So Ryan did some more ball pitching to win Bo a bigger bear. (I had been right.) Chris entered a contest to guess how many jelly beans were in a jar, fully expecting to win. Amane took her own turn with the baseballs and won a bigger bear than Ryan. Annoyed, Ryan asked, "Seriously?"
"It's just throwing balls, and hitting the targets. It's not like they're small," she told him without much expression. But I could tell she was lapping it up.
The extended group headed for the bumper-boat rides, which were basically large inflated inner tubes in a giant round pool of sun-drenched water. There were signs posted that said no rough-housing. Despite that, Robby reached out of his boat, and pulled Chris into the water, for a good laugh from the rest of us.
Chris was pissed because his expensive high-tech phone got wet, but then he was happy because he was able to confirm that his expensive high-tech phone really WAS waterproof.... something he had only known through a spec-sheet up to that point.
A young wimpy looking attendant with an over-sized belly in a red carnie t-shirt pointed at Robby, and pointed out the 'no rough-housing' sign, saying, "You'll have to leave." Robby pretended to be contrite, and helped Chris back into his boat.
Moments later, he dunked Ryan into the drink, and as soon as he did that, I dunked Robby, and all hell broke loose. Bo dunked me, and Mags dunked Bo. Betty and Veronica dunked each other. And we were all pulling people into the water that we didn't even know. The only one who escaped was Amane, who was on the other side of the pool, uploading shots to FaceBucket.
The attendant blew a loud whistle and removed us, giving us each a stamp on the hand that meant no-admittance back on the ride. But it was kinda worth it. We all had a blast and a good laugh out of it, and the cool water felt good drying in the hot night air. Amane finished her ride before joining us. She didn't want to be directly associated with us trouble makers.
Ryan was mortified. "What is it with you people? We've been banned from the bumper boats and the carousel. Are you trying to get us kicked out of every kiddie ride in the park?"
Robby grinned wide. “Are you kidding me? Wet t-shirt was inspired.” He looked at the girls around him with admiration, dry-humping Betty while Veronica giggled.
Mags, Bo, and I all exchanged an evil grin and raised our hands in the air, and started whooping excitedly. “Get kicked out of every ride in the park!!! Let’s Do it! DO IT! YEEAAAHHHH!!!”
It was a great idea, but the rest of the gang shot it down. Amane and Chris groaned with Ryan and talked us out of any mischief. Instead we got some sugar-coated fried dough, and went on some flying cars that were tame enough for everyone. It was still fun, even if it wasn’t crazy.
Then we heard an announcement that the fireworks would be starting in 10 minutes. Robby asked Betty and Veronica if they wanted to watch the fireworks from the back of his van, and to our surprise, they said, yes. He winked at us, and said, "Later! Y'all can find your own way home!" And he took off with the girls.
“Hey!” I hollered. “You might want to check their IDs; make sure they’re old enough.”
“I checked what matters,” he scoffed. “To ME.” Robby flipped me off again as he and the girls departed.
The remaining six of us found a spot in the back of a big field and watched the Fireworks.
“The Ferris wheel would have been perfect for this,” Bo thought out loud, dreamily. We agreed.
I stood there with my right arm around Mags. Bo was to my left, with Ryan's arm around her. Chris and Amane flanked us on either side.
Feeling like children, we couldn't help but "ooh" and "aah" as the colored lights exploded into bigger and better patterns, overlapping and sizzling through the sky accompanied by pounding booms. The finale was a non-stop attack of colors flying higher and higher, wider and wider, overlapping, and swimming in the sky. Bo and I turned at the same time to face one another, and gave each other the sweetest of smiles and a meaningful glance. I felt like I was holding her, too, even though I wasn't.
[ Mags Favorites ]
After the carnival, Ryan gave Bo an extended hug and kiss in front of me. Bo showed no sign of resistance. Mags rubbed my back as if she understood how much that bothered me.
Ryan drove Bo home, and I was left to let my imagination wonder if she would be staying at his place overnight. I sighed. I had no right to feel that way.
Amane and Chris did their usual carpool and said goodnight. Mags and I weren't tired, so I talked her out of making a stop for some public sex somewhere and instead we went to a late-night diner for dessert and coffee.
As we sat there on one side of a torn, red-vinyl booth seat, I realized that she and I had been together for a while now. We had hung out with the gang, gone out on the side, and talked on the phone - though that was pretty much restricted to her practicing some pretty amazing phone sex, as far as the phone went. But through all of that, I realized I still knew near nothing about Mags. She was very private and closed, and I thought she might appreciate it if I showed I wanted to know more about her as a person. My previous attempts had failed.
"You never talk about yourself," I told her.
"There's nothing to say. You know what you need to know," she told me, poking some pie with a fork, smearing the melted ice cream around the sides into creamy channels.
I grimaced, then I tried to be playful. "What's your favorite flavor ice cream? Vanilla?" The pie was topped with vanilla.
"Cherry," she answered.
I scoffed. "No, Seriously." I thought it was one of her sexual-innuendo jokes.
She told me earnestly. "I like Ben and Jerry's Cherry Garcia, with those big chunks. And their Georgia Peach, but you can't get that anymore. They replaced it with something that isn't as good."
I smiled. She was being honest with me. No games. No jokes. "Well, that wasn't so hard. Was it?"
She smiled back, easing up a bit. "All right. What else do you want to know?"
"Favorite song."
"I already told you that. Don't you remember?"
I thought back. I thought hard. She was watching me with an unusual amount of determination. I was afraid to forget, but I didn't remember her telling me before. I knew she loved Kesha, because she was always playing it on her phone, and dancing to it in the clubs. Then it came back to me. The first night we had met, she had pointed to her phone’s playlist and said "My song." I remembered and told her, "Kesha's - Dancing with tears in my eyes."
She smiled wider and moved her hand as if she were dropping a coin in a slot machine and pulling a handle, and said, "Ok, you get another spin. Keep going."
"Favorite color."
"Green."
"No way," I protested. "You're making this up. I never see you wear green. Your car's red, not green."
"Doesn't mean it's not my favorite color. I love the look of the leaves, and the grass, and the trees, and even the way the kudzu covers everything in its path along the sides of the road; especially when it has just rained, and the sun shines down on it. I love the morning, when the grass is glistening with dew. It makes me feel like the world is fresh, and full of hope."
Our eyes connected in a way they never had before.
I teased, "Have I used up all my wishes?"
She brushed my face with the back of her hand. "You better stop while you're ahead, W2. You might find yourself getting in too deep for you to handle."
"I can handle an awful lot." I didn't know why I was saying that. I felt that things were secretly moving forward with Bo, but there was something addictive about Mags dropping her guard and opening up to me.
"You play with fire, you're gonna get burned," she said with an ominous but playful grin, biting the edge of her lower lip. "You know you can't give yourself to me completely. I thought we had that in common."
She touched a raw spot in my heart. "Maybe if we stopped playing these games, and started talking about..."
She put a finger to my lips to hush me. "No labels. No talking of the future. You know the ru
les. We are who we are."
"That's a Kesha song," I pointed out.
"Very good. Wanna go park somewhere?" She kicked off her shoe and lifted her foot into my lap, under the table, wiggling it seductively with precision.
"Yep."
[ Zombie Party ]
A week later, the whole gang happened to be free on a Friday afternoon. Out of nowhere, we decided to do the Atlanta Walking Dead tour, taking a bus to see all the places where the show was filmed. That was Bo's suggestion. She liked zombies. (Who knew?) Chris was right there with her, giving us the blow-by-blow comparison of the TV show with the graphic novel; and behind-the-scenes comments from director and cast interviews and the Talking Dead discussions. The tour was actually kinda cool, complete with a few made-up zombies on the tour bus. That gave us all the inspiration to throw a hastily-crafted weekend house party called "Halloween-in-July." The theme was zombies. Obviously. And Mags volunteered to host it since her parents were away again.
We invited (by phone, text, and word-of-mouth) various people from our respective schools, and of course, friends, and friends-of-friends (sorry about the ‘no notice.’) No buzzkills welcome (that weren't already in our own little group) and NO adults.
Bo went as a Japanese High-School zombie based on one of her Anime shows, complete with short sleeved white shirt with school badge; short pleated green skirt; and small white socks and little black shoes. High School of the Dead was the show. I thought she was painfully hot, despite the rotting flesh plastered on the side of her face.
Ryan was the pet zombie from Fido, complete with neck collar and leash. Seemed like a good fit. Despite thinking at one time that he was the so-called alpha male of the group, he seemed more and more like a submissive pet as time went by. I wondered what had changed.
Chris went classic Romero. No frills zombie, simulated in black and white. An homage to Night of the Living Dead. “Death comes in many colors,” he told us poetically.
Amane tried to be the girl with the machine gun leg from Planet Terror, though it was so uncomfortable for her that she abandoned the prop early on and ended up looking pretty much like “Amane.”
Robby insisted on being one of the hillbilly zombies from Cabin In The Woods. I thought that was a great idea, being a big fan of Josh Whedon, so I went as another one of the same.
Mags surprised us all by not being a zombie at all. She dressed up like Ophelia from Hamlet, the dead Ophelia, drowned in a shallow pond, wearing a soaked white nightgown and wild water-lily flowers for a necklace. Her face was bluish, and her makeup ran down her deadened face. Bo quietly shared with me that it was actually her idea, a reference from one of her anime shows, Ergo Proxy. Not quite a zombie, but an effective and fairly classy addition to the theme. In the end, Mags would say, “dead is dead.”
After doing photos - individual and group - we all helped finish setting up the house for the party.
As with any unsupervised party at Mags house, there was too much alcohol, and probably too many drugs. I never encouraged Mags' use of illegal substances. I always stuck to beer. Or hard spirits. Robby liked the alcohol, and the occasional joint, but nothing worse. The girls all chipped in to help decorate. Bo had tapped into her art skills and made some decorations herself. The food resembled brains, eyes, grubs, and body parts. It was a little gross without being stomach-turning disgusting. The drinks made use of dried-ice to give them that mad scientist spooky smoking-mist feel.
The music mix was provided by Amane's roommate, Rayne, who doubled as a DJ at night. It combined popular Halloween-style and death-themed songs with some short special effects loops. The jukebox was loaded with “Zombies on your Lawn” by Laura Shigihara, The Wallflowers’ 'One Headlight', and "Monster Mash' by Bobby Pickett; 'Thriller' of Michael Jackson, 'Dragula' by Rob Zombie, Martina McBride's ‘Concrete Angel ‘, 'Better Dig Two' by The Band Perry, 'Creepin' by Eric Church, 'The Devil Went Down To Georgia' and a whole lot more. Rayne said she could keep the tunes going until dawn. Literally.
Once the party started and the guests showed up, we started a laser tag game with a “shoot-to-the head” required kill (because once Romero set that criteria for zombie movies, no one ever looked back.)
It was funny to see Amane following Robby around trying to eat his brains. At one point, I told her she'd probably have to dig deep to find any, and even then, she might not get lucky. She seemed disappointed and asked, “You don’t think I can get lucky with Robby?” I started to realize she liked him more than I thought. I gave my head a little tilt, as if to say, “Who knows?” Then added aloud, “But why would you want to?”
After the first wave of the party had wound down, I wandered into the den to give myself a break from the noise.
There was an old upright piano in the corner, covered with framed family photos. There were pictures of Mags' relatives and grandparents, her parents’ wedding, and Mags from the time she was a little girl till almost the present. All of the pictures of her looked innocent and sweet. It was hard to make the connection with the wild and reckless girl I knew today.
I picked up one picture of her as a kid, and was won over by her smile and charm. She didn't have that sad defiant edge that made her eyes droop (though maybe that was the drugs and alcohol these days.) Mags came into the den and caught me.
"You were a cute kid," I told her with a friendly grin.
"I'm not anymore?" she asked with a roll of the eyes and a pout. I should have anticipated that.
"'Course y'are. But this…" I held up the photo frame for her to see. "... is a whole 'nutha world a cute."
Mags took the photo from my hand and considered it without expression for a moment then put it back on the piano. "Pictures only show the part of the story that can be shown," she told me.
Concerned with her comment, and possibly her life in general, I became more serious and replied, "I don't think you're happy, Mags."
"I'm happy when I'm with you." She added with the rising corner of her lip, "As happy as I get anyway."
Despite her cover as a party girl, she seemed to carry the weight of the world on her shoulders. I felt bad for her and offered, "If you want to talk ..."
She didn't even let me finish the sentence. "W2... talking don't change shit."
"Maybe it could make you feel better."
"It would only remind me of the things I cannot control, and that fires me up and makes me more depressed."
"I want to make it better for you." I was sincere. They weren’t empty words.
She knew I meant it and seemed thankful, but she started getting riled up. "It's already better. I don't want you or ANYBODY putting a label on me every time you see me. Do you understand me? Unless it's a label I specifically choose myself. Is that clear?"
"I like you for more than just the hookups, you know. I worry about you."
"I'm a big girl."
"Sometimes you're a little out of control."
"Now you're just being polite." She smirked, trying to shift the direction of the conversation. Taking my hand, she led me toward her bedroom. "Shut up and come."
This was the first time I had ever been in her house, so I found myself taking in the little details. Her bedroom was simple, almost bare. There was no sign of anything personal except a couple of items her parents might have put there, as if creating their own version of a story.
Like the photos on the piano. There was not a hint of the girl I knew from the night clubs.
There was a classic white bureau set with matching canopy king sized bed. She had a small first communion plaque on her wall with her name hand-painted on it in pink, and an image of a child praying. I was surprised she had kept it there all these years; it felt out of place. On the wall opposite her bed was a flat screen TV, cable-connected. The carpet was shag; a green color; she did say she liked green.
Mags closed the door to the bedroom behind us and pushed me onto her bed. It was big. It sure beat the seats of her car, and the other various public places s
he had taken us.
"This is nice," I told her. "How come you've never brought me here?"
She reached over to the top drawer of her nightstand. When she opened it, I peeked inside. I wasn't entirely surprised to see it full of condoms, some wrappers already opened. There were also silk scarves that might be used as blindfolds or binds. We hadn't done any of that yet. I wondered if that meant she liked me more, or less, than other guys.
"I don't bring guys here," she told me. That didn't make a lot of sense to me, given the nightstand, but I let it go.
It made me think of something else. "Is this why you still live at home?"
"You gonna shut up tonight?" she asked me, a little cross.
"After you answer me," I told her.
She sighed. Not wanting to talk anymore. "Kind of a Catch-22 with my lifestyle. I live the lifestyle I do because of my parents, and I live the lifestyle I do because of my parents." She put a different inflexion on different words in the two parts of her reply.
"I don't know what that means," I admitted.
"You're not supposed to. But DON'T repeat it. It's private. Ok?"
"Yep."
"Now shut up and do me already. At this rate, I'm gonna be dead for real before you ever get around to it." I unintentionally had struck a nerve.
She lay back on the bed, and folded her arms across her chest. She lay very submissive on the pillow, like the Ophelia she had chosen as her costume tonight. It disturbed me. It wasn't sexy. It wasn't Mags. It was strange. I pulled my pants down anyway and climbed on top of her, but my heart was not there. I was some strange detached hillbilly zombie trying to take the pretty dead girl. It wasn’t working for me.
The door to her bedroom opened. Robby had found a new temporary friend and was looking for a place to take her. He walked in on me and Mags, and stood there for a minute before we realized he was watching. He asked excitedly, "Room in there for more?"
Under The Covers Page 12