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Chapter 2

Gordie looked around. "Did you know that your porch could be considered sparse?"

"Um, yes." Jana nodded. "We're not big on the whole porch furniture deal."

"Right. I say we head to the treehouse."

"Gordie, it's four o'clock on a Wednesday. No one will be there, you fool."

"Not true! It is my personal belief that Teddy actually LIVES up there, and just comes out to fool us into believing that he DOESN'T."

"O... kay. To the treehouse!"

"That's the spirit!"

~~

"Hey," Chris said, inside the treehouse. "We need food."

Teddy smirked. "YOU need food. I, being the smart, mature human being that I am, already GOT food before I came here."

"Hey. Vern. Go get food."

"WHY?!" Vern shrieked. "I ALWAYS hafta get the food!"

Chris and Teddy rolled their eyes. "Gordie and Jana'll probably be here soon, if I know them," Chris conceded. "And again, if I know them, they'll probably have food."

"They always have crappy food!" Vern whined. "The last time I relied on them to feed me, I ended up eating wheat germ for a week!"

"When the hell did those two health nuts ever feed you for a week?" Teddy demanded.

"Well, my parents won't let me stay home alone, and-"

"And I'm done hearing about this," Chris cut him off. "I don't want to hear about Gordie and/or Jana babysitting you."

"I was just saying about the wheat germ-"

"No."

"And the Brussels sprouts-"

"NO."

"And they fry them up and then do this tofu thing that looks like cheese and-"

"NO! For one thing, every DAY for me is a struggle to forget that my best friend is a health nut! For another thing, I don't need to HEAR about the food that I spend my life trying to AVOID! Vern! STOP TALKING!"

Vern blushed at Chris's outburst. "Okay."

Just then, Gordie's head popped up the trapdoor. "Hey guys," it said, smiling. "Guess what we brought?"

Teddy rolled his eyes. "Good God."

Gordie pulled himself through the trapdoor. He took off the pack that had been around his neck and opened it. "Look! Granola popsicles!"

Vern's jaw dropped. "How did you get it to freeze?" he asked in wonder, picking one up by the stick and examining it.

"Mr. Fisher thinks we should call them "gransicles"," Gordie added, ignoring Vern.

"And," Jana continued, "because my father is not exactly the picture of health, as you know, he sent along some chips and pork rinds. You know. For you guys."

"Your dad sent pork rinds?" Vern repeated in shock.

"I keep trying to tell him that it's his health we're talking about," Gordie replied, shaking his head, "but he doesn't seem to listen. I tried to serve him a pineapple-and-beans smoothie yesterday, and he looked at me like I'd grown an extra head!" He looked down, dejectedly. "No one understands me."

Chris wrinkled his nose. "That's because to understand you would be to accept you, and that would entail eating the equivalent of fish paste for the rest of our lives."

"Actually," Jana spoke up, "fish paste is quite high in calories, and-"

"STOP."

"Sorry."

Teddy scoffed. "Are you two here for a reason, or are you just here to save our lard-eating, pot-smoking, non-flossing, doughy, fatty souls?"

"Both," Gordie replied. "Actually, I'm here because I need to borrow a hundred dollars."

All four jaws dropped.

"I'm SERIOUS!" Gordie continued.

"Um, why?" Teddy spoke up.

"You're giving me the look again! The have-you-grown-an-extra-head look!"

"Why do you need money, Gordie?" Chris asked. "Have you fallen behind in your prostitute billing system?"

"No! I just... need... money."

"WHY?"

"I... I want to enter a poetry contest."

Chris snorted. "Look, if you can't even tell us WHY you need the money..."

"No! That IS why I need money!"

"You're gonna enter a poetry contest?" Teddy repeated dubiously.

"If I... get... a hundred. dollars... maybe, I'm not... well..."

"FAG!"

"Hey," Jana reprimanded, then burst out laughing.

Gordie stared in horror. "Look! I'm trying to express my SOUL to the world! You can't put a price on that!"

"Sorry, man," Vern laughed from the floor, where he'd rolled after falling off his chair, "but unless I'm sadly mistaken, none of us have that kind of money."

"Maybe you wouldn't roll so much if you ate gransicles instead of pork rinds, fatty," Gordie muttered.

"He's right, man," Chris said, laughing. "We're all as broke as badgers."

Gordie sighed. "How am I gonna express my soul?"

"Get a job," Teddy suggested, still breathing heavily from the peals of laughter he was trying to suppress.

"I guess I'll HAVE to." Gordie shook his head. "I can't believe I'm getting a job. I'm a virgin to the corporate world. I-"

"Wait. You're a WHAT?" Teddy demanded, on the verge of another crippling peal of laughter.

"It doesn't ALWAYS mean that, you perv!"

"SURE! You VIRGIN!"

Gordie rolled his eyes and threw a gransicle at Teddy. "Eat gran," he muttered. "I'm off to find a job."

~~

"What do I do?" Gordie asked Jana, kicking rocks down Shadyside Boulevard two hours later. "There ARE no jobs in Castle Rock."

"Looks like you're gonna be a virgin forever," she laughed. She opened her mailbox, pulled out a letter, and slammed it shut.

Gordie sighed, hit her shoulder, and turned up her front walkway. "You shut up."

Jana smiled again. "Look, do you want to come in and stay for dinner?"

"Sure," he shrugged.

"Cool. Come on," she replied, and shoved the door open.

"Did we have fun with the fresh air?" Mr. Fisher asked, when the two entered the house.

"Loads," Gordie responded brightly. "Now let me take your money."

Mr. Fisher was a co-owner of the only law firm in Castle Rock. He'd been a lawyer for twenty years, and thus had somewhat of a prominent position in Castle Rock. He cleared his throat. "Gordie, you are many things, but you are not a mugger."

Gordie sighed and flopped down on the couch. "I was sort of serious."

"Why do you need my money?"

"Gonnawritepoemhundredcontestmoney," Gordie mumbled into the couch pillow.

"Young man, stop making love to my couch pillow and kindly repeat what you just said."

"I don't find your couch pillow attractive."

"Well then stop toying with its feelings. The only way you are allowed to have relations with my couch pillow is if the two of you are properly united."

"Mr. Fisher, your couch pillow has no lips. Normally, I'm not an appearances type of guy, but that poses an issue in our non-existent relationship."

Mr. Fisher laughed. "Okay, shut up about my pillow. Why do you need money?"

Gordie sat up and stared at the lawyer. "I'm entering a poetry contest," he replied flatly, bracing himself for another round of jeers, this time from both the Fishers. But to his great surprise, Mr. Fisher jumped up in what seemed to be a joyous gesture.

"Poetry! Oh, Gordie, you're going to be a POET! 'Two roads, diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry that I could not travel both, and be one traveler, long I stood'... this is wonderful! How much do you need?"

Gordie stared. "A hundred dollars?"

"Wow," Mr. Fisher repeated. "That's... a lot... holy SHIT... what are you ENTERING, boy? The poet laureate finals?"

"No, but the prize money is five hundred dollars..."

"Whoa. That's a lot too."

"Dad, you're an idiot," Jana murmured from the other side of the living room. He smiled winningly at his daughter.

"Gordie, I'm going to make you a deal," he said brightly. "We're getting you in this thing!"

Gordie raised an eyebrow. "What kind of deal?"

"I'll pay for your entry, and then for the next couple months, you can work for me around the office and pay it off. And then if you win, I'll give you back the hundred and consider it a gift. Deal?"

Gordie's jaw dropped. "Are you serious? Deal! Totally!"

Mr. Fisher smiled. "Great," he said, shaking the younger boy's hand. "If you like, you can start working for me this weekend."

"Oh, Mr. Fisher, that would be great!" he cried. "You are SO MUCH COOLER than my family!"

"Oh, I know. I leave a lot of people in my coolness dust."

Jana coughed.

"Actually, that's just the way I interpret the constant staring," he continued thoughtfully. Gordie cackled.

~~

Later that night, Gordie, who was sitting in Jana's desk chair, scratching out fiction, leaned back and ran his fingers through his hair. "Le sigh."

Jana looked up. "What the eff?"

"What the eff?" Gordie repeated, amused. "Uh..."

"You heard me. What the eff. You just sighed IN FRENCH."

"You just swore in an ABBREVIATION."

"Wow, Gordie. Nothing gets past you!"

"I can't believe you just said what the eff."

"I'm done having this conversation."

"Don't you mean you're EFFING done having this EFFING conver-EFFING- sation?"

"Shut the eff- the fuck up."

"OOH!" Gordie cried. "Big man on effing campus now."

"Will you STOP it?"

"Stop what? Stop effing mocking you?"

"Arg! You should go screw something! Now!"

"Your cat's busy," Gordie replied.

"EEW! You sick monkey! You leave my cat out of this! Why are you such a horrible person?"

"That's just the effing way I am," Gordie replied, smirking, as he reclined in Jana's desk chair. "Jana, did you know my handwriting slants to the left?"

"Yes," Jana replied. "That denotes an idiot."

"An effing idiot."

"SHUT UP! Anyway, what are you sighing in French about over there?"

"This poem hates me," Gordie replied, suddenly serious as he rested his head on his hand. "English hates me."

"English loves you. You and English should get a room."

"Wow."

"An effing room," she added and laughed. "I am going to go get some food," she informed him. "Do you want anything?"

"Do you have any more pork rinds?"

"Ooh! You ARE secretly a horrible eater!"

"Only when I'm depressed," he replied. "Go. Get food. I have to go drown myself in sustenance and throw my troubles away."

"My God," she muttered, and shut her door. It should be illegal for one person to be so damn alluring while asking for pork rinds.

End of Chapter 2

I hope you're enjoying this... no real romance yet, I don't want to jump into anything and make it seem unnatural. Review!