Chapter
8
They talked and laughed long into the
night. A few fans interrupted them for autographs and pictures, but
nothing too bad. Nick and Brian had spent over a hundred dollars buying
tokens for endless video game plays. They would walk past the table
with wheels of tickets winding themselves around their arms and necks like
snakes. AJ had joined them after watching purchase their twentieth round
of tokens. At around 10:00 that night the place was ready to close, and
the Boys were still trying to finish off a cold pizza. Nick and Brian had
crowded the table with the large stuffed animals they had bought for
themselves. They had given a lot of their tickets away to the smaller
kids running around the place, but they made sure they left themselves with
enough tickets to purchase the big Bull dogs that were invading the table.
“My dog can kick your dog’s butt, any
day, Carter,” Brian was saying in a low threatening voice, eyes narrowed at his
advisory.
“Is that so Littrell, care to put your
money where your mouth is?” Nick asked equally as low. He chewed on his
straw like it was a cigarette.
Kevin, Howie, and AJ sat and watched
the contest in amusement, “Hey guys, hate to break this up, but we’re closing
in 10 minutes,” the person they could only assume was the manager came to their
table. He smiled at them genuinely, he knew who they were, and had even
given them some free tokens, and food.
“Oh… sorry,” Kevin checked his watch,
“Guys we better hurry if we still wanna get that ice cream.”
Howie nodded, “Who wants the last two
slices of pizza?” He glanced at Nick, “Nick, you didn’t eat much. Why
don’t you take them?”
Nick blinked, and tore his narrowed
gaze away from Brian, to Howie, “No thanks… don’t want it.”
“Nick’s turning down pizza?” AJ looked
incredulous, “Brian, look out the window and tell me if you see the four
horsemen of the…”
“It’s not the end of the world AJ, I’m
just not too hungry, that’s all,” Nick said with a shrug.
“Are you ok?” Kevin asked with a
frown, remembering what he had said in the car earlier about not feeling well.
Kevin thought he was just trying to get himself out of the situation, but
maybe he was telling the truth. Studying Nick, he really didn’t look too
well. Dark bags under his eyes, pale, and had he lost weight?
Nick frowned, not liking all the
attention he was suddenly getting, “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I’m just… on a
diet. I don’t get as hungry as I used to anymore.”
Brian blinked, and laughed a bit,
“Hmmn… Well good for you Frack. Now that I look at you, you have lost
weight. But you can have ice cream with us, right?”
Nick looked from Brian, to Kevin, to
Howie, to AJ, before he nodded and smiled slightly, “Right, of course. Since
you’re paying I wouldn’t miss it for the world!”
They got to the ice cream parlor 20
minutes before it closed, and nearly put the place out ordering the biggest ice
cream sundaes they could find on the menus, for each of them. They
giggled recounting the look on the single lady working the counter’s face as
she tallied off just how many ice cream sundaes she would be making, as they
ate their messy sundaes in the parking lot around AJ’s car.
“Damn, mint does not taste good with
butterscotch,” Brian grumbled, sticking his spoon in Nick’s sundae sampling
some of his, “That tastes better.” He then proceeded to eat out of Nick’s
cup until Nick noticed and whapped him over the head with his hand.
“This is great,” Howie sighed as he
sat on the hood of AJ’s car staring up at the stars and polished off the last
of his ice cream.
“Yeah, I told you these guys have the
best ice cream…”
“No, I mean, us hanging out,” Howie
said, “We have to do it again. We can make it a monthly thing.
You know, a time when we just drop everything and go have fun. No
matter what anyone is doing, they have to undo it and get on a plane from
wherever they are and meet up with the rest of us, just so we can hang.”
“Um… Howie?” Brian butted in.
“Yeah?”
“People are going to think we’re gay.”
“Let them,” Howie said firmly.
They laughed. Then they tossed
away their empty ice cream containers and piled back into AJ’s car.
“Wanna catch a late night movie?”
“Sure, why not.”
***
