I had blacked out and had no idea where I was. When I opened my eyes, I was on a greyhound bus with Michael and his sister Rose. At first I was confused but thing’s seemed too familiar. Was I dreaming? I had to be. There was no way I had gone from Melanie’s front yard to a grey hound bus early in the morning with my best friend and his sister. Once I had looked around, I got this strange sense of déjà vu.
Mike and Rose were sitting in the two seats behind me talking. Mike was shocked, “What do you mean you don’t like chocolate? You’ve always liked chocolate!”
“No I haven’t.” Rose replied in a calm “sure-of-yourself” kind of way
“Hey Nick, Hasn’t rose loved chocolate before?”
“Yeah Rose, remember when we were little and Mike and I talked you into eating that whole party size bag of mini Hershey bars? You said you loved chocolate so much, you could eat that whole bag in 10 minutes.”
“Yeah, we were like 7 or 8. You must have been 5 or 6. Remember?” Mike added.
“And you’re shocked that I don’t like chocolate? Really?” Rose said sarcastically.
Mike and I looked at each other and laughed like oh yeah, that. As I said these things, I realized I wasn’t making myself say these words. That was strange because I knew I was dreaming but I couldn’t control what was happening. Just then, a big football player, from a high school team that was on the bus with us, came up to us and started hitting on Rose. As soon as I saw him, I realized what this was. It wasn’t a dream. I was reliving a memory. All of this happened last summer when we went to Sedona for a day trip just to check out shops and go swimming in local rivers. The player introduced himself, “Hey, I’m Chet. I’m the wide receiver of that AWESOME FOOTBALL TEAM BACK THERE! GO COUGARS!” He yelled back to his teammates. The guys yelled back, “WOOT WOOT!!” Mike and I looked at each other and tried to hold back our laughter. Rose wasn’t impressed though. The bus driver yelled back at them, “Hey! Keep it quiet and SIT DOWN!” “Sorry sir.” Chet said and took a seat across the isle from mike. He continued to flirt, “So what’s your name?” Mike intruded and stuck out his hand, “Name’s Mike. Nice to meet you.”
“Not you, dweeb, her.” He knocked mikes hand down. “So what’s your name?” Wrong move for him because Rose lost all interest as soon as that happened. She was quick on her feet, though. “A secret.” She said in a flippant manner.
“Oh, I see how it is. So what do I have to do to get your name?”
“Steal the passenger list.” She never made eye contact with him. At this point the rest of the team was giggling at Chet’s utter failure.
“Ooooh, Cold!” I said to her with out thinking.
Chet started to get mad. “Hey, I’m trying to be nice here. At least you could return the favor!”
She finally looked at him straight in the eye and said, “Since you can’t take a hint, I’ll spell it out for you. I’m… Not… Interested… Got it?”
At this point, Chet was ticked. He stood up and took a step towards her. “Hey, slut…” Mike stood up and put his hand on Chet’s chest “Hey, that’s my sister man!” Chet hit Mike’s hand away again. “DON’T touch me.” I stood up now to defend my friend. “Hey douche bag, Go sit back down!” “Nick, I got this.” Mike said, cutting me off. The bus driver piped up again, “Hey, I said SIT BACK DOWN, or I’m gonna stop this bus and throw all of you off!” Mike replied to the driver, “It’s ok sir, Chet, here, was about to go back to his seat.” He stared Chet down until he walked away. “Eh, she’s not worth it.” Chet said as he sat back down. The rest of the ride there was filled jokes and car games, laughing at what had happened and talking about what we were going to do.
When we got to our destination, we headed straight for the nearest shopping center. It was early and we had only eaten snacks on the bus. So, needless to say we were hungry. We found a McDonalds and we decided to eat there. Mike opened the door for Rose and let me go in before him. We were looking at the menu when Rose realized she had left her money at home. “Ah, crap.” “What is it?” I asked. “My money is at home. Guess I cant go shopping with you guys.” Mike jumped in, “Don’t worry about it. I just got paid so all your stuff is on me.”
“Really Mike?”
“Yeah don’t worry about it.”
“Thank you. You’re a great brother.”
“Love you sis.” He winked at her and we ordered breakfast. As we sat down to eat, Mike thanked me for this trip. “You know, man, it was really great of your parents to buy us these bus tickets. This is going to be an awesome day trip.” Rose added, “yeah thanks, This will be a nice hoorah to add to the scrap book.” She had been putting a scrapbook together since Mike and I first started to really be friends and hang out a lot. It started because she had a crush on me that, to my knowledge, was just a phase. Now it stood as a memento to all the good times we three spent together throughout our lives. “Yeah, today is going to be fun. Are you still putting thing in that old binder?” I asked. “Yeah. Ticket stubs from movies, concerts, fairs. You name it; it’s in there. I’ve got a bunch of embarrassing pictures of mike in there too.” She smiled and looked at Mike. He was shocked and adamant about taking those photos out. “You didn’t! Not the ones from 8th grade graduation!?!”
“Yep, those are the ones!”
I interjected, “Oh the ones taken when Bobby convinced him that there was nothing wrong with the sprite he had brought even though it tasted like alcohol?”
Rose was laughing, “Yeah and then he got super drunk off of that 2 liter and decided to go streaking across the backyard.”
“And then Ms. Laurence had to tackle him, as he was running butt naked, just to stop him! Hahahahaha…”
“Alright guys knock it off.” He wasn’t very amused.
I continued though, “I remember having to convince her not to call your parents and trying to prove that Bobby was the one who brought in the vodka. That was a fun night.”
“Yeah, mom still doesn’t know what happened that night, AND I would prefer it to stay that way!” Mike said looking at Rose. She replied, “I’m just happy to have something over you.” She smiled and kept eating her pancakes. “Yeah I’m sure you do.” Mike said as he continued eating as well.
The rest of the day consisted of shopping, Mike buying Rose the thing’s she wanted, at the cost of some thing’s he wanted, and swimming at the river.
When we had gotten to the river, we ran into the Cougars. Chet and his gang were already drinking and swimming. They must have been on their own because there were no coaches or teachers around, not even on the bus. Mike saw them and turned to Rose, “Ah great, do you want to find another spot?” She saw them and said, “Yeah lets go.” But before we could leave Chet saw us and yelled out “OH HEY! IT’S OUR FRIENDS FROM THE BUS!” He started to get out but one of his friends tried to stop him. I couldn’t hear what was said but the friend knew it was a bad idea. Chet continued to get out though. “No man I got this. I’m not tha-drunk. I can still, *hickup* walk.” I turned to Mike, “Let’s get out of hear before he makes it up the hill” but it didn’t take him long. We got about 10 feet from where we were before he caught up to us. “Hey,” the alcohol on his breath was over powering, “I jus wanna say, ‘m srry, *hickup* fer what I did on th-bus.” He was really slurring his words together but he seemed genuine. “I was bein ‘n ass ‘nd I apologize.” Rose looked at him then looked at the group of friends, all staring on, down by the river. “Why are you the only one completely drunk out of all your teammates?” She asked. Chet replied, surprisingly honest, “when th-guys saw you geton th-bus, they bet me 10 beers that I couldn’t get yur number. Dumb bet, I know.” He was obviously ashamed of what he had done and Rose just stood there thinking. Mike and I were looking ate each other wondering what she was going to do. It was a tense 2 minutes, at least, of just waiting and wondering. Finally, after some deliberation in her own head, she said, “Apology accepted.” then grabbed his face and kissed him really quick. Mike and I were TOTALLY shocked, and we heard a few of Chet’s friends whooping and hollering down by the river. She kissed him for about 10 seconds, then let him go, turned around and walked away. Mike and I were speechless. We looked at her, then at him, then had to run after her. Chet just stood there in shock, trying to make sense of what just happened. “WHAT was THAT?!?” I asked emphatically. “What? He was sorry. Plus I like the taste of Heineken.” “WHAT?!?” Mike exclaimed, “HOW the HELL Do you know what that tastes like?” “Your’s are not the only secrets I keep from mom.” She said and kept on walking. We didn’t know what to say. I thought Rose was such an innocent girl until then. We kept on walking until we found an open space where we could swim just the three of us. We had fun, and that night, when we had to leave, we all got on the bus, tired beyond belief, and headed home.
Two things I came away with from that day was how much Mike cared for his sister and how much I didn’t know about Rose. It was brief and a fleeting thought, but I had almost asked her out that weekend. She was secretly rebellious but loved her family and if it wasn’t for her being my best friends sister, and the fact we practically grew up together, I might have tried. All in all, though, that day was one of my best memories.
As I closed my eyes on the bus, listening to Mike’s horrible singing voice serenading us to the tune of Go Your Own Way by Fleetwood Mac, the world faded away, as blackness engulfed my being. Panic gripped me, but I didn’t know why. I was fighting for my life in my mind and didn’t know who my enemy was. I heard a voice calling me. Could it be the threat, the one trying to kill me? I couldn’t see anything but I felt sharp pains in my head, side, and neck, as if someone was stabbing me. Then things started to lighten up just a little bit, and there, out of the darkness, came my enemy.
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