Chapter 3
Tien
During break, our little group went out to find Erebus. Lilith texted Oliver telling him they were over by the performing arts theater. When we say them, Lilith's hand was over Erebus' left shoulder and her face was contorted in concentration with Aaron sitting next to him.
"You really need to be more careful, E," I heard her say.
Erebus rolled his shoulder a little and said, "I'll be careful when I die." He glanced up and saw us. "Hey guys," he said in a chipper enough voice.
"Hey," we all said.
"So this whole deal with hanging out with me...?"
"Right," Giovanni said. "We only really have to spend time to see how you work and get an understanding of you."
"Why?" Erebus said, eyebrow raised.
There was a pause. "To see the world through another view I guess."
Erebus' eyes narrowed at Giovanni. "There's something you're not telling me."
Giovanni shrugged. "There is, but it's a surprise."
Erebus glanced over to Aaron. Aaron nodded, Erebus shrugged. "So then I guess we should work out some sort of schedule. Is there like a certain amount of hours you need to rack up?"
"Just a couple times a week."
Erebus nodded. "Well, Rosen and Tien have my number, so just text me when you want to hang out and I'll say yay or nay."
I found it funny how Erebus didn't just give Giovanni his number. I figured there was a reason but I didn't question it. "Is tonight ok?" Giovanni asked.
"Tonight is perfect."
"See you then."
"Later."
Lilith glanced between the two of them. "OK," she said. "You two seriously need to stop with the pissing contest. Either pull'em out and measure or start being decent to one another. Isn't that the point here?"
Erebus shrugged and leaned back, closing his eyes. "Like I said, I'll see you tonight. I had a long night, so forgive me if I'm a little anti-social."
I heard Giovanni mutter something about faggots and Erebus' eyes shot open then narrowed in anger. Lilith put her hand gently on his shoulder and shook her head, Erebus put his hands behind his head and closed his eyes again.
Well tonight should be fun.
Erebus opened the door and smiled at me. "What's up?"
"Nothing much," I said.
Erebus moved away from the door. "Well, come on in, dude. The twins are already here, we're just waiting on Giovanni."
I smiled at him. "Cool," I said as I stepped in. "What are you doing?"
Erebus closed the door behind me and walked to the beat of the music playing loudly on the speaker system. "Just hanging out, you know? Want something to drink? Coke? Sprite? Anything?"
He's being so hospitable. "I'll take a coke." He motioned for me to follow him. He took me into the kitchen and reached into the fridge.
"Here you go," he said, handing me the soda. "Have a seat where you like. I'm cooking gumbo."
I sat next to Rosen at the kitchen table. I glanced over and Lilith was flirting it up with Oliver over on the couch. Aaron was in the kitchen with Erebus trying to help cook and talking. I really couldn't make out what they were saying but they seemed relaxed. This is the most I've seen Erebus smile since reading a play out loud in english a few semesters back. He wasn't staring off into space, his facial expressions were real (though I believe I'm the only one who really notices this), and he was acting like a regular guy.
What also kind of surprised me was Rosen and Morty talking about Modern Warfare 3. They seemed pretty engaged so I didn't interrupt them.
"Oh my god, I love this jam!" Lilith said, getting up. She started shaking her hips and moving around.
"Don't start this," Erebus smiled, turning up the music.
"Please, E, you know I can pop it better than you."
"Bitch, swerve." Erebus laughed. He came out of the kitchen and stood in front of Lilith.
"Let's do this!" Lilith got in the middle of the living room, bent her legs and started to twerk (twerk. verb. to dance in a sexual manner, usually involving shaking on the buttocks.) She moved her hips to the left and dipped them to the right. She shook her ass one cheek at a time. Then she put a hand on the ground and bounced her booty, making little circles. In a provocative manner, she stood all the way up and dropped it like it was hot. She slammed her hands against her chest in a challenge to Erebus.
Erebus lifted his chin defiantly and stepped up. He turned around and twerked it just as well as Lilith. And when I say he twerked, he twerked. He brought it around, bounced it down, and swiveled his hips like one of those hoochie mamas in the videos. When he was done he dropped it like it was hot and stood up.
Morty whooped and started to wolf whistle and Erebus shook his head and smiled.
"You always say 'I'm gay, not a girl' and yet you can do that, *better than a girl*," Morty laughed over the music.
Erebus flipped the bird to Morty. "You know you found my ass sexy," he said, also raising his voice over the music.
"When you move it like a girl, I almost can't help it!"
"Whatever, asshole," Erebus said, still smiling. These two have the weirdest relationship.
Suddenly there was a knock at the door. Erebus looked and rolled his eyes. Morty disappeared. Erebus cut the music off with his phone and flicked his wrist at the door. It flew open and Giovanni walked in. Erebus flicked his wrist once more, not even facing the door, and closed it. The silence Giovanni had created was deafening.
"Alright," our host said out loud. "So, Aaron, you start work on your homework, let me know if you need anything." Aaron nodded, grabbing his backpack and another soda before seating himself at the kitchen's bar. "Lilith, continue flirting with Oliver, but move it to the kitchen table, Tien and Rosen, the Playstation is set up, have fun. Morty stop trying to scare the locals."
From behind me, I hear a sudden, "Aww you're no fun," which of course made me jump about ten feet in the air. I should have seen that coming.
"Morty we'll work on what we need to do and dinner's almost ready," Erebus continued. "If you need anything let me know, otherwise... relax!" He clapped his hands and we moved. I jumped on the couch next to Rosen and we started up Modern Warfare 3. Morty and Erebus sat on the couch opposite us and started setting up what looked like a command center. There were two pretty decent sized stacks of paperwork on the desk, two laptops, and two tablets. These two were legitly doing paperwork.
"What's that for?" I asked. Erebus looked at me, raised an eyebrow, and cocked an ear at me. "What's that for?" I asked louder this time.
"Morty and I do the books for our donut shop and the other parts of our chain," Erebus said, looking a his stack with great sadness.
"We're mostly handling transfers right now, making sure what needs to be done is done, ignoring the complaints, seeing what needs to be fixed, seeing what needs to be delivered where..." Morty listed, his face getting lower and lower as he spoke.
"Thank *god* I did most of this in pen already," Erebus said. "We mostly have to type this shit in now..."
"Still a lot of work."
Erebus shrugged and picked up part of his stack of paper. He set the tablet up on his arm chair. As he began flipping through the pages, he quickly tapped on his tablet. Morty started doing the same. I was watching them out of the corner of my eye while I played Co Op with Rosen for about an hour. We got bored of the pretty quickly and Erebus told us the Black Ops 2 was on his video game stand. While that loaded, I continued to watch them.
"Are you even old enough to be doing the books?" I suddenly asked.
"Nope," Erebus said, popping the 'p'. "but fuck it."
"Butt fuck it?" Morty asked. "Of course you would go with that response!"
Erebus swung his fist and got Morty right in the arm. Morty just laughed his ass off and they continued to work. I would still glance at them every once in awhile between waves of zombies. They worked fast. Both their stacks of paper were almost done and it had only been an hour and a half since the last time I checked. Other than confirming codes with each other and switching papers, they were pretty organized and getting through that quickly.
Rosen and I put the controllers down, feeling bored with just killing zombies when Erebus slapped all his papers off his lap and onto the floor. Morty whooped and did the same. "Last thing, vacation time and scheduling!"
"My favorite part," Morty said, both of them pulling laptops into their laps. The furiously typed and stopped and then typed and stopped. It was actually a pretty interesting topic thing to watch. They would mutter to each other and kept talking about calendars and who was where.
"He's currently in china and not coming back until the fifteenth. We should give him a break when he comes back. At least a short one." I figured they were working off of some cloud system because when Erebus said that, Morty squinted at his laptop.
"Well we can move this guy here..."
"Then what about that day..."
"We can have this girl..."
"But she knows this better-"
"But she can do it faster."
"...ok we can put her and her here, him here... ok that works."
"What about this day?"
Erebus looked at his laptop.
"Wait... that doesn't work..."
"Why?"
"Because I took that day off weeks in advanced... months in fact."
"What? How long?"
"The day after... hold on, Aaron?"
"Yea?" said over by the kitchen counter.
"Go to the store and go get some more root beer, I'm out."
"You're just trying to get rid of me aren't you?"
"Yup," Erebus said, tossing him his car keys.
"How come he can drive your urus?" Lilith complained.
"Shh," Erebus said, dismissively waving a hand at her. "Go and come back," he said to Aaron.
Aaron shrugged and left.
As soon as he was gone, Erebus started talking a mile a minute. "I took this day off on my birthday!" He hissed.
"Right..." Morty said, typing on his laptop.
"i missed my birthday, being in Thailand, not even the GOOD part of Thailand, away from my friends, not even able to celebrate an entire WEEK after the fact. That freaking SUCKED! But I am not missing Aaron's birthday!"
"Relax," Morty said, still typing. "We can fix it, we'll move people around, we'll have you work doubles sometimes."
"But it'll still show me up as available online!" Erebus sighed and ran his hand through his hair,
Morty bit his lip. "We can figure this out. I'll do anything you might have to do."
"No, you need to be there just as much as I do! Fuck I swear if anyone ask me for a favor, I'm saying no!"
"You can't just say no," Lilith said, interrupting. "You have a duty."
"I'm saying no," Erebus said, running his hand through his hair in an agitated manner. "I took this day off almost half a year ago! I am NOT missing Aaron's birthday!"
"You won't have to," Morty said triumphantly. "I got it changed so you're not on as 'available'. That should deter anyone from asking for your help."
"Is it 'unavailable'?" Erebus said, voice sounding on edge.
"No..." Morty said, looking at Erebus like he was expecting him to flip out again.
Erebus just sighed, and rubbed his temple. "Thanks, bro... It's a start I guess."
Morty smiled and went back to his work. Erebus was really dedicated to making it to Aaron's birthday. He took off time because he knew what spending a birthday alone was like. Erebus really has taken a brotherly roll with Aaron. It was almost a fatherly role. How many people would actually spend the time and resources like this just to watch over someone who wasn't their blood and not even their adoptive sibling or whatever. As far as I knew, Erebus was just Aaron's close friend but...
Suddenly Aaron came back in the apartment, holding a 24 pack of Mug rootbeer. "What'd I miss?"
Erebus smiled warmly. "Nothing!" he jumped onto the couch next to me and pulled a new controller on the playstation. "Time to school you in Black Ops!"
We played zombie mode for a couple hours, constantly switching controllers. Even Giovanni got into it. But every time we got him on in the circulation, he would often leave Erebus, Morty, or Aaron to die at the hands of zombies. In contrast, however, the three of them did their best to keep reviving him.
The night was almost over and Erebus announced that it was dinner time. Giovanni excused himself and waited at the door like he was expecting us to follow. The food smelled so good, my stomach growled loud enough for everyone to hear and Erebus took me by the arm. "Eat something, you little fucker."
Lilith and the twins were already filling up their bowls of gumbo so I figured I might as well stay. I never had gumbo before. So that left Giovanni to leave Erebus' home alone. "You can always stay," Erebus said. "There's plenty and you're welcome to some."
Giovanni just pressed his lips together as if just talking about the food would poison him and he'd get raped because that's how evil and gay Erebus was. Giovanni left the apartment without another word.
I'd like to say that we sat around and talked and had a good time but Erebus' cooking was so good, the only sounds that could be heard were our slurps of enjoyment and the soft sounds of Luther Vandross that Erebus had playing over the speakers.
Between moans of pleasure, we commented on Erebus' cooking. It was so good.
"I've never had anything like this," Oliver moaned. "It's so good."
Erebus laughed. "That just makes me think my chow mein wasn't that good!"
"Oh no," Oliver quickly said. "I meant-"
Erebus held his hand up. "I know what you meant."
"I can't wait to eat here tomorrow," Rosen said between bites.
"Why do I feel like tomorrow is important?" Erebus mused.
Morty and Aaron shrugged but they looked bothered by the thought. That they had something to do tomorrow.
"Regardless," Erebus said, gathering up his dishes. "It's time for y'all to get the fuck out of my apartment!"
"Aw, but I'm so full!" Oliver complained. "And I'm so tired and it's already ten!"
"It is?" Rosen said. "Shit I got to get home, I got an essay due! Let's go, fatass!" Rosen grabbed his twin by the arm and dragged him out the door.
"I didn't get to say goodbye-" was all we heard of the twins.
"I have to go to, my parents are probably freaking out," I said. "More about their car then me being out over a friend's house late."
"Alright, I'll see tomorrow!" Erebus said, walking me to the door.
"Not if I see you first," I said, walking out of the door.
"You know I'll see you before you see me!" Erebus said with a wink before he closed the door. "Always," he said, suddenly next to me.
I jumped about ten feet in the air again.
"It's so funny making you do that," Erebus smirked, going back in his apartment. I just smiled and shook my head, not even bothering to wonder how he did that. I went home and got a shit storm from my parents about being out late but when I told them I was hanging out with Erebus and explained to them about what we've been assigned, they calmed down.
"So he's a gay, black, and an umbreon?" my dad asked. I nodded. "He must get a lot of shit, unfortunately." I nodded again. "I don't know why, he's such a nice person." My dad met Erebus briefly and only twice when Erebus dropped off my cake over the summer and my brother's a couple months later.
"Those cakes he made for you and Ian were the best I've had," my mom said with a warm smile. Speaking of Ian... I walked through the halls of my home and found Ian in his room. He was on his iPhone, headphones in on full blast, sitting on his bed. The little guy looked depressed. He set down his iPhone and rubbed his face like he was fighting back tears. I walked all the way in and cleared his throat. Ian jumped and I finally saw why Erebus and Morty found it so funny sneaking up on me.
"Hey, bro," I said, sitting on the edge of the bed.
"Hey..."
"What you up to?"
"Texting Josh."
Josh was Ian's best friend. They had known each other for as long as I could remember. They even showered and bathed together until they were old enough to be embarrassed by it. Josh lived in the house just behind ours and it was pretty common for them both to be sleeping over each other's house. Josh was pretty much my other little brother. It was hard for us to keep our secret around him but they were close and always laughing and giggling and just being as close as two people can be without getting married. So that brought up a big question: why was Ian upset by texting him?
"What's going on with Josh?"
Ian shook his head. "I wanted to go hang out and see a movie tomorrow or something but he said he couldn't. He really likes this one girl and is trying to get at her but... we haven't been able to..."
"You guys haven't been able to hang out lately?"
Ian nodded.
"Hey, dude, don't worry about it," I said in a confident voice. "It happens, Josh is thinking with his wrong head. You guys'll be hanging out again in no time."
That didn't seem to cheer Ian up at all. But he thanked me nevertheless and pretty much kicked me out of his room. I didn't mind because I was beat anyway.
The next afternoon, we came over Erebus' early since he and Aaron didn't have volleyball. Giovanni, the twins, Abby, and I were sitting around at the kitchen table. Erebus and Lilith were in the kitchen cooking up an early dinner for all of us. Morty was sitting on the couch, flipping through the channels with a new girl, Irene. She was an asian girl with long black hair. Her frame was slender but curvy with tight muscles. From the way she acted, it seemed like Morty and Irene were dating and I had to admit, I was jealous.
"Hey, it's four o'clock," Morty said, grinning from ear to ear. "That means Ellen is on!" Morty switched to NBC and sure enough, Ellen was on the screen going through her opening monologue.
Erebus flipped Morty off and Morty changed the channel. "Did I say change the channel?" Erebus hollored.
"Oh, you make making fun of you too easy sometimes..." Morty switched the channel back and sighed.
"...and now it's time to dance!" Ellen said through the TV. When the music started playing, they all looked up and the TV and smiled as an old hip hop song filled the apartment. Erebus and his friends gathered around in the living area and started dancing. Their dance moves looked straight out of the 90s but they were all doing it, even Aaron got into it. He was clumsy but he was on beat and still able to keep up. Morty and Irene held hands and rocked together. Lilith and Aaron stood full arms length away, holding both hands and rocking back and forth. Aaron had a huge blush across his face but they were all having fun. The best part was when Morty grabbed Erebus and got into a ballroom style hold. The leaned back and forth on beat and just laughed. Those two really do have a weird relationship but I wasn't going to question it. The song ended and they all "aww"-ed in unison and resumed doing what they were doing.
Giovanni had been on his top-of-the-line iPhone 5. He suddenly shouted out, "Guys! We're taking our test for the practice stylers!"
"You guys are just getting your beginner stylers?" Irene asked.
"They go to a different gym," I heard Morty whisper at the same time Giovanni said, "Yea out test is next week!.. Wait what do you mean by 'just now getting?'"
Irene shrugged. "We all have ours." Irene reached into her back pocket and pulled out a green practice styler. Morty reached into his coat pocket and showed his off too. All around us, Erebus' friends pulled out their green stylers, even Aaron!
"How'd you guys get them?" Giovanni asked.
"We go to a different gym," Lilith explained. "We've had ours for a while now, almost a year. We haven't taken the test for the real ones because... we just... I don't know, didn't care enough."
"And we all wanted to take the test together, including Irene," Morty trailed off. "But yea-"
"SHIT!" Erebus suddenly exclaimed. "That's what we had to do today!"
"SHIT!" they all exclaimed.
Erebus started to cook faster. The sounds of boiling water and fried food got louder, much louder. "The test is at six thirty, if we leave around five we'll have plenty of time," Erebus muttered mostly to himself.
"I can't believe we forgot about our test," Morty groaned. "That's like the fourth time."
"Fifth," Irene corrected. "But it really doesn't matter."
"Doesn't matter?" Giovanni explained. "Having a styler is more important than owning a gun!"
Irene just looked at him and shrugged. Morty laughed at the expression Giovanni had on his face as a result.
"Dinner's ready!" Erebus called. "Help yourself!" He sat next to me with a plate of pork chops, mashed potatoes, and peas. I got my own plate and my mouth was salivating. Everyone had decided to sit around the table. To my left sat Erebus, followed by Aaron, Irene, Morty, Rosen, Lilith, Oliver, Giovanni, and then Abby who sat on my right.
"What kind of test do you think it'll be?" Morty asked.
"Probably just some combat drills," Lilith guessed, taking a sip of her soda.
"It'll probably be a Charlie Foxtrot since the five of us are taking the test at the same time," Irene added.
"Wait, your gym does a lot of battling?" Giovanni asked.
"Yeah," Morty said quickly. He said it like he was trying to push Giovanni out of the conversation.
"What's a Charlie Foxtrot?" Aaron asked.
"A clusterfuck," Irene said.
"A shit ton of shit happening," Morty added.
"A whirlwind of fuckery," Erebus concurred. "In other words... 'oh hot damn!'"
"It shouldn't be too hard..." Lilith said. "If it's fair." There was a pause and then they all busted into laughter.
"Oh, that's rich!" Erebus said, wiping a tear from his eye. Conversations began around the table. Giovanni was busy talking to Abby about some raging party coming up. Lilith and Rosen were busy flirting it up while Morty and Rosen were leaned close together talking. Irene, Aaron, and Erebus talked about different trips they were planning on taking. The conversations were pretty segregated, it felt like no one could just jump across the table into another conversation without throwing it off of the path. I just sat there for a while slowing Erebus' godly cooking.
"You're in Mr. Todd's third period, right Tien?" Erebus asked me.
I nodded.
"When's the essay due?"
"Next week thursday."
Erebus cocked an ear at me. "What?"
"I said next Thursday."
He nodded. "You finish it yet?"
"Nope, I hate the prompt."
Erebus smiled at me. "I love the prompt. Goodness can be found in everyone no matter what."
I gave him a smile back. We had an unspoken moment of understanding. Erebus glanced around the table then back up at the clock.
"Time to go, guys," he said. "Let's go get changed then we can leave." He looked at me and ran his eyes over Giovanni's friends. "You guys are welcome to join us." We all took our plates into the kitchen and scraped them off and put the dishes in the sink.
Erebus, Morty, and Aaron went into Erebus' room while the girls went into one of the other rooms.
The boys came out first, wearing entirely new clothes. Erebus came out wearing a black under armour shirt and holding a black sweatshirt. He work a thick pair of black and gray camouflage pants that looked like and emo version of the cammies he wore for MCJROTC. The pants were even bloused the same way with the black combat boots. Behind him, Morty and Aaron came out wearing his sweatshirt but pretty much identical. The ladies came out to the guest room wearing the exact same thing except Lilith's boots had three inch heels. Their hair was pulled back into a tight, flawless buns as well.
"Let's go," Erebus said. He glanced at me. "You guys coming?"
"Yeah," I said. Oliver and Rosen twined their yes as well. Everyone glanced at Giovanni and Abby. He nodded and that settled it. We were going to see this new mystical gym that let young Pokémon battle each other freely.
Lilith decided to drive her audi with the twins, Morty and Abby in her car. Aaron drove Morty's Audi r8 with me, Giovanni, and Erebus in the backseat while Irene took shotgun. Morty's audi was his pride and joy and he told Aaron if there was one scratch, he was dead meat. I had no idea where we were going but it was kind of exciting. These guys were wearing real military type clothing for a real challenge. We had been on the road nearly half an hour when I heard Erebus snoring.
"Is he really sleeping right now?" Giovanni asked.
"Yes, I am," he grumbled. "Keep it down, I'm trying to relax while I wait." Irene cranked up the tunes and we listened to songs like Gangnam Style, Pound the Alarm, Shots, and Outta Your Mind and so on as we rode. How Erebus slept through that but woke up the second Giovanni started to talk.
