by Laura Preble
“I guess some things are actually more important to her than the club,” I say, grabbing Elisa’s arm so she doesn’t get sucked into a tidal wave of very tall aliens coming our way. “I haven’t seen her like this before.”
“Hormones,” Elisa yells over the noise surrounding us. “Thank God I don’t have them.”
We finally spot Becca examining strange role-playing costumes (PVC corsets? C’mon, it’s made of plumbing!) and maneuver over to her. After forty minutes of shopping and no purchase, she finally agrees to move on. At just that moment, my phone buzzes.
“It’s a text message from Fletcher,” I yell. “Becca!” I have to yell because we are next to a big mob of people waiting for a free keychain or something. She turns to me, stone-faced, and follows as we swim upstream and get out of the crowd to a relatively quiet spot, but not before I lose a strand of asparagus. People are brutal when it comes to free key chains.
“So?” Elisa is leaning over my shoulder, trying to read my phone.
“Just a minute.” I get to my message menu, and click. “It says, ‘Sux…no win. Hungry?’” I flip the phone closed. “So, that’s that. At least we got some cool costumes out of it.”
“We’re not done yet!” Becca announces. “How could we not win? Our site was awesome. Nobody else had anything like we did—”
“How do you know?” Elisa has taken off the headset and is scratching the spandex neck of her costume. “Can I take this off now? I didn’t like this idea from the beginning. I think I’m allergic.”
“You could have said something, then,” Becca says, on edge.
“How can anyone say anything when you just take over?” Elisa tries to stare Becca down, which is tough, because she only comes up to Becca’s chest.
“Listen, if you don’t like how I do things, then—”
“Shut up!” I hiss. Everyone stops and stares at me. “The bunny. The bunny man is following us again!” I subtly gesture with my asparagus hair toward a booth behind us.
We all freeze. Becca slowly turns her head, hoping not to be seen. But as she does this, the bunny man ambles up to us, establishing direct contact!
He (I’m assuming it’s a he) is even taller than Becca, and with his ears, he is quite imposing. He towers over us, a menacing cloud of white fur with a little pink nose.
“Uh…hi.” Becca extends a hand, trying to shake paws with it. The bunny man stands totally still, silent. “We…we like your costume.”
Elisa and I instinctively cluster around Becca, just in case we have to defend her from the stranger. I think about what he could do in the middle of a big crowd: Throw deadly carrots? Use his powder-puff tail to suffocate us? But still, he’s scary.
“So, we’ve noticed that you’re sort of following us,” Becca says, trying again to open lines of cottontail communication. No answer. “Okay then. Guess we’ll be going. Nice to meet you.”
As she turns toward us, the bunny man slips a note into her hand and walks away.
7
RABBIT DROPPINGS
(or Euphoria Bags a Boyfriend)
“What does it say?” Elisa stands on tiptoes trying to read the note.
Becca clutches the paper to her chest. “Would you just let me read it, and then I’ll tell you?” She holds the note away from her face and squints at it, biting her lower lip in concentration. “Whoever it is, the person definitely doesn’t want us to figure it out too easily.”
Becca reads:
Sweet Mary Ann, I send you greetings from the rabbit hole.
And hope you have the fur and whiskers writhing in your soul.
More words to come I will impart to others, by and by,
A fan, some tea, a little cake, and oysters as they sigh.
We all stare silently at the note as if it will explode.
“What does that mean?” Elisa asks, grabbing the note as if she thinks Becca has made up the whole thing. “I think the rabbit ate carrots laced with LSD or something.”
Becca’s eyes sparkle. This is just her thing; she loves a good puzzle. I, however, think the whole thing smells like a prank. “Look, that guy must be somebody from school,” I say reasonably. “I would almost bet that Fletcher put him up to that.”
“Maybe not.” Becca has taken possession of the letter and stares at it intently, as if her laser vision will somehow make a secret message appear that will tell her the meaning of life, the universe, and everything, including big sweaty guys in big sweaty rabbit suits. We have to table analysis of the mystery message for a while because it’s time to meet Jon and Fletcher and Amber for some dinner. Through some complex text messages, we agree either to meet at the café in the exhibit hall or to fly to Paris for snails in butter sauce. It’s hard to tell with text messages sometimes. We opt for the food court.
We get grub and somehow snag a table, which is a contact sport. After we get our delicious food (sarcasm there), we have to actually hover above an Asian family of four that seems to be lounging at the table without really eating anything. After being surrounded for five minutes by the Geektastic Four, the family scurries away in fear of a tasteless makeover.
“So, who won the contest?” Elisa asks as she chomps her way through a wilty salad.
“It was a group from Seattle, a bunch of hip-hop nerds who call themselves Grand Funk Spaceport,” Jon answers. “They write lyrics to the Star Wars songs and then put it to a hip-hop beat. They wear costumes like the band in the Cantina from the first movie. You know, the buggy-looking aliens?” He’s sharing a hoagie with Amber, trying to catch bites of the sandwich between hair flips. Becca glares as if she wants to zap a killer laser beam at the hoagie and all lips touching it.
Fletcher snatches one of my fried zucchini pieces. “Those aliens at the Cantina could not have even played their instruments. They had no lips.” He leans over me and gives me a surprise peck. “Unlike you.”
“Did anybody comment about our stuff at all?” Elisa snorts, disgusted. “I wore spandex for nothing. How humiliating.”
Fletcher, who has laid off my food and is inhaling a bowl of lentil soup from a Greek food cart, says, “One guy thought Art-tastic was sexy.”
“Oh, sure, but that was Jon.” Elisa chuckles.
“No, it wasn’t me.” Jon realizes he put his foot in it, and checks Amber for her reaction. She’s busy slurping up hoagie leftovers, so I guess she missed the whole sexy exchange, which is just as well.
Becca, who has elected to make her dinner a diet soda and a Mrs. Fields cookie, proudly displays her note. “I got a secret message from a giant rabbit.”
“Sure you did.” Fletcher arches an eyebrow at me. “A giant rabbit. Right.”
“Seriously, she did.” I feel I have to defend her because, after all, she did get a letter from a giant rabbit, and how often can a person really say that and mean it? “It’s a cryptic poem.”
“Let’s see.”
She hands him the crinkled paper, and he carefully unfolds it as if it might explode into a million face-shattering pieces. As he reads the poem, he mouths the words solemnly, as if he’s reading the secret of resurrecting the dead and fashion-challenged. Finally, he folds it up and hands it back to her. “Guy’s on crack.”
“He’s not on crack, you moron.” Becca stuffs the note into her Smart-tastic bustier. “You don’t deserve to read it anyway. Obviously, this guy has a sense of the mysterious, the twisted, the bizarre.”
“Perfect for you.” Elisa picks through the plastic salad container, looking for one last crouton, but doesn’t match Becca’s melting stare. “What? I’m just saying, he’s a unique individual. I hope you two will be very happy in your hutch.”
“I have to figure out what the poem means first.” Becca replies.
We all decide to call it a day, and since Fletcher has his mom’s van, he offers us all a ride. We change out of our Geektastic outfits too; the body paint is starting to smear and the asparagus dreadlocks are itchy. As we head for the bathroom, I, of course,
have to call Dad to be sure it’s okay that Fletcher gives me a ride.
“I don’t know,” he says. “Is he a responsible driver?”
“No, Dad. He frequently tries to hit pedestrians and police officers.”
“Don’t do that. I’m serious.” He sighs deeply, as if to let me know that letting me get a ride home could be one of the biggest decisions of his life. “I guess it’s okay. Can we talk later, though? I have some things I need to talk to you about.”
“Oooh. That sounds ominous.” I’m trying to be light and breezy on the phone, but it does, in fact, sound kind of scary. My imagination always flips out when he says stuff like that: I usually imagine scenarios that are much worse than reality. We need to talk about…what? Moving? Getting a kidney transplant? Sex-change operation?
Rather than pollute the phone lines with my paranoia, I just say, “Thanks, Dad. Be home soon.” I flip my phone shut and catch up to the group. No one else has to call home, I notice. I think this is because my dad is especially protective of me. Ever since Mom died, he’s gotten weirder every year about this; I think he’s worried he’ll lose me too. If he saw Fletcher drive, he might be even more concerned, but I’m not going to tell him that.
Stopping at the bathroom, we all detach ourselves from our spandex (Elisa is so happy she practically purrs) and get back into our old familiar jeans and T-shirts. I know at that point that I will never truly be a superhero. I can’t dress the part, not long term.
When we get into the van, Becca dives into the back seat right after Jon, making sure that Amber can’t sit next to him. I climb in the front seat; as girlfriend, I get to ride shotgun. It’s one of those things in the unspoken dating code, I suppose. I’m not going to argue; I do not want to see a cat fight break out in the back seat. In that enclosed space, it might pack the equivalent power of a nuclear explosion in a tin lunch box.
Elisa parks herself in the third seat in the row, leaving Amber to sit in the third row back. Smoldering annoyance is radiating from back there. Elisa just seems amused, which doesn’t surprise me. For some reason, she just loves conflict.
The back seat is eerily quiet. I fearfully glance back, and see Becca slowly, slowly moving her hand toward Jon’s forearm. Danger! Danger! I have to do something…so I throw my Vege-tastic headpiece at her.
“Ow!” She yelps as a spike of plastic cauliflower pokes her in the shoulder. “Why did you do that?”
“Just slipped.” I notice, though, that in her haste to defend herself against my clever assault, her hand has gone back to its rightful place.
The trip home is full of perilous almost-touches like that, and I have to try and deflect each one so a civil war doesn’t erupt between the Queen Geeks. By the time we get to Becca’s house, I’ve thrown everything at her except my boots. She jumps down from the van in frosty silence and huffs to the door, clearly angry.
“What’s with her?” Fletcher asks as he steers back into traffic. “Who’s next, by the way?”
Amber has moved to the seat next to Jon and they are much closer than he had been to Becca. Elisa puts her hand in the air. “I’ll go next. This love fest is going to make me puke.”
He drops her at her house, and that leaves us two couples in the car together. “So. What now?” Fletcher asks.
In the rearview mirror, I see Amber’s hand is entwined in Jon’s. “Maybe you guys could come over to my house. I’m sure Dad won’t mind.” Perhaps if I can keep an eye on them…
The two in the back don’t even notice that my mouth is moving. Fletcher is humming some tune while he navigates onto the freeway. I’m just hoping we get to my house before they start face-hugging each other.
It’s almost seven, and when we get to my house, Amber and Jon manage to get out of the car while still holding hands and I can feel the hormones pinging between them like radar signals. I try to get out of the car, but the handles of a plastic bag loop over the stick shift and stubbornly refuse to let go. Fletcher seems blissfully unaware that I’m stuck. He casually skips up the steps to my front door and opens it without knocking. “Hey,” I call after him, tugging at the uncooperative bag. “Wait. Wait!”
Euphoria is programmed to be a nanny/domestic servant/ policewoman. If someone breaks into our house (or opens the door without proper identification) she can take any measures necessary to insure the safety and stability of our home. This is bad at the moment; I know there are going to be some fireworks. And I’m right, of course.
Sirens scream from the porch; red lights undulate in waves across the swing. We all cover our ears, and as I stumble to the door (bag in tatters), Euphoria is there, tasering my boyfriend with an auxiliary claw she keeps hidden for special occasions.
With a yelp of pain Fletcher falls to the floor and crawls into the fetal position. “Are you all right?” I say as I crouch down beside him. “Do you know who I am?”
“You’re the crazy woman who has a lethal droid for a pet.” He rubs the part of his arm that was stunned by Euphoria’s weapon. “Can we turn off the sirens, now that everyone in your neighborhood knows I’m a burglar or a rapist?”
“Euphoria, disengage.” I key in a code on her back panel; the siren stops, the red light stops, and we’re all left in traumatized silence. I help Fletcher to his feet. He flinches a little when we approach Euphoria.
“I’m terribly sorry,” Euphoria says, sympathy in her voice. “I just didn’t recognize you right away.”
Jon brushes by us, carefully skirting the robot. “Geez. You don’t believe in putting out the welcome mat, huh, Shelby?”
“Yeah,” Amber says, scurrying after him. “Usually, if someone doesn’t want you at their house, they just lock the door and hide behind the couch with the lights off. Could you guys do that next time?”
“You should probably let me go first anyway. That’s just polite.”
Euphoria is still reeling from her social blunder. “I just thought you were breaking into the house or something,” she babbles. “I certainly don’t make it a habit of injuring invited guests.”
“So, as long as we’re with you, she’s cool, right?” Jon asks. He’s still lurking behind Amber’s tallness.
“Don’t worry.” I walk toward the TV room, and they all follow. “She wouldn’t hurt anybody. That taser was only a mild shock.”
“It was not mild,” Fletcher says, wounded that I would downplay his injury.
“Where’s Dad?” I ask as we plop on our sofas in front of the TV.
“He’s out back.” Euphoria trundles over to Fletcher. “Would you like something to drink, honey?”
“Sure. Whatever you have that’s cold.” He still leans away from her slightly.
“Diet cola okay?”
“Great.”
Jon and Amber also are fine with diet cola, perhaps fearing a zap if they say they prefer lemon-lime. After Euphoria brings the drinks and two big bowls of popcorn, Fletcher says, “So? Now what?”
“What do you mean?” I ask. “Like, what should we do now? Watch a movie? Catch up on our reading?”
“No, no. I mean, now that the website thing is defunct, what are you going to do now? What’s your new mission?”
Amber and I just look at each other. It’s kind of weird not having Becca here. She always speaks for the Queen Geeks; in fact, when I think about it, no one ever asks me policy questions. So, I’m kind of at a loss. What are we going to do?
“It kind of seems like a shame to waste these great costumes and the website,” Amber says, her comment trailing off into the land of unfinished lines designed to keep a prospective boyfriend nearby. “Maybe there’s something we could do with them.”
Jon shifts in his seat and casually puts his arm around Amber. Not good. As Becca’s friend, I feel an obligation to try and thwart physical contact, at least when I’m in the room. I know Becca is going to grill me on what happened, and I cannot lie to her. I do a very juvenile thing: I throw popcorn at Amber’s head. I have to really analyze this someti
me; I seem to throw something at somebody whenever things get uncomfortable. Probably some deep, psychotic tendency there.
In this case, it sort of works, because she flinches and moves back to wipe salt and butter from her eye. “Why’d you do that?” she asks crossly. “I’m going to use your bathroom. I think that stuff’s all over my eye makeup.”
“I’ll show you.” I hop up, leaving the guys alone, and lead Amber down the hallway. “Listen, while we’re alone, I wanted to ask you a favor.” I stop at the bathroom door.
“What?” By the tone of her voice, I think she knows what I’m going to ask.
“Well…could you kind of cool it with Jon? I know it’s not a fair request—”
“No, it’s really not.” She opens the bathroom door and turns toward me. “I know Becca still has a thing for him, but he is not into her. Doesn’t she see that?”
She’s right, of course. I don’t know how to defend it. “She just wants what she wants. She’s not used to being told ‘no,’ I guess.”
“Well, maybe it’s time she started to get used to it.” Amber closes the door in my face. Yes, that went well.
“Okay, well, then I guess you can find your way back,” I shout a bit too loudly as I shuffle back to the living room. The guys are engaged in a lively conversation about the Sith Lords (what is it with Star Wars?) and wondering if the face paint on some of the Sith Lords is actually a mutation brought about by evil or if it’s just a genetic thing, like freckles. They really have too much time on their hands.
“So, back to my original question,” Fletcher says, completely ditching the Dark Lord freckle discussion. “What is your club going to do now?”
“I don’t know.” I’m sick of talking about the club, honestly. Okay, to be more honest, I’m sick of talking about the club with Jon and Fletcher. I keep feeling like they’re trying to insinuate themselves into our inner circle, like they’re spies from the other side looking for organizing tips or fashion advice. But that’s sort of stupid, huh? I mean, they’re just interested because we’re interested. Right?
