A/N: Oi, I'm fighting the urge to double and triple update daily; don't ask, it's not happening. I just want you all to know that I'm as impatient to update as you are for the updates, because I want people to read it all and I'm anxious some won't. I need to stop worrying.
Reviewers, thank you for taking the time to write, I know you're all busy. You guys are awesome!
I apologize in advance for my OCs. Sorry, read.
XXXVI.
Ryan always got the best pot. It was his older sister's connection, her boyfriend, and he always got it for dirt cheap. It was this deep green color, still looked a bit moist, and its smell was rank. He sat on the ground layering the tiny leaf bits into a sheet of cigarette paper, absently pushing the pale blond strands out of his face as he worked.
Somewhere near the backside of the front bleachers, rotund Gary on watch called out, "We got incoming." He crawled back towards the small group of four boys variously sitting and standing and announced gleefully, "Looks like Jamie Hassler and Laurel Chin."
"Nice," Kevin smirked, readjusting his silver-rimmed glasses over his long nose and putting a cigarette to his lips. He paced a few times back and forth, deep in consideration, then he plucked the cigarette up between two fingers and stated thoughtfully, "I'm thinking pink. A nice soft pink on Jamie. And something…black on Laurel."
"No way, dude," Lenny said from his place on the ground beside Ryan, "Something lacey…and red on Jamie, floral on Laurel."
The boys all snickered at the rhyme.
"Laurel is yellow polka dots, Jamie is definitely black," Gary decided.
"Nothing on both," Ryan piped up, still concentrated on packing the joint.
"You always say nothing," Kevin noted, sounding almost put out about it.
"And one of these days, I'm going to be right," Ryan reasoned, nonchalant, "And what a beautiful day that'll be, right boys?" He expertly lifted the paper filled to its brim with green leaves and carefully ran his tongue along its outer edge to dampen it just slightly, asking," What about you, James?"
James looked up from where he sat on the ground absently twirling a cigarette in his fingers, knees pulled up and arms propped across them.
"I'm gonna say flowers on Laurel too," he replied quietly, pondered a moment then said, "And for Jamie…I'll go with white."
The bleachers creaked overhead as the two girls ascended, unaware of the danger that lurked below. Ryan sealed the joint and passed it to eager Lenny beside him along with an orange zippo lighter. Gary grinned.
"My turn to verify," he declared, positively drooling around his meaty jowls.
"According to you it's always your turn," Kevin muttered, lighting his cigarette, "I'm coming with you this time. Anyone else want to join?"
The three other boys gave some negative response or another and Kevin shrugged nonplussed.
"Well, suit yourselves, fags," he teased, donning a decent vocal imitation of Curly Howard, and then he and Gary hastily maneuvered through the bleachers towards where the girls were standing, as the other three boys rolled their eyes and shook their heads unimpressed at his comment.
Lenny lit the joint and took a long drawl, then passed it back to Ryan who took a hit of his own, and finally handed it off to James, who relit the joint, took a hit, two, passed the joint back and used the lighter to ignite his cigarette, then handed that over as well.
"Oh my God, who the hell is down there?" one of the girls squealed, from the sounds of it Laurel.
"You little pervs," the other girl screeched, and there was a rumble overhead as the girls took off running.
Gary and Kevin returned in a rush, laughing uproariously and gasping for breath.
"Results, boys?" Ryan pressed, lighting up the joint for another toke and eying them over the flame.
"Laurel had little stars," Gary exclaimed between heaving breaths, "No points for her. And Jamie was…drumroll please…cotton white." He pointed at James, who lifted his free hand up to accept a congratulatory slap from Kevin's palm as the other boy walked past.
"Jesus Christ, man, what does that put you at? Like five this week?" Lenny teased, "You're like the panty whisperer."
"Fuck you," James muttered, scowling, and taking a drag of his cigarette, leaving it to rest on his lip as he fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a crisply folded piece of paper, his name written across its front in delicate, curly-cue lettering. He inspected it, turning it over a few times, and pulled the cigarette from his mouth.
"Panty whisperer," Gary repeated, his eyes glazed over, a strange smile on his face, "How awesome would that be if you could really whisper to panties…could you guys just imagine?"
"What the hell, dude? Would you sniff 'em, too?" Lenny jeered and Kevin burst into giggles at the thought.
"What is that?" Ryan asked interestedly eyeing the paper in James's hand.
"I don't know. It was in my locker this morning," James shrugged, answering around a billow of smoke rising from his mouth.
Kevin snuck round then and suddenly snatched the paper from James's hands and James jumped to his feet immediately, nearly dropping his cigarette in the action, and lunged towards Kevin in attempt to get the paper back. A game of keep away ensued.
"Oh shit, James got a love letter," Kevin teased, the other boys peeking interestedly and chuckling at the exchange.
"Give it back, man, I haven't even looked at it yet," James growled, Kevin held him back with a hand on his chest, his other hand stretching the paper far away while working at unfurling it. Ryan moved to help hold James and Kevin waggled the paper to fully spread it open, his eyes scanning the neatly written cursive letters inside.
"Holy shit, listen to this you guys…" Kevin snickered, reading in a dramatic, high-pitched tone, "Dear James…you have the most beautiful blue eyes."
Gary took the joint from Lenny and lit it, grinning as his eyes darted back and forth amongst the three boys standing overhead, fighting over a piece of paper.
"Kevin, seriously, that's not funny," James snapped, fighting against Ryan to get to the other boy.
"James, seriously, that's what it says," Kevin replied, "Oh, and it gets better…'when you smile it melts my heart'…oh, shit, someone's got an admirer."
The other boys made cooing noises and a hot blush crept into the edges of James's face.
"Cut it out, man," James seethed, "Just give it back."
But Kevin kept reading, "I think you're the sweetest boy in all of school. Do you want to be my boyfriend, circle yes or no."
"Circle yes or no? Who the fuck uses that?" Lenny complained, snatching the joint back from Gary.
"It's signed," Kevin interrupted authoritatively, "X-O-X-O…"
"…Peter Wagner," Ryan put in teasingly.
"Oh, go fuck yourself," James scoffed, smacking the other boy hard on the shoulder, as their friends all snickered at the thought of the scrawny, effeminate boy they shared biology class with. Kevin's face fell when he scanned the last line and he darted a look to Lenny on the ground.
"It's signed Amber Szinsky," Kevin said, straight-faced. All the boys fell silent and James stopped fighting for the note. Lenny's eyes darted up, brows perked, mouth hung open slightly.
"No way," he challenged, jumping to his feet and snatching the paper out of Kevin's hands, skimming it quickly.
James took a small step back, studying the tall, slender, dark featured boy closely for his reaction; Lenny had been obsessed with Amber since the fourth grade.
Lenny turned his head suddenly to gape at James. "Dude, you have to circle yes."
"What?" James replied, stunned, brow furrowing together.
"You have to," Lenny persisted, "It's Amber Szinsky, she's the captain of the cheer squad and I heard she went to third base with Paul Townie. I got some of the details from Rudy Goldman, she blew Paul's mind, dude. I'm not even joking. James, you got to climb that mountain and tell me what it's like on top."
James shrugged nonchalant again. He moved forward to take the note from the other boy, as he took another drawl from his cigarette, letting the smoke out in small rings.
"I don't know, man, I have to think about it," James answered, sitting on the ground again beside Gary and taking the joint from him for a quick toke.
"What are you retarded?" Lenny demanded, "What the hell is there to think about? You take a pen, you circle yes, you drop the note in her locker. Say hello to third base. It's that easy."
"Man, Amber Szinsky is fucking stacked," Kevin noted, taking the joint from James and relighting it again, pulling the smoke hard into his lungs, "Her tits are almost as perky as her."
"And she wears lace panties," Gary added, "Lace…in every glorious color of the rainbow."
"You're a sick man, Gary," Ryan remarked.
"So what's it gonna be, James?" Lenny demanded arms folded over his chest, glaring down his nose at James on the ground. All of the other boys had their eyes intent on James, the pressure swirled around him and pressed him to the ground.
After a few seconds ticked by, James rolled his eyes and smirked.
"Fine. Give me a pen," he muttered, and the other boys made excited noises of approval.
Kevin handed James the requested item and James messily circled the 'yes', refolding the paper and shoving it in his pocket as Ryan took a hit off the joint and Lenny waited impatiently for it. Gary went to check for more unsuspecting girls to look up the skirts of, but wasn't gone long, returning pale and shaken.
"Keegan…" he choked out, gasping for air.
The boys all exchanged panicked looks then scrambled to put out their cigarettes, and clear the air. Ryan shoved his stash in his backpack along with the stubbed out joint, then retrieved a can of aerosol spray and spritzed it thickly over the boys just as old Miss Keegan's footsteps stopped on the edge of the bleachers.
"Who's back there? Come out, right now. Do not make me come in there."
All five boys shuffled out, heads hung low, and lined up outside the bleachers.
"Mister Blakely, Mister Heinz, Mister Gunther, Mister Boland, and Mister Durnt," she ticked them each off as they appeared out of the bleachers, then demanded of them all, "Shouldn't you boys be in class?"
They remained silent, studying the ground and attempting to appear otherwise innocent of any misdeeds beyond ditching their fifth period. Miss Keegan looked them over with her hands on her hips; her chapped, red stained lips pressed thinly together, her wrinkled eyes cascaded into themselves, forming a deeply creviced scowl.
"Why am I not surprised?" she sighed, then barked, "Mister Heinz, that hat is out of dress code. And Mister Boland, you are not in full uniform. Where is your tie?"
Kevin tugged his beanie off, mussing his black curls underneath and James pulled the aforementioned garment out of his pocket and begrudgingly slipped it around his neck, fumbling to wind it into the traditional Windsor knot.
"Tell me, what do you boys hope to do with your lives? What kind of future do you see for yourselves?"
The five shifted uncomfortably, a few looked amongst themselves, but no one said a word. Miss Keegan always let them off with a warning so long as they all just remained quiet and each appeared adequately ashamed of themselves. Miss Keegan tapped her foot and folded her arms over her chest.
"Or were you all just hoping to leech off your parents for the rest of your lives?" Miss Keegan sighed, shook her head and dropped her eyes from them, "There will come a time when each of you five boys will be expected to prove your worth in this world and, I am sorry to say, that at this rate I do not expect any of you to amount to much of anything. I want you all to think on that, and to think hard about where exactly you want to be in the next five…ten years and whether or not the choices you're making now are really, truly, going to get you there. Now go to class, boys."
The boys turned to shuffle away, careful to keep their heads low and their faces grim and serious.
"One of these days, you'll miss something important skipping lessons, something you may need later in life…" Miss Keegan kept calling at their backs and then suddenly she shouted, "All of you stop right there."
They all abruptly halted, slowly turning to look curiously back at the old woman, and their stomachs dropped to the floor. She was staring at the bleachers; a small stream of smoke flitting up from below. The boys exchanged quizzical glares, 'who the hell forgot to put out their cigarette?'
"You all stay right there," Miss Keegan commanded. She disappeared beneath the bleachers then returned with the 'smoking gun' held daintily between her index finger and thumb, keeping it far from her body. She glared at them all, an expression that exemplified all her spoken of disappointments in each of them, "Headmaster's office, right now." She narrowed her eyes on Ryan, now fidgeting noticeably with his backpack, and informed them all, "And yes, we will be doing searches of all your persons."
An hour and a half later, James hurried after his father, hands in his pockets and head hung low as his father stormed from the school building, and across the parking lot, ranting the entire way.
"You are unbelievable. I don't understand your desperate need to be this worthless scumbag, I really don't, but of course you choose the week your mother is at nana's to pull a stunt like this," James's father snarled, "So, of course, I have to come down here and talk to the school about my idiot son and his inevitable screw-ups. I was in a meeting with three of the bank's top investors, do you have any idea how it makes me look when I get a call saying I need to come pick up my son, he's been caught with marijuana? Marijuana? For Christ's sake!"
James muttered under his breath and his father stopped, wheeling round to pin him with a dangerous look.
"What was that?"
James swallowed hard, glancing around his surroundings. There were a couple older women walking across the street, they lingered, their eyes watching curiously the scene unfold in the school parking lot. Emboldened by their presence, James peeked up into his father's eyes and cleared his throat.
"I said…it doesn't…by any chance…make you look like an asshole, does it?" James said smartly, darting looks at his father up through his lashes. Something hot and white flashed over the old man's eyes.
"You little…" he seethed, his hand coming up for the strike.
James instinctively flinched away, his eyes squeezing shut, but it never came. His father caught sight of the women across the street. He reeled in his rage, and instead, jerked James forward by the bicep, a bolt of pain shocking through the young boy's arm by the action, and he hissed in his son's ear, warm breath berating the delicate skin there, "Get in the car," then he pushed James, stumbling, towards their black BMW.
Jimmy peeled his eyes open. He attempted to draw in air, his lungs stinging from the effort, but ended up with a mouthful of dust and debris, and his body convulsed painfully with hacking coughs. Everything hurt and there was a loud ringing in his ears, it drowned out any other possible sounds. He grimaced, pulling himself up to sitting as best he could, still wracked with coughs whilst wheezing and gasping for air. He tried to remember where he was and what he was doing there, and things came back to him in slow, fuzzy images.
Moving took effort and a lot more thought than Jimmy seemed capable of that moment. Everything hurt. His vision came back to him in parts. First light, blinding and sharp. Then color, contrasting, casting glaring starbursts across his eyes, and then the colors and lights took form and suddenly he could see the sky, it was late afternoon if the sunlight were any indication, and he could see the layers of debris that lay all around and blanketed him.
Eventually, Jimmy managed to sit up, knocking off chunks of wood and mortar. He inspected himself, but through the clinging white dust and thick, matted blood coating his body, it was difficult to assess his condition. His left arm throbbed at the shoulder; there was a knot at the base of his neck. His right leg had a gash across the thigh, it was bleeding profusely, and when he tested weight on it, a feeling electric shot through him and he hissed at the pain. His head felt heavy and he was dizzy, his throat and mouth were dry. His entire backside felt like one giant bruise, and he was certain if he could take a look at it, there would be discoloration to match.
Alive, Jimmy decided. He was definitely alive. Hell wouldn't even be this painful.
Jimmy pulled himself to his feet, keeping his weight carefully leaned to the left. He took in his surroundings; the warehouse basement, what little was left of the warehouse draped overhead. Dead and broken things lay scattered all around him. He turned and his heart jumped into his throat, a Skitter stood several paces away and he reacted on instinct, shuffling hastily behind the nearest coverage, leaning back against the chunk of cement he'd chosen and swallowing dry air. After a moment, his heart jackhammering away in his chest, he took a peek.
The Skitter didn't move.
Catching his breath and smudging the dust across his face, Jimmy stepped back out and tentatively approached the Skitter, then nearly collapsed in relief. The thing was dead, like all the others that were in pieces strewn all about. It was impaled up through its underside with a stretch of rebar.
"Fuck…" Jimmy ran his hand over his face and through his hair, ready to burst into tears from the sensory overload.
"James."
Jimmy spun round slowly; his focus was taking its time readjusting to sudden movements. He met those large blue eyes, clear as the summer sky, and she smiled cutely up at him, her hands folded neatly behind her back. She looked the same as last he remembered her, except she hadn't worn that paisley dress since she was five, and she had stopped wearing her hair in those curled pigtails, pink ribbon laced through them, when Jimmy had told her they made her look like a baby.
"Cass…?"
"You've really made a mess this time, James," she steadily informed him, "Everyone is going to be so mad."
.
.
A/N: Um...yeah. Tell me what you think in a lovely review please.
Reviewers: U-know-u-luv-me-99, focus is a difficult thing to develop, I'm still working on it myself. I only manage to get longer things written because I can write really fast. That's the real reason I space out updates so much and need the story complete or near it before posting, I've left so many fanfics discontinued, I didn't want to do that anymore. WhisperMaw, how's a series of flashbacks to his life before and his inner demons as a warped incarnation of his little sister work for ya? Sounds like a good bet. JDMlvr1, nope, not harnessed...just seriously fucked up. Haley, easier to write than your screen name. You're welcome, and you'll have to wait, but the reunion is worth (I think anyhow, but I'm very, very biased). FacePalmer123, gasp, Ben is not a murderer...is he? The romantic stuff, the romantic stuff, really, you people. I am contemplating withholding the next update a day for every reviewer that demands kissing/smut...I'm joking, I swear I'm joking, I would never do that to the other readers, but it does get to me...there's more to this story than just the making out and it kind of makes me feel like shit when all some people say is "they aren't making out", I'm grumpy right now, waking up before the sun does that to a person...ignore me. Heracratzarism, good, good, and yeah, Jimmy's kind of messed up...sorry! CallMePox, I called you 'Pow' last A/N, turned you into an action hero. Aw, I'm glad to get such an emotional response, awesome! Thank you! thricechampions, I am putting him through the wars. It's my MO, I take my favorite characters and I beat the crap out of them. Cookie97, see what happens when you're absence, all hell breaks loose! If you miss anymore chapters, who knows what'll happen next? The world might end...again. Ben risking his life to go alone and blow up an alien-infested tower didn't make him a hero? Poor Ben, I'm going to beat him up in the sequel. :D
Got to go...day full of classes. I'm excited though, tonight or tomorrow I'm going to start writing a scene that I've been planning for the sequel since...before I had this story wrapped up; the boys muse on what kind of lives they would've had if the aliens had never invaded.
See you guys tomorrow!