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The music was so loud I could feel it through the sidewalk on the way in. When no one was looking, I sidled up to the stereo and scooched the volume down a few notches. No point in pissing off the neighbors.
“Seriously?” Adam asked.
“Do you want to go home early?”
“No.”
“Best not to piss off the neighbors then. The cops around here are always happy to jump at any reason. It’s got to be boring, really, policing a town with a crime rate nearly in negative numbers.”
“Shit, you’re right,” he admits, “Good call, man.”
“I do what I can.”
The drinks were set out buffet style on the kitchen table. There was an unwritten code that the host provided. Granted, the host was supposed to change every time, but most of the parties that semester had been held at Mullins’ house, which was pretty awesome, to be fair. Much roomier than any of our dorms.
Things were going so well, I nearly let myself relax. Nearly, but not quite, and more the better because that was the same time it happened.
Most of the guys were cool. Others not so much. Matt “Tank” Thomas was one from Column B. Nearly as big as Mountain Mike, Tank liked to use his powers for evil. Sadly, there weren’t any superheroes around to thwart his vile, voracious villainy. Any mere mortals who tried were liable to need dental surgery.
None of which much troubled me when I saw him walking an only partially conscious freshman girl, rendered insensible with alcohol, to where I happened to know there was a bedroom.
I looked at my bottle of non-alcoholic apple cider for a moment, evaluating its efficacy as a weapon if things went south. Deciding it would probably kill him, I left the bottle behind, counting on my wit, will and speed to keep me from getting my face pulped.
“She doesn’t look up to it, Matt,” I said, putting myself between the two of them and the door.
“Oh yeah?” Tank slurred, dropping the girl, so she made an audible thump that couldn’t have been pleasant.
“Yeah.”
“Who’s going to stop me?”
“Me.”
“Oh, fuck off, short-ass. You and what army?”
“That one.”
I’d never seen Mountain so angry. Usually the epitome of a gentle giant, in that moment he looked more than happy to grind some bones to make his bread.
“Oh, fu -”
Matt didn’t even have time to finish his curse. Like clockwork, “Mountain” Mike Lawrence and “Angry” Adam Anders forcibly escorted Matt from the house, relieving him of his team polo on the way, while Mickey and I reunited the girl with her friends, several of whom were fortunately in a better state and able to take care of her.
There were some things that the terrifying trio had no sense of humor about. A sensibility shared by the administrators, even in terms of winning varsity athletes. Not with that many credible witnesses. Matt wouldn’t be at the school come Monday.
Chapter Three - Elise
It was like a time loop. The DVD menu for The World’s End playing on repeat. Luckily, I had my earbuds in minimizing the potential damage to sanity for those around me. Squinting my eyes slightly, the computer clock came into clarity, even without my glasses. Just after five, I assumed in the morning, which gave me plenty of time to set my cunning plan into action.
If I cut it close, I had time for another movie before my morning class. My inner Machiavelli kicking in, I decided to take the same action as before and watch on the way. They unlocked the buildings about six, which gave me just under an hour to shower, change and eat. All three pressing issues after the previous night.
As the water blasted from the high-pressure shower head, I soaped up, still enjoying the appreciation for my body that had been slowly developing. Around the time I turned 17, the awkwardness of puberty fell away.
I started losing weight, and it seemed like I’d developed hips and tits, and rather sizeable ones, overnight. My hair got glossier, and my skin seemed to almost glow under certain light, the mess of zits that had plagued my forehead vanishing and leaving my complexion smooth and creamy.
A state of affairs that saw me get a lot more attention from boys, who used to treat me like I was invisible. Not an issue that continued at college, where I was one of my vivacious young freshmen and no one knew me from before. Not that I wouldn’t welcome it, from the right guy.
Even if my only real experience with dudes came from Hawthorne, with whom I’d always been strictly platonic. He was in love with Amber and I respected that, even if he’d had yet to pluck up the courage to say it. Good-natured argument had been their main mode of communication up until that point.
