A/N: Happy new year everyone! I hope you all had a great time with your loved ones and/or doing what you wanted to do after another year!

I plugged away at this one over the summer holidays and found myself wondering what it would have been like to live summer like the ones I'm currently writing about, as I was only a child at that point in time.

Anyway, Onto the chapter, I hope you like it!

P.S thank you for some of the reviews I have been getting, I'm glad you're enjoying it!

Chapter 8: Are you ready to party?

Max had to hand it to Goofy, no matter what happened in the next 24 hours, it was a trip for the record books.

An uncomfortable confrontation between the two of them when Goofy realized Max had altered the map and shellshocked that he would do that, and Max angrily trying to explain to his dad that he wasn't little anymore, all this during a life and death situation that absolutely no one would believe they were in.

But in the end, he and Goofy had reconnected after a strained couple of weeks from even before they had set foot on this trip.

However, it was all for nothing if he couldn't get on stage for Powerline's concert.

The car was far too waterlogged and damaged to start - Max suspected it never would again but Goofy had hope – and so having left it behind they hitched a ride with four friendly nuns who they had encountered over the course of their trip who were kind enough to give them a ride.

Camping outside the stadium, Goofy peered through his binoculars.

"Gawsh Max, it looks pretty locked up, I don't think we'll have much luck that way."

Max sighed, all day they had being trying to scope out how to get in, they had lost most of their money during the waterfall situation, so scalping a ticket was out of the question, sneaking their way in was their only way.

"Anything else you can see?" Max asked

"Mmmmmmm…Nope" Goofy replied.

Max felt crushed, he was this close that he could taste it and now that he could see it, he couldn't go any further.

"Thanks for helping dad, maybe we should just go home, we got enough for a bus ride back" he said dejectedly.

"I'm sorry Maxie," Goofy said as he put his hand on his son's shoulder

"I'm sure Roxanne will understand." He finished

The two of them slowly walked down the road, ready to head home.

Goofy looked around to take one last forlorn look at the stadium, Max continued walking with his head down, unable to look back.

Just as Goofy started to turn back, he took another quick glance and paused.

He grabbed max's arm to stop him walking, who looked up in surprise and annoyance.

"What is it?"

Goofy smiled and pointed to what he had seen.

Max looked confused, and then smiled in realization.

"It's not over yet" Goofy said.

As the days breezed past back in Spoonerville, Roxanne found herself getting anxious, anxious or nervous? She couldn't decide. There was a ball of stress in her stomach that she couldn't shake no matter what she did, like some sort of signal of impending doom.

The only thing that eased it was being kept busy, which she found in spades with Stacey, who knew Roxanne well enough to point this out that it wasn't a sense of impending doom, but a sense of impending something that Roxanne hadn't fully considered.

"Well, it makes the most sense. . ." Roxanne said slowly.

Stacey grunted in reply as she leaned over dangerously on the foot ladder Roxanne was bracing to attach the banner on the outside of her house.

Having done one of the attachments, Stacey leaned back to get a more stable bearing.

"We'll find out after tomorrow night anyway, if its not that, it'll make itself clear in time." Stacey said as she fiddled with the knot that was on the other hole of her banner.

"But what if Max isn't on TV?" Roxanne blurted out.

It wasn't until this moment when Roxanne said this that she felt like a big weight got off her chest, she said it so quickly that it felt like it was being built inside her all this time. In fact, she didn't know she wanted to ask that question at all.

Stacey stopped fiddling and got down from the ladder – it was clear that this was something Roxanne had been stressing over for a while, her tone proved that – Alice and Emily, who had been on the other end of the banner, decided to take a quick break to give them some room, it was best this was something that Stacey would help best with for now.

Stacey looked at Roxanne with such a look she felt like she was being judged and she could be seen right through.

"If he is not on TV" Stacey started slowly

"…then you'll have to deal with that if it happens" she finished.

She raised her finger in the air

"If. And for what it is worth, I do not think Max is one to tell fibs, otherwise why risk it all at school in the auditorium?"

Roxanne felt relief when she heard Stacey say this out loud, but she was also a bit angry with herself. Normally she was never like this, but ever since the auditorium and being the centre of attention – not to mention Lisa's words that still echoed from the mall – her emotions were all over the place.

Roxanne smiled weakly, but Stacey was not finished.

"That reminds me, Lisa and Chad broke up, for good maybe."

Roxanne raised an eyebrow, but did not reply.

"Anyway, they are both coming tomorrow night, fine with that?"

"Of course, no problem with me" Roxanne replied.

After the events of the mall, Lisa had actually rung up Roxanne – though how she got her number she did not know – and caught up with her and Stacey a couple of days ago. Lisa said she had broken up with Chad after that but thanked Roxanne and – to her surprise – was quite friendly towards her, she had looked a lot happier but Lisa stressed it was her taking more time to work on herself, though Emily claimed she saw Lisa talking to Chad at one of the parks the day after that, so none of the girls really knew what was going on.

Stacey put a hand on Roxanne's shoulder, waking her out of her thoughts.

"Don't stress it Roxy, no amount of worrying is going to change it now anyway."

Roxanne looked to the banner outside Stacey's house, it has Powerline's face on it with two atoms on either side with the words 'POWERLINE' & 'LIVE' inside the atoms.

"Alright you two, its okay to come out" Roxanne called out.

Alice and Emily tentatively opened the door from the house, Roxanne wasn't fooled though, she saw Alice peek out a couple of times.

"We didn't really hear anything by the way" Emily quickly said.

"How defensive?" Roxanne laughed.

Emily put her hands up in a defensive stance proper at this.

"Hey, just saying!"

Stacey looked up at the banner with a small frown on her face.

"I want to finish the rest of this off myself, but thank you all very much for helping me today" Stacey said.

"Oh? You are sure?" Alice asked.

"Yup, don't worry we're basically all set for tomorrow anyway" Stacey waved off.

"Did that air conditioner ever get fixed?" Alice asked.

Stacey burrowed her eyebrows at Alice.

"No. Don't remind me. There is a reason why its 'powerline goes rainforest' tomorrow" Stacey said.

"Ah. Well, Roxanne want to join us? We are going to the library for a while"

"Sure, I got nothing else going on today, lets head out" Roxanne shrugged.

"Stupid piece of junk, it barely works!" Alice exclaimed as she gave the computer monitor a slap on its side.

It was surprise it was working at all, Roxanne thought to herself. Their library was well equipped with books but the library staff were somewhat a traditional type, so they had an older earlier model computer as the scoffed at the technology.

"Not if you keep hitting it! Let me try" Emily said.

Alice shuffled off the seat and Emily took over, her face locked in concentration and started tapping some buttons, when suddenly a blue screen lit up.

"UGH!" Emily slapped the computer on its side in disgust as well.

This proved to be the wrong move, one of the hawk-eyed librarians swooped down on them.

"Can't you see the sign?" she hissed as she pointed to a sign that said 'Do not disturb'

"It's YOUR computer that's not working Alice hissed back at her

The librarian looked affronted.

"Excuse me! That is no way to talk to your…"

Roxanne silently crept away, she had no desire to get thrown out, the library was like a second or third home to her on winter days and did not want to risk been banned, but she did giggle at Alice's indignant face upon being scolded.

As the sounds of the argument faded into the background, Roxanne strolled through the rows of books.

"Haven't read too many books lately" she thought sadly to herself as she picked up Arabian nights to inspect the cover of it.

"I'll have to get back into it next week" she vowed.

Just as she put the book back carefully in its slot on the shelf, a flash of light came from the room not far from her.

Roxanne blinked, trying to clear her eyes.

There was another flash.

Then two more.

"what on ea-"

A flash of light, some sparks, and then a second of silence.

BOOM!

A small explosion came from behind the room and someone came out coughing from all the smoke that had poured out behind him. Roxanne was also coughing from the smoke and a few kids nearby bolted for it from fright, voicing their displeasure and cursing.

The person that came out continued to cough while being doubled over, his hands on his knees, then he stood up and dusted himself from the soot.

"Yeeeeeaaaaheeeahhhh!" he shouted triumphantly.

There was no mistaking who this was.

Roxanne was still coughing from some of the soot as well, it had taken her completely by surprise.

Bobby Zimmeruski looked over.

"Oh, sorry yo!"

He held up a blow torch that was charred.

"This little bad boy packs way more of a wallop than I thought, but its seeeeeeeeerrriously cool stuff" he said.

Roxanne dusted some of the soot that was on her jeans, she was not best pleased about this.

"Oh it's okay, I mean I have to clean these up…" she said rather huffily.

"Well come on iiiiin and have a looksie!" Bobby said as he gestured Roxanne to come inside.

Roxanne sighed and walked inside the room somewhat reluctantly, the stench of fried circuits hit her full in the face and she began coughing again, this time, her eyes watered.

The room must have had at least four computers and numerous cameras lying around on shelves, half of them were pried open and the room was draped in cables on the walls and floor as if it were some sort of spaghetti monster or vines in a jungle.

Roxanne felt her heart stop as she inadvertently tripped over one of these cables, she only just managed to catch a hold of herself on the side of the table before she fell over.

"Gotta watch yourself in here hahah!" Bobby laughed as he came in the room behind her.

Bobby's laugh turned into a stream of curses as he tripped on a cable himself, falling onto the ground as some more cables came down with him .

As Bobby struggled to untangle himself, Roxanne had a quick look around.

"So, errrr, what is it I am looking at in here? Is this the AV room?" she asked.

"You could call it that" Bobby said as he got the last cable off his shoe.

"I take any junk and do things with it, make interesting things"

Roxanne ran her hand over one of the open computers next to her.

"How did you get all this?"

"I acquire electronic devices that are no longer held in high regard by their previous owners and also not notice their absence" Bobby said solemnly.

Roxanne stared at him, and he burst out laughing.

"Mostly junk sites, sometime I collect them because people don't know what to do with them anymore. I make the magic happen in here"

Roxanne had to take his word – however confusing – for what it was, Bobby seemed to be a strange and quirky person, she hadn't made her mind up about him in the first couple of minutes she spent with him so far, even Max she had a fair idea what he was about.

"So, you're Max's friend that helped him do his Powerlinge…. enactment?"

Bobby leaned back and grabbed a can of cheese and began shaking it.

"Ohhh, ole Maximillian huh? I wouldn't say we were friends; I had my price for him." Bobby chuckled.

Roxanne was somewhat taken aback, in her mind she thought Bobby was a close friend of Max's, but that was based on her experience with P.J back at the BBQ.

"Not friends?" she asked

"Little bit, he made the last day of school interesting at least, but all paying customers are my friend" Bobby grinned in reply.

Feeling Bobby would not probably offer up any more information than that, Roxanne turned her attention to the environment they were in.

"How are you allowed to do all this in here?

"Ah" Bobby grimaced.

For once, Bobby's smile slid off his face.

"My mom is the head librarian here; she says its better here than blowing up the house."

Bobby laughed and shrugged.

"But whatever dude"

Roxanne felt a little awkward, unlike P.J she couldn't think of more topics to talk about, her time with Bobby was strange.

"Nice! Well…. I think I should find my friends; I'll see you at Staceys?" Roxanne asked as she slowly backed out of the room.

Bobby shot two hand pointed at her.

"You betcha!"

Bobby then sprayed some canned cheese on his hand and started messily eating it.

Feeling nauseated from the sight of this, Roxanne took her leave, and didn't spend more than five seconds catching her breath before Emily was suddenly in her face.

"Where have you been?" Emily demanded.

"Alice got kicked out and we better go before I do too."

"What? What did you do?" Roxanne queried

"Didn't help matters is what I did" Emily said.

"Tell you more outside, now let's go."

Roxanne and Emily headed outside and found a fuming Alice that was not having any of it.

"Can you believe it? I'm not allowed to go back for a month!" she said angrily

As Alice started ranting about the injustice of it all – seemingly to herself – Emily turned to Roxanne.

"Where were you? You missed the excitement!" she said

"I was having a look at some books and then found that Bobby guy blowing things up" Roxanne said.

Emily appeared to be interested.

"Really? What is he like? He seems a bit strange but don't know anything about him, even though he's our year"

Roxanne took a moment to pause to think on the question, her interaction with Bobby had been mixed she could say that much. He was strange but that was just the more visible part of him, it was more the fact he seemed indifferent about Max and his general interactions with people that threw her off more than anything.

"To be honest, I don't think I like him too much, is that a bad thing to say?" Roxanne said.

Emily chuckled.

"Not like you to not see the best in someone"

Roxanne shrugged.

"I know, but maybe it was just a strange meeting to start off on"

Emily looked back at Alice, who was pacing back and forth – talking about other transgressions that had impacted her in recent times – she had no awareness that Roxanne and Emily were having their own conversation.

"Well, we better cool her off, she's a wound up clock at the moment" Emily said.

Walking up to Alice, she gave her a quick smack on the shoulder, pulling Alice out of mid conversation, albeit startled.

"Come on you, lets get going, I'd like to get home today if possible"

On their way home the three girls excitedly talked amongst themselves what they would be wearing tomorrow for the big party, and what they planned to do there.

Well, two of them.

"Come on Roxanne, you're not even going to dress up?" Emily pouted

"That is me dressing up! I don't know what you mean by that" Roxanne said

"Not even a little bit? Especially given the circumstances?" Alice winked.

Roxanne felt that flicker of apprehension go through her which she did not have since the early morning helping out Stacey, it took the wind out of her sails a little.

"Ha-ha, no… I'm comfortable in what I wear"

"Well are you going to at least drink with us?" Emily asked.

Roxanne hesitated, she normally only had a couple of drinks in the past, she never saw the appeal in getting drunk, especially with her fellow fourteen year olds that seemed to regard as a forbidden state of mind they only saw the higher years do.

Still. . . it was summer, and a good chance to blow off some steam.

"er… sure, yes! Not too much, but I will"

"YESSSSS!" Emily punched the air in triumph.

Alice laughed.

"Roxanne drinking with us is not some great achievement, she has done it before with us"

Roxanne laughed and stopper at the bus station they were walking by.

"Well this is my ride, what time will you be at Stacey's party tomorrow?" she enquired.

"We'll be there from about… oh actually we'll be there beforehand, won't we?" Alice looked at Emily, who nodded.

Roxanne gave a puzzled look.

"We're helping Stacey with the punch and other things, you know, to take the pressure off her" Emily answered Roxanne's look.

"Its also the only time I can get dropped off, my parents are heading off for a couple of days to see some friends" Alice mentioned.

"Yeah that too, I mean Alice is my ride" Emily said.

Roxanne saw her bus coming down the road and flagged it down, as it came slowing down to her, she turned to the others.

"Will see you tomorrow then!"

"Can't wait!"

"See you there"

The bus opened its doors to Roxanne who got on, paid her fare, and took a seat and sighed.

"What a day" she thought to herself, it had been busy for the last couple of days, but it was worth it to have been kept busy from her own thoughts. It was hard to believe that the party was tomorrow, it felt like the day that would never come.

After the rest of the evening Roxanne laid down in bed and gazed at her ceiling.

In less than 24 hours, Max would be on stage at the Powerline concert

In less than 24 hours, it would be Staceys party

In less than 24 hours, Max would be on stage with Powerline himself.

Roxanne had a thousand thoughts going through her head as she fell asleep

"I hope he's there" was the last one she had before sleep took her.