Independence Day
By: Stretch
Despite having the A.C turned on as high as it would go, the July air was thick and stuffy in Sam Manson's room as laid sprawled out on top of her black bedspread. Three days into her weeklong grounding, Sam had exhausted all her usual methods of aggravating her parents until the eventually got so fed up that they practically kicked her out of the house. She'd been trapped, a prisoner, despite how loudly she'd played her music, or how smart mouthed she'd been at dinner. She'd even giver her nails a fresh, black paint job (something which never failed to piss off her mother) but that hadn't gotten so much as a brief glance the last time she'd ventured downstairs for something to drink.
Honestly, she couldn't tell what was worse at this point-her boredom or her parents totally apathy. And of all the weeks for them to crack down on her about breaking curfew, as if she hadn't been doing that all year long! Her mother must have seen something on The View about how being a stronger disciplinarian kept children from participating in satanic rituals, or some other daytime TV nonsense. Still, her parent's couldn't have waited a week before trying to prevent her from becoming an occult priestess?
She'd broken the news to the boys yesterday when Danny and Tucker's faces had suddenly appeared on her computer screen (one condition of her punishment meant no phone privileges).
"Dude, carnival just rolled into town!" Danny exclaimed. "You ready to go?" Sam just sighed and flipped on her webcam's microphone.
"I'm afraid you two are on your own tonight," she muttered.
"What gives?" Tucker demanded. Then a look of enlightenment crossed his face, his eyes going wide. "Oh, is it cramps, cause we can just call back later then and-," he stammered. Sam just buried her head in her hands, shaking it back and forth slightly.
"No, you idiot," she snapped. "I'm grounded for coming in late the other night, but thanks for that." Tucker's only reply was to look relieved that her answer had nothing to do with PMS. Danny, however, had the decency to look crestfallen.
"I'm sorry, Sam," he said.
"It's no biggie," she assured him, "so don't start in on the whole martyr routine. You guys will just have to go without me. Maybe if I'm lucky and I annoy the 'rents hard enough, they'll let me out on Monday night, and we can at least see the fireworks together." This time it was Tucker's turn to be a buzz kill.
"Actually, my Dad's decided he wants to go visit my Uncle in Nebraska for the three day weekend, so I won't be here on monday." He looked like he was going to enjoy Nebraska about as much as he would a root canal without the novicane. "Sorry."
"WHAT!" Danny shouted, rounding on Tucker so that all Sam could see on her screen was a close up shot of the back of his head. "You too? I can't go see the show by myself!"
"Look, it's not like we want to bail on you, Danny," Tucker said from somewhere behind the wall of black that loomed on Sam's monitor. "My dad's calling executive veto on all other plans for an impromptu Foley family road trip. You can't possibly blame this on me." Sam took comfort in the fact that at least she wouldn't be the only miserable one this weekend. It helped ease the pain…a little. Suddenly she heard the sounds of voices on the landing at the bottom of the stairs. The last thing Sam needed was for her parents to realize that they'd have to remove her computer to completly cut her off from the outside world.
"I gotta run, guys" she hissed, lowering the volume on her speaker. "Danny, I'll call you if I get sprung early, okay? But I wouldn't count on anything." He nodded, finally turning around and backing away from the camera.
"Let me know."
"Try not to have too much fun without me, kay?" Tucker added from behind him, to which Sam snorted in reply.
"Oh, don't worry about that," she muttered, darkly. "I'll most likely be stuck at home, praying for a wildfire, or earthquake, or another natural disaster to come along and put me out of my misery." She shuddered visibly. "An entire week of being stuck inside while my parents play bridge and talk about how Oprah says that the use of eyeliner is a definitive sign of depression and drug abuse. It's almost enough to make you wish that school was still in session…"
That conversation had taken place only three days earlier, but it seemed like years ago to Sam's grounding-addled brain. She was even to the point now where she would've welcomed a ghost attack, simply because it would have provided her with something to do.
"Man,' she muttered to herself, wiping a few stray drops of sweat from her forehead. "I'm really getting desperate if I'd face almost certain peril just to cure my boredom…"
As if in response to her comment, Sam was roused from her stupor buy a soft tapping, coming to her left. Rolling to her feet, she froze, listening hard. Silence, and then…
tap, tap, tap
She jumped, and whirled around in a motion that was quickly becoming more and more instinctual in her everyday routine. Pulse pounding, Sam grabbed the nearest heavy object she could find (the fact that it happened to be that ugly floral lamp her mother had painted was purely coincidental) and advanced on the window. Again, something scratched against it. Planting her feet solidly, she reached out grabbed the shade tightly in one fist, and raised the lamp high over her head with the other. Taking a deep breath, she wrenched down on the shade so that the spring mechanism came to life, rolling the shade up and away…
…and promptly dropped the lamp in surprise as she saw Danny's face pushed up against the glass, his eyes glowing wickedly green in the darkness. Hands flying up to her mouth in indignation, Sam moved out of the way as Danny passed through the window, silently praying that her parents hadn't heard the crash downstairs.
Now openly laughing, Danny, very much solid, leaned casually against the wall, staring at the broken glass littering the floor by his feet.
"Really Sam, you're on the second floor? Who else would've been knocking?" he croaked between bouts of laughter. "And who knocks before they attack you, anyway?"
"Shhhhhhhh!" she hissed, reaching out and taking a swipe at his shoulder. He cheated and her arm passed right through him, making it feel as if she'd plunged the limb into a bucket of ice water. "Gimme a hand here." She yanked her garbage can out from under her desk and began picking up the larger pieces of porcelain that littered her floor. Danny crouched down beside her, lending the obligatory hand, but that didn't stop him from cackling like a hyena.
"No, really? What exactly were you gonna do with the lamp? I must know," he chided. "Maybe we should trade in the thermos for one?" Glaring up from her task, Sam brandished a particularly large, sharp piece of ceramic at him.
"Keep it up, ghost-boy, and you and that thermos are going to become well acquainted," she threatened. "Especially when I shove it up your-,"
"Okay, okay," he interrupted, throwing up his hands in mock surrender. "No more harassment, I swear. It just wasn't the scene I was expecting to greet me, is all." The duo worked in silence for a few moments, as Sam felt both her heart rate and her breathing return to normal. She shot another glance at Danny, kneeling on her floor in that long sleeved jumpsuit of his. For a moment, she wondered if he ever got warm in that get-up. Or if ghosts got hot ever, regardless of clothing. Though tempted to ask, Sam thought the better of it, and kept her mouth shut. All she knew was that, despite wearing little more than a black tank top and an old pair of boxer shorts, and she was still sweating profusely in the muggy summer weather. The loud clatter of the porcelain pieces ricocheting against her metal garbage can brought her attention back to the matter at hand.
"You know, I could totally blame my reaction on you," she teased. "Before capturing rogue spirits became part of my daily routine, I was never this paranoid." As she swept the last of the shards into a pile with her hands, she shot him a chagrin grin to take the sting out of her words.
"Sure," Danny replied, sounding wounded and playing along. "When in doubt, just blame it all on me. It's all Danny's fault. Every, little thing wrong with your life must be related to me."
"Damn straight," Sam shot back. She held out the garbage can so that Danny could dump in the small pile of broken flowers he had collected, before returning the can to its position under her cluttered desk. Casually, she kicked out her rolling chair and plopped into in, spinning it around so that she was looking at the ghost-kid still sitting cross-legged on her floor.
"Although I'll admit," he muttered, his voice sounding serious for the first time all night. "I do still feel responsible for you getting grounded and all." Sam responded by flicking out her hand, as if brushing his stupid comment away.
"I chose to break curfew-," she began, but he interrupted.
"Only because you were helping me."
"Only because I chose to help you," she replied. "Like it or not, Danny, following you headfirst into dangerous, strange, and often stupid situations is something Tucker and I do under our own free will. We can leave at any time, we just haven't," she muttered. "At least, not yet…"
"Good to know," he mumbled, running his hand back through is unruly hair. It was such a classic Danny gesture that it seemed…out of place, somehow, in his ghost form. Then again, Sam thought, her best friend was also currently a ghost. He was currently a ghost, and she found that perfectly normal. 'My life has gotten incredibly weird,' she thought to herself. 'I mean I knew freshman year was supposed to be a transition, but this is a little much…'
"So, are you going to tell me what you're doing her, or am I going to have to play 20 questions with you?" she asked out loud. Danny's response was to shoot her another grin. "C'mon, what's going on?" He tore his eyes away from Sam's long enough to glance at the alarm clock on her nightstand. 9:18 pm blinked back at him.
"We'd better go, or we'll be late," he said mysteriously. With a groan, the halfa got to his feet. He held out one of his hands to Sam, beckoning her towards him. Sam, however, didn't budge from her chair.
"What the hell is going on?" she asked. "I'm grounded, remember?"
"I know," he retorted. "But you shouldn't be. Not during your summer vacation and especially not during tonight." He inclined his heard towards her window, looking rebellious. "So I'm staging a prison break. I'm gonna spring you." Much to her own surprise, Sam laughed.
"Rumor has it you're good at that," she snorted, covering her mouth and blushing at the embarrassing sound. "So you're not going to tell me where we're going?"
"That's right."
"But we're getting out of here?"
"Right again." Sam looked over her shoulder, chewing on her bottom lip. Normally, she was all for a show of teenage rebellion. But lately she and her parents had been more at odds than usual. Just because they didn't agree on many things, didn't mean that Sam wanted to put them in an early grave. Still, a chance to escape from his house was pretty tempting after three days of mock-imprisonment…
"Sa-MAN-tha?" called an annoyingly melodic voice from beyond her bedroom door. Mrs. Manson. In a heartbeat, Sam had vaulted her bed, and thrown herself up against her door to prevent her mother from entering, should she try. Heart racing, she looked back at Danny, but he had disappeared from sight. Taking a calming breath, Sam opened her door a crack and peered out. There was no one there-her mother was calling from the living room downstairs.
"What?" Sam shrieked back in reply.
"Why don't you stop pouting and come watch some Lifetime with me?" Sam went whiter than Danny's hair. Closing the door behind her, and locking it tight, she turned around slowly.
"Get me the hell out of here," she said to the empty patch of air where she knew her friend stood. A pair of green eyes appeared out of nowhere, and glared back at her mischievously in reply.
Flying was an experience Sam had become accustomed to over the past year.
Flying blindfolded, however, was something new entirely.
Danny had agreed to help liberate her, but continued to insist on keeping their destination a surprise. When he'd brandished one of Jazz's winter scarves (which he'd left on her window sill upon arrival) at her, though, Sam had flatly refused.
"C'mon Sam," he insisted. "You're, like, ten times smarter than I am. You're going to guess where we're going before we get even halfway there. Just humor me," he pleaded. "It was a lot of work to think this up." Finally (and mostly out of pity) Sam allowed her vision to be obscured.
"You try anything dirty, though…." She warned, letting the threat hang. Danny just chuckled.
"It's so nice to know you trust me."
There was something both equally breathtaking and frightening about flying blindfolded. About knowing that the ground was a long way away, and that if anything happened, there'd be little she could to save herself from, or even witness, the plunge. The thought sent adrenaline pounding though Sam's veins, and made her feel daring.
Bold.
Brave.
Even more so, the lack of her vision made Sam keenly aware of the feel of the air around her, and the roaring of the wind in her ears. The absence of familiar sensations, like the feel of ground beneath her feet, or the view of the buildings in front of them, washed over her like a second baptism. Like and infant, she was exploring a world previously unknown to her, where every second held the possibly of new discoveries, of something amazing taking place.
Not that Sam lost her practicality entirely. More than once did she felt her stomach drop out as their direction changed, and she gripped tighter to Danny's waist in response. Just because the possibility of plunging to her death sent her on an adrenaline rush her, didn't mean she was eager to give it a try. The third time she wound her arms tighter together, Danny leaned in towards her ear.
"Do you really think I'd ever let you fall?" he asked rhetorically, shouting over the roar of the wind. And the more Sam thought about it, she realized he was right. Not once had he ever let her down, literally, figuratively, or otherwise. She relaxed her grip, much to Danny's relief. The bite of her nails in his flesh was more painful than he'd ever be willing to admit.
Finally, Sam felt the wind decrease as they slowed for their landing. How long had they been in the air? Hours? Minutes? Sam had no idea. Time lost all boundaries, all meaning when you were traveling across the heavens.
"Almost there," Danny advised her, as they dropped rapidly, liked controlled stones. "Watch your feet." It was sound advice too, as a second later they came to a complete stop and Sam, unable to see, didn't time the impact correctly and almost sprawled onto her face. Danny kept a tight hold on her though, and managed to keep the girl on her feet, rocking her back against him. Fumbling about, Sam was reminded of the first time she tried to ice skate, and how's she been completely unable to even stand still without toppling over onto her knees. Fortunately, she'd walk away from this experience with fewer bruises.
"Nice catch," she chided, handing onto his arm with one hand, her other stretched out in front of her, trying to feel for her surroundings.
"Thanks, I've had a lot of practice," he shot back, implying that was her fault. Which it was.
"So can I take his thing off now?" Sam demanded, reaching for the scarf that was beginning to itch her forehead. Danny slapped her hand away though.
"Not yet," he ordered. "We're almost there." He took a step forward, pulling gently on her arm. "Just walk forward a few steps…" Cautiously, Sam took one baby step forward, then another. Shoes scuffing as she walked, Sam noted that the ground seemed to be rough, uneven, rocky.
"You're not going to run me off a cliff, are you?" she guessed with a grin. Danny responded by poking her hard in the ribs.
"Yeah Sam, that's exactly what I'm doing. I flew you all the way out to-,"
"Yes," Sam encouraged him. "Flew me out to…where?" She was punished with another poke.
"Nice try, but you'll find out soon enough. A little to the left now," he directed, as they walked a few yards further, feet crunching all the way. "Okay, stop right here." Slipping a little, Sam froze on the spot. Suddenly, Danny's arm disappeared from under her hand.
"Hey, what gives?" Sam demanded, suddenly very aware of her inability to see. She could very well be standing on the edge of a cliff for all she knew. She tried her best not to move, all the while groping out in front of her for Danny.
"Hold your horses," his voice said, coming from her left. "I'm right here." There was a flash of light which Sam was aware of, even with her eyes closed behind the blindfold. Then a second later, Danny's hand was on her arm, this time his bare skin against her own. He turned her wrist to the left. Sam was puzzled until he said
"Almost time…" and she figured he was looking at her watch. "Any second now…"
"'Any second' what!" she practically cried. A heartbeat later there was an ear-splitting BANG from over to the right. Instinctively, her hands flew up over her head, and she crouched to the left, but she heard Danny laugh, and he grabbed her shoulders and straightened her upright again.
"Okay, he said, reaching for the knot on the back of her head. "Now you can look." And as the blue wool fell away from her eyes, Sam was greeted by a flash of red, and another, equally impressive BANG! Her jaw fell open as the crimson sparks faded in the air around her.
"…Wow…" was all she could manage to say. Beside her, Danny was grinning fit to split his face in half.
"Best seats in the house," he boasted.
Turing in a slow circle, Sam tried to process exactly what she was seeing. Stretching out for miles around her was the cityscape of Amity, it's blinking lights and pulsating glows reaching back as far as the eyes could see. Danny had landed them on the roof of the Provincial Banking Building in the heart of the city. At sixty-five stories, it was the tallest structure in the Amity's more urban hub. It also happened to border on the city park where, among other things, the town's big annual fireworks display was held. As each bright explosion lit the night sky in a myriad of colors, Sam felt like all she would have to do was reach out her hand if she wanted to catch one of the falling stars.
"Danny…this is…amazing," she choked out, walking across the gravel coated rooftop until she reached the guardrail running around the perimeter. As if in response to her exclamation, a rocket of bright green pulses exploded into life out over the park, just a few feet above where they stood. "I feel like I could reach out and snatch them, right out of the air."
"Well, that would probably burn pretty bad," he teased, coming up beside her. "But it is a pretty great view." He glanced at her sideways, blue eyes sparkling in the bright light. "Now isn't this better than sitting home all night?" he asked, wrapping his arm around Sam's waist in a half-hug. She shot him a wry grin, peering at him out of the corner of her eye.
"You bet your ass it is," she replied, leaning her head on his shoulder as the night sky exploded around them, as if the world was on fire. "Thanks…for everything."
"Hey, what are friends for?" was his only reply.