Tag, You're It
By Allie-Dee

The four RFR DJs sat in their underground, a circle formed. Travis besides Lily, Lily besides Ray, Ray besides Robbie. Their eyes were locked on the space in front of them, yet no one dared to move. There, sitting right in front of them all, was a scrapbook, filled with pictures, notes, everything about their year at Roscoe High. A picture of them, smiling at Mickey's was pasted on the front. "Grade 9: Complete" said the title.

You could see the anxiety and their eyes filled with curious looks. Each and every DJ had a section...all about them. Crushes, hatred and much more filled the pages of the scrapbook. Everyone was getting nervous. No one wanted to tell what they thought in 9th grade, but they wanted to know each other's thoughts.

The silence was overtaking everyone; you could hear a pin drop. Finally, a gentle female voice rose in the air. "Tag. You're it Ray." She said calmly. The three male DJs looked at her with confusion. "You read first. I tagged you. You tag the next person." Travis and Robbie looked happy and relieved it wasn't them. As Ray's trembling hand reached out, he touched the book, and slid it toward him.

He took a deep breath, and then cracked it open, flipping the pages. It seemed like eternally when finally, he cleared his throat. All attention was his. "The Story of Pronto." He stopped, and blushed, you could hear him murmuring, "Did I really write that?!" His three friends, sitting there, gave him looks, as if to say, Shut up and continue. Once Ray finally got his courage back he started his story.

"Well, this is odd. Lily made an idea that we make our own sections in this scrapbook. And uh--where shall I begin? I guess I'm the clown in the group. I'm Pronto, the one cracking jokes. You know, I wondered why I didn't think of the name...but Question Mark did because I'm the opposite of it. I let things wait to the last minute." He sighed, then continued. "No one ever would think I could be serious. Too out of character right? Someone just make me laugh...and I'll be fine. Neally." Everyone looked at him oddly. "Not really formed together." Lily cracked a smile.

"High school was odd to me, and still is. I learned a lot too, in just a month. First off, love can do strange things. I started stalking a girl by taking her retainer and then by smoothly asking her out, giving her retainer back. It didn't work out." Everyone laughed at the memory.

"I even when out with a girl named Veronica to make someone jealous. My two amigos know who it is and I can't lie to you scrapbook." A pause. "It was Lily Randall." Ray looked up and saw Lily looking down at her hands, red in the face. "Lily was the person I was in love with, even before Veronica and those other ones. Her smile makes me feel more at ease and I never could stop the rushing feeling when I saw her.

"She wanted to be Class Pres, and I helped her on her quest, maybe making her fall for me. I guess my power- hungry ways didn't impress her I guess." Another pause and a cough. "Though, Lily did kiss me to get Ronnie away from me that one time. I was so happy, I was about to die...

"But then the unthinkable happened. Lily. Kissed. Travis. Travis. Kissed. Lily. One of my best friends kissed the love of my life. The rushing feeling inside...stopped cold when I heard. I just couldn't believe someone did that to me. Travis KNEW I loved Lily and Lily, I knew I shouldn't have been jealous...but whenever I saw her face...the lump in my throat became bigger.

"Nightmares haunt me at night. I don't know if Lily likes me or if Swami's the one that captured her heart. But at the end of Grade 9, maybe I'll find out." Ray looked up and stared at Lily for a minute. Uneasiness filled his voice. "Just maybe." He then started smiling at his Robbie and Travis.

"But friendship was there too. We had so much fun at RFR. Making fun of Waller, the Detention, that little war with Kim, which we won...and so many good memories. The word pronto means to be done instantly...but I want my times with my friends to last forever. Dammit, that was really, really corny. But this school year was jam-packed with drapiness. Drama and Happiness. Best of both worlds."

He shut the book, and the four friends stopped cold, just grinning at each other. They had found out things about Ray, and there was still three to go. They didn't really want to go on, but they needed to. Ray slid the book to Travis. "Oh Swami," he sang in an annoying voice, making his friends grin. "I tag you!"

Travis let the Swami remark slide and then took the book. Sighing, he opened the book to his section. "The Zen of Being Smog." he announced. "Smog - n. 1. Fog that has become mixed and polluted with smoke. 2. A form of air pollution produced by the photochemical reaction of sunlight with hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides that have been released into the atmosphere, especially by automotive emissions."

Robbie chuckled. Only Travis would give a definition of his name. "Can you believe that Ray thought of that with his 'Best of Both World' phrase of his? It was Smart Dog, it turned into Smog...and it stuck. I was the new guy at Roscoe and I remember that test on the first week of school. Everyone labeled me the 'Weird Kid from Hong Kong' when I drew the bubbles in to make it look like a donkey." Ray put his hand on his mouth to keep from laughing.

"I seemed to not have a voice at all. But when I heard Yo and Hello from Kim at Cougar Radio. I was jetting of to get my Radio Supplies and crashed her little talk. Then Ray, Robbie and Lily said, 'Hey! Let's make a radio station.' Or someone asked someone this, but it doesn't really matter how or why we made RFR. It just matters that I founded it."

Lily slid her shoe off and chucked it at Travis, who nearly missed it. "I'm only joking Shady." he said calmly before returning to his speech. "Anyway, the first few days were tough. We were such...amateurs. NO ONE liked us, until we got our act together and just...did what we had to do. Things happened: Waller, Kim, Detention, etc, etc, etc. And then I started going out with Audrey." Pause.

"Audrey was the best. She was smart, nice, pretty, and she got along with my best friends. At least, until, I helped Lily with her CD and then...the Kiss happened. I never really knew it was going to happen. It was just I moved in, she moved in and WHAM. We kissed. I was shocked at first, then ashamed. I knew Ray loved Lily, and I knew I had did something wrong. I had hurt Audrey most of all. Lily and I, we tried to keep it secret but Robbie found out and then eventually, Ray and Audrey did too.

"A few days later, Audrey had broken up with me. I didn't know what to feel. I kissed Lily...so was I in love with her? Should I have gone after Audrey? And Ray almost punched me in the face with his total jealousy and anger, but I couldn't blame him. I had destroyed his trust. Completely.

"So, while three people hate me (Audrey, Ray and Robbie) I'm totally confused. Maybe I do love Lily, the talented and gorgeous Lily. I don't want it to break up the RFR friendship though, in the process. But when I thought of the good things of Lily I knew...I knew I loved her. Though, the thought of being hated by friends overtook me and I never even told about these feelings. They were covered up by the memories of good friendship."

Travis closed the book and sighed in relief. But his friends just sat there. Robbie, sad for Travis; Ray, ashamed of how he acted; Lily, unsure of Smog's words. There was a very long silence until you could hear the scrapping of the book on the floor. It nudged Robbie, who got out of his daze. "Tag." was Travis' response when Question Mark looked up.

He coughed, took the book and stopped and looked at his friends, waiting eagerly for his passage. He didn't want to but... "What's Question Mark Wondering?" he said. "The name's Robbie, or I'm most commonly known as Question Mark on RFR. Why? Well, I ask questions...a lot. But my problem is I never think anyone cares about me. See, there's a love triangle between my friends, Ray, Travis, and Lily." Robbie stopped and looked to see if they were blushing. Yes they were. "Because of this, no one cares about me."

Lily stopped blushing and looked up, her eyes soft. Travis and Ray stared at Robbie, who continued. "I was always trying to keep RFR together, when they were fighting. I loved it when it was happy and when we had so much fun." The boy stopped and he choked out the last words, but he continued.

"No one seemed to care when I kissed Kim, the biggest enemy, when I seem to love Kim, and when I actually asked her out. Actually, maybe it was because I didn't tell anyone. Shady Lane AKA Lily figured it out though. To her it was easy as pie. But I loved Kim and I knew that Ray and Travis might hate me because of it. So I kept it secret. I almost thought I should have broken up with her so I didn't have to get in a fight with my friends.

"I didn't, though. I just kept her secret and helped out my friends with their troubles. I loved when they smiled and we had good times. I never wanted them to end. And when Lily suggested we do these sections, I was actually kind of freaked...but happy. I could tell them, I thought, when she proposed the idea. Anyway, I'm Question Mark, and I'm wondering...is RFR going to stay on the air for as long as we can make it?"

Everyone looked at him, closing the book, and then Lily got up and jumped on him. "Oh Robbie! We all love you! We never meant to make you feel left out!" Travis and Ray agreed, and Robbie grinned and hugged Lily happily.

"Robbie!" Ray yelled, "In front of my eyes?!" but Travis smiled and then hugged Lily and Robbie, then Ray sighed, "Alright, alright..." and then joined in too.

After a few minutes of a huge group hug, Ray backed out. "Shady. Your turn. Did you think you could get away from saying your section?"

Lily sighed and took the book away from Robbie. "If you insist..." She opened to her pages and then coughed. "Shady Lane's Shady Life." she announced. You could hear Pronto mumbling, 'How original' in the background. "It's the best I could do okay?" Lily shot back at him, who just shrugged his shoulders in disbelief. "I'm Shady Lane AKA Lily. Shady Lane is a song that got me into guitar. Question Mark, Robbie, suggested it and I thank him for it." Robbie had a proud look on his face.

"Year 9 was scary. Great, but scary. So many things happened. I ran for president, then backed down, I made a C.D. and we made RFR, the best radio station ever!" Everyone smiled at each other for a minute. "But, really, I bet you guys don't want to hear about that boring stuff!" 3 heads in the audience bobbled up and down, up and down, up and down...

"I guess the cat's out of the bag. I kissed Travis and Ray. I was jealous when I saw Veronica and Ray together and Travis and Audrey together. I didn't know whom to choose and it hurts to think that I will hurt someone if I choose the other. I made a list of pros and cons and you know what..." a pause. A big pause. You could here Robbie muttering, 'Get on with it!' and then chuckles by the other boys.

"It was a tie. I didn't do anything special but Travis' unique and deep ways matched Ray's childish pranks and funny ways. I don't know whom to choose. I'm so sorry. I don't want to mess up the friendship. The amazing friendship we had, the friendship that tied us together even when we were fighting. I don't want that to fade..." she said, closing the book. "I love you guys!"

The three boys jumped on her and then they gave each other another big "group hug". When they were done, they looked at the pictures that were taken and little mindless notes that you have but can't live without. That day, the RFR crew learned a lot about each other. Their show at 4 was the best yet with Ray's snappy comebacks, Robbie's wonderings, Travis' Buddha quotes, and Lily keeping it all together. And they have a new book for next year. They plan to play Tag, just like they did today.

I would say the end right here, but actually, the story never ends.

I know this sucks and I bet your like, what a piece of CRAP. But I actually dreamed it up! I woke up and I was like, whoa...so I started writing it. It took forever to finish because its not really in character is it? Travis is serious but...OH! Ray turns serious and Robbie tells about his feelings and you know what? I bet you probably hate me for making this fanfic because it sucks...but I like it.

-Allie