by Jim English
Gay People Can’t Stop Reading
Date with Destiny Adventures!
* * *
“Just like the Choose Your Own Adventure books I used to read growing up. Only with hotter guys. In Speedos. And blow-jobs!”
—Blake, age 26, florist
“We read it again and again and again!”
—Larry, age 26, and Mel, age 54, bed-and-breakfast proprietors
“All the excitement of a Fire Island vacation—for just $7.95. You can’t even buy a drink on Fire Island for $7.95!”
—Keenan, age 24, designer
Don’t miss these future
Date with Destiny Adventures!
* * *
NIGHT OF A THOUSAND BOYFRIENDS by Miranda Clarke
I KNOW WHO YOU DID LAST SUMMER by James H. English
GET OFF THE CROSS, MARY! by R. A. Klofine
MY WHITE HOUSE INTERNSHIP by Miranda Clarke
A CONNECTICUT QUEEN IN KING ARTHUR’S COURT by R. A. Klofine
HELP! I’M TRAPPED IN AN AARON SPELLING TEEN DRAMA! by R. A. Klofine
COUNTRY BEAR JAMBOREE by James H. English
DOCTOR, THAT TICKLES! by R. A. Klofine
HE SAID HE WAS EIGHTEEN by James H. English
UNCLE GLADIATOR by James H. English
QUEST FOR STREISAND by Miranda Clarke
JOURNEY TO THE BOTTOM OF BEN AFFLECK by Miranda Clarke
Copyright © 2003 by Quirk Productions, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental. The publisher also acknowledges that—at press time—Fire Island doesn’t really have buff shirtless lifeguards like the ones in this story. But wouldn’t it be a better place if it did?
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Number: 2002094335
ISBN: 1-931686-40-8
eISBN: 978-1-59474-916-2
Quirk Books
215 Church Street
Philadelphia, PA 19106
quirkbooks.com
v3.1
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Warning!!!!
Map
First Page
About the Author
About the Illustrator
WARNING!!!!
Reading these pages in consecutive order would be like watching Memento and Sliding Doors spliced with outtakes from Run Lola Run by way of—well, let’s just say it would be pretty damn confusing.
Instead, begin on this page, and follow the instructions at the bottom of each page. These instructions will guide you through many adventures and decisions. Each choice has the potential to bring you success or disaster—so think carefully!
Choose wisely, and you could end up with an absolutely gorgeous bodybuilder. Choose poorly, and you could end up facing charges for indecent exposure. Anything’s possible—and it’s all up to you!
Your vacation to Fire Island is already off to a bad start—and it’s all because of your annoying best friend Jose.
First he forgot to pack his lucky hair dryer—so you both wasted an hour in Wal-Mart looking for a suitable replacement. Then he became nauseated on the ferryboat, and begged the captain to slow down.
Now you’ve finally made it to the beach, and Jose won’t stop shrieking about the cold water. He’s dressed in a skimpy Speedo and prancing in the waves like a little drama queen. You’ve seen this act before, and it works every time—Jose’s stunning six-pack, shapely pecs, and lustrous black hair have captured the attention of every guy on the beach.
But enough about him. This is your vacation, too, and you’ve come to Fire Island to relax, unwind, and maybe even find a little romance. There are hundreds of gorgeous young men on the beach, and it’s easy to see why the affluent village of The Pines is considered the greatest gay playground on the East Coast.
You stretch out on your blanket and scope all the eye candy for a good twenty minutes. When you glance back at the ocean, you don’t see Jose anymore. Your best friend has vanished!
* * *
Turn to this page.
Several moments pass before you finally locate Jose—he’s at least two hundred feet out to sea, just a speck on the horizon, waving his arms and frantically trying to get your attention. He must be drowning!
“Don’t worry!” you shout. “I’m coming!”
You know that Jose can’t swim to save his life. But as you run toward the water, you’re not sure you’ll be strong enough to rescue him. Maybe you should try to find a lifeguard instead, and leave this job up to the professionals.
* * *
If you swim out to help Jose, turn to this page.
If you run to the nearest lifeguard stand, turn to this page.
“I’m sorry,” you tell Jose. “I know I’m a total coward, but I just can’t do it.”
“It’s your loss,” he shrugs. “But I’m not going to let this opportunity go to waste.” He checks his hair in the mirror behind the bar and then saunters over in the hottie’s direction.
You’re in no mood to watch Jose pick up another guy, so you turn your back and order another Margarita. It’s a huge glass, but you gulp it down quickly. The next time you glance back at blondie, he’s leaning against a wall, and Jose is grinding up against him.
“Where’s the bathroom?” you ask the bartender.
He points to the far end of the room. “Through the red door and down the stairs. Keep walking, and you’ll find it.”
The bathroom could be in Timbuktu for all you care—you just want to get away from Jose and blondie as quickly as possible.
* * *
Turn to this page.
“We need to save some of the Brut for Champagne Toast,” you tell Lance. “Our only hope is to try weaving through the zombies.”
You run north and plunge into the crowd of zombies. You spritz Brut in their faces, and it burns through their skin like acid! The zombies shriek and howl in pain. You’ve made it through the crowd when you realize Lance is no longer beside you. Without the bottle of Brut, he was defenseless!
“Lance!” you shout, as you run back into the crowd. The zombies close around you and knock you to the ground. The last thing you see is a stiletto heel stomping dangerously close to your face.
THE END
“Come on,” you tell Lance. “Maybe we’ll find some kind of weapon on the other side of the lighthouse.”
Unfortunately, this turns out to be your least successful decision so far. You find no weapons on the other side of the lighthouse—but rather a group of Champagne Toast’s evil zombie minions, who pounce on you and Lance as you come around the building.
The bad news is that you and Lance die within minutes.
The good news is you’re both spared the horrific effects of the president’s nuclear missiles, which transform Fire Island into a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
THE END
With just four minutes left to save Fire Island, you know there’s no time to mess around. You lunge toward Champagne Toast, reaching for her wig, but she deftly sidesteps you.
“That wasn’t very smart,” she says.
She approaches a rope that extends straight out the window. Jose must be tied to the end of it! With a single swipe of her razor-sharp nail, the rope severs in two—and you can hear your best friend screaming all the way down to the ground.
“No!” you shout, but it’s too late. You don’t even fight back as Champagne Toast charges forward. Your life is over—but maybe, if the world is l
ucky, Lance will find a way to save Fire Island on his own.
THE END
“I appreciate your offer,” you tell the bodybuilder, “but I need to get out of here.”
He points you in the direction of the ferryboat terminal and wishes you luck. “By my watch, the next ferry should be leaving in five minutes,” he says. “If you run, you just might make it.”
So you start running—and you do make it. As the boat sails to safety, you try telling your fellow passengers about the zombie epidemic in The Pines, but no one seems to believe you.
You don’t really care. You managed to survive, and that’s all that counts.
THE END
The entry in the journal gives you hope—if you can find one of these anti-zombie pills, you’ll have a much better chance of escaping! But when you look around, all you see are two tablets—a red one and a blue one—and neither is marked.
You realize that one of these pills will probably vaccinate you against the zombie poison—and the other is probably just straight Viagra.
There’s a loud splashing in the water behind you, and Jake climbs out of the pool. “You were smart to hide in here!” he exclaims. “Look what’s happening!”
He points outside, and you see that zombies have stormed the patio. Gorgeous young twinks are being slaughtered. There’s more carnage and bloodshed than the first twenty minutes of Saving Private Ryan, and you’re forced to look away.
“What should we do?” Jake exclaims.
You look down at the workbench and pick up the two tablets. “We each have a fifty-fifty chance of survival,” you tell him. “You must take one of these pills.”
* * *
If you take the red pill, turn to this page.
If you take the blue pill, turn to this page.
“Here goes nothing,” you tell Lance as you lob the bottle of Brut into the air. There’s a loud explosion and thousands of screams; the Brut splatters everywhere, burning the zombies like an acid cloud.
“You did it!” Lance exclaims, and then he kisses you on the cheek. “You’re absolutely marvelous!”
“Save that thought for later,” you tell him, checking your watch. “We only have twenty-five minutes left to stop Champagne Toast!”
You both run toward the south end of the street, where you’re lucky enough to find an abandoned motorcycle. “Hop on,” Lance tells you, and then he starts up the engine. Within moments, you’re both on the beach, racing toward the lighthouse on the far end of the island!
* * *
Turn to this page.
“I’ll take the lens,” you tell Cosmo. “Someone has to stop the zombies, and if you’re too old to do it, then I guess I will.”
“Whatever,” Cosmo says. “Just hurry up. I’m missing my show.”
When you return upstairs, there’s another man in the living room watching The Golden Girls. He’s dressed in a tailored suit that showcases his shapely upper body, and he’s wearing fabulous Revo sunglasses that you’d kill to own. “Which one of you is Cosmo?” he asks.
“Who the hell are you?” Cosmo fires back.
The man introduces himself as Lance Bottom, a special agent for the CIA. “My sources tell me you have a weapon for defeating the zombies. I’ll need you to give me this weapon right away. If I don’t save Fire Island in the next thirty minutes, the president is going to destroy it with a nuclear weapon!”
“Thirty minutes?” you exclaim. “We’ll never make it to the lighthouse in thirty minutes!”
* * *
Turn to this page.
You’re pretty sure it’s a left turn at the post office, a right turn at the coffee shop, and another right turn at the bookstore—and there’s no time to think twice. You run toward the museum as fast as your legs can carry you.
As you come around the side of the bookstore, however, you don’t see anything that looks like a museum. In fact, the only thing you see is a small pink house with a white picket fence, several meticulously groomed flowerbeds, and a series of lawn gnomes.
When you take a closer look, however, you notice a small plaque beside the front door that reads: FIRE ISLAND HISTORICAL WAX MUSEUM. Relieved to find that you’re in the right place, you open the door and step inside.
* * *
Turn to this page.
You know that every second counts, so you jump into the water and start swimming. A rush of adrenaline gives you strength you never knew you had, and you reach Jose in minutes.
“Oh, thank God!” he exclaims. “I thought I was going to drown! Some strange invisible force is pulling me out to sea!”
You grab Jose by the waist and start paddling to shore. Unfortunately, you don’t get far—there really is something working against your body, and you realize you are caught in a riptide. After three minutes of hopeless paddling, you’re exhausted.
You shout for help until you’re hoarse, but no one on shore seems to notice. There’s some kind of fistfight happening on the beach, and nobody sees your signals.
“What now?” Jose asks.
* * *
Turn to this page.
As much as you like Jose, you’re not about to risk your life so he can get laid. “I hope your do-me queen has a map,” you shout into the woods, “because I’m not sticking around!”
Then you start running down the nearest trail. After about ten minutes, you find yourself at the entrance of a small village. It appears to be completely deserted. A black crow is sitting on an old wooden sign that reads WELCOME TO CHERRY GROVE.
You walk toward the center of town. “Hello?” you call out. “Anyone here?”
Silence answers.
And then, in the distance, you hear the faint but familiar rhythms of ’70s disco songs. First it’s “Hot Stuff” by Donna Summer, then “I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor. Instinctively, you follow the music until you are standing before a tall, wide hedge.
Curious, you spread two of the bushes apart and peer between them.
* * *
Turn to this page.
When you get to the top, you immediately see the light beam where you need to place the anti-zombie lens. Unfortunately, Champagne Toast is standing right in front of it. Dressed in a Lycra body suit, she throws back her frizzy pink hair, and you and Lance cringe in horror at her terrifying makeup. Big fake lashes rest on her eyelids like demonic caterpillars.
“What are you looking at, bitches?” Champagne Toast asks. “You wish you had what I got! It’s called confidence, you whores! I may have lost that beauty pageant forty years ago, but I never lost confidence that I would get my revenge!”
“We can’t let you destroy the island,” you tell her.
She steps toward you and starts eyeballing your body. “You think you can stop me, pretty boy?” she asks. “Then you clearly underestimate my strength! It’s obvious you’ve never slept with a drag queen before! Have you?”
“No way,” you tell her. But then, sensing an opportunity, you quickly add, “I mean, not yet …”
“Not yet?” she asks, with a crude smile.
There’s about six feet of space between you and Champagne Toast—if you charged right now, you might be able to pull off her wig. Then again, your flirting seems to be disarming her.
* * *
If you try to rip off the wig, turn to this page.
If you continue flirting, turn to this page.
As you step into the museum, you call out, “Hello? Is anyone here?”
All you hear is the echo of your own voice—the entire museum appears deserted. There’s a ticket window beside the front door, and you pick up a brochure with a self-guided tour. If you can’t find Cosmo, maybe you can get some information about how to stop these horrible zombies yourself.
You move into the first room of the museum, which is filled with a series of wax figures reenacting famous moments in Fire Island history. One display shows early settlers on the island. Another depicts the legendary Mermen of Fire Island, who reportedly live b
eyond a large sandbar just off shore.
But it’s the last wax figure that truly catches your attention. It’s a tall queen in an ugly sequined gown, with pink hair and thousands of split ends. With a shock, you realize that it’s a wax figure of the same tranny who threatened you and Jose!
* * *
Turn to this page.
As Lance studies your map of Fire Island, he stands unusually close to you—but you’re not about to complain. He really is handsome, and you totally dig his whole Men in Black getup.
“I guess our chance of making it to the lighthouse in time is pretty slim,” he admits. “But our only other option is to persuade the president not to nuke the island. And I gotta tell you, his advisors seem pretty keen on the idea.”
Cosmo raises the volume on his television and gives you both a dirty look. “Can you talk about this outside?” he asks. “This is the legendary twenty-fourth episode, with a cameo appearance by George Clooney.”
You’re not sure what to do. On one hand, making it to the lighthouse in thirty minutes seems impossible. But is it any more impossible than trying to reason with the president?
* * *
If you try to make it to the lighthouse, turn to this page.
If you try to persuade the president, turn to this page.
