"Come on, Price, this is the home stretch! You can do it, Price, strong finish! Strong finish, eyes on the prize, Price! Right, left, right, left, go, go, go!"
With legs of jello and lungs on fire, Chloe Price stumbled round the final turn of Blackwell's race track as the school's physical ed coach, Mr. Krebabble, exhorted her with pretty much every cliché known to mankind. She could barely make out what he was saying because her heart was thundering in her ears, and she paid little heed to his voice anyway, for her ears were focused squarely on the crunching gravelly footsteps and labored breathing maybe five yards behind her.
On cue, Mr. Krebabble's cliches switched targets to the girl trailing Chloe. "Come on, Chase, only forty yards to go, hustle hustle hustle! Light on the feet, Chase, light on the feet, the wind's at your back now, no excuses! Strong finish, strong finish!"
Chloe did not dare look back to see how close Victoria was. All of her energy was focused on the finish line beckoning to her from the horizon, her wobbly legs alternating as fast as they could with the surefootedness of a newborn calf. Sweat dribbled down her pink face, stained the pits of her plain white T-shirt. Her running form was total crap now, arms flailing rather than pumping, hips all over the place inside the loose black cotton gym shorts.
For the hundredth time in her young life, Chloe swore to God that she would quit smoking. For reals, this time she would quit, honest to God. As soon as she got back to her locker, the first thing she was going to do was grab her pack of cigarettes and chuck it into the trash. But first, in the meantime, please God, if there is a god out there, please let her beat Victoria. Fucking Victoria and her hench-wenches, calling her Chimney behind her back whenever Mr. Krebabble had them pick teams for soccer or basketball. Wouldn't it be a sweet thing to have Victoria and her finely sculpted legs be outpaced by the resident slacker. Although Chloe liked to think that she had a nice pair of legs herself, thanks to all the walking the restless girl did within and outside town boundaries.
Chloe couldn't really remember what happened next. Possibly she had blacked out or passed out while on autopilot. But the next thing she knew, she found herself on the other side of the finish line and Mr. Krebabble was screaming congratulations from the grassy sideline.
"Good job, Price, good job! Shaved nearly a minute off from last year's time, heck, almost matched your phenomenal first year time! Good freaking job, Price, good to see that fire back in your belly!"
Chloe appreciated Mr. Krebabble's sentiments (if there was one thing that wasn't fake about Blackwell, it was Mr. Krebabble's enthusiasm about his students pushing themselves to their limits), but she was pretty darn sure that she was about to puke out all that fire in her belly, along with her morning cereal and the chewing gum she had surreptitiously swallowed during chemistry class when Ms. Grant had called her out on said gum. She promptly bent over to place her hands on her knees and cease all movement, staring at the gravel with bulging eyes surely bloodshot from all the blood rushing through her head.
"Good job, Chase, good job! Shaved off twenty seconds from last year's time, ever improving, Chase, ever improving, that's what I like to see! Let's crack that eight minute mile next semester, Chase, we know you can do it, you got the eye of the tiger, Chase, eye of the tiger!"
Chloe finally turned her head to look behind her, where Victoria Chase, in a similar white T-shirt and baggy black cotton gym shorts, was also bent over and facing away from Chloe in a most determined effort to avoid all eye contact. Victoria's primary hench wenches, Taylor Christensen and Courtney Wagner, had just crossed the finish line themselves and they put aside their own physical woes to rush over to Victoria and confirm her well-being.
Chloe managed to grin as she straightened up, placed her hands on her hips, and looked away from the defeated Victoria, all so that she could better suck in that sweet smell of victory. From somewhere on the other side of the track, she could hear Justin calling out to her in sincere admiration.
"Goddamn, Chloe, you busting ass like Speedy Gonzalez! You got jets for wheels, man!"
Mr. Krebabble shouted, "Williams, holy crap, what the hell are you doing over there! You still got one and a half laps to go, quit your yapping and get hustling! I've seen you on your skateboard, you're an able bodied young man, now go go go, push push push!"
Justin's lazy drawl replied, "I'm going as fast as I can, Mr. Krebabble, I got tinnitus in my left knee, I swear!"
Chloe grinned at the skater boy and his fellow stragglers in the distance, then trudged straight to the girl's locker room, not bothering to go sit in the bleachers where quite a few sweaty jocks and jockettes already sat. She had almost upped and left at the start of class when Mr. Krebabble had announced that today was the one-mile run, but the opportunity to slink out unnoticed had never presented itself; he had been staring at her pretty much the whole time, most likely surprised that she had actually bothered to show up on a Friday. In hindsight, she was glad that she had stayed, even if she was pretty sure that she had just suffered a series of mild heart attacks. For today, at least, V stood for victory, not Victoria. Hell fucking yeah.
Once inside the girls locker room, Chloe shucked her clothes and shoes and tossed them into her locker, slid into a pair of flip flops, and wobbled over to the showers. A couple girls were already in there, Dana "The Actually Nice Cheerleader" Ward and Steph "Don't Call Me Newt" Gingrich, having already finished their mile run and getting their lather on. Chloe liked them both, even if Dana was a cheerleader, and so she greeted them as she settled under the shower head next to Steph.
"Hey Steph, hey Dana."
"Hey Chloe," the two girls chimed.
Chloe gave her shower's faucet a spin and ducked her head into the ensuing stream of pleasantly hot water. "Damn, Steph, you run the table top club and you run a seven minute mile. What's next, you gonna run this town as well?"
The shorter girl grinned from where she stood in between Chloe and Dana. "Well, slap me silly and call me Prescott. But nah, I'm skipping this town and gunning straight for world domination. And you also forgot that I run on the track team as well."
"Damn, let me know when you're skipping town so I can roll with you," Chloe said.
"Sure thing," Steph said, the open lesbian very much content to be sandwiched in between two tall pretty girls with legs to die for. She took a look up and down Chloe. "Have you been working out? Your legs are getting buff. In a good way."
Dana took a look as well. "Whoa, Chloe, Steph's right! Those thighs and calves are rocking!"
"Oh my god, you guys." Chloe's eyes rolled as her face went pink. "I've just been doing a lot of walking lately, that's all."
"Oh, that's great!" Dana nodded enthusiastically. "Brisk walking is totally the best exercise. Low impact on the joints, high cardio for the heart, you can't go wrong!"
"Don't worry, my cancer sticks cancel all that good shit out. Hey! Speaking of walking!" Chloe grinned. "You guys know what's better than walking, right?'"
Steph and Dana blinked. "What?
Chloe emphatically pumped her fist. "Firewalking, that's what! They're playing next week at the old wood mill, baby!"
Steph's and Dana's faces registered absolutely nothing at the mention of Firewalk, and Chloe realized that her totally clever wordplay with her favorite band's name was totally lost on the other two girls.
The cheerleader asked, "Who's playing?" Dana's face suddenly brightened. "Oh, you mean the football game next week against the Firebirds!"
Steph's face suddenly brightened as well. "Oh wait, Firewalk? I know who they are! That's Skip's band, isn't it?"
Chloe's shoulders sagged underneath the hot water. "Ah, forget about it."
A few minutes and a mundane conversation later, the three girls headed back to their lockers. Most of the other girls were streaming in just now from outside, some of them already at their lockers. Victoria's locker was on the other side of the room from where Chloe's was, and Victoria was still making sure to keep her back facing toward Chloe at all times. Chloe smirked and swung open her locker to retrieve her clothes and shoes.
Ten seconds later, a loud angry roar reverberated throughout the room, evoking memories of the Rancor underneath Jabba the Hutt's palace within Stephanie's fantasy-muddled head. Every girl inside the locker room turned her head and looked to where the irate Chloe Price stood in disbelief in front of her locker.
"I don't fucking believe this!" Chloe was turning her denim pants inside out in animated frustration. "They're gone again, Steph! They're fucking gone again!"
Steph, who was two lockers down from Chloe, said, "What's wrong, Chloe?"
"My fucking panties! They fucking vanished into thin air!" Chloe tossed her denims onto the bench and plucked out her shoes and shirt (no backpack, because she'd forgotten to bring her backpack to school today) so that her locker was totally empty, save for a few feminine products. "This is the third fucking time in the past six months!"
"Holy crap, again?" Steph walked over to check Chloe's pants and locker to confirm the utter lack of panties. "Well damn, that fucking sucks. I guess we have a real life panty thief among our ranks."
"I guess we do." Chloe made sure that the towel around her body was secure before she spun around to glare at Victoria, who had finally turned around to acknowledge Chloe's existence. "I guess we fucking do."
Victoria's emerald green eyes flashed with an indignant fire, and the short haired blonde crossed her arms over her bra-clad chest. "Why the fuck are you looking at me?"
"I dunno, Victoria, I didn't say shit to you just now. Why are you copping an attitude?"
"Me copping an attitude? You're the one on the fucking warpath, barking up the wrong tree!" She sniffed, "Besides, I wouldn't be caught dead with a pair of Hanes in my hands."
Taylor chimed in, "Back off, Chloe! Victoria walked in with everyone else, she didn't mess with your locker or clothes!"
Chloe really wanted to walk over and slap Victoria and Taylor silly, but the only problem was that the wannabe queen bee actually seemed to be telling the truth for once. Plus, quite a few other girls were nodding their heads in affirmation of Taylor's alibi, girls who didn't really care for Victoria. Just to be sure, Steph placed a soothing hand on the huffing and puffing teenage Rancor.
"Hey Chloe, I got a backup pair you can wear for now. Normally I save them for track meets but you can have them instead."
Chloe's dark scowl softened to just a frown as she turned to her beetle browed savior. "Thanks, Steph, I owe you one."
"You owe me two, actually. You borrowed a pair the last time as well. Two months ago, I think?"
"I do? Holy shit!" Chloe blinked in shock. "You're fucking right, that was the second time too! And now a fucking third time? A fucking serial panty thief in Blackwell, what in the flying fuck! What kind of fucking pervert would fucking steal my panties?"
"An admiring pervert, maybe?" Steph shrugged. "Maybe there's another girl who's got the hots for you, Chloe Price, but she's too shy to tell you."
"Whoever this girl is, she's gotta be real fucking dumb if she thinks she's scoring any points with me pulling off this shit - " Chloe blinked in shock one more time. "Wait, Steph, what did you just say?"
"Oh, nothing. Here, put these on."
Fifteen minutes later, the inconspicuous Samantha Myers hurried out of the girls' locker room, her bowed head lost amid the babbling brook of similarly homebound girls. Samantha rode the schoolgirl wave out the door, then veered off toward the school parking lot. The waifish girl's backpack was stuffed to the brim, her shadow from the overhead sun that of a wicked hunchback crone. Her thin legs were very much that of a healthy teenager, though, anxiously speedwalking across the fresh black asphalt, passing by cars both gleaming and rusty. Her ears burned red as she cast furtive glances over her shoulder, half expecting the silhouette of a bellicose Chloe Price to suddenly appear on the horizon, beating her chest with a deafening roar, and then lumbering furiously after the thief who had made off with her beloved Hanes.
Samantha had nothing to fear, however, for Chloe Price was currently sitting in the absolute back of the school bus, staring at the ceiling with her jaw agape, wondering where the fuck her panties were. And so, as the girl neared the far end of the parking lot, her nerves calmed down and her gait eventually slowed to that of a brisk trot, until she finally came to a stop by a yellow well-traveled hatchback.
Eliot Hampden was waiting, leaning against his car, hands in his pockets, his face eerily bland as always. "Hey. You got them?"
Samantha nodded, barely able to make eye contact. "Yeah. How about you?"
With one smooth motion, Eliot reached into his jacket and retrieved a bulky manila envelope. "Right here."
He cracked open the envelope so Samantha could peek inside and view its contents. She nodded, lowered her backpack to the ground, opened it, and pulled out a crumpled paper bag.
Eliot took the bag from her, opened it, and peered inside. Baby blue cotton peeked out at him, adorned with a white waistband labeled HANES. He took in a deep sniff, just to be sure, and his beloved's wonderful musk filled his nose, rushed down his throat, invigorated his lungs.
He nodded in confirmation and handed the envelope over to Samantha, who immediately crammed it into her backpack. "Thanks."
She nodded as she shouldered her backpack once more. "You too."
The exchange had been made, thus the conversation was over. They went their separate ways, Eliot sliding into his car, Samantha hustling back to her dorm room.
Meanwhile, a shrill scream suddenly filled the boys' locker room of Blackwell.
"What the fuuuuuck!"
A number of boys stared in confusion as a wild eyed Nathan Prescott stood with balled fists at his sides, huffing and puffing in front of his open locker.
"Who the fuck keeps taking my underwear! Who! Who in the flying fuck whooooo!"
To Be Continued
Author's Note: I have no fucking idea where I'm going with this, hah! The other day I was thinking about how creepy Eliot was, and I started wondering what creepy things Eliot might have been doing besides stalking Chloe. Also, I can't help but think that something ain't right about that Samantha girl, so I threw her in there as well.
Comments, criticisms, feedback, and suggestions all welcome!