One Failed Cheer Later…
"Maxie Guevara?" a medium-sized black man asked, walking quickly across the gym to catch Max, who was sprinting out as fast as she could. She had a plan to call Alec from the convenience store across the street so that she could get her ride back home, but she stopped when she heard the nickname that she allowed only certain few people to call her; namely Jondy, Zack and no one else.
Turning around, she realized the recognized the man who was perusing her body with a lecherous look through his one eye.
"Mr. McGinnis," she remembered. McGinnis took his hat off and nodded.
"You can call me 'Jim'," he told her.
"I'd really rather not. What do you want?" Max asked. From her memory, McGinnis had been a horrible, pervert of a guy. The last time she'd seen her father's old business colleague, he was putting the moves on her mother – her real mother, and not Renfro. Her mother, of course, disabled McGinnis with a kick to the groin and from that point on Deck didn't allow McGinnis to dinner anymore.
"That was a very interesting cheer out there, Miss Guevara," McGinnis said, trying to make his voice sound mellifluous and failing. "I especially enjoyed the part where the bleachers exploded."
"What's your point?" Max asked.
"So interesting, in fact, that I thought I might put in a call to your father and step-mother about it…"
"Now, Mr. McGinnis," Max smiled. "There's no need to alert the Jewish Inquisition about this," she said. "I mean, they'll learn about it in the morning paper when I'm safely in Mexico, anyways."
"It's too late for that," McGinnis said. "I already called Deck and told him about that little fiasco. Luckily for you, I have some very interesting contacts in the press that can keep your failure off of the nightly news…for a price."
"Look, McGinnis, I'm not going to sell my body to you for a clear name!" Max argued.
"Yes, I know that," McGinnis said sadly. "And actually it's not that that I want… at least not with you." Max crossed her arms over her chest.
"I'm listening. Barely, though, so make it quick."
"Too bad, because I'll have to start from the beginning," McGinnis said, taking his hat off and playing with the edges.
Original Cindy watched Max talking to the evil-looking man warily. Okay, so he didn't look evil, but he gave off a certain vibe. Max seemed to be slightly disgusted by him, judging by the horrified look on her face. OC figured that when Max started yelling and pushing him away, she'd step in. Until then…
"Damn girl," Original Cindy said, sidling up to one particularly nice-looking blonde (again – it was just a vibe she got). "I saw you out there, you got some bangin' moves." The girl smiled.
"Thanks!" Original Cindy held out her hand.
"I'm Cindy." Best keep it to "Cindy" for a while. The "Original" part tended to freak the white chicks out.
"OC, baby!" Alec said, walking by and clamping a hand firmly over Original Cindy's shoulders. "That last step you did during that cheer was amazing! When you lifted your leg all the way up over your head like that and – god, I want you just thinking about it." Original Cindy's eyes bugged out and the blonde girl gave a similarly disgusted look and walked away.
Cindy counted to five… then to ten… then to twenty, before pushing Alec away.
"What the HELL is wrong with you, boy?" she ranted. "I was this close – THIS close, to getting some!" she yelled.
"I was just saving you from me having to tell your girlfriend," Alec shrugged. "What's her name again?"
"Her name is Chrisette, and who said I was going monogamous?" Original Cindy demanded. She paused and looked at Alec. "What's with the ugly carnations?" Alec looked down at the bouquet of flowers in his right hand.
"Really? Ugly?"
"Yeah," Original Cindy nodded. "Hope they didn't cost you a lot of cheddar. But then again, with the amount of allowance you get each week, I hope you spent a lot of money on the person you got them for."
"Flowers?" Kendra asked, wandering by. "For me? Really? God, you're so sweet, Alec." She seized the flowers and smelled them, then made a face. "Ew. Carnations."
"Who'd you get them for?" Original Cindy asked. "Brin? Jondy? Tinga? Syl?"
"He couldn't have gotten them for Syl," Kendra stopped her. "Krit'd murder him alive."
"What, by not talking me to death?" Alec asked dryly. "I got them for my dear…" he hesitated, "sister."
"Please, boy, I am not no relative of yours," Original Cindy shook her head. "Not if you're gettin' me flowers that ugly."
"Well, then you got them for Maxie," Kendra said, coming to the last logical decision. Alec looked at her from the corner of his eyes.
"No, I didn't," he said. "You want the truth?"
"Yes," both girls said at once.
"Fine, the truth is…" he sighed. "Dix has a new girl coming over tonight and he wanted me to get him some flowers so that he could really impress her."
"Yeah, right!" Original Cindy shrieked. "Dix hasn't seen the sunlight since 1989!"
"So?" Alec asked. "There are some real freaks out there, trust me; I mean, I once met this girl at a bar named Lux..."
"Another induction into the Costume Calvary, huh?" Kendra asked. "I don't care what you say," she told him, shoving the flowers back into his hands. "You got those for Maxie and boy are you off."
"Off?" Alec asked. "How?"
"Maxie's high maintenance. If I were you, I'd get a dozen roses, with a white one in the middle and sign the card 'yours always, Alec'," she said.
"What color would the rest of them be?" Alec inquired.
"Red, dumbass!" Original Cindy yelled.
"Well, I guess I could get those," Alec said. "Not for Max, though."
"Oh, sure," Kendra nodded. "Definitely not."
"Brin really would appreciate roses right about now," Cindy agreed. "I mean, with her whole cheerleading career being over because of one explosion during regionals."
"Hey, they have no way of tracing that explosion back to the squad," Kendra corrected her. "Not if I have anything to do with it, anyways."
"What do you mean?" Original Cindy asked. Kendra smiled enigmatically.
"Oh, you'll see," she giggled. She looked towards the glass doors and grinned even bigger. "There's Walter! I thought he wasn't going to show up!" she waved good-bye before running towards the doors and hugging an overweight cop that was waiting for her.
Original Cindy wrinkled her nose. "Heterosexuality is just wrong." She turned her attention to Alec, who was staring intently at the carnations he'd brought. He finally seemed to realized that Cindy was staring at him and looked up.
"What'd she say to get?"
"A dozen red roses with a white one in the middle," OC reminded him.
"Right," he said, tossing his flowers in the trash before making a quick exit.
"Oh, don't worry!" Original Cindy yelled after him. "I'll get a ride with someone else!"
Like the cute blonde doing the stretches over there.
Max stormed over to Original Cindy, who was just writing the phone number of some blonde in her "little black book".
"What happened?" Original Cindy asked. "You have to sell your soul to the devil for a trip to Nationals?"
"Nope," Max shook her head. "I had to sell Zack's body to the devil for the presses not to get wind of everything that happened. Turns out McGinnis had a helluva mid-life crisis."
"Won't Zack care?"
"He better the hell not if he wants to stay on the squad," Max said, looking around. "Where's Alec? He was supposed to drive us home and I'm getting sick of this gym already."
"He went off to give Brin some posies," Original Cindy said. "I'm sure he'll get back soon."
Max growled, "Brin. Did you see the way she fell on her ankle like that? Such an amateur! She acts like she's never seen one of Zane's explosions before!"
"I'm with ya there, girl," OC agreed when a loud voice interrupted their conversation by screaming across the hall.
"Max!" Max turned her head towards the sudden distraction and her jaw dropped when she saw the person coming towards them.
Author's Note: I have good news and I have bad news. So, I'll start with the good news first. The
Good News: it's Christmas time and I'm going to get a TV! (Okay, so maybe that's good news for me...).
Better News: I've got the pictures up for the characters and I'll put the link to the pictures on my bio.
Bad News: my computer died and now I've got to wait a while to get another one because I'm getting a new TV for Christmas. And, my computer sort of melted down with absolutely everything on it and I was an idiot and didn't save anything to disk.
Luckily! I know mostly what I had written for the next three or four chapters. After that, who knows. And, most likely I am going to write a sequel... I think. By then I should have a new computer. So...
Coming Soon in Bring It On! Dark Angel Style: Another party at Joshua's, and an unexpected guest comes to stay at The Big Tacky Castle Next Door. (I'll give you a hint: we've seen her before in the fic.)
This concludes this very, very long author's note. Have a Merry Christmas or a Happy Hanukkah (which I obviously don't know how to spell) or a Merry Chrismukkah... whatever you do on the holidays.