Frankie peeked out the window of Draculaura's upstairs bedroom, glancing at the normie residence next door.
"Frankie."
"Oh what?"
"I asked if you had any 3s" Lagoona reminded her.
"Oh. No. Sorry. Go fish."
Lagoona rolled her eyes drawing a card.
"Hey how long is this supposed to take." she asked Clawdeen who stood behind her, crinkling foil into her hair.
"Well we have all night. But I know what I'm doing." her werewolf friend reassured her. "Besides, the party's theme is 'gold', how spooked will Cleo be to see you got a highlight for it."
"Well, isn't it more yellow though?" Frankie looked at the hair dye box.
"Look if you want to spend money on more hair dye be my guest, but I mean the hair equivalent to gold is pretty much just blonde, and I feel like that has less of an impact." Clawdeen explained "Besides, Draculaura already had the yellow."
"Mm hm." Draculaura lay on her belly squeezing a pillow with her arms, already wearing hot pink polka dot pjs. Her phone was in her hands, her cards face down mostly ignored.
She kept texting, then giggled.
Lagoona looked at Frankie who was glancing out the window again, and Draculaura who was wiggling her high heeled slippers back and forth in her own little world.
She defeatedly put her cards down, it was a lost cause.
"How's the boy's party?" she asked Draculaura.
"Isn't Gil texting you?"
Lagoona shrugged "Turned off my shell phone for a bit." she pulled out her iCoffin "Though it's probably been long enough…"
Frankie put her hand on her phone too. But wasn't sure what she'd even ask him. Maybe just. Who he was? Not a bad ice breaker when they shared a phone.
"Make plans for your date yet, luv?" Lagoona asked.
"Oh me?" Frankie sparked.
Clawdeen stepped back "Ghoul. Foil. In hair."
"Right sorry." She looked at her phone again "Something about a picnic I think. Maybe the maul…"
"So both of them then?" Lagoona pressed.
"We're gonna try."
"Does it feel weird doing it like that?"
Frankie shrugged "Sometimes I feel like I have so little unlife experience, nothing is really "weird" " she held up quotation marks. "But it doesn't make me uncomfortable if that's what you mean. I want to be fair. I mean."
"I guess you have a special case." Lagoona pointed out. "I guess it'd be similar to dating a two headed monster."
"Woah no." Frankie wasn't sure if she could handle two actual boys "I think I'm better handling them one at a time."
"Well it's not that different." She started putting their cards away "They are two people. In a sense."
"I mean kind of." Frankie squinted "I guess. It's just easier this way. I mean… in a way. It's- I don't know." she sighed "I'm still new to dating I don't know what the rules are."
"Hm, I mean if they both agree on it, it's not cheating or anything."
"That's not what I… mean.." Frankie seemed uncomfortable, and was glad when Draculaura took the focus off her.
"Clawd says he misses me~" she giggled.
"Oh gag" Clawdeen mumbled "Can we please talk about something else, like… something not boys?"
Lagoona snorted "Oi, would you rather talk about girls~?"
Clawdeen growled "Lagoona! Come over here so I can dye your fins yellow."
Lagoona continued to laugh while Frankie felt her hair being done more aggressively.
"We can watch normie movies if you want" Draculaura announced, sitting up. "You ready Frankie?"
"Am I?" Frankie asked Clawdeen.
Clawdeen nodded "Just try not to mess with it while it sets."
She walked off to the bathroom while Frankie finally pulled out her phone, taking a breath.
-Hey. Is this Holt or Jackson?
Finished texting she looked at Draculaura who she realized was staring at her.
"You texting him?"
Frankie looked down "Not about his mom or any of this stuff…"
"Don't worry I won't tell him you stopped by his house."
"Thanks."
"No problem, ghoulfriend~"
"Jackson."
Holt looked up from his phone.
"Uhm." he looked at the expanse of the gridded game in front of him. "Can I cut through the bushes with my sword?"
"Yeah just roll a 6 or higher" Gil assured him from behind a binder.
Holt rolled, but didn't look at the result, already texting back.
"Alright, you got through the bushes. You can all get into the cavern now."
"Mm hm." he adjusted Deuce's earbud still listening to his mix. Trying to decide on the perfect emotes to send to Frankie.
Heath glanced over. "Pft. Jackson. Are you really telling Frankie that Holt is texting her?"
Holt shoved Heath away from looking at his phone.
"I just wanna see how she reacts.." Holt explained. Though really he had other reasons. Only obvious to himself.
"Heh I wanna tell Draculaura what's up." Clawd pulled out his phone.
"Dude, you're gonna ruin Jackson's prank" Heath put his hand over Clawd's phone.
"I don't know if I'd call lying to your girlfriend a prank…" Deuce mumbled.
"She's not my girlfriend." Holt auto responded. Rolling the 12 sided die with one finger around the floor.
"I don't know if I'd call lying to your crush a prank."
Not lying...
Holt tried to ignore them. Texting Frankie back.
-Frankie Fine! cant wait to see ur pretty face at cleos bash
He relaxed against Heath's bean bag chair waiting for a reply.
This game was a bit on the boring side.
"What do you think the girl's creepover is like?" Heath mused "Do you think Abbey's there?"
"That's a negative on the Abbey." Clawd announced texting again.
"Aw." Heath looked at his own phone.
"Can you guys stop talking about it…" Gil looked back at the game "You… should be focusing on your Monsters and Mayhem quest."
"Draculaura says Lagoona's phone's been off." Clawd informed him "So she probably hasn't even looked at your forty million texts."
Gil was quiet "She knows I sent her those forty million texts though right?"
"Yeah all 29." Clawd clarified "Well I mean I guess technically the whole party knows."
"And now we do too…" said Deuce, looking up.
Gil had pulled open his phone to send number 30, and Heath seemed to be peer pressured into saying something to Abbey.
"Guys." Deuce said somewhat loudly "You know we're having our own creepover, right?"
They all mumbled something along the lines of yes. Deuce sighed.
They were all in their pajamas already. Though not the coolest of clothing, it beat varsity jackets and jeans. Him in green scaled pants, and a black shirt with a metallic snake streaked across.
Grabbing a basketball from his bag he stood up and bounced it against the floor, making the characteristic loud bouncing noise. Causing everyone to look up in surprise.
"We either finish this game of MnM or we shoot some hoops. I'm tired of watching you all talking to your ghouls."
Heath swallowed "But… we like our ghouls."
Deuce sighed as if he understood deeply "I like my ghoul too, but this is the guys slumberparty-"
"Creepover"
"This is the guys creepover. We came here to hang out, and we're never going to finish this game if you keep being in your own little love bird world.
So like, come on, physical activity to wake you all up or let's wrap up this game."
"I mean I'm down" Clawd shrugged, always up for basketball. Or really any game that involved a ball.
"Man, I don't want to move.." Heath complained instead, then looked over at his cousin snickering "I mean… neither does Jackson."
They all looked over to Holt laying against the beanbag chair, eyes closed.
Gil went to a hush, leaning over to Clawd "Is he asleep?"
"Well he is the boring one…" Clawd mumbled.
Deuce made a disapproving sound, then changed attention to Heath "Hey Heath is your mom done with the tv yet."
"Oh yeah! Guitar Monster. I'll go check." Heath ran off excitedly.
"Should we… prank him?" Gil asked with a small smile.
"He did fall asleep at a creepover." Clawd added.
"I have a better idea." Deuce slowly moved over and took the iCoffin he was listening to in hand.
Clawd and Gil leaned in, as Deuce pulled out the earbuds suddenly. His victim bolted up, grabbing at the floor, looking confused and surprised for a moment, before looking down at himself, for a moment.
Clawd and Gil let out a disappointed sigh, "Oh is that all."
"What'd you think, I was going to do?" Deuce asked.
"I don't know you had music control…" Clawd seemed uncomfortable "Going to go see if Heath needs help." He got up to leave.
Holt rubbed his eyes under his glasses and looked at Deuce, smiling oddly and raising his pierced eyebrow. "Did you need something?"
"You fell asleep dude."
"Oh."
"We almost drew on your face." Gil closed his binder.
"I feel like that sort of thing is better for night…" Deuce argued, then smiled "So watch out tonight, Jackson."
He offered a hand to Holt, and gripped him in a quick motion to help him stand up. Holt brushed off some chip crumbs he'd gotten earlier.
"Are you any good at Guitar Monster?" Deuce asked.
"Am I?" Holt declared proudly.
"Are you?" Gil asked "I mean… can you play?"
"Oh right." Holt looked at himself like this was a problem. "I uh, haven't played since before I started transforming to music." he lied "So maybe just keep the volume low?"
Deuce smiled "Sounds good to me."
Clawd looked at the finger indentations melted into the plastic bass guitar controller, making a face.
"Heath. You're on drums."
"Uh you say that every time." Heath complained relegating himself to the stool they set out for the drumset.
"That's because you can't take care of your controllers…" Gil murmured looking at the same marks on the simplified plastic keyboard.
"I can't help it my hands get really hot when I play." Heath whined twiddling a drumstick.
Holt strung a guitar around him, grabbing Heath's remote.
Pressing the volume up on the setup screen, 'til he could feel the edge of what it might take to transform himself.
"You sure that's not too loud?" Clawd asked "For your uh… condition?"
"I know what I'm doing." Holt assured him, adjusting Jackson's glasses.
Deuce grabbed a mic, "You can pick the song too… if you can like… feel that?"
"I'm not handicapped…" Holt flipped through the songs with his guitar controller, picking one of his favorites.
"Are you sure?" Deuce asked hearing the preview.
"Um, yeah." Holt confirmed. Pressing play.
"It's just." Deuce started as the screen set them up to a band venue. "Doesn't the music get louder when it actually starts to play?"
The build up music began.
Heath started on drums. And Holt began to feel his beat. Fingers feeling hot.
"I'll be ok." He reassured himself, pushing through it, stubbornly.
Clawd moved in on the undertones of the song. Keys clacking lightly over his actual bass guitar noises on the game.
Gil glanced over as his instrument not in yet. "Jackson you don't look so great…?"
"Too late." Deuce cleared his throat starting on vocals.
Holt burst into flames.
"What?" Jackson blinked, his fingers moving without thinking about it, looking at the screen to that Rock Band Guitar thing game. He could hear loud music. Loud rock music.
He swallowed heart beating fast, feeling the rush from the transformation.
"Keep going!" Heath yelled at him.
And Jackson realized he'd slipped up a little, trying to catch the rhythm and keep playing. He could have sworn he played this game before but wasn't completely sure when.
Pressing the buttons it almost felt like playing a real guitar, he looked around to see his manster friends in their pjs.
He felt sweaty having to keep up with the game.
"What's happening?" he asked knowing the answer.
"Just keep going!" Heath encouraged him, smashing on the drums. "Or the song will fail!" he laughed "And you probably don't want that."
"What?" Jackson paid closer attention to the game causing him to miss a few more notes.
"Augh, come on Holt. Don't let the meter go down." Clawd and the rest of his gang seemed to try harder to make up for Jackson's mistake.
His hands felt sweaty. Thinking fast. Would he really disappear when this song ended?
Using his peripherals he glanced around for the remote to the tv.
He hit a particularly good note chain. The guitar melody ending for a minute, as Heath took over on drums.
He stepped closer to the remote looking at it and trying to catch where volume button was.
"Holt!"
"Sorry!" he went back to focusing on the game. Maybe focusing too hard, he seemed off rhythm.
Come on…
His meter rose as he got the beat to it. Sighing with relief.
"Woo! Holt! Use your star power!"
"How do I?"
Heath grabbed the end of his guitar and tilted it rapidly, as Jackson's notes on screen all flashed blue. Jackson swore this made it harder. But music couldn't be too hard… it was like… math just game in waves and… he knew that was bull but tried to convince himself otherwise.
His guitar melody strung out, as he seemed to be on some sort of guitar solo. Great.
Great. Crap.
He missed a few.
Crap. He caught a few.
Making a face in a collective cringe he finally hit out the last ones, as Heath beat out the last kicks of the song.
Ending it.
Jackson's heart seized, as he quickly grabbed the table behind him, no the remote, table.
Remote in hand he spazzed, pressing past the judgement screen with his guitar, til it got to a musical title card, he shoved the volume up on that one.
"Ow too loud!" Clawd yelped grabbing the remote from him.
Jackson fell to his knees exhausted.
"Sorry…" he wheezed.
"Dude that was awesome!" Heath hit him hard on the back, Jackson let himself fall over. Whining on the ground.
"Oh do you not want to play?" Gil asked sympathetically.