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Chapter Seven

"And she like stripped right in the middle of the bus, right in front of me, like it was nothing."

It was about an hour after The Incident as I was calling it, and I was on Brian's bus, which smelled of bacon and Apple Jacks. Brian was patting the oil off a plate of bacon he'd just pulled out of the microwave. He looked over his shoulder at me as I finished up the horror story of my night-and-morning with Charley the She-Guard.

AJ raised an eyebrow. "Okay, who are you and what've you done with the real Nick Carter?" he demanded.

"What?"

"I second that question," Howie supported. "The real Nick Carter would never complain about a really hot chick stripping in front of him. Ever. No matter what the situation was."

"Particularly one that probably owns a pair of handcuffs," Brian added, putting the bacon down in the center of his breakfast bar table. He pushed AJ over and sat down on the bench and shoved a piece of bacon into his mouth.

"Charlotte Avery is no ordinary woman," I said darkly.

"Clearly," Brian said, his mouth full, "You remember her first and last name."

"Charley's a bully!" I said.

"A bully?" AJ laughed, "Why? Because she knocked you to the ground in front of Eddie?"

I hadn't yet told them about the freaky elementary school connection with Charley. I took a deep breath, "See, there's more to this than you guys know," I confessed slowly. "I - I have a - a history with Charley."

"A history?" Howie snorted. "Nick, you have a history with every breathing entity that has breasts on the West coast. You really think we're shocked that you've got a history with this one?"

I frowned, "Not every living entity with breasts," I snapped, "I don't have a history with yo' momma."

AJ snorted.

"Don't bring my momma into this or I'll keel you," Howie hissed.

"Besides, I didn't mean that kinda history," I said, ignoring Howie's death threat.

Brian was munching more bacon. He was like a bacon eating machine. Or like one of those commercials with the dogs with the beggin' strips. Iiiiiiiiiit's Bacooooooooooon! "What kinda history?" he asked.

"We went to school together. When I was in the second grade."

"Which time?" AJ joked.

"Shut up, it was fourth grade I stayed back in," I snapped.

Howie giggled into his coffee cup.

"Seriously guys, I have a history with this chick. She's vicious."

"What'd she do? Give you a swirley?" AJ laughed.

"I gave a kid a swirley once," Brian said. His cheeks flushed as we all looked at him in surprise. "What? I haven't always been the good one," he said. "I was a jock in high school."

AJ pointed at Brian, "Okay. We'll come back to that, I definitely wanna hear about you giving someone a swirley. But first, I wanna hear about Nick getting beat up by a girl." He turned back to me.

"I didn't get beat up by a girl..."

"What then?" Howie asked.

I looked at my apple jacks and pushed them around in the bowl. They were soggy and getting kinda gross. I hesitated. "She pantsed me," I admitted. "In front of like the whole school."

AJ snorted. "Oh sweet Jesus," he gasped.

"Then she pushed me down a hot slide and melted half my ass skin off." The guys exploded into further laughter. I scowled really hard at them. "It's not funny," I snapped.

"Yes it is," AJ gasped.

Brian nodded, "Really, it is Nick."

"It explains why you do stuff so half-assed," Howie snorted.

This made the lot of them explode in laughter all over again.

"Oh sure, y'all laugh now but just you wait," I pointed at them each with my spoon, "One of these mornings you're gonna get up and find me all dead-like with rigamortis set in or something. I'm telling you. She's vicious. She's probably back to finish the job she didn't get done in the fourth grade."

Brian laughed, "Yes, Nick, she's here to assasinate you."

"She could be."

AJ turned to Brian, "And now it's your turn. Spare us no detail about the swirley incident."

"Well," Brian started, his face and neck turning red, "It was a freshman hazing thing and ...."

But I'd tuned Brian out because I didn't feel like thinking he was very funny right now.