Against my will, I've become super-busy this summer. I'm less busy during the school year! But, I did deny myself swimming today so I could stay home and write! This story is actually about two thirds of the way done (sniff), but I finally have an idea about how the entire story will wrap up and such. Again, sorry about the really long delay in updating.
Kelsi giggled, trying to keep the soda that was already in her mouth from going flying across the table. She had just read the next task, which the thought of how stupid they would look just somehow amused her. It was amazing what four boys, inclined to embarass their girlfriends, could come up with every once in a while. She suddenly became aware of her surroundings, which was her three friends were staring at her, all with eyebrows raised and puzzled expressions.
"So, what's number seven?" Sharpay asked, taking a long sip of her Sprite. The girls had decided to take a quick break after their worries of the boyfriends had passed. They assumed that the four of them deserved it, especially since they knew that they could catch up if easy dares kept coming up.
"Take a look." Kelsi handed the crumpled piece of paper across the table, but Taylor reached for it faster than Sharpay.
"Hey!" Sharpay shot her friend a dirty looked, which Taylor ignored. Gabriella turned to lean over Taylor shoulder, reading down the list to number seven.
"Those guys are smarter than we give them credit for!" Gabriella burst out into laughter, reading what their boyfriends had written. She took another sip of her Coke, just imagining the group doing the dare.
"Okay guys," Taylor said, speaking to the camera that she put in front of her. "You'll get you're laugh. But I'm dying to see your video!"
"What is it?" Sharpay demanded, finally pulling the paper away from Taylor. A look of pure disgust crossed her face as she scanned down the page to number seven. She looked up at her giggling friends. "Are you serious? How can you be laughing?" Sharpay questioned, sending an angry glare across the table.
"Because it's funny. Guys live to see stuff like this!" Taylor reasoned, thinking of the dare. She believed it was Chad's little addition at the end.
7) Tuck your shirts in, pulling your pants up as far as you can. After that, tuck a piece of toilet paper in your shoes and walk past at least twenty stores that way! Nerds!
"But this is the first dare that I think the guys actually thought through!" Sharpay bit her lip. "What if the dares start getting more and more difficult? What if this break was a mistake?"
"Nah, the next few don't look that bad. Anyway, do you want to lose? I know I don't. Now, let's get going!" Kelsi pushed, throwing her empty drink cup in a nearby trashcan.
Sharpay stammered in protests, but seemed to eventually get over it when they reached the nearest bathroom. The girls began making their new appearances. The only problem they encountered was the fact that each were wearing flip-flops, which made it hard to stick toilet paper in.
Finally finding a solution, Gabriella passed around sticks of gum. The four chewed the strawberry flavored gum quickly, stuck it to a piece of toilet paper, and stuck that to the bottom of their sandals. The consequences of putting gum on the bottom of their shoes had yet to occure to them.
Coming out of the bathroom, the four locked elbows, took deep breaths, and started strutting down the mall, as if clueless as to their appearance. From left to right, the line was Sharpay, Gabriella, Kelsi, and Taylor. Taylor had the camera, holding it much like Ryan had when the boys went skipping.
"1…2…" Sharpay started, counting all of the stores the four passed. This dare had actually gained them more curious looks than all of the previous tasks put together. Gabriella shot a menacing smirk at a trio of middle school-aged girls that were trying to hold back hysterics at the sight.
"Just wait until you have boyfriends," She mumbled, causing her friends to giggle. Sensing that the four were laughing at them, a brunette that seemed to be the leader of the middle school girl trio shot the four a very dirty look, but it didn't quite match Sharpay and her infamous Ice Princess glare.
"Hmph. They apparently don't know who I am." Sharpay used her free arm to flip out her hair as a final acknowledgement to the other girls.
"Well, you really don't look like yourself with an Abercrombie and Finch shirt tucked in," Kelsi commented.
"I wish I could say the same, but since all three of you are wearing t-shirts…" Sharpay rolled her eyes. Taylor looked down the line of girls and her eyes widened in surprise.
"You're right. Awesome!" She glanced down the row, doing a double take once she saw Gabriella. "Hey… Didn't Troy wear that shirt the other day?"
"No!" Gabriella turned three shades of red, seeing all of her friends looking at the red shirt she was wearing. "We got matching ones for basketball season." She mumbled, barely audibly.
"If you ever want to find a couple with so much gooey-mushy moments…" Taylor began, which a goofy grin plastered across her face.
"Just find Troy and Gabriella!" Sharpay and Kelsi finished, erupting into laughter. Their brunette friend's face had flushed entirely red, avoiding her friends' gaze.
"18…19…" Taylor picked up the counting, trying to hold the camera at and angle where they could capture the final store the foursome passed.
"20!" The four chorused, pulling out their un-tucked shirts and trying the best they could to get the gum off of their shoes.
"This gum idea sucked!" Sharpay commented, trying to get the strawberry scented creation off of the bottom of her sandal.
"It was a quick fix!" Gabriella defended, pulling the last strand of sticky substance off of the bottom of her flip-flops. Kelsi was the only one that had no trouble getting the gum off—in fact she was already reading the next task for the girls to do.
"Taylor, this one's for you," she observed.
"Read it out loud," Taylor responded, still trying to get gum out of the ridges of her sandal. "A little busy here..."
"Number eight: Taylor—Go to the makeup section of a store and use the test samples to make your makeup look ridiculous. Show a salesperson your new look and excitedly say that you'll 'recommend this place to all of your friends!' and run out."
"Easy." Taylor nodded, picking the final bit of gum out of a ridge. All of the girls had finished getting the gum off of the bottoms of their sandals, dumping the toilet paper and gum into the trashcan on the way to the nearest make-up counter. The closest one that Sharpay could remember was in the direction that they just came from.
Once they reached the make-up counter in the nearest retail store, Kelsi took the camera from Taylor while she prepped herself up with a load of cover up, which was the wrong skin tone for her to begin with. She chose a dark purple for her lipstick color, and a lime green for her eye shadow, which she rubbed and made the green smudge over most of her forehead. With some finishing touches, they had a very messed up make-up arrangement.
"Do I look gorgeous?" Taylor batted her mascara-clumped eyelashes at the camera.
"Excuse me… Would you four like any help?" A woman tapped Taylor on the shoulder. Taylor spun around in response, as her friends darted away, and the look of shock crossing the woman's face was priceless. It was a mixture of confusion, shock, and a dash of disgust.
"No, thanks. We were just using the testing samples. I love my new look! I'll recommend this place to all of my friends!" Taylor said quickly before darting away. The woman looked distressed, calling Taylor back to see if she'd like a professional to do her make-up again. Of course, her efforts were futile and Taylor ignored them when she approached her friends.
When Taylor reached the group, they had already gotten ready to remove the smears of products on her face. Kelsi had the camera pointed at her, zooming in at their lovely creation one last time.
"It's there's one thing harder to get off than gum, it's dry cover-up." Sharpay said, giving Taylor a bottle of make-up remover that she had stored away in her purse. Kelsi put the camera under her arm and helped in the efforts as well.
Finally, every spot of the badly applied make-up was off. Unfortunentally for Taylor, her other make-up also ended up getting washed off.
"Gabriella, do you have that mascara that you let me borrow yesterday? I think we got all of the mascara I was wearing…" Taylor asked. Gabriella nodded and handed her a stick of mascara from her purse. Sharpay lent Taylor a mirror and soon they were ready to move on.
"What's next?" Gabriella asked.
"We're supposed to go into a music store, scan a country CD on the music player, have it play out loud, and attempt to square dance badly for the entire song." Kelsi said, reading number nine off of their list with a giggle.
"Where's the nearest music store?" Sharpay asked, observing that there was no music store in their general area.
"There's one next to the bathrooms. I saw it on our way out when we were doing number seven." Kelsi responded.
"Are you sure this store had the kind of music player they're asking for?" Gabriella reasoned as they came in sight of the store. "You know, all stores don't have those preview things."
"I know they do. I was in there the other day." Kelsi nodded. "When we get in there, I'll go get a CD, and you three wait at the music preview station. It's in the back, left side." She explained quickly, darting off to find the CD.
"Back… Left… Aha!" Sharpay said, spotting the station through the rows of music. Taylor once again had the camera, this time capturing the rows of music as they went by. The store was fairly quiet, with only a few shoppers, who seemed intently gazing down the aisles of music.
"Got it!" Kelsi came running to the group, passing the CD to Gabriella, who scanned the bar code of the CD on the platform.
"What track?" She asked.
"Seven." Kelsi finished. "It's the best fast-paced one." As Gabriella entered the track number on the number pad, sound of country music guitar chords filled the store. Taylor grabbed Gabriella's elbow, the two friends starting to skip around in circles to the music.
Sharpay and Kelsi soon followed in giggles, earning the stares of question from the entire store and a puzzled gaze from the clerk sitting behind the counter.
The four girls switched dance partners halfway through the song, where Gabriella was now dancing a very bad square dance with Sharpay. But, Kelsi and Taylor both were not paying attention to the other, they collided, collapsing on the ground in a giggle fit.
"Ow!" Kelsi said between laughs, rubbing her forehead at the point where the two had run into each other. "Thanks to your hard head, you nearly broke my glasses!"
"That's Taylor!" Gabriella said, laughing as the song ended. "Hard headed and stubborn!"
"Hey! That's not nice miss know-it-all." Taylor retorted, getting off of the ground.
"Guys… I hate to interrupt this giggle fest, but the songs over, and we need to make up time from that break that we took earlier…" Sharpay said skeptically.
"You're right." Kelsi nodded, standing up. "But even if we lose—which we won't—the boys video will be especially funny!"
"Oh, yeah!" Taylor agreed, a mischievous grin crossing her face. "Especially number twelve!"
I bet all of you are dying to know what number twelve is. Hehe, no, it won't be in the next chapter. It was have it's own chapter after that! It's going to be that long. The boys will have number 10 and 11 to do in the next chapter, and then it will be Chad's special chapter.
As for what the dare is, nobody has guessed it yet… and I'm surprised nobody has (no, it has nothing to do with a haircut)! As I said, Ms. Darbus will make a grand appearance… just a hint.
Oh, and I posted a new series of oneshots called Something Beautiful. So, please, check that out and tell me what you think. But not before you click the little button below this and tell me what you think of this chappie :D