"Okay, please run that one by me one more time," I said, too confused to be losing patience, though that's exactly what I should've been doing. Fang had better have a damn good explanation for this one. I don't recall him falling on his head, though I don't watch him every single second, so who really knows what the kid does in his spare time? Blogs, falling on his head. He must have one busy day.
"We go to the football game," Fang replied simply.
"Uh huh," I replied, holding all of my exasperation in. It wasn't easy, lemme tell you.
"Do you want to get spotted?" I asked him.
"Yes," Fang said, "Do you need me to draft a mission statement for the whole thing? That'll take me a sec but I'll do it."
I blinked. What the hell had gotten into Fang? "Uh, yeah, how 'bout no?" I said, "I dunno if anyone sent you the memo, but we don't go seeking attention. Hence the whole 'on the run' thing."
"Well, it's not hard to get out of the stadium. In fact, it'd be easier for us," Fang said, "Get spotted, get some airtime, literally and figuratively, and leave... C'mon, it'll be fun."
Fang certainly seemed to have an incredibly damaged view of what 'fun' was.
We were just leaving the Kennedy memorial thingy (it was so depressing) and we were just about set to roam aimlessly around Dallas. And Fang just wouldn't let this football excursion go.
And neither would anyone else in the Flock.
Darn them all.
They were all paying rapt attention to the Clash of the Titans (myself and Fang) wondering if we would once again go out of our way to something inordinately stupid. Why did everyone always insist on doing something that was sure to get us in a fix? I just didn't understand it.
"I don't think going into a massive stadium and being crammed in with thousands and thousands of people would be fun, Fang," I said, perturbed.
"I don't see why we shouldn't go!" Nudge threw in her opinion. It sounded rather blurted out, and I knew it was from the buildup of not talking for several minutes.
"Second," Iggy said.
"Yeah, I wanna go!" the Gasman added.
"Second," Iggy said.
"We should go. It'd be fun, and we'd maybe get to show off again," Fang said.
"Second," Iggy said.
"Stop that!" I snapped, glancing at Iggy who was smothering a smile at having aggravated me even more than normal.
"Second," Iggy said.
I sighed, "Well why do you wanna go so bad anyway?"
"Three guesses," Iggy said, and I was thankful that his streak of seconds had come to an end.
"I don't know," I conceded.
"Cheerleaders!" Iggy almost shouted, waving his arms to try to emphasis the vast importance of this statement.
Fang pointed to Iggy, "See? There ya go. We should go."
"Second," Iggy said.
"You can't even see the cheerleaders even if we went!" I snapped at Iggy, trying to ignore Fang.
"Oh, don't even discriminate, dude," Iggy muttered, and I knew by his tone he wasn't really hurt by my remark. He was enjoying my brutal dethroning as leader by the mutinous Fang; he knew the mutineers were winning, so nothing I said could make him feel bad.
Yeah they were winning. I'm not perfect, okay?
"Discrimination is so totally evil," Iggy continued, "In fact, I'm gonna discriminate the discriminators. That'll show ya."
I noticed that both Angel and Total had stayed out of this one so far. I wondered if Angel was trying to mind make me go through with this. She was up to something...
She probably heard me think that...
"I think we should go," Angel said.
There was a slight pause as I tried to figure out how to respond to that. I didn't bother me to snap at Iggy or Fang, or maybe even Nudge or Gazzy if they really deserved it, but Angel was different.
I was just about to reply when Iggy cut in.
"Second," he said.
"Please?" Nudge and Gazzy said at the same time. It was almost creepy, actually. Like, Children of the Corn creepy.
I looked at Fang, and he wasn't even trying to hide his smile. He had rallied the masses, stormed the castle, and beheaded me. So to speak. And he was freakin' happy about it. But whatever.
Screw it; I threw in the towel.
"Fine!" I said, trying to sound as upset about it as possible, "But I swear something'll happen and I don't want any complaints from any of yo when it does, okay?"
"YES!" Gazzy shouted, pumping his fists into the air.
"I love you, Max!" Nudge said, smiling.
"Second," Iggy said.
"Thank you, Max," Angel said quietly.
I turned and offered my baby a half-hearted smile.
"Thank you, Max," Fang said, even more quietly than Angel had.
I looked at him, and he looked back. There was so much happening behind those eyes. I wish I knew just half of what it was.
I'll ask later.
We walked along the sidewalk entering the outskirts of Dallas, and man was it warm. I mean, almost unnaturally warm. I tried to ignore it. But damn was it hot. Why did we come here of all places?
Oh right, because we had to go somewhere. And we'd been almost everywhere else it seemed. So Texas... Why the hell not?
Being on the run sucked, I told myself for maybe the thousandth time during our adventure.
"I'm hungry," Nudge reported.
What else was new?
"Alrighty," I muttered, "Everyone start looking out for a place to eat."
"I'll give it a whirl," Iggy muttered back.
"Look! Donuts!" Gazzy said, pointing like he had just spotted Bigfoot or something.
"Yeah, alright," I said, not even needing to glance around to know that everyone was staring at me, waiting for me to make a decision. The curse of being in charge, I suppose.
"I want a jelly filled one," Total said.
So the talking dog was talking again. It had been a while, I noticed. I wondered if a cat had had his tongue.
Ha ha ha...
I led our intrepid little group into a Krispy Kreme for what would be maybe the most unhealthy lunch in the history of the world.
But it was worth it to see them all so happy.