Hey people. Here's a new chapter. also, i changed my username to boogityboo from mactavish. Hope everyone has a COOL 4th of July Weekend. You guys across the pond: I'll be cheering for England tomorrow!

btw: thischap is Phil's perspective

Chapter 11

"Giggle It, Just a Little Bit"

I couldn't believe we had come so close to doing what we came so close to doing. Keely's right, though. Maybe we shouldn't rush into it. It's been less than 24 hours. Gives us something to look forward to, right? Keep telling yourself that, Phil. Anyway, as crazy as it made me, I was determined not to be a total idiot. I thought I was all Mr. Doesn't Let His Hormones Go Berserk, but apparently not. I'm human. Imagine that. And she's… Keely. She's incredible. Who could blame me? It's like I have this inner evil twin who comes out when she's around and just wants to get naked. Anyways….

So Keely sent me home. She needed to shower, change fifteen times, etc. I was going to get there first and apologize to Lloyd and Barb for not calling last night. I really doubted they'd noticed, but, better safe than sorry. When I reached our house though, I saw something missing. The time machine. The clunky brown and tan 1970s RV normally parked in the driveway. Gone. I ran inside.

"Hello? Where's the time machine!" I yelled to anyone who could hear me. Pim appeared on the stairs.

"Well hello, loverboy," she said, kind of snarly.

"So where's the time machine?" I asked. I wasn't too worried yet. There was usually an explanation for this kind of thing in the Diffy household. Dad had probably dragged it up to the hardware store to get a new part. Or maybe Curtis had… I don't know… eaten it? Surely it wasn't fixed.

"Don't get your knickers in a twist, big brother," she said, coolly, crossing her arms. I read her t-shirt: GO BLANKYOURSELF. "Assuming you are wearing knickers," she said, laughing. Pim had heard Via use this knickers phrase once and she thought it was a riot. I actually chuckled at this remark, considering what almost occurred back in Keely's bedroom. Pim must have sensed something when I grinned because she made an I'm-gonna-puke face. "You've been over there… in that girl's pants all night, haven't you?" she asked.

"Wouldn't you like to know," I said. I went into the kitchen and pulled a chocolate-chip cookie spray can from the cabinet.

"I would not like to know, thanks," she said, sitting on a stool next to me. This was strange. She generally kept her distance.

"So, time machine?" I asked her, spraying a few cookies and two glasses of milk.

"It's like this, Diffy," she said, biting into a cookie. "Somebody stole it."

"What?" I couldn't believe my ears.

"Yep," she said, nodding. "Woke up this morning and went to the garage to feed Curtis. Saw that the time machine was missing. As were mom and dad. I was beginning to wonder if you three had left me here in this godforsaken century when you turned up all hippity-hoppity high on life."

"Are you sure they didn't fix it or something? Take it for a test spin?" I asked. No wonder they never called to check up on me.

"Fix it? Are you daft, man?" Pim asked, banging her fist on the counter. "This is Lloyd and Barb Diffy we're talking about!"

She was right. There was practically no chance of my parents fixing the time machine. But where could it, and they, be? "You're right, you're right…" I said. "Think, Phil, think."

"A lot of good that's gonna do us," Pim muttered.

I ignored her. "Wait," I said. "The Giggle!"

"What about it, wingnut?" Pim said.

"We can search for them, duh," I said, pacing. "It'll show us what happened!"

I ran upstairs to my room, got the Giggle, then came back down to the kitchen where Pim was sitting.

"I hope this works, Nimrod," Pim said. She so loves me. "Scooch over so we can both watch." It had been years since I had sat so close to my sister.

"Okay, Giggle on. Search Diffy family, June 2006," I told the Giggle. After a second, four choices popped up on the screen, one for each of us. "Okay, um, Diffy, Lloyd and Barbara, Sunday, June 4."

The screen showed my parents getting out of bed, Dad shaving, Mom fixing coffee, yada, yada, yada. Then my dad goes out to the garage to start on his normal Sunday morning try-and-fix-the-time-engine duties. Mom does some laundry. Dad comes in the kitchen with his eyebrows burned off. Mom fixes them with her Wizard. Blah, blah, blah. So far nothing major. Then, my mom follows Dad out of the kitchen through the back door. Outside, Dad goes into the time machine—"Now we're getting somewhere," I told Pim—and sits in the driver's seat. He cranks the ignition with the keys. Mom sits in the passenger seat.

"Well that explains it," I said.

"Explains what, fry daddy?" Pim asks. Where does she get these names?

"They did go for a drive," I said. "Just not through time. The time machine's an RV, remember? It still works. Did you even try calling them with your Wizard?"

Pim slapped her forehead. "No, I guess I just assumed they either left me alone in this century of suckiness or they had been kidnapped," she said. She stood up and walked out the backdoor. "Guess I'm going over to Lil' Danny's," she said on her way out.

I laughed and kept watching the Giggle screen. My parents drove the RV all over Pickford, did some shopping, parked on Make-Out Point. Make-Out Point! What I saw then—because I couldn't get the Giggle screen up, it was jammed—would curl your hair so I'm just not going there. If you've ever walked in on your parents… Then you know what I'm talking about. My eyeballs almost turned to stone.

Ugh, gag, gross, anyway, so I flipped the Giggle back a few screens to the "Diffy family, June 2006," section. There I was, in a little box, next to Pim. I thought it would be funny to see what Keely and I would be up to tonight and maybe impress her later with my future-telling skills. "Diffy, Phil, June 4, 2006, 11:00 pm," I told the Giggle.

Up popped my bedroom and Keely and I were sitting on the bed, only the bedside lamp was on. Keely was crying. I had my arm around her, rubbing her back.

"Shhh, Keels, you'll feel much better tomorrow. I promise. Let's go to sleep. You can stay here," I said.

"I can't go home, Phil," Keely blubbered.

"I know, it's okay," I said. "Just stay with me."

She sobbed into my shoulder then said something about her mother not finding out. She looked up at me, her mascara running in watery streaks down her cheeks. I kissed her forehead. Then she kissed my mouth. It got pretty hot. Wow. She pulled me down onto the pillows and got on top of me. Woa. Just watching us made my heart start up again at Richter-scale levels. This thing was getting majorly heavy. Keely was crying one minute then she was all over me the next. And I mean, All Over Me. First base, second base, third base… no home... yet. Gulp. "Giggle off," I said. I yanked on the screen and took off the helmet. Why did I have to poke around in the future? You would have thought I had learned my lesson the last time, but nope, Phil Diffy had to go around snooping. Giggles were dangerous. They didn't even sell them to kids in 2121. The one we had was technically my dad's. If the Giggle World Overseers in the future knew Lloyd had been letting Pim and me use it, he would have been arrested. But of course, in 2121, I only used the Giggle to delve into the past, not the future. In the 21st century, the Giggle was even more of a risk. I was determined to find out whatever had upset Keely so much and stop it. Whatever it was, she hadn't wanted her mother to find out. That was a start.