Mark

"There they are," Randy said, pausing a moment to point over towards the end of the row of bowling lanes. It was Saturday evening and Randy, Shane Arrington, and I had just arrived at Bridgeport Lanes, the local bowling alley. It was pretty full- which wasn't surprising really- mostly with grownups, although I did notice more teenagers than I expected.

"We must be the last to arrive," Shane added, as we noted the rather large group standing around lanes 7 and 8. Suddenly Melanie Edwards turned and saw us. She grinned and trotted over.

"There you guys are! Hey, get your shoes and then pick out your bowling balls so we can get started," she said happily, giving Shane a hug. She and Shane have been dating since last spring, which I still find amazing. No offense to Melanie cause we've been friends a long time, but she's a huge flirt and I never thought she'd manage to stay with one guy for that long. Besides, I still felt bad about her breaking up with Scott. Shane's our friend, too, but I knew Scott had really liked Melanie.

"Hi, Randy. Hi, Mark."

I jumped back to the present to see that Jana had come up too. She was smiling at Randy now and nudged him playfully with her elbow.

"Hey, if you want your Lucky Blue Comet Ball, you better hurry up. I saw several people checking it out- it might not be available too much longer and then what will you do?" She giggled. Randy laughed and nudged her back.

"I'm just surprised *you* didn't take it," he teased. "I know how much you like it."

"Oh, right," she snorted. "It's so beautiful and so easy to use."

"It's certainly my secret to success," Randy said with mock seriousness, causing them both to laugh. I smiled although I had no clue what they were talking about. 'Lucky Blue Comet Ball'? It had to be some joke they had from a past visit. I trailed behind them as they walked over to where Shane was getting his shoes and then followed them back to where the rest of the group was. We were greeted cheerfully by everyone and I felt honored to be included. I counted 14 of us altogether and immediatly felt comfortable since I knew every one of them. There was The Fab Five, Randy, Shane, Tony Calcaterra, Derek Travelstead, Jon Smith, Funny Hawthorne, and Alexis Duvall and Bill Soliday (who were currently going out). I'd thought that Chase Collins would be there since Christie was, but apparently he had some sort of prior engagment. Maybe that's why I'd been invited along- it would make sense, as it had been a real shock when Beth and Jana had come up to me in the hall yesterday and asked if I wanted to join them. I had that nagging feeling something else was up though- the same feeling I've been getting for the past several days- but I still couldn't figure out what it was. Oh well, I thought with a shrug. Might as well quit thinking about it and enjoy myself. I focused my attention back to their conversation and realized everyone was having some sort of argument over how we should split into teams.

"Boys against girls," Tony was insisting.

"You feel like losing tonight, Calcaterra?" His girlfriend, Katie Shannon, countered with a grin.

He made a face at her. "Oh, get real. We can blow you girls out of the water any day!"

"Ha!"

"I think it'll be more fair if randomly pick teams," Alexis interjected.

"And how would we do that?" Jon asked with a laugh. "Eenie-meenie-minie-mo? Or shall I go ask the guy at the concession stand for some straws?"

"Hey, look everybody," Christie said firmly, stepping forward. "We're here for two games- we'll play one boys vs. girls, the other with random teams. Ok?"

"Man, can this girl think or what?" I joked, slapping her playfully on the back. "No wonder she gets straight A's!"

Christie gave me a shove and everyone laughed, then split into two groups, us guys on one, the girls on the other. In almost no time, we had a real competition going. On our team, Tony, Shane, and Bill proved to be excellent bowlers, while Randy, Jon, and I were pretty decent and made up for all of Derek's gutter balls.

"I'm just trying to help the girls out," Derek insisted as he came back over after rolling another no-pin-down. "If I bowled to my true ability, the girls wouldn't have a prayer. I do hate to see girls cry."

Tony groaned loudly. "You miss another easy shot like that, Travelstead, and you're going to see ME cry!"

The girls all laughed, and I had to laugh too. The girls definitely did not need any help. Jana, Christie, and Beth pretty much made strikes or spares every turn, and Katie and Funny weren't too bad either. Alexis and Melanie had some troubles, but even they got more pins down then Derek.

"I think it's about time to switch to Plan B, guys," I said, leaning back in my chair.

"And what's that?" Randy laughed from his seat next to me.

"Trade Derek for one of the girls," I replied, reaching over and snatching Funny's forearm. "Here, Derek. You take Funny's place."

"No way!" Jana cried, jumping up and grabbing Funny's other arm. "We get her this time, maybe you'll luck out the next game."

I pulled Funny again in my direction, then let go suddenly so that she snapped backwards into Jana and the two of them ended up on the floor laughing.

"Jerk!" Jana cried, sticking her tongue out at me.

"I'll say," Funny agreed with mock seriousness, standing up and then pulling Jana to her feet. "If these beautiful shoes are in any way scuffed..."

We all laughed as Funny sat back on one of the chairs and stuck her feet out in front of her, which were clad in a pair of dark green and brown bowling shoes that looked like they could have had their start back in the 50's.

"It's obvious why you're so protective of them," I grinned. "Therefore, I promise that if I in any way marred them, I'll do my best to get you a replacement." I turned and grinned at Derek. "Which shouldn't be too hard- I'll just raid Derek's closet..."

"Hey!" Derek cried, giving me a shove which caused everyone to laugh again. Finally, Christie got us back on track and we finished the game, with the girls winning by a *very* slight margin. Then the difficult task of picking new teams arose and a debate ensued on how they should be chosen. After about 15 minutes of arguing, I decided to take a snack break.

"I'm going to go get something to eat," I said finally, aware that no one had really heard me over their discussion. But I was wrong.

"Mark, wait! I want something, too."

I turned to see Funny come up behind me, smiling.

"All that major male butt kicking made me thirsty," she explained with a grin.

I pretended to be offended.

"Oh, please!" I scoffed, punching her in the arm. "You just want an excuse to hang out with a cool guy like me."

"Oh, yeah," Funny giggled. "That's it."

I laughed too, and glanced down, ready to make some crack about how silly it was that everyone was taking so long to decide on teams for the second game, but stopped in surprise when I noticed that her cheeks were a flaming red and she had a really weird smile on her face. Probably just all the exitement, I figured, yet I was aware again of that weird nagging feeling that something was going on that I didn't know about. But what...?