Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ My Shinigami, My Hamburger ❯ The Wind Cries Mary ( Chapter 16 )

Chapter 16

"The Wind Cries Mary"

Heero was sitting at the kitchen table, alone, when he heard the sound of the bathroom door opening. He was dressed in one of his old Japanese T-shirts, with brazen white hiragana splayed across the chest, advertising for some oddball game show that had gone under years ago. He also had changed out of his sopping wet jeans for a rattier pair with tattered knees and a few tears in the hemming. He hadn't really been paying attention as he'd picked out a clean, dry change of clothing, and he hadn't really been concentrating as he had made himself that tea and drank it, mixing with the taste of alcohol in his stomach. Now, after staring at the woodgrain with a long-empty cup in his hands, he turned his head to glance at the hallway through the open archway leading into the kitchen.

He looked over his shoulder where he would have seen the bathroom door cracking open had there not been a wall there, listening dully. He heard the cautious footsteps of the Shinigami padding across the threshold, almost trying to steal away silently. Living in the same house for the majority, if not entirety, of his life, Heero could tell if a mouse sniffed upstairs or if someone was going left down this hallway, or humming to themselves as they walked into that room-he pretty much had a complete grasp over the goings-on in the house. After all, it was mostly empty nowadays, aside from himself.

The Shinigami treaded cautiously over the threshold and pattered across the hallway. He didn't want to consider what kind of state of dress he was in, or if he was dripping all over the carpet, so he focused on listening to the footsteps instead. They disappeared as they neared the closet directly across from the bathroom, and sounded as if they reappeared at the end of the hallway. The feet remained there for a brief minute, mostly likely staring out the window into the leaves of the tree towering beside the house. Shini apparently grew tired of gazing out the window, because again he seemed to instantly appear at the top of the stairs, the floorboards beneath the carpet letting out a tiny groan as his feet settled. Heero kept his head twisted over his shoulder as he stared at the wall.

He waited for the Shinigami to call out or start his descent down the stairs and wondered what he was doing when no answer came and his weight disappeared again. He simply shrugged to himself, dismissing it, and turned back around to stare at his empty glass. The mortal could hear his feet reappearing and scampering over the carpet in his room. That made him instantly turn his head back around and he squinted distressingly at the ceiling, over which his room lay, listening intently. He expected the feet to start wandering all about his room, doing only Hell knows what to the clean state of his bedroom, and to generally cause trouble.

Instead, the footfalls settled in the corner of the room near his dresser and the sounds of the drawers being pulled open was audible. The first drawer quickly shut again, a plain, soft 'thunk' as it was closed, and Shini went searching through the first three before he settled on what was presumably the bottom drawer, where Heero kept most of his jogging clothes and his old, ill-fitting or tattered shirts used for messy housework or whatever would ruin perfectly good clothing. He rummaged through it for a second and it slid shut again. By then, Heero had turned his attention towards filling his cup again.

When the Shinigami's footsteps didn't reappear, and said deity didn't just magically appear himself from upstairs, he walked down to the living room sipping at his tea. He flicked on the light and flopped down on the couch after he'd set his mug down and lay there for a few minutes, staring at the ceiling. He could run a five-minute mile, he had set every longstanding record at his high school, and he could bench press what men twice his size could, but put him in charge of a child and he would be exhausted by the second day. It seemed strange, but it also made sense.

Heero sat up and sighed to himself, taking a deep drink that was supposed to soothe him. He'd been alone for most of his formative life, and his tolerance for difficult people, namely mischievous children, had suffered because of it. There had been an instinct to march up to his room and make sure that it hadn't been demolished by a clumsy Shinigami, but that would mean facing him again. While he was still upset over being 'taken advantage of', if you will. And Heero was positive he'd rather clean up than try to keep a libidinous Angel of Death in line anymore.

He thought of the chores that had been neglected in his absence, as he sat on his couch sipping tea, of the plants in the window that needed watering. And when he glanced over to them, he saw how light it was outside. That prompted him to glance at the clock, and he frowned.

It was barely even noon. He tossed his head back against the couch in exasperation and heaved another sigh.

While a throbbing beat pulsed overhead through the glaring, multicolored rays of light emitting magically from the ceiling, Iria stood at a bar of pure, rosy crystal doing shots with a gaggle of rave-dressed vampires sitting on the ethereal barstools to either side of her. She was dressed in a virginal white dress, one which only extended a few inches past her hips, and her brilliant red lipstick was smeared slightly over her lips and the necks of a few of the barkeepers. The Goddess of Love laughed raucously as she flagged down one and ordered another round of drinks-of course, only ones with very suggestive names would do-and eagerly squealed and threw it down. Her face was flushed a bright pink and it suggested that not to far in the distant future she might find herself laid out on the bar engaged in body-shots. Her flock of newfound fanged drinking buddies giggled along with her as they joked and flirted the immortal night away in a bar in Valentine.

Nadette had her seat reserved directly beside Iria, who preferred to stand at the bar and dance casually with a drink in hand. The Goddess of Love's secretary was not quite as free-spirited after the same amount of drinks, or Hell, even three times the amount of alcohol, and was very happy just to be off work instead of trying to manage Aphrodite's chaotic bureau until late into the night. She took another level sip from her martini as her supervisor giggled lushly and readjusted her dress over her chest in a mischievous way, just so that the mythological creatures that hadn't been ogling her before, started to. The tall blonde woman rolled her eyes out of the corner of her eye and took another sip, rather than watch anymore.

Iria was shouting loudly along to the music and leaning against one of the gothic-looking Vampires as she did so, tossing her hair up in the style of every blonde, over-intoxicated spring breaker. They seemed to circling in closer every time that Nadette glanced out of the corner of her eye at them, only a fraction closer than they had the last time, but definitely drawing closer around the very drunk and very, uh-libertine Aphrodite. Not that she would be insulted by it anymore, because of the sheer frequency of similar happenstance, but it was becoming more and more of a bother to simply supervise her supervisor as she unashamedly lavished the attention she got after she had a few alcoholic ambrosias. The hungry gleam in the eyes of the undead drinking comrades was growing more and more unnerving as Iria flirted with them shamelessly, even going so far as to grope a few with a laugh and another sip of her drink.

The secretary idly flicked at the metallic chains hanging down from either side of her cat-eye glasses, and finally looked back over to Iria. She was blathering drunk by now and leading her favorite Vamp off toward the dance floor, though she could hardly take a straight step without staggering four to the right or left. The flock of undead quickly followed after them in a silent, lip-licking manner. That was the last warning signal the normally solicitous secretary could ignore.

"Miss Iria!" The thudding bass of a mortal-style swing song swallowed up her voice before it could even travel a foot from her mouth and it went unheard. The barkeep passed by, shaking his head as he went to toss the third bottle of premium ambrosia booze emptied by the lush Goddess of Love herself. Nadette stood up off the barstool and called out again, just as the blonde goddess stumbled on her stilettos and took a graceless fall to the floor.

The Vampire she'd been leading just stood over her and started at her sprawled over the floorboards, in a very Courtney Love fashion. Her awkward position, on her stomach with the legs twisted up beneath her and her one hand still holding a drink, served to emphasize all her curves, whether they be good or bad. She drunkenly sat up, her short, tight dress ruffled out of place and affording all a free show, and squinted around in the bright lights in her alcohol-induced haze.

Nadette sighed and started walking over to her flush-faced supervisor. She could empathize now with the goddess' motherly troubles-watching over her was probably just as difficult as watching over her son. They both shared a lack of limitations that at times was blatantly obvious. She'd only met Shini a few times, but the similarities were there. The secretary was acquainted enough with Iria to notice them, or at least she hoped she would be, after serving five decades as her secretary/vice-president. With only one staff member-herself-she'd had many more responsibilities than simply answering the phones.

"Miss Iria, let's go home now!" she called out over the din as best she could, definitely not being as loud and fiercely extroverted as her employer. "Miss Iria!"

As soon as she tried to walk over to her inebriated friend, there was a veritable wall of undead standing between her and the slurring woman on the floor. The secretary, being as tall as she was with her heels on, stepped back and held a hand to her chest, startled. "Excuse me," she said humbly, bowing her head in the face of the other Vampires whom had been carefully eyeing her employer. She tried to step forward through the crowd, and again they pressed together and refused it.

"Gentlemen, please. There's no need to become rash about anything; I am simply trying to assist Miss Iria home," Nadette managed to get out, not stumbling even though her heart had begun thundering like a hummingbird's. She was only a spirit-they were Vampires: the cursed undead bodies of humans. And they were tens, perhaps even a hundred times more powerful than she was physically. It definitely wouldn't turn out well should there be a brawl of any sort.

The tallest Vampire cocked his head up at her with a sharp look.

By now, her face had flushed an anxious, fretful pink for all to see under the bright, flashy lights. The secretary clutched her hand to her breast, beginning to have enough sense to start fearing for her safety in a situation like this, with hungry Vamps encircling her whenever she tried to move forward. "I am telling you, gentlemen, there's no need for any-"

The group started laughing in a raucous, playful way that just came off more sinister than anything and the secretary balked back a step. Their dangerous, hungry gleam seemed to direct itself on to her and she could feel her heart start fluttering in her chest as she took another step back. The Vampires took another toward her, still snickering amongst themselves, and Nadette nervously glanced past them to see Iria stagger up, trip drunkenly, and drop her glass so that it shattered on the floor. Luckily, the barkeep heard it and turned his head towards the sound and saw the situation unfolding. It might have ended badly had he not stepped in and told the Vampires off, managing to get them to slink off to another corner of the bar.

Still ruffled by the encounter, Nadette nodded a polite thanks towards the bartender and quickly walked over to her employer, who was still sitting haplessly on the floor, drunk and light-headed. It wasn't the first time she'd picked her off the floor after a night out on the town, but it was the first time she had to carry her out the door, thrown awkwardly over her shoulder and holding her legs to make sure she didn't fall. Even though Iria was barely coherent, red-faced, slurring, and thrown over someone's shoulder, she still managed to wink at a few people before they went out the door.

After a while, Heero had picked up a book on the table beside the couch. He didn't even bother to glance at the cover before he opened it to a random page and started reading. He wasn't overly intrigued by the story or anything-he'd read it countless times in his teenage years-but it did take his mind off the current situation, the perfect aspirin to the perpetual headache plaguing him. He didn't get further than four pages before the source of that headache returned, walking quietly into the living room and standing next to the arm of couch where Heero was laid out, reading silently. The mortal man reluctantly lifted his head to look at the Shinigami, coming to accept that he was eventually going to have to face him again despite himself, but he was disappointed if he was expecting the guilt of two puppy eyes set on him.

The Shinigami wasn't even paying attention to him. As soon as he'd wandered into the living room, dressed in Heero's clothes and generally pouting to no one in particular, he'd forgotten the whole incident he'd been upset about and started wandering around the room, staring up at the decorated walls. Heero had hardly changed a thing in the house when it came to décor; the way his mother had put it was decent enough, so he had no need to move it around except to clean.

Shini didn't even glance over at his mortal husband, even as he stared as his back, moving around the room. He was too busy marveling at the pictures-the color pictures!-of Heero's family, the way it had been before the tragic deaths that had left him orphaned. Snapshots of military functions, vacations, birthday parties and first-days of school. Shini got a very special kick out of a picture of Heero as a young child kicking and fussing as he tried to dodge the dress shoes that were being shoved onto his feat for that first day of school.

His mother, Yumi, was displayed in one picture in her finest kimono and in another in her regular blouse and knee-length skirt, posing with her best friend in front of their high school, backpack slung over each shoulder. She also had big, square glasses that made her slender face appear even more dainty and innocent than to begin with. But those only appeared once. And there were the standard military portraits of Heero's father, Odin, looking very distinguished in his pressed, polish, and impeccable uniform, staring seriously into the camera, but still glowing with pride. There was one of him sitting at a table with an arm slung warmly around his wife and smiling ear to ear. His face was very handsome, especially while he smiled, and he knew that his son could be just as becoming if he'd just gain a little sense of humor. He went on to more pictures of extended family, uncles, aunts, cousins, and Heero's grandparents, strolling around the edge of the room looking up onto the multitude of framed pictures.

Heero was still squinting at his back, a little surprised he was actually being ignored. That squint soon focused on Shini's clothes, however. He was wearing a pair of nondescript grey sweatpants, but the drawstring had long been lost and he'd rolled over the tops until it had fit on his hips. As he walked, the forked tail peaking out of the pants coiled lazily back and forth. The paint-smeared white-beater tank top he wore was loose and better fitted for Heero's shorter torso, so there as the shirt fluttered slightly it gave glimpses of his stomach, which was flat from a life of eating only the food of the Divines. There was one oddity with his wardrobe: the shirt was drawn up rather tight against his shoulder and armpit so that the straps could stretch around his wings and give them room for flexibility.

Well, there definitely weren't going to be wing-holes in any mortal clothing, Heero thought to himself, so what was he supposed to do? He watched the Shinigami wandering about staring raptly at the family photos and seemingly ignoring him for a few more seconds, then lowered his eyes to the book and sighed to himself.

Without warning, the Shinigami yawned and strolled around Heero's father's armchair to flop down in it. He smiled to himself as he settled into the comfortable chair, wiggling his back against it and stretching his bare toes out. His hair was still slightly damp the ends, dripping onto his shoulders and arms. Heero glanced over at him past the printed pages as the Shinigami even bounced in the seat a little, and there was a sudden little click. The deity lifted his head like a confused terrier and frowned, perplexed what had caused it. Heero knew what, of course, and it was obvious to him because an instant later the television sitting on the opposite side of the room lit up and came to life.

Heero knew what had happened, of course, and it was obvious to him because an instant later the television sitting on the opposite side of the room lit up and came to life. The sound of a dubbed Warner Bros. cartoon, complete with Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny arguing back and forth, "Duck season!" and "Rabbit season!" in Japanese, filled the room. It wasn't overly loud, just louder than the sort-of awkward silence between them. The mortal watched as the deity laid his eyes on the strange box for the first time in his life, waiting for a reaction. The normal adolescent response would probably be excitement, but instead he watched his face scrunch up slightly, almost skeptical. Still sitting in the chair with a leg slung over the arm, Shini squinted at the screen for another second and watched as a pudgy and enraged Elmer Fudd came forward with his rifle and it shot off in a cloud of puffy gray clouds.

Shini turned to look at Heero and made a face. "What's that?"

The mortal sat up and put his book down, still a little surprised that Shini hadn't burst forward and started licking the screen in joy. Not that he was disappointed, though. "Television," he said plainly.

"That thing with movies? That is this? The thing Okasan told him about? The TV, the tube?" The Angel of Death continued to make a face and glanced back over at the color screen. Daffy's beak had just fallen off.

"Really?" he asked, the tone of disappointment obvious. When Heero just nodded in reply the Shinigami huffed almost angrily to himself, and continued to scowl at the hapless bald hunter and the two talking animals that eluded him.

His shoulders slumped and started digging around for the remote. He'd heard of it-of course he'd heard of television, even some of the gods had some to occasionally watch strange mortal broadcasts-and he'd remembered Iria talking about the stick that controlled it. When he shifted in his chair, the volume bar started inching across the screen, louder and louder. Shini dug through the folds of the armchair beneath him and eventually found it. Heero wasn't disappointed if he was expecting Shini to do something strange out of curiosity. He sniffed the remote in his hand first before trying to figure out the buttons.

"It's the red one," Heero said plainly, and the Shinigami quickly found it. A second later the sound of the television bulbs shutting down led into silence and the happy killing spree of the old, dubbed American cartoon ended. Shini sighed again and dropped the remote on a table beside the chair. "He is sort of disappointed." He looked over at Heero, who was still sitting on the couch. "Is all of mortal entertainment now artificial?"

"Artificial?" Heero asked, furrowing his eyebrows slightly. "Artificial how?"

However, the Shinigami was apparently too off on his own tangent to answer. "Do you not spend time with each other? Not all of them are so lonely as you, are they, Teishu? Don't you have something else to do? You know, to kill some time?"

"It's Heero, and yes, lots of stuff," he ground out. He'd at first been a little nervous while gauging Shini's reaction after he'd snapped at him-for a good reason, mind you-and now he could feel that upset sensation returning to his stomach. The least he could do was answer him; he was his arranged husband after all, or at least until the five days were up. There had to be some way that he could exploit that position to get him to at least call him by name.

"Like what?" Shini asked, tapping his bare foot in the air and leaning over the other arm of the chair as well, letting his washed hair brush at the floor. "Something that involves another mortal? What happened to that? Markets, forums, saloons-what about those?"

He glanced back and forth in the general, dismissive way as he made another of those tiny, regular frowns. Not an overly wide grimace-just a little tightening of his brows and one corner of his mouth falling. The Shinigami stared at him, awaiting an answer, and thought to himself how he slightly resembled an old curmudgeon with a young face that way. He answered plainly, "I'm not taking you to a saloon."

"Ayaaaa, of course not! He meant something like-um, something like-"

"Golfing?" Heero asked dully, his own private joke. He highly doubted that he would even have heard of such a thing, and he was slowly starting to enjoy the fact that he had few things over the deity's immortality, supernatural skills, and his disregard for things called laws of physics, ones that stated you could not walk through doors. He was up to date with the world, and the Angel of Death wasn't.

"No, that's not it," Shini said absently, staring at the wall as he tried to put it in words in his most recently learned language. "He cannot think of what to say, Tei-Heero. What would you do to pass your time?"

The mortal man just sighed a little and gave a lame answer off the top of his head. "I don't know. Read?"

"He can't read English." The Shinigami confessed to him with a tinge of an embarrassed flush. It was nothing to be ashamed of though-he had mastered quite a few languages out of pure necessity when he'd been placed with caretakers of various ethnicity and languages. He laid back over the other arm of the chair and sighed to himself, shrugging his shoulders as he took up a lock of his hair and toyed dully with it. "He doesn't know what there is to do in this era-he is just shocked that machines have replaced the horse. He is beginning to wonder if there is still entertainment in this strange mortal time."

Heero gave his own shrug of defeat, and stretched back out onto the couch with the guise of reading a book. Really, he was just going to try and straighten out his head before it got too tangled and medicated itself with a nice and painful headache. "Why don't you go get a coloring book or something?" Heero muttered to himself, opening the pages but not really seeing the words.

The Shinigami sat up in the armchair, making the old piece of furniture let out a few rusty squeaks as he moved, and beamed over towards Heero's side of the room. "That's a good idea-Shini loves to draw!"

Heero glanced at him past the side of the book and scoffed a little to himself in amusement. He'd meant it as a remark that he was childish, but the grin on the Shinigami's face somehow seemed more rewarding than a temper tantrum. It was much better than tears in any matter; very bad things could come from a crying Shinigami. He knew that from experience. He looked back to his book. "There's paper in the top left drawer of my desk in the study. Down the hall, second door on the right," Heero informed him, knowing that it would get him some peace and quiet.

Shini's face glowed, reminding the mortal man of the baby pictures he'd seen, where there was only one tooth in that smile. He had both his hands on the arm of the chair and both his legs flopped over the side, his heels tapping against the furniture excitedly. "Do you have carbon pencils?"

"Uh… there's some crayons or something in the bottom drawer. Those will work," Heero tried awkwardly. He barely had time to form a thought before the image of the bright-faced God of Death sitting in his armchair, now with his tail wagging back and forth, disappeared as if he hadn't ever been there at all, like he'd been a figment of his imagination the entire time, and he heard weight reappearing on the floorboards of the down the hall. After a few minutes and the sounds of drawers being opened and slammed shut, the Shinigami sort of just fell into the dimension and existence again and appeared on the floor beside the couch, with one of Heero's books from inside the desk behind a sheet of paper. He clenched the box of Crayola basics in his mouth and grinned at his husband like a dog.

"Thmmank muu," he said sweetly. His teeth let go of the box and he pulled out a red one and started drawing seemingly random lines all over the page. Heero didn't say a word and watched the Shinigami sitting next to him create what looked like just random, whimsical lines that formed nothing really. He still held the book and still rested his head on the arm of the couch, but he hadn't read any further than he had fifteen minutes ago. Suddenly, there was a divine face pouting at him and Shini defensively pulled the book and piece of paper to his chest, holding it away from Heero and squinting in his face.

Automatically, Heero's face tensed up in another mini-frown. "What?" he asked edgily, a little frustrated he was being glared at for no reason at all.

"No peeking," Shini drawled, as if it were completely obvious, and scooted over a foot on the floor and faced Heero completely so that he wouldn't be able to glimpse at his budding piece of art. "No looking until he finishes! You should realize it's the same for all artists, Tei-Heero."

The married mortal man snorted to himself and actually turned to face the book he held open as if he didn't care, but he was a little less frustrated now that he was being called by name, even if it was difficult. He just didn't understand why he needed to be reminded every time the deity addressed him that he was, in fact, his legal and binding husband. At least for a few more days. Heero tried to read, to actually focus on the words instead of just mechanically rolling his eyes over them, but again he was interrupted. Shini happily moved back to the side of the couch and held up the piece of paper a few minutes later and grinned brightly.

"Come on! Tell him how it is!" he urged proudly, his tail flopping against the floor from side to side. Clutching the book to his side and using the other hand to shove the paper practically up underneath Heero's nose, the God of Death eagerly awaited his arranged husband's opinion and his smile grew even more, if that were possible, as he finally took the piece of paper. He put the book down against his thigh, not really caring if he lost his place, and it took a few seconds to realize that he was actually seeing what he thought he saw. His mouth gaped a little.

That spurred the approval-hungry deity to lean forward and his tail to wag at an even faster tempo. "How is it? D'ya like it? Oh, come on, answer him, please, Heero!"

"It's, uh-good, good," Heero mumbled in response, still a little astonished that it was just as good as it was. He'd assumed that from the way Shini had started scribbling randomly that it would somehow turn out to be just a tree and a sun in the corner, standard of any pre-schooler's artistic range. But this was definitely not a finger-painting.

Even though it was sort of blocky from using crayons, it was a very detailed and downright outstanding recreation of one of the family reunion pictures hung on the wall, with a little Shinigami added in the bottom corner of the family, sitting beside a young Heero and his blonde western cousin. He had drawn everything in quickly, but with enough proportion to make it work and just the right lines to recreate the faces of his aunts, uncles, cousins, and in-laws. It wasn't exactly a perfect recreation of the fourteen-year-old photograph, but it was as close as you would get with crayons and a few minutes. He hadn't gone back to look at it again-he'd done it all from memory.

Eventually, Heero realized all this and managed to croak out a little, "Wow."

Shini beamed and proudly ruffled his feathers. He was practically purring as he stood up and, barely able to restrain his happiness with the approval, asked jauntily while he rocked back and forth on his heels, "Anything else you mortals like to do with your time?"

The mortal man sat up on the couch and leaned back against the armrest as he tried to reign in his surprise. He hadn't expected this from the Shinigami at all and he opened his mouth a few times to make a sound, but quickly clamped it close again when he couldn't form the words. He looked up at the deity standing before him, in his old clothes, and made that discerning little frown again. "Where did you learn to draw like this?" There were deliberate lines across the paper that Heero was cultured enough to know were techniques of an artist, and he definitely didn't remembering hearing of an Art School for Demons and Other Creepy Things.

He waved it off casually, still grinning from ear to ear. "Oh, he learned that a while ago from an old painter. He cannot recall his name-he was only his caretaker for a very short time-but he remembers watching him paint some beautiful old church, he does. Took him an awful long time to finish, but he was very nice."

Heero still was shaking off his surprise when the Angel of Death started tugging at one of his eartails anxiously and said, "He also stayed with a good ole Texan ranch hand centuries ago-Hey, how about card playing! Shini learned how to in the Buckskin Saloon! Oh, it's been so long since he played poker. Come on, Tei-Heero!" He snatched him up by the wrist in his excitement and eagerly pulled him to his feet, the paper still clutched in hand. "One hand with him, please!"

Heero glanced once more at the crayon picture, still mildly astonished, then shook it off and shrugged. "Alright, I guess. Why not," he said casually, allowing himself to be pulled along as Shini went off eagerly sniffing for a deck of cards across the hall in the kitchen drawers.

Hiragana = a form of Japanese writing

A/N: Sorry to keep anybody waiting for the next installment. I really went over the usual 10-day writing period. The whole week and last weekend I was wrapped up in homecoming week plans and I didn't get to writing as much as I usually can. I was f-ing pumped that the class of 2007 might have such an upset and overthrown the class of 2005, one of the more enthusiastic classes we've ever had at our school, and take first place. Unfortuantely, even though the spirit week competitions were more fair than last year, we just didn't have the sheer power to overtake the Seniors, though Sophomores were right on their ass and thoroughly kicked it in the yelling contest again and again, and the dress-up days. We were only seven or eight points beind, and we were way ahead of everyone else. The one thing I was really pissed at was how we got second place for the window-painting contest, which I slaved over. Okay, not really slaved, but I really worked on it, with my best friend Alicia and Brandon. I'll tell you what was unfair--we were beaten by the Juniors, who are notoriously apathetic in everything and we had four measly windows to work with and they had eight or nine and we had ten times more things in that small space. We had some pretty damn clever phrases and pictures for the theme, Butcher the Buffalos, and all they had, all they had was a rotting buffalo carcass and a wierd-looking panther, our school mascot. I, being the manual laboror and artist of the grade, drew much better than them. Granted, they colored theirs in, but mine looked better with just line definiton, alright? The only thing we might have been marked down for was the abundance of blood. Two pictures had some splots of red, but that was not so bad, come on! Everyone's was gory! Yeah, I feel a little injustice, but I'm pretty damn proud of my Sophomores anyway. Thanks for sticking with the story, and I promise you guys I'll get out another chapter out quicker--and oh yeah, I try for my driving license Friday morning, so wish me luck. I'll need it. I'm probably going to get the heinous bitch with the lisp from the DMV. Ciao!