My NaNo is going good, I'm on target with about 1800 words per day. Here's another chapter of Teenager. If it seems a little slow, don't worry. Some conflict starts up in the next chapter.

Just wondering how you all are percieving the Goth Ethan. Can you see him with the black and blue hair and the piercings? Do you think it could really happen? I wanted to do something different, yet remain true to the characters---at least true to what the characters might become.

By the way, does anyone know Veruca's last name?

Enjoy.

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Somehow they were out on the sidewalk, putting one foot in front of the other, heading down to Food Giant. "Oh man," Ethan laughed. "Are we going to Food Giant? Really?"

"That's where they keep the chocolate cupcakes, sweetheart," Veruca said.

Ethan looked across at her. "Your hair," he said. "It's red. It's really…really red…"

"I know," Veruca said. "After this, we'll catch the bus over to Super Sound, okay? It's almost seven."

Ethan nodded. "Rookey, I love you," he said. "You're going to buy me chocolate cupcakes?"

"Sure, Ethe," she said, linking her arm in his.

By the time they got to Food Giant they were not as stoned as they had been earlier, but craving the cupcakes more than ever. They ran all through the store, looking at virtually everything, then settling for two packages of Ring Dings and a two liter bottle of A&W cream soda. They brought their snack on the bus, and sat in the back, enjoying their feast, sharing the warm soda. They were laughing so much that the other people on the bus kept casting odd glances at them.

"We've got to calm down." Veruca warned, "Or the bus driver is going to throw us off."

"That's right," Ethan agreed in a loud voice. "Throw the weird Goth kids off the bus. Because they were laughing."

"A crime!" Veruca exclaimed, and they laughed some more.

Then finally, Veruca said, "Okay, okay. Let's calm down. Seriously."

"And how do you suggest we do that?" Ethan wondered pushing his black hair out of his eyes. He reached into his back pocket and produced a comb, smoothing down his long mop of black and faded blue hair, then checking his eyeliner in the small attached mirror.

"Well…" Veruca suggested carefully. "How about…we talk about Lizzie?"

Ethan clutched his heart. "Ouch," he said quietly. "You know right where to aim, don't you?"

"Come on, Ethe. You listened to me go on and on before about Gordo. I want to know what's happening with you and Lizzie."

"Nothing's happening with me and Lizzie," Ethan said heavily.

"Will she even talk to you?" Veruca wondered. "Will she return your calls?"

"No," he said flatly. "She gets her family to lie for her and say she's not home. And when I see her in school, she looks the other way."

Veruca sighed. "Kind of like what Gordo does with me."

Ethan laughed derisively. "What the hell is wrong with us, Rookey? Why the hell are we crushing on a couple of Straights? And Straights that are such stuck up snobs they want absolutely nothing to do with us."

"At least at one time Lizzie was crazy for you. You remember."

"Of course I remember. In middle school. Man! What was wrong with me? Such a fine chick like Lizzie, and I totally blew her off. I had my chance and I blew it."

"Yeah, but Gordo never even gave me a second glance. And I know why. It's because I'm fat."

"Damn it, Rookey! You are not fat! And if it bothers you so much, why don't you just go on a fucking diet?"

"Ethe! Don't yell at me. I'm far too delicate…"

"Delicate, my ass," Ethan scoffed. "You are the strongest woman I know. The strongest and the smartest. And David Gordon is an absolute imbecile if he can't see that."

Veruca laughed. "Did you say…imbecile?"

"Yeah, I did!" Ethan exclaimed.

"Ethe! Such a big word. We may have to reconsider getting you into Ohio State."

"Don't kid yourself, Rookey. The best I can hope for is Assistant Manager at the Hot Topic in the mall. But I wouldn't mind that."

"I wouldn't either," Veruca said. "As long as you can get me a discount."

"You can count on it," Ethan said. "You can count... on a discount."

Counting on a discount sent them into hysterics again, and all the people on the bus were happy to finally see them disembark, ten blocks away from Super Sound Studios.

-

The walk to the Studio did not seem that long, as they met up with friends along the way, joked around, smoked another joint. Andrew had a bottle of booze and they passed it around. "Oh man!" Ethan said as he chugged some down. "I am going to get so wasted!"

As a matter of fact, by the time they got to the concert, Ethan was pretty far gone and feeling just fine about that. Everybody they knew was there, it was a total party. Veruca went off with Melissa, Cassandra and Tom, and Ethan found himself floating around the crowd, enjoying each new experience as he came upon it.

The music was too good for words, and so he just listened, getting lost in the energy of it for songs at a time. Those were minutes that seemed like hours. Pedro's band played first, and Ethan kept yelling "You rock, man! You fuckin' rock!" They were good, and he was so wasted.

Next came another band, which Ethan did not know so well, and which he quickly discovered did not rock his world the way Pedro's band had. Temporarily bored by the music, he glanced around, looking for chicks.

Chicks always dig me, Ethan thought with a cocky smile. Always have, always will. It didn't matter if he was a straight jock or a head-banging Goth, there was always some girl somewhere that wanted a piece of him. And sure enough….there she was.

Ethan grinned across the crowded room at Kate Sanders. Once upon a time Kate had been as straight at he had been. They had been hot and heavy, off and on, for many years. Still were. Kate could not seem to let go. Even now, Elvira-ed out from her pitch black hair to the tips of her black leather stiletto heels, her breasts pushed up by a black corset and practically falling out of her fishnet top, she could clearly attract any guy here.

But she had her eye on Ethan, across the crowded room. Slowly, he made his way over to her, pushed here and there by the crowd as if by waves, but eventually bobbing quite contentedly directly in front of his old flame.

"Kate…Sanders…" he said, still grinning.

"Ethan, you germ," she said. "How the hell are you, anyway?"

They talked for a while, barely able to hear each other over the music. Soon, jostled by the crowd, Ethan yelled, "Hey! You want to get out of here?"

Kate nodded and grabbed his hand. She dragged him to the back door and out into the alleyway. Here it was quieter, darker, cooler. Ethan sat down on…on something, he wasn't sure what, and he was too wasted to care. He barely knew where he was, or even who he was.

"Oh, Kate…Kate…" he moaned. "How the hell did we get here? How did we ever go from the popularity jocks we were in middle school to…to…this…"

Kate got down on her knees before him, wrapping her arms around his waist and kissing him fully on the lips.

Ethan laughed through the kiss. "Katie…what are you doing…?"

"Shut up," she said. "I want you."

A half hour later Ethan found himself lying down in the back seat of some anonymous car, zipping up his pants, sighing as the rushing noise within his head slowly subsided. "Damn, Kate," he said appreciatively. "You still got it."

"So do you," Kate complimented, readjusting her fishnet top. "And the tongue piercing…very nice touch," she added.

"I did it just for you," Ethan said with a crooked smile.

"Did not, you moron."

Alright, I didn't," Ethan amended.

"Ethan!"

"Hey! Wait! Listen!" Ethan exclaimed, suddenly sitting up. "Shit! That's Kendrick's band! I'm missing it!"

Ethan jumped up and Kate screamed, "Hey! What about me?"

"It's been real, Katie. But I gotta go."

"Fuck! Ethan, you get back here!" Kate yelled at him through the back window of the car.

But Ethan was already back in the crowd, absorbed by the music, screaming along with the lyrics. Tom and Cassandra were by his side. Veruca was there too. They all began to dance. "Kendrick is awesome!" Veruca yelled. "He's fuckin' awesome!"

"No, shit!" Cassandra agreed. "I want to have his baby!"

The energy was so intense until finally the concert ended with an explosion of sound and fury. Afterwards everybody was exhausted, musicians and audience alike, but not too exhausted to wonder what their next stop might be this evening. After much milling about, it was decided that Denny's was the place to be. Ethan and Veruca would catch a ride with Tom and Cassandra. Pedro and William were also coming along in the car.

Veruca called her mom to advise of the plans. Mom just wanted to know if she was still with Ethan, if he was still protecting her. "Yes, Mom, Ethan is always protecting me," she said into the phone, smiling at Ethan. "I'll see you later."

Veruca offered her phone to Ethan. "You gotta call anyone?"

Ethan looked at the cell phone as if it were a poisonous snake. "No," he said glumly.

"What about your dad?" Veruca asked.

Ethan shook his head. "I got no one to call, no one who cares. All the people I care about are right here," he added, leaning back against the shabby leather seat of Tom's rusty, people-packed Cadillac. He wrapped his arm around Veruca and in that moment, that was all he needed.

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More.