Chapter 6: Let The Summer Begin.
"I don't think they're here for the party." Lyssa whispered, staring at the kids, most of whom looked murderous. Some of the boys were holding lacrosse sticks while others were just getting themselves ready to charge at us.
"I can't believe it. We have hit the moron jackpot!" One in the middle of the group shouted, he seemed to be the leader.
"Everybody who needs a beating is all here on one lawn." He continued, looking down on all of us. What had any of us done to them? I looked up at Braden, who was glaring up at the group.
"Excuse me, why are you here? What's the matter?" Mom stepped out of the crowd with Deanne and Sally following, they stood in a line a little bit away
"I will tell you what the matter is!" A kid next to the leader, mocked my mother's accent, my fist clenched as I glared at him.
"These old townies trashed our frat house." His voice turned back to normal as he had a little spaz attack pointing at my Dad and the other guys. I rolled my eyes, these guys were dumb... My Dad and his friends may be crazy, but vandalism isn't their style.
"And nobody treats our good time headquarters with disrespect!" Spaz continued, causing the rest of the idiots to cheer in agreement. Braden stepped forward, I looked up at him in confusion.
"They didn't do it. Me do it." He growled, cracking his neck as he glared at the kids. My eyes widened. But that was understandable, vandalism does seem like his thing.
"Don't try to cover for them, Z-Dog!" Another Frat brother shouted, pointing at Braden. Z-Dog? I arched my eyebrow up at him, a smirk on my face. I will have to ask about that one.
"Who's Z-Dog?" Dad asked, looking at the all of us, we all shrugged back
"We know they were trying to get back at us for making them do the naked plunge in our swimming hole." The leader shouted, bringing the attention back to himself. Did he just say naked plunge? Oh my God… Ew. Why would you do that to anyone?! People swim in there!
"Your swimming hole?!" Dee demanded, the leader looked at her, glaring slightly.
"I have been swimming at the quarry since I was eight years old." She pointed to herself, many of the other people in our group nodded, also having grown up here.
"Apparently, everybody in this crap town has been swimming there since they were eight years old!" Leader shouted,
"I guess nobody wants to leave this dump because they are too busy sucking!" He added, and again, they all cheered and hollered as if this guy was the smartest of them all. These guys were really dumb… Are these the types you get at college?
"Listen, Lenny Feder left this town, moved to Hollywood, made big bucks, probably more than all you brain acts put together ever will!" Mr. Bailey shouted from somewhere in the crowd. I looked to see him walking forward to stand at the front.
"But, guess what! He came back here! Because this beautiful town is his home and it will always be his home." He continued. I smiled as he and Dad exchanged a look and a nod. Maybe that will put an end to the constant insults whenever he was around us. I turned my attention back to the college group, as some of them began laughing
"Well that was just a moving testament to this community, bro!" Spaz chuckled sarcastically.
"But we didn't come here to hear any lame speeches. We came here to kick some old, smelly, ass!" He shouted the end. The others shouted along with him. Oh boy. Something tells me we were going to have to kick some ass. The cheering continued until Dad stepped up, spreading his arms.
"Fellas! we may be old." He shouted,
"We may be smelly." Marcus continued.
"We may have a penis!" Deanne's voice piped up and I looked over to see her, Mom, and Sally pointing to Fabio. I let out a laugh as Fabio rolled her eyes in frustration.
"But the only ones their ass kick around here is going to be you spoil, privilege, uppity, preppy, d-bags." Eric finished, bringing the serious tone of the situation back around.
"Now let's get busy!" Kurt shouted before charging forward. We all followed him, picking targets. I instantly went for some blonde girl who looked wasted, she instantly went for my hair, but I punched her and she went down. I fought off a few more, but not without getting a couple of kicks and hits. I noticed some guy going after Greg, who was distracted by fighting some other guy. I ran and jumped onto the guys back, tackling him down.
"Agh!" The guy yelled as he managed to throw me off of him and kick me in the stomach. I punched him in the jaw, bending slightly as I regained my breath, he could take a punch though and instantly went to grab a fistful of my hair. I cried out as he pulled me to the ground, kicking my ribs, and then all at once, he was thrown off of me. I looked to see Braden had tackled him.
"Thanks!" I nodded, evading one guy, and punching another.
"Look out!" Braden pointed behind me, I whipped around and kicked the girl that was coming at me across the face. Okay, at least those 8 years of Jiu-jitsu paid off.
"Behind you!" I noticed one with a lacrosse stick coming after him; Braden spun and punched him in the face. I laughed, and then noticed Marcus was in trouble. Braden noticed too and ran to help him. I went after a guy that was going after my Mom, using the other guys lacrosse stick.
"You may want to go help Dad!" I nodded to where Dad and the leader were duking it out. Mom nodded and ran off in that direction. I continued to use the handy lacrosse stick, causing some serious damage.
"GEMMA!" Tanner's voice rang out, I looked to see him running towards me, but a Frat guy jumped in front of him. He punched Tanner, who dropped. I had mixed feelings about this situation. The Frat guy turned to me, stopping for a second.
"Hey good looking…" He smiled, I rolled my eyes and went to whack him with the stick, but Braden re-appeared and the guy was gone. All of a sudden, everything sort of stopped, there was only yelling. I looked and saw the deer from earlier, and he was going to town on Becky's monkey again, and the leader's junk. Upon seeing their leader was defeated, the college kids started running away. A few of the main group stayed and dragged their crying leader away. I laughed at the scene, and just the sheer insanity of what just happened. Everyone was cheering in celebration, and soon the party was back in full swing.
"Well, I'm a little sad I didn't get to punch him." Braden grumbled, poking the still unconscious Tanner with his shoe. I giggled slightly.
"Let's get him out of here." I sighed. I took his hands and Braden took his feet, and we began to lug Tanner out to the front of the house. Once we placed him on the front lawn, I sent a text to his big sister, who I cheered with. We walked to the back, and Mom walked up to us,
"Should I be concerned that you two were just carrying an unconscious boy out front?" She asked, a slight smirk on her face. Braden and I exchanged a look, coming to a silent agreement, we looked back and answered.
"Nah." We said. She just shrugged and went off.
"So, what should we do now?" I asked, turning to look up at Braden, but he didn't respond. He looked me straight in the eye and leaned down slowly. I found myself wanting to kiss him back, and just as our lips were about to touch, my Dad walked up.
"WHOA! Didn't mean to- uh, sorry. I've…. Gotta go. Tell your mom I'll be back." He shouted, covering his eyes, walking away. Braden and I jumped away from each other.
"Okay Daddy…" I looked down at the ground. He walked away, and Braden cleared his throat.
"Sorry… That was…" He started, I looked up at him and shook my head.
"No, it's fine… I just… Maybe it was for the best… I mean, I just ya know…" I trailed off.
"Broke up with your boyfriend… Yeah…" Braden nodded. I nodded too, looking away.
"We should get back to the party…" I whispered. He nodded and we went back to the people, going our separate ways.
"What was all that about?" Lys asked as I sat next to her.
"What was what?" I asked,
"I totally saw you and Braden almost kiss!" She whispered, I rolled my eyes.
"It's not that big of a deal! Nothing is going to happen! Besides, I just broke up with my boyfriend… Like 5 hours ago." I pointed out, anything with Braden I'm afraid would just be a rebound.
"Tanner was a huge ass!" She exclaimed, I shook my head.
"I still really liked him!" I said,
"You could really like Braden!" She pointed out.
"He's here for 2 months at max, there's no point." I sighed,
"You're being ridiculous." She muttered, I shrugged. Soon after that conversation, the party was basically over, and everyone went home. I was in the kitchen cleaning up some of the mess when my Mom walked in.
"Have you seen your father?" She asked.
"He told me he would be back later." I replied, leaning on the counter, looking at her. She frowned.
"Okay… He didn't say anything else?" She asked. I shook my head and she sighed.
"You okay Mom?" I asked,
"Yeah… We just have a lot going on. Why don't you leave those for tomorrow? It's late." She said, I shrugged, placing the last of the stuff in the trash.
"Okay.. Love you. Goodnight." I hugged her, and she hugged me back tightly.
"Love you too sweetheart. Sleep well." She said, I nodded and walked out of the kitchen and up the stairs. I took a shower, dressed in my favorite sweatpants, and t-shirt. I turned on Netflix to Walking Dead and lied in my bed, landing on the stuffed bear Tanner had won for me at the fair. I threw it off my bed and turned my back to it.
"Just go to sleep." I whispered to myself. On my bed side table there was a picture of us at Prom. I glared at it. Around my room were random reminders of him and I, and I groaned.
"So much for sleep." I grumbled. I hopped up and walked downstairs. I grabbed an empty box from the basement which was still there from moving, and ran back up. Once there, I began to throw whatever reminded me of Tanner into it. Once my room was cleared, I walked back out and placed the box by the door. I hadn't even noticed I was crying until I wiped my face, feeling suddenly exhausted.
"Gemma?" I jumped and looked up at Greg, he was at the foot of the stairs, rubbing his eyes.
"Shit, hey Greg." I crossed my arms over my chest, looking at the ground.
"Why are down here?" He asked, I looked at the box, then over at the kitchen.
"Getting a drink." I replied.
"That box wasn't here before…" He pointed at it, walking over to it. He looked through it.
"I just needed to get rid of some stuff." I shrugged. He sighed, remaining quiet. Not that I minded.
"I'm gonna go to bed." I said, moving to walk past him. He all of a sudden wrapped me in a hug. Sighing, I hugged back. That was the good thing about having a twin, no words needed to be said. We just know.
"It'll be okay." He assured. I nodded, backing away from him and wiping my eyes again.
"It will… I'm just really confused… I don't understand why…. Did I do something?" I replied.
"No, no. He's an idiot." He assured. I shook my head.
"Whatever you say. I'm gonna go to bed." I said, nodding up the stairs. He nodded and turned to walk to the kitchen. I ran up the stairs and into my room. I collapsed onto the bed where I fell into a fitful sleep.