So, here I am again, sitting on the steps to the tent, skipping breakfast. Normal routine by now. I hate the point in the case where you have all these leads but nowhere to go with them. So, here I am, sitting on the steps to the tent, thinking about the stupid case thingy and what it all means. And, yes, I have nothing.
Anyway, my mind keeps wandering. I can't think out in the early "still dark" morning. Which I don't consider morning but oh well. The moon was still out, but there was light, just enough so you could see.
And when my mind wanders, I usually start thinking about, none other than, Clay Aiken. Actually, his songs just get stuck in my head and prevent me from thinking anything useful.
I could hear the saxophone playing in the background and the words came to me. "For five long years, I thought you were my man. But I found out, I'm just a link in your chain. You got me where you want me, I ain't nothing but a fool. You treated me mean, yeah, oh, you treated me cruel."
Ah, the wonderful memories of Clay concerts, and the lovely song "Chain of Fools". I know I seem to think about Clay a lot, and it's a bit annoying but oh well, I can do what I want, whenever I want.
Well, at least when I'm by myself and everyone isn't telling me what to do. I'm such a loser. "Chain chain chain, chain chain chain, chain chain-ain-ain chain of fools."
Chain of Losers. Yeah, that's what that song should be named.
Well, when I get started with a Clay Aiken song, I, at least, have to finish it. So it continued playing in my head. As soon as the song ended in my head, I looked over to see a figure walking over to me, carrying something.
As soon as the person got near enough, I could tell it was Squid, and he was carrying something. He walked up beside me, and then stood in front of me, carrying, like, six pieces of toast and one was already in his mouth.
I looked up at him like he was crazy, and all he did was say, "You want some toast?"
I made a face at him, and then said, "Not really."
"Oh come on!" Squid took a piece of toast off the top of the stack and waved it around in the air. "Look at the dancing toast. It wants you to eat it! Yummy yummy toast." I continued to look at him like he was a psycho. And he just continued with the "dancing toast" act.
I looked down at the ground and tried to think. There was a moment of silence, and then suddenly, Squid's face appeared in front of mine. "Is there something you're not telling me?" he asked simply.
I slowly shook my head. "No, nothing." I don't know how convincing it was, because all Squid do was stand there, staring at me.
"Are you sure? Cause you've really been out of it."
I actually wanted to just tell someone why I was really here. I really wanted to, but I knew I couldn't. I was being forced to lie to everyone here. "It's just a little thing," I lied once again. At least I admitted something was bothering me.
"You can handle the little things," he told me. "You're a strong girl."
I smiled, and replied with a very boastful, "I know."
"You're such a self-conceited bitch." I had to stop myself from laughing at his remark. Indeed I was. I could agree.
"And you're an arrogant bastard," I said back.
I looked out into the distance to see many figures leaving the dining hall. Which only meant one thing: Digging time. I so look forward to this every single solitary day. Yay.
"Time for another delightful day of digging!" I said, as sarcastically as I could manage. And that's pretty sarcastic.
"Stop complaining and do something about it." I looked over at Squid, as we started walking over to the "Library".
"What the heck do you mean? We can't do anything about it. That's the point," I told him, as we picked up our pace over to the rest of the guys.
"Make it interesting. Instead of just digging, do something else too," he explained. I just stared at him in confusion. Okay, how could I make it interesting? I guess he didn't want me to be all quiet and reserved as I was yesterday.
We met up with the rest of the guys, grabbed our shovels, and were led out to where we would have to dig. As I started to dig my hole, I thought about what Squid had said. Make it interesting. Okay, so how could we make digging interesting?
I suddenly got an idea. "Hey, do any of you guys know how to sing?" I called out.
"No way," Magnet answered.
"You guys would seriously be no fun in a karaoke bar," I announced.
So we started arguing about singing and music styles. Ah, the fun I was hoping for. Arguing, the most fun of all.
"I don't really like rap," I said in the heat in the discussion.
"Of course. All you listen to is Clay Aiken," ZigZag teased me. I hate the way the guys say Clay's name. They say it like it's poisonous.
I rolled my eyes. "I listen to other things too. But guys, Clay Aiken isn't all that bad. I mean, can you hold out a sixteen second glory note?"
"A glory note?"
"Yeah," I liked explaining about Clay Aiken-related things. It was fun. "Like in the middle of Solitaire. Out of nowhere you hear..." Oh goody, I was gonna sing. "Solitaireeeeeeeee..."
The guys just started at me at first, and then shook their heads. "That's a long note," X-Ray exclaimed.
"Yeah, but at a concert Clay held out a thirty second note with his backup singers. Really long time." That thirty second note always became a contest at the end of one of his songs with his backup singers. It was a memorable moment.
"So what other music do you listen to?" Squid asked, leaning against a wall of his "soon to be but not yet" hole. I don't know if he was trying to change the subject off of Clay, or if he really wanted to know. Oh well, that doesn't matter.
"Umm...Maroon 5, Switchfoot, Evanescence, basically a lot of bands that are way different from Clay. I like a variety of music," I said, and then quickly added, "Oh, and a lot of oldies. My parents got me hooked on the oldies."
"Oldies? Why oldies?" Armpit asked.
I shrugged. "They're cool. Like some of the oldies are just classics. Many artists from today redo them cause they're so well known and loved." I continued to dig my hole, which was going faster as usual, since I was preoccupied with the conversation.
"Name one," Caveman said.
"Umm...Solitaire was redone many times. Kyrie by Mr. Mister, Rosanna by Toto, Still The One, not the version by Shania Twain but by that other group, I Love Rock and Roll, need I go on?"
"Aren't all of Clay's songs an oldie redone?" I heard a voice from behind me. Whoo-hoo. I must be very special if I got Zero to join in our conversation.
"A couple, but all. All of his songs on his CD are original. He just had to do other songs on American Idol and his tours."
"Sing one," Squid suddenly said.
I looked over at him like he was crazy, which wasn't the first time today. "I don't want to," I told him flat out. I wasn't gonna sing a whole song in front of a bunch of guys.
"Come on, sing one." They all wanted me to sing a song. I just tried to ignore them and get back to my digging.
"Okay," I looked up to see Squid looking at me. "If you sing a song, I'll...um...do something in return."
"Like a revenge?" I asked with a smirk.
"Sure, whatever you want to call it."
Those were the words I was looking for. Revenge. This was gonna be fun. Now what song would I sing? It had to be Clay Aiken and off his album, but which one? Invisible was too well-known, and I needed a song that wasn't as popular. It had to be a song that would be another topic later on, so we could get through this digging thing. A controversial song. Ooo...I had one.
"Let's see..." I pondered and then started the song while digging,
"When the world wasn't upside down, I could take all the time I had, but I'm not gonna wait when a moment can vanish so fast. 'Cause every kiss is a kiss you can never give back.
Lift me up, in your eyes. If you told me that is what heaven is well you'd be right. I've been waiting forever for this, this is the night.
When the answer to all my dreams is as close as a touch away, why am I here holding back what I'm trying to say?
Lift me up, in your eyes. If you told me that is what heaven is well you'd be right. Hold me close, to your heart. I would go with you to the ends of earth and we'll fly. I'd been waiting forever for this, this is the night.
This is the night...where we capture and all our tomorrows begin, after tonight we will be never be lonely again...
Lift me up, in your eyes. If you told me that is what heaven is well you'd be right. Hold me close, to your heart. I would go with you to the ends of earth and we'll fly. I'd been waiting forever for this...this is the...night..."
There was a silence after I finished my song. "It's Clay's anthem," I tried to explain during the silence.
"Is that a song about...dirty stuff?" Caveman finally asked.
I laughed. "Clay doesn't even know." Often Claymates would ask what that song was about, if it was religious or just about...well...what it sounded like.
I continued my digging, and then looked over at Squid. "You've gotta do thing I get for revenge."
He sighed. "What then?"
I thought about it for awhile, and finally decided that he'd have to wait, have to sweat it out. In fact, I knew a way the dare, as I was gonna call it, could be more embarrassing. "Hmm...I have it, but you'll have to wait until everyone is around to do it."
"What!?" he exclaimed, "That's not fair!" He stopped digging to look over at me with a look that said all.
"Oh yes it is. You'll never know when the dare's coming, but it's coming all right. And believe me, you'll hate it." I ended the sentence with a smirk. Squid just frowned and went back to digging.
Oh what fun! I get to torture Squid! I thought about what he would have to do for the dare until people started to finish up with their holes. I didn't want this to have to do with Clay, since he probably thought that in the first place. I wanted it to be a total surprise.
It was while I was digging my hole I noticed that Squid was already done, leaning against his hole with his eyes shut.
"Umm...what are you doing?" I asked him, making him startle awake.
He shrugged, rubbing his eye, getting out the sand. "Keeping you company I guess."
"Well, that's great," I sarcastically said, digging out the last shovel-fuls of dirt in my hole.
"Just trying to be nice, ya know. Can't you return the favor?"
I really wanted to just tell him that he's wrong, but I decided to keep my cool. "I am, you just don't notice."
"Right. That's why you're so nice to me," Squid retorted.
"Look. It's just my personality so you'll have to deal with it." Everyone has to deal with me anyway.
Squid shrugged again, lifting himself out of his hole with ease. I still can't get out of my hole without climbing out. Guess it took practice.
I measured my hole, and then lifted the shovel onto the ground above me. I looked around the hole for a second, and then looked up to see Squid watching me. I knew what he was thinking. That little Kristina couldn't get out of the hole without struggling. Well, I was gonna show him wrong.
I tried to put my foot into a little hole I dug on the side, and hoist myself out. I put my foot on the side of the hole and the "foothold" collapsed on me, causing me to fall onto my butt.
"Come on." I looked up to see Squid reaching out his hand to me. "You're never gonna get out of that hole the way you're working at it." I looked at me, wondering if I should take his hand or not. Finally, I grabbed his hand and he pulled, helping me get out of the hole and landing on the barren wasteland above me.
I brushed myself off, standing up. I was about to get my shovel when I saw the look on Squid's face. "All right, all right," I said with a sigh. "Thank you."
"You're welcome. See, that's what I'm talking about."
I rolled my eyes. "Maybe you should tell yourself that," I said, grabbing my shovel and brushing past him.
He walked with me to the library, even though we barely said a word to each other the whole way there.
"Big news you guys!" X-Ray said, coming out of nowhere behind us. "There's another new kid."
"Another one?" I asked, and even though I thought I said it in my head, I actually said it outloud.
"Yeah. Noodles was beat up pretty badly. He had to leave." There was a minute of, what I'd like to call, "silence for Noodles", until X-Ray spoke up again. "Oh, and he already had his nickname."
"Already?" Squid asked, doing the exact same I did when X-Ray told us the news.
"Would you stop asking dumb questions?" X-Ray snapped. We both shut up. "Anyway, yeah. Since he got off the bus eating a Reeses cup, we nicknamed him Reeses."
Sounds like someone I knew. But, no, he would never get sent to a camp like this.
We walked to the Library, dropping off our shovels, X-Ray following us the whole way, telling us about the new kid, but nothing real specific. All I knew was that this kid is now nicknamed Reeses, and he had brown hair. That's about it.
I walked past our tent, and everyone came out as I did, crowding around me.
"Going to see the new kid?" Magnet asked.
"No." I replied, "Actually, I'm going to the Wreck Room."
I walked by A-Tent, to hear a familiar voice shout out, "KRISTINA!"
Confused, I turned around and saw the person I least expected to see. "W-what are you doing here?"