17
Nikki
My one fear as I sat between Barry and my aunt was that the hot dishes next to them would get horny in the middle of the show and start making out. Really, that was it. I wasn't afraid of getting the spit of the actors on me because we were front row center. I wasn't afraid of going home by myself because I could just go straight to bed because I had let the dogs out already. I was especially sure that Auntie Tonya's strange prophecy wouldn't come true. I was really happy to be at Phantasma again, seeing a supposedly new show. The chatter around the huge theater immediately stopped the moment the band started playing and the bright red velvet curtains drew to reveal three vaudeville-freak show-esque people introducing Mr. Y's Phantasma. They weren't as prominent last time I was there. I recognized the voices but not the appearances of the actors and dancers on stage because they all seemed so altered with the makeup and costumes.
They sang new original songs and did new awesome dances with them and there wasn't a critical eye amongst the dazed eyes surrounding to say anything bad about it. Even Barry and his partner and Tonya and Deshawn were too amazed to get bored and get horny and make out or something in front of their seventeen-year-old companion. The show went on until ten and I let Deshawn take Tonya to stay the night at his place and convinced Barry I could so much as make it to my car by myself. Looking back…should I have let Barry and his partner escort me? I haven't the slightest idea.
No stars, as usual. Just a heavy black sky, and some muffled music coming from who-knows-where. I parked at the edge of the cast parking lot near the stage door and walked along the building to my car. I didn't see them coming, but they came. Two drunken dudes in coats and beards, laughing. Perhaps from the orchestra because I didn't see them. I was about to make my merry little way past the other cars until they saw me and one shouted, "Hey, Mack, it's a babe!"
That was so ridiculous that I stopped and gave them a weird look rather than running, or even just ignoring them because I get this every time I go to Harlem to so much as visit my grandmother. "Hey, hey babe," the other guy said as they approached me. "Wanna…wanna…uh, how did that thing go again?"
"Dumbass, it went nice shoes, wanna fuck?"
"Can…can I call you two inebriated gentlemen a cab?" I asked.
They laughed and tried to hug me or something, but I managed to step back until I stepped against a car. Cornered. "Shit," I whispered. Did I bring my pepper spray? As the inebriated men began to try to grasp me, I reached into my purse and grasped a bottle. Yes. The minute I pulled it out, though, I fell into the car I was leaning against. It was a van with an automatic fucking door. I hit my head and dropped the pepper spray, and my pants loosened a little. I was too hurt to fight back as the men apparently sober enough to do stuff started doing stuff. All I could do was awkwardly scream, loud enough for only one set of ears to hear. Before I knew it, the men had screamed and fell off me. I hit my head trying to sit up again and blacked out like a goddamn wimp.