Hiding in Closets and Lofts - 4. Chapter 4

Mark drove up the darkened road, and Dillon felt like it was the perfect setting for a horror movie moment. It was almost ten, and the wheat fields were darker than the sky. The road had no lights, but there was the spot of light up in the distance.

“A party in a barn? Are you kidding me?” Dillon complained. “Isn’t it going to smell?”

“No, it’s only for storage, and they haven’t harvested yet,” Mark answered tightly. “Stop complaining! It took me so much extra gas to get to your house and pick you up to bring you with me!” He teased playfully.

“Yeah, three blocks. Probably like point two of a gallon,” Dillon gripped.

“Do you know the mileage on this?” Mark stressed. “I get fifteen miles to the gallon.”

“It’s your fault for having a full-bed truck,” Dillon jerked his thumb over his shoulder. The truck bed was laid out behind them, longer than what Dillon was used to seeing.

Mark’s Ford truck was only six years old, and dark blue. There was a new radio put in with bright blue lights on all the buttons, and an animated image behind the clock and channel on the screen. While the animation was repetitive, it was also super fascinating.

They got closer to a lit barn and dark house. Dillon wasn’t sure whose house this was. They parked in a dirt lot with the other cars, and entered through the open barn doors.

Somehow, giant speakers had been brought in and hooked up, blasting out music. The barn lights were already dim, and the barn was empty of almost anything farm related. There were more people inside than what could have fit inside a house.

Aaron was in the crowd and seemed to have his own personal space bubble as he tried to dance. Too many people were trying to give him space, afraid of being bumped into and put on their backs. Tyler had managed to climb up on some stall wall in the back, hanging on to a support beam and waving a red plastic cup around while cheering at girls.

“What, no cow tipping?” Dillon yelled over the music to Mark.

That earned Dillon a solid elbow in the side and a dirty look. “Keep that up and good luck getting a ride home,” Mark warned.

“You’re not drinking, are you?” Dillon asked, only now thinking about the whole not driving drunk lecture he had gotten from his parents.

“No, you?” Mark asked and started to push his way into the crowd.

“No,” Dillon tried to respond but felt like his voice was lost. Being on a farm, an upside was no neighbors to complain about the sound.

He followed Mark through the crowd of unfamiliar faces. Only some of them were from the football team. Dillon jumped, swearing he felt someone grab his ass. He turned and searched for the offender but saw nothing. He scowled and hurried to catch up to Mark, who was daring Aaron’s open area.

Mark nearly got an elbow to the stomach after going up behind Aaron. He pushed Aaron forward, yelling something at him. Aaron managed to stumble and not fall before giving Mark a dirty look over his shoulder.

Dillon kept a safe distance, laughing. Mark dragged Aaron out of the crowd and Dillon followed again. Mark convinced Tyler not to hang from the rafters, as he was drunk. He fell anyways, landing hard on his eyes. Tears pricked his eyes but he didn’t make a sound. He hobbled up from the floor and took another swig of beer.

“Coach will kill you if you get caught drunk,” Mark reminded Tyler over the music.

“We don’t see him ‘till Monday.” Tyler waved the warning off and made eye contact with a girl. He was off in an instant.

“I was having fun,” Aaron complained. “I’m not drunk, least you can do is let me dance.”

“I saw you almost knock three people on their ass,” Dillon said, laughing. “Why is flailing your arms while trying to head bang dance?”

Aaron scowled and socked Dillon in the arm. Dillon flinched, but Aaron just smiled.

“Hi,” A girl’s voice chirped, high and loud over the music.

Aaron straightened up to attention, and Mark seemed a little confused. He was the only one to speak back. “Uh, hi.”

“I’m Vickie,” the girl introduced herself with a wide smile, brushing some of her blonde hair off her shoulder.

“Mark,” Mark said, and pointed to Aaron and then Dillon. “Aaron, and Dillon.”

She nodded to the other two but stepped closer to Mark. They started talking more between each other, not loud enough for Dillon to hear.

“Come on.” Aaron grabbed Dillon by the arm and dragged him off.

“He’s my ride…” Dillon dragged his feet, trying to keep an eye on Mark.

“He won’t leave you. Vickie just wants to ask him out,” Aaron explained. “We don’t need to hang around for that.”

“How do you know that’s what she’s doing?” Dillon asked, defensive.

“Because she found me earlier asking where Mark was, before you guys showed up. She told me she wanted to ask him out, idiot,” Aaron said, laughing slightly.

“Oh,” Dillon grumbled, looking down at his feet. Aaron let go when they were towards the barn doors, thriving on the cool breeze blowing in. The rest of the barn was too hot with so many people, and the music was too loud farther in.

“Aw shit,” Aaron groaned, pointing out to the crowd. It wasn’t hard to miss Tyler trying to climb one of the speakers. “I’ll be right back,” Aaron said and pushed his way towards the speakers. Tyler got to the top, stumbled, and threw his arms out. It didn’t help that half the people were cheering him on to crowd surf.

Aaron made it though, catching Tyler by the waist as he jumped. They both fell and some of the crowd jumped back, but Dillon couldn’t see them. He figured Aaron could probably take being landed on.

A few minutes later, Aaron returned with Tyler piggy-backing. Aaron did not look amused, and Dillon tried not to smile.

“At least he landed on me and not some unsuspecting person,” Aaron growled to himself. “Probably would have dropped him, cracked his head…”

“Are you the babysitter?” Dillon asked, laughing. He couldn’t help it. He jumped away before Aaron could try to hit him while still balancing Tyler.

He carried Tyler out of the barn, and Dillon went with them. Aaron dropped Tyler none too gently on the hard packed dirt of the lot, making Tyler yelp in pain. “My ass!” He screamed, rolling onto his side.

Both Aaron and Dillon laughed, watching Tyler wallow in the dirt and complain. Dillon didn’t feel like going back inside already. It felt too nice outside. Aaron seemed to have the same idea because he didn’t look like he was going back inside any time soon.

They sat on either side of Tyler and poked fun at him. Aaron would pin him to the ground, and Tyler would kick and scream like he was throwing a tantrum. Dillon would poke him in the sides, and Tyler would try and scurry away—right back into Aaron.

It went on for a while. Dillon even picked a small piece of wheat and started tickling Tyler with it. He started screaming about a spider and slapping himself where he was tickled.

Mark poked his head out a while later. “There you are,” he paused as Tyler slapped himself in the ear and Dillon and Aaron broke out laughing. “What are you guys doing?”

“Watch,” Dillon said and tickled Tyler’s exposed lower back where his shirt had ridden up.

“Spider!” Tyler screamed in a fairly high pitch for a guy and scooted as fast as he could on his side towards Aaron. Aaron just pushed him back into place and waited for it to happen again.

“Oh give me that,” Mark admonished, taking away the offending wheat while trying fight back his own laugh.

“You get a date?” Aaron asked.

“Uh, yeah,” Mark answered awkwardly. “We’re going to talk more about it on Monday, though. It was too loud in there.”

“Tell me about it. My ears are ringing,” Aaron complained.

“I wanted to crowd surf,” Tyler sniffled. “I could have done it. Bands do it.”

“Crowds like the bands and will catch them.” Dillon smiled crookedly. “A crowd of drunk high school students isn’t going to catch a drunk football player.”

Tyler mumbled something incoherent and wrapped his arms around himself.

“Well.” Aaron frowned. “I think I should take him home. His ma will kill him if he comes back drunk, and my ma’s got a good hang over recipe… I’m taking him back with me. I was his ride, anyways.”

“You need help loading him up?” Dillon offered, standing up and wiping dirt off the back of his pants.

“Nah,” Aaron grunted as he stood up as well, then he dragged Tyler up. “I can carry him.”

Dillon unlocked Aaron’s car and got the door open while Aaron put Tyler into the backseat. Aaron said bye and promised to see them at school on Monday.

“I don’t want to go to school,” Dillon complained as Aaron’s taillights disappeared down the dirt road.

“Have you done the reading yet?” Mark asked.

“Shit! I knew I forgot something,” Dillon groaned. Mark laughed and headed towards his truck. “Are we leaving?” Dillon asked, though he didn’t have a problem with it.

“No, I just want to cool off out here for a while,” Mark said opened the hatch to his truck bed. He hopped up and sat on the hatch, looking expectantly at Dillon.

Dillon jumped up as well and shifted around on the hatch. “This won’t break off, will it?”

“No,” Mark laughed.

“I really don’t see why you drive this when it gets fifteen miles to the gallon,” Dillon said. “Though my jeep doesn’t get much better.”

“My parents are strictly Ford,” Mark explained, frowning. “Old school. My family has bought Ford stuff since… forever. Gas efficient or not, my family is pretty traditional.”

“I like my jeep,” Dillon stated for no reason.

“Right. And since I pay so much for gas, you’re my ride to school, don’t forget,” Mark teased.

“I thought that was because you helped me move?” Dillon corrected him.

“And because I got you invited to the football camp,” Mark added smugly. “So yeah, you owe me rides. Do you want a ride home so you can read the summer assignment?”

“Hell no.” Dillon laughed. “I still have all of tomorrow.”

“And tomorrow you’ll say you have all day, and come nine o clock you’ll panic and start reading,” Mark said, smiling. “I already finished it, if you want to borrow my copy. I bet the book store is all sold out now if you haven’t already gotten it.”

“Probably. Can I borrow it?” Dillon asked.

“Yeah. I’ll just drive us to my house, get you the book, and you can walk home from there,” Mark mumbled dazedly, looking up at the sky.

Dillon noticed it was oddly clear. Not a lot of city lights polluting the sky out here, and there were more stars than he ever remembered seeing. There were some starless areas in the distance, and he figured they were clouds. They were too far away to mean rain, though.

“You’re going to make poor little me walk home in the dark?” Dillon pouted playfully.

Mark reached over and punched him in the thigh, laughing. “Little? Please. Do we need to have this conversation again?”

“So who’s Vickie?” Dillon asked in an abrupt change of subject. It was kind of bothering him.

“Girl from school. Popular, I guess. Cheerleader, all that stuff,” Mark answered vaguely.

“You don’t like her?” Dillon frowned. It sounded that way from the way Mark was talking.

“I don’t know. I don’t know her that well. We agreed to talk at school about going on a date later this week… we’ll see how that goes,” Mark sighed.

Dillon didn’t say anything more. He tried to remember Vickie in her head. She was maybe a little tall for a girl, but still short compared to Mark. She had blonde hair, curled probably by a curling iron. Her nails were painted. That was really all he could remember.

Mark slid back on the hatch, making the truck rock, and laid down in the bed. It didn’t look very comfortable, but Dillon did the same thing. The music wasn’t too bad to listen to, from a distance. It didn’t hurt his ears anymore, and it was nice outside.