed how I keep my darks so… dark?"
No one had.
"Yep. I'd say it's a classic case of the red sock in the whites. Not my doing," Paul said, crossing his arms triumphantly. It was one of the few times he was right and felt the need to savor the moment.
"Christ," Marko mumbled, putting the claws and antics away as he angrily stomped off to get a cup of tasteless coffee and continue with his hair-care ritual.
Dwayne was also walking away, grumbling wordlessly beneath his breath.
It was right then that David finished the article and looked up to discover, to his horror, that he and Paul were the last two occupants left in the cave.