Cheer-Stained: One Week In Westbridge
by The Jessica X

Libby, Sabrina, et al. are © Archie Comics / Hartbreak / Paramount / Whatever.
Adymm, the members of In Absinthia, and this work of fiction are © myself.

I present to you Chapter 14, Scott Korman. I mean, you're the only one reading, anyway, so why not dedicate this chapter directly to you? :P But cheers for sticking with my woebegone tale; it will all pay off eventually.

Chapter 14: The Best-Laid Plans Of Nice Absinthians...

"So, what now?"

Sabrina shrugged, putting her feet up on the coffee table and staring at the ceiling. "You tell me, Rox. It's the night after Christmas, and all through the house... nothin'."

"Hmm," Roxie mumbled as she paged through the newspaper. "How about we hit up the theater? That new Tom Hanks movie just came out."

"The one where he's trapped on an island with a beach ball for company?" I asked with a sour expression. "Thanks, but no; it's eerily similar to my Senior year."

We'll pause here for a second to satisfy any curiosity you might have about the rest of Christmas Day, but there's not much to tell; we all felt incredibly stuffed, Aunt Hilda made us watch "Ernest Saves Christmas" (her all-time favourite Yule flick) while we digested, and after all the excitement and my lack of sleep the night before, we pretty much passed out the moment our heads touched the pillows.

Of course, that's not to say I was totally comfortable the whole time; once during dinner, both Sabrina and I reached for the butter dish and brushed hands, and I almost lost my cool for a second. Messed up, isn't it? Also, the going-to-bed-together thing felt a lot stranger this time, but I bit the bullet and made with the wax-lip smile. Actually, by then I was even starting to really feel fine - the old "fake it 'til you make it" trick, right? So enough about that crap for now.

Back in the present, Sabrina was flipping through the rest of the day's mail, tossing stuff into general piles on either side of her feet. "Well, there has to be something we can do with ourselves short of buying those big padded sumo-wrestler suits."

"Those sound like fun!" Roxie piped up.

"Ew?" I breathed.

"Don't worry, mi amigas," Sabrina continued, "some exciting development will present itself in due time; we just have to- hmmm."

"Hmm?" we both said, flocking to the couch.

"This flyer got slipped into our mailbox," she continued as she held it up for us to see. "There's gonna be a rave tonight!"

"'A Club Christmas'," I read aloud. "At least they're inventive?"

"Dude, seriously?" Roxie breathed, grabbing it from her. "Wow, this solves all our problems!"

"Except one," Sabrina sighed, slumping down into the couch. "This flyer was obviously meant for Morgan; if any of the rest of us call the number, we might not sound cool enough to get invited."

"That's not necessarily true," Roxie said excitedly. "I mean, you're a total geekwad, but I can pull off cool long enough for a couple phone conversations, right?"

"Maybe, but- hey, wait a minute!" Ooh, that look of indignation was priceless.

"Hate to break it to you," I interrupted with a shrug, "but if neither of you have been to a rave before, there's a pretty low likelihood that you'll get invited to this one."

They both folded their arms. "Who says we've never been to a rave?" Sabrina asked coldly. All I had to do was wait maybe five or ten seconds before she cracked. "Okay, fine, so what? It's not like we've never been to a party before, though."

"But raves are exclusive," I went on, folding my legs under me as I sank into the recliner. "With a party, any idiot can hear the music and just waltz on in, tap the keg. The two main objectives of a rave are to get some use out of your strobe lights and to filter out the undesirable elements of geeks and losers."

"Like us," Roxie muttered.

"What?" Suddenly I found my mouth had a foot in it. "Oh, no, I didn't mean you guys!"

"Yeah you did," Sabrina sighed, tossing the flyer on the floor. "Who am I kidding? I'll never be cool enough for something like that."

"Wait, c'mon, you two!" I picked it up, bracing smile affixed to my lips. "It's not like you're missing anything, anyway, right? These things are usually just a bunch of drugs and sex, and we can get that watching ER."

Roxie's eyes darted up to look at me. "Hold on - you've been to one?"

I had to snort derisively. "Been to one? Sweetie, my band played a rave once. Of course, that specific rave was less traditional, what with the lack of techno music, but- hmm, I guess it was more of a vampire thing, actually..."

And then, the sparkle appeared - that gleam of creativity and cunning that showed itself in Sabrina's eyes just before she went off to do something half-cocked. "So you've been to a couple of these by now, huh?"

"Well... yeah, I mean, there's plenty of abandoned warehouses and stuff in the city. The New Yorkians practically invented raves."

"Then you'd probably have enough street cred to get us in, right?"

I hesitated. "What? Well, I don't know, it's-"

"You can't act like you're not hip enough all of a sudden!"

"Okay, first of all, hip people don't actually use the word 'hip', and secondly-"

"Nevermind that," Roxie called over the rest of my sentence. "You could get us in, right? You've got connections!"

"Not down here," I explained patiently. "If it were a rave in like, the Village, we'd be so in, but..."

"Then we're screwed," Sabrina moaned.

But at that moment, the door slammed open and our prayers were answered... in the form of the world's second-most annoying redhead behind Lucille Ball.

"Remind me never to go back there again!" Morgan growled as she dragged her suitcases inside - though "growled" isn't too accurate, considering her voice is unpleasantly squeaky. "My parents are sooo unfortunate, and Chad found this cat in the village, and... what?"

I guess we were all staring at her like vultures; Sabrina, of course, was the first to recover. "Morgan! Hey, how ya doin'? How was the trip?"

With a sigh and a roll of her eyes, she dropped her bags and put her hands on her hips. "Okay, fine... what do you want?"

- i o i o i o i o i o i o i o i -

My retinas threatened to give out from the persistent flash of multi-coloured strobes all around the room. Subwoofers the size of Volkswagens thumped with the sounds of Daft Punk and Depeche Mode remixes. Writhing bodies filled every square inch of the room, leather came in neon colours, plastic cups got thrown at the DJ... it was a killer rave, and at least two hundered other people were there to enjoy it.

"There", as it turned out, was the gym at Westbridge High; since the school was empty for the holidays (save one principal during the daylight hours), it was an optimal spot to host such a soirée... if you wanted to get caught. As soon as we paid the ten-dollar cover and walked in I knew these guys were out of their minds to do this here, and if Roxie and Sabrina weren't so dead set on experiencing it, I would've been more than happy to drag their butts right back out. As it was, I promised myself I'd at least try to listen out for the police - but I wanted to make my opinion known.

"These guys are out of their minds to do this here," I said.

"What?" Sabrina yelled.

"Nevermind!" After dancing in place to the "beats" for a few seconds, I asked loudly, "Are any of you guys as parched as I?"

"Yeah, it is!" Roxie yelled.

Shaking my head, I wound my way through a crowd of glowstickers to see if there were any non-alcoholic refreshments to be had, when I ran into an old friend... or something like one.

"Gordie?"

His fuzzy carrot top turned to see if he had actually heard his name, and when he spotted me he did a double-take. "Libby? Libby Chessler, is that you?"

"In the flesh," I said pleasantly. "Wow, Gordie, how've you been?"

He grinned sheepishly. "Not bad, not bad. How about you, though? I heard you were in some reform school in Bavaria!"

"The reports of my deportation have been highly exaggerated; only went as far as Vermont." I cocked my head to the side and looked him up and down; he was still as geeky and gangly as ever, but he was dressed pretty sharp. "You look well; college must be good to you, huh?"

"Oh, yeah, yeah it is. But what about you? This sure isn't the Libby I remember tormenting me!"

"Huh?" Following his eyes, I saw he was referring to my outfit; fishnets and such. "Oh... well, this is a rave, right?"

A nervous chuckle. "Yeah, I guess. Say, it was nice running into you again!"

"You too!"

As he moved away from the table I saw a group of kids signaling to him; he waved back and dove headfirst into the crowd.

"Things sure have changed," I muttered as I turned to the rotund guy in a bucket hat behind the table. "Excuse me, but do you have anything with a few less... hops? Liquor's not so much my deal."

"Ahh," he said with knowing grin, tossing me a water bottle. "Gotcha covered, Gina."

"Thanks!"

"Wow, you're an animal," he laughed as I chugged it; unfortunately, I had already downed half the bottle before I realised something.

"Wait a sec... where'd the label go?"

One of his eyebrows receded under the brim of his hat. "Well, Jesus, we had to rip the labels off so we wouldn't mix 'em up with the regular water. Don't you know anything?"

Shit.

- i o i o i o i o i o i o i o i -
END Chapter Fourteen