Disclaimer: I don't own Danny Phantom, Butch Hartman does. Kris and co.are mine. Blah blah blah. Oh, also, there are a couple references to Smallville/Superman and Spongebob Squarepants, and maybe a few other things, so I figure I better mention that I don't own any of those either. Just Kris and her friends and family.
"Are you sure you saw it?" Ben asked with all seriousness, rather than using the mocking tone that had been used when discussing these incidents in the past.
"Yes." Teresa and I replied at the same time.
Lexi paused for a minute, messing with her hair. "No." She answered.
"What do you mean 'No'? You said so yourself, if almost attacked you!" Teresa voiced exactly what I'd been thinking. We both gave her a questioning, and slightly upset, look.
"Come on girls. You don't actually believe we saw some monster creature." She answered with an eye roll.
"Uh, yeah. We do. Why don't you?" I asked.
She sighed, glanced off to the side, gave a flirty wink to some guy walking past, and then replied, "I think we just had too much sugar Friday night. Made us hallucinate or something."
"You think that, or your parents do?" Teresa sounded a bit frustrated. "And we did not have very much sugar. Your mom wouldn't have allowed it."
Lexi glared at this. "My parents have nothing to do with it." She answered, though I must say that I didn't really believe that. "And maybe it wasn't the sugar, it could have been something else we ate. I thought the cola tasted odd, anyway."
"It tasted odd because it was diet cola. Your mother just removed the label, thinking we wouldn't know the difference." Teresa pointed out, sounding even tenser.
"Listen, you can believe this magic and fairy tale junk all you want, but I" Lexi began, but Teresa stopped her.
"Who said anything about magic?" She snapped.
"Well what else could it be? Other than a hallucination."
"Maybe it was mutated from radioactivity or something." Ben chimed in.
Lexi rolled her eyes again, still glaring a bit. "You watch too many cartoons, Ben."
I could see things getting real bad, real fast. "Hey!" I called. "Guys, calm down. There's no reason to argue over this."
"You're right, Kris." Lexi agreed, though her tone was somewhat snobby. She stood, lifting her lunch tray from the table the four of us were seated at. "There's no reason to argue, because there's no such thing as monsters. It was all in your imaginations. And until you all can accept that, I'll be eating my lunch with some of my other friends." She marched away then, leaving a very upset Ben and Teresa behind.
"Ugh, she's such a pain, sometimes." Teresa growled.
I sighed, "No. She's just… opinionated." Keeping my friends together is difficult sometimes, but somebody's got to do it.
"She's annoying, that's what she is." Ben grumbled.
It was Wednesday, around lunchtime as you've probably guessed, and we had just finished relating our story to Ben. He'd been sick since Sunday, so we hadn't had the chance to tell him about the slumber party. Lexi, Teresa, and I had recounted the whole ordeal to Brad (who was currently receiving punishment for talking out in class), but Lexi's opinion of the incident seems to have changed over the past two days.
And because of that, three of my friends aren't too happy with each other. We've had problems before, no true friendship doesn't. All this means is that we'll be seeing less of Lexi for a short while, two or three weeks at the most. She'll come around eventually, and everyone will forget about the whole thing.
In fact, only a few minutes later Ben and Teresa had already gotten over the problem, and moved back to what we were discussing earlier.
"So, what did it look like, again?" Ben asked, his serious tone back again.
"Well I didn't see it as well as Kris. She's seen it twice." Teresa said before finishing her mashed potatoes.
"You saw it again?" My friend shouted, surprised.
I gave an annoyed sigh. "Yes. I saw it several weeks ago in the park. Cal saw it too. But, honestly, I'd rather not describe that thing again."
"Well then, what do you think it was?" Ben continued.
"I have no idea. Cal thinks these are all signs of an alien invasion or something." I said, laughing a little at the suggestion.
Ben considered this for a moment. "That's possible." He nodded. Teresa and I gave him odd looks.
"Maybe you do watch too many cartoons, Ben." Teresa joked and we all laughed.
Just then, a white blur rushed past our table, followed by a larger red blur and Dash's angry voice shouting "You're dead, Fenton!" That exclamation was enough to determine what was going on. Dash chasing Danny… again.
"Think they'll ever learn to get along?" I asked, watching the two boys take off around the corner and out of sight.
"Doubt it." Teresa answered, pushing a small pile of peas around her lunch tray with a spork. "This is Dash we're talking about. He's spoiled and stubborn, and gets what he wants. And for some reason, he really wants to pummel Danny."
"Speaking of Fenton…" Ben started, a somewhat teasingly evil glare in his eyes. "You hear what he did at the Zoo the other day?"
Teresa's blue eyes brightened and shot up from her lunch tray to meet Ben's gray ones. "What? What happened?" She asked excitedly.
"He and his friends snuck into the cage of some rare gorilla. Said they were studying it for some school project."
"The Purple Back Gorilla?" I spoke up, not much interested in the actual conversation. Ben simply shrugged.
"Seriously?" Teresa pressed. "How close did they get to him?" She loves this kind of thing, gossip and such.
"Close enough for Fenton to figure out that the monkey wasn't a he, but a she."
Both of my friends then began to laugh rather loudly. I'll admit the news was interesting in a slightly amusing sort of way, but they were laughing for a different reason. I knew what would come as soon as they could catch their breath, and hoped to change the subject before that could happen.
"Gorillas aren't monkeys." My pathetic attempt to distract them wasn't even heard, and they continued.
"He's a regular Jane Goodall." Ben chuckled.
"Or Doctor Doolittle. Maybe he can tell me what's wrong with my cat." Teresa giggled.
The mocking would continue for a while, probably drifting to Danny's friends as well. I sighed, pushed my lunch tray out of the way, and let my head drop to the table. I wasn't trying to attract attention to myself, but that's how it turned out.
Teresa's half of the laughter stopped abruptly. "You okay, Kris?" She asked, somewhat concerned.
I sat up again, focusing on a tree a short distance away. "You guys… you shouldn't talk about people like that." I answered, slightly afraid of what their reaction might be.
Ben's chuckling died down. "Come on, Kris." He said with a smile. "It's just for fun, not like we're saying any of this to their faces."
"Oh, so that makes it alright?" I remarked sarcastically.
Teresa and Ben fell silent, their smiles vanished, and they looked from me to each other, then back to me. Ben squirmed uncomfortably, and Teresa's eyes held a hint of guilt.
She sighed sadly. "No. It doesn't. You're right, Kris."
"Yeah…" Ben agreed, looking down at his lunch tray. A moment passed before he looked up again, this time with a mischievous smirk. "We can still talk about each other though, right? As friends?"
"I don't see why not. Haven't we always?" I answered, suspicious of what he was thinking. "All though, with the recent scene with Lexi, I think it would be best if you didn't tease her until things get sorted out again."
His smirk grew. "Well then Saint Kristina, do you plan on finishing your grapes?"
I glared playfully. "No. You can have them." I then proceeded to toss three or four grapes at him, pelting him on the head.
Brad walked up then, carrying a lunch tray piled with food. He laughed at our mini food fight as Ben began to return fire with his carrots. "Careful guys, you wouldn't want to pull a Fenton from a few weeks ago. I hear he's still on thin ice with Lancer. Hey! Speaking of Fenton, did you guys here,"
"Yes." Teresa, Ben, and I said at the same time, and a bit louder than we maybe should have.
"Okay, okay! Gosh. What was that all about?"
I sighed in frustration, setting my head on the table again. Teresa patted my shoulder and whispered that she'd talk to him later. I thanked her silently with a smile. She turned to our other friend and looked at his meal. "Wow, Brad. You think you've got enough food to last the winter? How do you plan to eat all that when lunch is half over?"
Brad responded by shoving three large forkfuls of spaghetti into his mouth, chewing maybe two or three times, and then swallowing the whole mouthful in one big gulp.
"Ew!" "Oh, gross!" "Yuck!" Teresa and I shouted. Ben just laughed, first at Brad then at our reaction. He then went ahead and began shoveling heaping spoonfuls of mashed potatoes into his own mouth.
Teresa winced, then glared. "If you two are going to sit here and be disgusting, we're leaving." We both stood up and stepped over the benches, taking our nearly empty trays with us. Brad tried to protest, but his mouth was too full to make any sense of it.
xxxxx
My mom, brother, and I have set up a system over time, a certain way things happen that doesn't really change without a very important reason. You've already witnessed some of this, especially our morning routines. It's not like this is a major thing or that I'm dependent on it. After all, Mom's work schedule keeps anything from being set in stone. But I do like to know when something is changed, and in most cases I usually do.
Let me get to my point. Everyday after school, I meet Cal at the bus stop and we walk home together. If there is some reason he won't be there waiting for me, my mom calls the school and makes sure I get a message or note to let me know.
However, when I got off the bus today I found the bus stop corner devoid of a certain ten-year-old little brother. As you've probably figured, I had not received any warning of this, and was a bit worried. Okay, so actually I was very worried, but can you honestly blame me?
When I first noticed he was gone, I had thought he might be just around the corner playing in Ms. Henderson's backyard with Joey. So I said bye to Ben and Teresa, and went to check it out. He wasn't there, and Ms. Henderson hadn't seen him. That's when I started to worry.
So I ran home, hoping he'd be there waiting on the porch for me to come find him and unlock the front door. All the way back to the house, I was worrying and wondering what to do if I couldn't find him. What if he'd been kidnapped? What if he missed his bus and tried to walk home, and got lost? (It never occurred to me that he may have just missed the bus and was waiting at the school for Mom or I) What if he got hurt? I couldn't help but let a few scary images of glowing monsters mix with all the other fear and worry.
He wasn't sitting on the porch. By now my stomach was doing flips, and not good flips like when I get excited. I decided to go inside and call my mom. She'd know what to do. I got out my house key, put it into the keyhole, and realized the door was already unlocked.
I walked inside, assuming Mom had forgotten to lock it again. Before I could even begin to search for the phone, I stumbled over the red and orange backpack belonging to Calvin.
"Hey, Kris." My younger brother greeted me, smiling with a mouth covered in peanut butter and jelly.
"Calvin!" I exclaimed, half relieved, half ticked off. "What are you doing here?"
"Eating." He answered, holding up a half finished sandwich.
I slipped my backpack off and looked at him a minute, not sure whether to hug him or scold him. "You're supposed to wait for me at the bus stop. I was worried."
He shrugged. "Joey stayed home sick today, so I was bored waiting for you. And I was hungry. So I came home." He took another bite of the sandwich.
I managed to keep my temper under control, taking a moment to calm down and change the subject. "How'd you get inside? Did Mom forget to lock the door again?"
"Nah, I used the key under the flower pot."
"That key is for emergencies only."
"This was an emergency. I was hungry."
I sighed, setting both our backpacks in the closet where they go. "You did put it back under the pot, right?" After a second thought, I pulled the backpacks out again.
"Yes. What're you doing?" He finished his sandwich and knelt down next to me as I began fishing through his bag.
"Where's your homework? How can you find anything in this mess?" I said, pulling out several old papers and garbage. I removed a brown paper sack and peeked inside. Immediately, I closed it again, making a face. Well, now we know what happened to that sack lunch Calvin lost three weeks ago.
Cal began to dig in with me. "I think I put my homework on this side…"
"You're lucky Teresa isn't here. She'd have a fit about this mess. Then she'd start lecturing you about cleanliness and organization." I chuckled.
We spent five minutes or so digging through his bag, and doing a little organizing. After throwing away a good chunk of the old, unneeded papers, we finally found his homework. I got mine out as well, and we settled at the kitchen table with some of the chocolate chip cookies I'd made the day before.
While I wrestled with some math problems, Cal spoke up. "See anything else today?" He asked.
"What do you mean?" I asked and took a bite of a cookie.
"You know." He replied. "Anything, er… special."
It took me a minute to realize that by special he meant glowing or floating for unnatural reasons. "No." I answered simply, not much interested in the topic. Then I had a second though. "Did you?"
"No." He said in disappointment. "Maybe we could go to the park today and,"
"I don't think so, Cal. Besides, it's probably gone by now."
"Yeah. I'll bet that other thing kicked its butt."
He was referring to the floating, glowing, black and white streak that had supposedly saved me and then went on to fight the park beast. Cal seems convinced the thing was, or is, good rather than evil. I don't know how he figures that. He didn't even see it. He only knows what I told him, and I hardly saw it myself.
I was silent, still avoiding the subject. Not to mention I was on a particularly difficult math problem.
"What do you think is causing all this?" He asked curiously.
"I thought you said it was aliens." I replied absently. What is seven times twelve again? Oh yeah…
Cal then went off on some complicated story about extraterrestrials and alien experimentation and recent abductions. I missed the majority of it, but as soon as he finished I looked up and smirked, "Cal, I really doubt this has anything to do with green rocks from outer space."
"I'm serious Kris! There have been six known incidents with these glowy things. Something is going on around here." Calvin whined at my sarcastic attitude.
I was just about to chuckle at how cute he was when he tried to act really smart, when I actually thought about what he said. Six incidents? Had there really been that many? Cal sees the park monster, I see the park monster, then there was the meat thing at school, some other lady supposedly sees the park beast, Teresa and Brad see the dragon, and then what happened during the slumber party. Of course I knew each thing was something serious, I just hadn't realized how serious. All of this had happened in only a little over a month.
I glanced up from my homework, finally giving Calvin a serious glance.
An hour later we were still deep in discussion while we loaded the dishwasher with things from breakfast.
"If they are all a bunch of science experiments on the loose, shouldn't there be something hunting after them? Like the scientists who lost control, or some government dudes in black suits and sunglasses?"
No matter how hard Cal tries to be serious, he still ends up sounding like a ten-year-old with a wild imagination. Which is okay, because that's what he is.
I laughed and shook my head at his question. "Yeah, I guess there should be something out looking for these things. We can't be the only ones who've noticed all this. And it's really possible that,"
At that moment the front door opened up and we could hear Mom walk into the house. "It can't be a real pineapple that he lives in, Cal. It would rot after a while." I said naturally, as if it were what we'd been talking about the whole time.
My amazingly intelligent younger brother caught on to the subject change immediately. "That still doesn't explain how it got under the sea."
"Hey kids!"
"Hey, Mom." My brother and I replied at the same time.
"How was work?" I asked, closing the dishwasher and turning it on.
Mom set her keys down in their place and pulled her hair out of the bun I'd pulled it into earlier. "Can't complain." She said with a sigh, leaning back in a kitchen chair. "What happened at school today?"
"Nothing." Cal answered, clearing the table of his homework (and unceremoniously shoving it all into his backpack again).
I wiped off the counter with a wet cloth. "Lexi got into another little quarrel with Ben and Teresa today."
"Oh dear. What about?"
I hesitated for a moment, and then shrugged. "The usual. She doesn't agree with something they said. You know the drill."
"So it's nothing serious then?" Mom asked, taking a bottle of water from the fridge and chugging quite a bit down.
"Nah. It'll all blow over in a week or two. Maybe sooner."
"That's good."
No, I haven't told my mom about any of the weirdness. I know I should have, like, forever ago. But it's just so hard. First there's finding the right time to do it, then there's finding the right way to do it. And who knows how she'll take it? Can you blame me for being so slow?
I had actually been planning on letting her know in a few days. But something else came up…
xxxxx
"Then he totally barfed it all up three minutes later." Ben finished his story. Both boys began a round of roaring laughter, while Teresa and I just groaned. My friend pushed her cheeseburger to the side, in front of Brad, who began eating it like nothing had happened.
"Lovely story, Ben." I said sarcastically. "Can we change the subject now?"
Brad swallowed a bite of burger, and then said, "Looks like Dash is handing out the invites to his party. Isn't it tomorrow?"
"Yep." Teresa said. "So, what are we doing Saturday night?"
"Movie?" Ben suggested.
"No… there's nothing good out." I said.
"Isn't Dead Teacher IV supposed to be out sometime soon?"
"Not soon enough."
"We haven't been to the roller skating rink in a while…"
My friends continued to ramble off different ideas. I let my gaze wander around the Nasty Burger restaurant. On one side of the room many kids I recognized from school were crowded around Dash Baxter and a few of the other 'popular' kids. Paulina, Kwan, and Valerie to name a few. Lexi was among them, hanging close to the star football player who was the center of attention.
I reached for my cup and put the straw to my lips as I watched Lexi with mild interest. When nothing but a slurping noise came from the cup, I lifted its lid to find I'd run out of soda. "Hey guys, I'll be right back. I need a refill." I said, standing up and heading for the drink spouts.
While adding a couple more pieces of ice to my cup, I found the brown-eyed face of my estranged friend there next to me. "Hey Kris. Sorry about yesterday. I just want you to know, that I don't hold anything against you. Honestly, it's Ben and Teresa who have the issues."
Yeah, that makes me feel so much better. I fought the urge to tell her off, and decided it might be best if I just tried to make peace. "Um… yeah. Well, we miss having you around."
Lexi ignored the 'we' part and figured I meant I missed hanging out with her. Of course, Ben and Teresa were still a little bitter toward her, so that may have been true. "Well you can always hang with me and my other friends. I think if you tried hard enough, you could really pass off as popular material."
In Lexi Language, that's a compliment. I just forced a smile and nodded politely. "Uh… thanks. But I,"
"Hey Lexi!" Dash's voice cut into our conversation from behind. We both turned to face the boy.
"Yeah?" She flashed a flirty smile.
Dash handed her a purple piece of paper. "I'll see you at my party Saturday, right?"
She giggled with a ridiculous and completely fake 'shy girl' act. "Yeah… I'll be there… but," she swung one arm around my shoulders in a half hug. "What about, Kris?"
"Uh… sure. Why not? The more the merrier, right?" Dash winked at my friend, handed me one of the purple papers, and walked off to continue handing out the invitations.
I stared at the paper with mixed feelings, thinking 'Kay, what just happened?'
Lexi cut into my thoughts. "See? You're getting noticed already. Now if we could just do something with your hair, and get the right shade of eye shadow… you'll be right up there on the social food chain with me in no time."
Did I like this? At the time, I wasn't entirely sure. Yes, it's nice to be noticed, and there aren't many people out there who don't crave at least a little popularity. But isn't that what I already had? A little was good enough for me. Besides, I had great friends, who were really my friends. Honestly, by 'popularity' standards, your friends are only friends if they had as much money, or looked as good as you did.
Lexi continued, not noticing my unsure expression. "This is great! We can use this party to boost your chances. I have this amazing outfit you can borrow just for the occasion. I'll do you hair and makeup. This will be awesome! And I,"
"Lexi! Get over here!" Someone called, and my friend smiled.
"Oops, gotta go. We'll talk tomorrow, okay?" She said quickly, and rushed off to meet one of her other friends.
I went back to the table where my other friends were seated. "What's up, Kris?" Teresa asked. She's always so observant.
I passed the invitation to her. Brad looked over her shoulder to see. "You got invited! How awesome is that?" He shouted.
"Only 'cause Lexi was standing next to me and making eyes at Dash." I said, rolling my eyes.
"So what? You're not going then?" Ben asked, taking the paper from Teresa so he could read it.
"I don't know…"
Teresa saw what was wrong. Gotta love that girl. "Come on, Kris. Don't decide you're not going just because we won't be there."
"That's not the only problem. If I do go, it would be for Lexi, to try and keep peace with her. Maybe I could convince her to forget about Wednesday." I said, playing with my fries.
"Then do that." Teresa shrugged.
I sighed. "I just… don't think this party is my thing, you know?"
"No kidding." Brad chuckled. This got him Teresa's elbow shoved between his ribs, as well as an upset glare. He quickly cleared his throat, and covered with, "Uh, you're too good for those parties."
Teresa was satisfied with this. "Well you never know, Kris. It could be fun." She added.
"Maybe… we'll see." I said, staring at the invitation Ben had returned to me.
We all got up to leave then. After throwing away our trash, Brad called out in surprise. "Dude, I think Dash just gave Fenton one of those invites."
"What!" exclaimed Ben, Teresa, and myself. Well, that was a surprise.
Which brings us to Saturday afternoon.
Really quick I think I'll tell you where my friends and I all live in relation to each other. First thing, we're all too far from Casper High to even think of walking to school. Except for Brad, he lives just inside the bus boundaries, meaning if he ever misses the bus he'll just sprint over to the school at top speed. Lexi lives several blocks away from him, and (as I've mentioned before) just one block away from the park, which is a short bike ride from my place. Ben and Teresa are across the street from each other, and around the corner from me. Do you understand all that?
Good, now back to the story. Ben, Teresa, and I had just left Brad's house after an unsuccessful study party (we all had a major science test coming up). My perfectionist, Hispanic best friend was not in the best of moods because of how badly the studying had gone, not to mention the fact that Ben and Brad continued their game of 'gross out the girls' that had been going on all week. Lets just say I won't be eating anything cream filled for a while.
Teresa glared straight ahead, ignoring Ben's teasing laughter and comments while grumbling to herself about many different things. I walked alongside her, carrying my backpack and nodding silently each time she ranted in my direction. When Teresa is like this, it's best just to let her rant.
We were planning on stopping at a nearby fast food place for a quick snack and to wait for Ben's mom to pick us up and take us home. I still had not decided whether I was going to the party with Lexi or not, and it was really bugging me. My friends all seemed convinced I should go, and that I'd have a good time, but I wasn't so sure.
My cell phone rang suddenly, and I had to stop in order to fish it out of my backpack. (The phone was my mom's old one. She'd decided it might be a good idea for me to have one after I had to use a pay phone to call her way back during the meat monster incident.)
The screen displayed Lexi's cell phone number, and I rolled my eyes in slight annoyance. I was only supposed to use the phone for emergencies, she knew that! I flipped it open anyway, putting it to my ear. "Quick, Lexi." I sighed.
"Coming or not?"
"Don't know yet…"
"You should! Have fun!"
"Well…"
"Food, people, A.J., games… fun,"
"Whoa! Wait a second… What was that?" I nearly shouted, forgetting about shortening our conversation to save minutes.
I could almost hear her smirking over the phone as she forgot to speak in small sentences as well. "There'll be lots of food, tons of great people, awesome games, it'll all be a lot of fun, and…"
"Lexi!" I said impatiently.
"…And I heard A.J. and his gang are going to be there too." When all she got as an answer was stunned silence, she continued. "I'll stop by your house in a couple hours to help you get ready. Buh bye!"
I heard her phone click off, heard Teresa saying my name a couple times, and felt her remove the cell from my hands, close it, and return it to my backpack. She stood in front of me and smiled. "I know that longing, dreamy, spaced-out stare. Have fun tonight, okay?"
"Okay…" I said finally, and then broke into an excited giggle. Teresa joined me, while Ben gave a fake gag. Serves him right.
We decided to hurry the rest of the way to the fast food place, but we got a little side tracked. As we rounded a corner, we found several people wandering around in front of a house. At the time, I didn't really realize the place was a house, mainly because of the flashing neon signs and the big, round, metal hunk of hardware perched on top of the building. The sign read "Fenton Works." A white banner hung across the building, reading "Giant Garage Sale" and a few tables were set up in front of it. These tables were practically buried in piles of things, mostly electronic devices. Danny Fenton, as well as his friends Tucker and Sam, stood behind the tables, apparently running things.
"What's going on here?" Ben asked.
Teresa snorted. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe a garage sale?" She pointed to the banner, and laughed at him.
He ignored her. "So this must be Danny Fenton's house." He said.
"I wonder what gave you that idea." Teresa continued.
I just laughed at my friends and went to take a look around.
A lot of the stuff was just parts, pieces, and chunks of other things. This seemed odd to me at first, but then I remembered that Mr. and Mrs. Fenton were inventors and scientists and that sort of thing. (I forget what it is they specialize in. It's something really… eh… different, I remember that much.)
I picked through some of the things, as did Teresa and Ben, though I didn't find much that interested me. For a moment I glanced up, and noticed Tucker Foley sitting in a chair across the tables and a little into the alley between houses. He smiled and waved in a friendly way. "Hey, Kristina!"
"It's Kris." I corrected before returning the greeting and then going back to my search.
"Oh…" Teresa cooed. I turned to see what she'd found. She was inspecting a pretty decent VCR. "Check this out. I could use a VCR, and this looks like it's in one piece. Unlike the rest of this stuff." She gestured with a hand at the piles of spare parts.
"Good. Then get it." Ben said with a bored tone. "I don't see anything I like." He whined. "And I'm starving. Let's get going."
I sighed. "I don't see anything either. Come on, lets," I stopped then as I noticed a little white something half buried in other junk. Without explaining to my friends, I dug the object out to inspect it. "Hey!" I said happily, holding up a little, battery powered hand mixer (like, for cooking). "I've needed another of these for a while. My last wore out from excessive use…"
"Does this mean we'll be seeing your Famous Grasshopper Brownies again?" Ben asked. No, he wasn't kidding about the grasshopper part, or about liking them.
I turned the little white mixer over, only to find a good section of the covering on one side was missing, with wires and things completely exposed. "That's got safety hazard written all over it…" Teresa said.
"Yeah…" I gave a disappointed sigh and set the thing down again. "Too bad."
"Something wrong?"
We all looked up to see Danny standing across the table from us. Ben held up the mixer. "I don't suppose you have any hand mixers that work?" he asked eagerly. He really wanted those brownies.
"This one should work fine." Danny said, taking the white mixer from Ben and inspecting the open side. "At least, it did before my parents tried to turn it into a proto-type for one of their guns…" He added.
I raised an eyebrow and gave a questioning glance to Teresa, who just shrugged. Danny turned to a box behind him, and fished around in it for a moment. When he turned back, he had a white piece of plastic the same shape as the missing piece to the mixer. He snapped it into place, and flipped the switch to setting three. Instantly the beaters whirred to life, spinning like any other mixer's beaters should.
"Well, it's not blowing up, so it should be perfectly fine." He assured us, turning the mixer off again and handing it to me.
"Thanks. I'll take it." I said with a shrug.
About an hour later I was back home carefully washing the mixer (Teresa pointed out a few spots of green something-or-other, and insisted it be cleaned immediately) while listening to Cal recount his play date with Joey. Teresa was organizing the pantry, and Ben had had to go home for chores. Lexi had called only a few minutes earlier to let me know she'd be over in an hour and a half.
Calvin finished his story, and then asked, "So, see anything today?"
He'd been asking me the same thing every day since Wednesday. My answer was, thankfully, always the same. "Nope."
"Seen anything?" Teresa repeated. "What does he mean?"
"Anything special." I said simply. She understood what I meant without any problems.
"Nope… none of that. Thank goodness." Teresa said, and then went back to alphabetizing the soup cans.
The phone rang then, and since my hands were too wet to hold the receiver, I tapped the speaker button with my elbow.
"Carey residence." I greeted the caller. Checking caller ID is not a habit I've developed, so I never really know who it is until they tell me.
"Hey sweetie." Mom answered. "I'm just calling to let you know I'll be home around eleven tonight. Okay?"
"What!" I shouted. "Mom, the party!"
"What?"
I sighed in annoyance. "I told you yesterday! I got invited to this major party, and it's tonight!"
My mother let out a slight gasp, and then moaned a bit. "Oh, Kris, honey. I'm sorry, I completely forgot. I thought you said you weren't going to that…"
"I said I wasn't sure if I was or not. And you said you would be home either way."
"My schedule got changed last minute."
We both exhaled at the same time, frustration obvious in our voices. I said, "I'll just have to stay home." Honestly, I was both disappointed and relieved.
"I'm really sorry, Kris. But I can't really do anything now. I'll make it up to you, though. I,"
Teresa interrupted, "I can baby-sit Cal, Ms. Carey."
There was a bit of a pause as my mom thought this over. Then she answered, "That… sounds good to me. What do you think, Cal? Mind if Teresa watches you tonight?"
"Nah, that's fine." My brother shrugged.
"Alright then. I'll see you all late tonight. Remember your curfew, Kris."
"I will mom. Thanks. Bye." I said with false enthusiasm, and turned the phone off again.
Teresa gave me a satisfied look. "You're going. So there."
I just smiled and laughed a bit.
Brad and Ben showed up a little while later, deciding to hang out with Teresa and Cal since they had nothing better to do on a Saturday night. I'll admit it was really awkward for me to think that all my friends were going to be having fun at my house while I was at someone else's, probably having no fun at all.
The doorbell announced Lexi's arrival, right on time as usual. Rather than waiting for someone to answer the door, she walked right in and called for me. I was in the kitchen at the time, along with my brother and other friends. As soon as I heard the bell and the opening door, I rounded the corner to the living room, and was in the doorway right as she called my name. Then I froze in my tracks.
There was Lexi's face and bossy personality, but it certainly wasn't Lexi's wardrobe. She was dressed in black, from head to toe, not a single other color in site. Well, other than her hair, which was streaked with red. Her eyes were thickly lined, she wore black lipstick, and… was that a nose ring?
It was a fake piercing of course, but just the shock of seeing the little silver ring attached to her face was enough to freak us all out.
"Lexi?" I practically shouted in surprise and confusion. "What… how… why are you dressed like that?"
She ignored our reactions and walked past everyone, grabbing me by the wrist and leading me up to my room. "The party's dress code was changed last minute. You won't believe how hard it was for me to find this stuff on such short notice."
"Dress code? Change? To what?" I stuttered. My eyes still hadn't left that little ring.
Lexi gently pushed me down to sit on the bed, then crossed to my closet and began rummaging through the different clothes. "Loser Chic. Now, let's find the geekiest clothes you've got."
I didn't like the sound of this, but before I could protest she had pulled out a brown plaid skirt and held it up to me. "Ooh, look at this thing. It's the perfect 'nerdy' skirt."
"I like that skirt!" I said, but Lexi didn't hear me. She had returned to the closet. A minute or two later she had removed a white dress blouse, some knee high stockings, and a pair of brown shoes I'd had to wear for a recent family portrait. Actually, the entire outfit looked like something meant for a family picture, or perhaps a school uniform.
Lexi threw it all at me, told me to change, then left the room for a few minutes. I groaned in frustration and put everything on. She came back just as I was slipping on the second shoe.
"Kay… we won't really need to do much with make-up. Unless you want a few fake zits?" She sat me down again and settled herself right behind me, beginning to brush my hair. "Some simple pigtail braids will have to do. Oh! With little bows on the ends. This'll be great."
Next thing I knew, my hair was pulled back into two clumsy braids, each fastened at the ends with a green ribbon bow. I still hadn't managed to get a word in with Lexi, at least not one that had been noticed. We were back in the living room, my friends all around me holding back laughter while I glared at them all.
"Now," Lexi said, fishing through a black purse. "For the finishing touch… put these on." She held out a pair of large, black, thick-framed glasses.
Rather than waiting for me to take them (not that I would've anyway) she put the things over my face and behind my ears. The lenses had been removed, so I could still see out of them.
Brad couldn't take this anymore, and he let out a couple chuckles.
Ben, instead of laughing at me, broke his strained silence (it had been obvious the entire time, that he was trying his hardest not to say anything to or about Lexi) and said, "Why do carry a pair of geek glasses in your purse anyway, Lexi."
"Oh who asked you?" She snapped, raising the already high tension in the room.
I decided dealing with my appearance was less important than keeping things calm between my friends. "Okay, Lexi. If you're done dressing me up, let's get going. We wouldn't want to be late, right?"
Lexi agreed and headed out the door, I followed after sending an unsure glance in Teresa's direction. She just shrugged and waved me off.
Mrs. Burks was waiting in the driveway with her car. She dropped us both off at the Baxter's, without a word to either Lexi or myself. I got the feeling that Mrs. Burks was not too pleased with Lexi's choice of clothing for the evening.
Despite the fact that we had left early, we arrived a bit late. Lexi's mother had gotten lost on the way. So once we got inside the place was already filling up, music was playing, and everyone was already having a good time.
I'd rather not go into detail about what they were all wearing. And there's really no sense in describing the first fifteen minutes of the party. You see, after we got there Lexi went off to chat with someone, leaving me to fend for myself. I wandered for a while, not really interested in starting a conversation with any of these people. For one, I doubted we'd have much to discuss, and for two, I really wasn't very happy with them anyway.
As I wandered through the kitchen and considered grabbing a handful of chips, I noticed the patio door was wide open, to let some fresh air in probably. So I went on out, feeling the need for some time alone.
I walked out and leaned against the wall next to the door, just staring at the night sky. I was only there for half a minute before a voice interrupted my thoughts.
"Kris? What're you doing out here?"
Trying my hardest not to act startled or embarrassed, I turned to the person. "Hey, A.J. I'm just… hanging out." I shrugged and motioned to the small backyard.
"Cool. Me too." He glanced around casually. "So… are you having a good time?"
I started to say something completely false like 'Oh yeah, it's awesome,' but decided to just stick with the truth. With a sigh, I answered, "No. I only came 'cause one of my friends was going to be here, but things really aren't that great."
"Yeah… this party isn't all it's cracked up to be. At least, not for our sort of people, huh?" He gave a half smile. I noticed then that he was dressed in his regular clothes, and my crush on him grew to about twice its previous size.
Just then, two more people wandered out the back door to join us. I recognized them immediately as Niki and Josh, A.J.'s two good friends.
Niki looked displeased. "Is it just me, or is this the dullest party we've ever been to? I mean, what kind of lame theme is 'Loser Chic' anyway?"
"Yeah," Josh nodded, chugging down a glass of soda. "I wish I had known this would be a costume party. I would've come dressed for the occasion."
The blonde girl turned to her friend and remarked with fake surprise, "You're not in costume?" We all laughed at the comment, while Josh just rolled his eyes. Niki turned to me then. "Hey, Kris. Long time no see. Cute skirt."
"Thanks." I said, glancing over the plaid thing again.
"Well, I don't know about you all…" the talkative sixteen year old girl continued, "But I'm ditching this place. Who's with me?"
"Yeah, why not? There aren't any good refreshments here anyway." Josh agreed, headed around the house for the street.
I thought about something for a moment as I watched the two begin to leave. "Could I, maybe, catch a ride home with you guys? I've had about enough popularity to last me a life time."
"Sure." Niki shrugged. "Come on, the car is this way."
"What about your friend?" A.J. asked.
I glanced back at the house. "Don't worry. I doubt that she'll even notice I've gone."
xxxxx"So… you just left? You didn't even tell her you were going?" Teresa asked while stirring some butter and melting chocolate chips in a saucepan on the stove.
"Yep." I sighed, dumping another half cup of powdered sugar into the mixing bowl next to me. I'd been home for forty-five minutes now, and immediately after arriving I'd started cooking. It helps me calm down.
The kitchen was full of the smell of freshly baked chocolate brownies, which were currently cooling in their pan on a counter. Teresa was, as I just mentioned, stirring and melting a pan of chocolate chips and some butter. I was about to mix together the sugar, butter, cream cheese, and mint syrup that makes up the filling for my Grasshopper Brownies. The mint is why they're called Grasshopper, you see. They really don't have anything to do with insects.
"I wouldn't be surprised if Lexi doesn't realize I wasn't there until after she sees me again on Monday." I said, picking up the, now clean, white hand mixer I'd bought earlier that day.
"Well, I'm sorry it didn't work out for you." Teresa said, scraping the melted chocolate into a separate bowl and leaving the now empty saucepan to cool.
"No, it's alright." I assured my friend. "I'm going to have fun eating brownies 'til I'm sick and watching movies with my friends and younger brother all night."
The boys came upstairs from the family room, then. "I smell brownies!" Ben said excitedly.
"Not yet, Benji." I smiled, using the full version of his first name. "We've still got to finish the filling and the frosting, put it all together, and then it has to sit in the fridge for an hour. You know that."
"Yes, Kristina, I know." Ben rolled his eyes, and sat at the table to pout. We all just laughed at him.
I set the mixing bowl of ingredients on a counter, and went to plug the mixer into the wall. Before I could get within inches of the outlet, the beaters suddenly spun to life and the whole thing started to shake in my hands. I shrieked and dropped it on the ground, jumping back. Everyone looked down at the little white machine as it spun wildly on the floor for a moment. A bright green glow surrounded the mixer, and it floated up off the ground.
At first everyone was frozen in fear, watching it with wide eyes. It turned around, almost as if it were looking around the room. The beater blades had stopped whirring, leaving the room in absolute silence. At least until Cal spoke.
"Whoa." My younger brother said, just as surprised as he was in awe. The glowing mixer turned suddenly to him, blades started spinning again, and it charged after him.
The next few seconds went a bit slow for me. When the mixer had first come to life, you remember, I had dropped it and jumped back. I happened to be next to the oven after that. The very instant I recognized that the thing was about to go after my little brother, instinct kicked in. I reached back behind me, gripped the handle of the saucepan Teresa had used earlier, and swung with all my might.
There were a couple loud cracking and banging sounds, then more silence, followed by another "Whoa" from Cal. The mixer was on the floor again, but it wasn't moving or glowing any more. It was now in two banged up pieces, lying there like any regular mixer might if someone had just smacked it with a pan. Speaking of which, the pan had a dent in it as well, and the bottom was scratched up a bit.
We all stood there stunned for a while. Then, silently, we cleaned up what mess had been made and finished preparing the brownies (I mixed the filling with a fork). After that we discussed what had just happened. I won't go into detail, since we really didn't say anything important. Actually, after throwing the mixer into a trashcan outside, everything went on as a regular Saturday night should.
There are only a few more important things to mention. My mom came home around eleven like she said she would, and asked about our night. We talked about the brownies, movies, jokes, and fun, but not a single thing was said referring to the crazy mixer.
Now that I think about it, there was one interesting comment made during our discussion about the attack of the mixer. Ben called it 'possessed' at one point, and the term just stuck. Before that, we had just figured it was caused by whatever experimentation Danny's folks had done to it.
The next day Teresa told us all about her missing VCR and the television it had been hooked up to, as well as the broken window in the same room. Her parents figured it was a 'breaking and entering' type thing, and that both items had been stolen. But my friends and I have decided, that the mixer must not have been the only electronic device to develop a mind of it's own that night.
Author's Note: Whew! I am extremely sorry for all the wait. I said you wouldn't get anything in November, but we're already about two weeks into December, which means I'm two weeks behind. I've been extremely busy all this week, and should be doing something else right now, so I haven't really checked over this chapter for mistakes. I just really wanted to get it up as soon as possible. That's really lazy of me, I know.
You might notice that I experimented with a couple things in this one. Italics in dialogue for one thing.Somesmall hints of character development here and there.This was also a very long chapter. It's the longest I've written so far, with chapter2 following close behind.
The next chapter is something like chapter 3: an original idea and incident, something that didn't happen in the actual series. You should be able to expect much more interaction between the main characters of DP and my characters, if all goes well. And hopefully, it'll be here within the next two weeks.
One more thing, Grasshopper brownies are the best desert food ever invented. Just thought I'd let you know.