Chapter Two: Insanity

          “So, are we on for Wonderland today?” My friend Alessandra had just called me.

          “Sure, what time?”

          “I don’t know, maybe around 3:30 this afternoon?”

          “Yea, that should be fine. I’d love to go. I’ll meet you at the front gates.” It would be fun to get out and forget all about this week. Just three days ago I had to paint that box with Violet after having that horrible conversation with the person we were making it for – her brother, just the night before. This weekend, I wanted to have fun, and be carefree.

          “Cool. Are your parents coming?” She asked me.

          “Yea I think so, but they’re going their own way.” I laughed, “How about yours?”

          “Same. Maybe our parents can go together.”

          “Sure, why not? I’ll mention it to them.”

          “Okay, oh and how did...that day go?” Alessandra asked me a little quietly. Alessandra was like my soul sister, we had so much in common; we could literally be twins, just not identical ones. I trusted her entirely, so of course I had told her everything that had happened the day after. I just hadn’t given her any detail on my feelings, because it was so overwhelming.

          “Well, I feel a bit better about it now. It’s really all overwhelming and confusing. I mean I’m not crying, which is a bit surprising, considering how much crying I did last time.” Alessandra knew about the first incident too. “I mean, what can I do? I told Violet I’d help her, and she’s my best friend, so.”

          “Yea, but you shouldn’t have said you’d pitch in. I’d have been like, screw that. I would get fake money and right ‘you’re a jerk’ on it and give him that.”

          I laughed a bit. “Yea.” Truthfully, though, I knew it was my fault. He just overreacted. So I guess, in a way, we were both at fault. “I don’t know why I said I would. I guess I just felt...obligated to.”

          “Yea I guess.”

          “You know what though? This weekend, I just want to let go and not care. I want to be reckless and carefree and just have fun.”

          “Okay, well then that’s what we’ll do!” Alessandra said defiantly. “It’s going to be the best weekend of your life!”

          “Awesome! Well, I’ll see you later.”

          “Kay, see you this afternoon!” Alessandra chirped. And I hung up the phone.

* * *

          “Nicole!”

          “Alessandra!”

          I ran to my blonde and adorable friend as she ran to me, and we locked our arms around each other.

          “Hello Nicole.” Silvanna, Alessandra’s mom, addressed me, and I hugged and kissed her, Italian style. Ditto her father, John.

          “Well, you girls have your cells right?”

          We both nodded at my mom’s question.

          “Okay, have fun. Call us when you’re ready to leave!”

          “Kay, Bye!” The two of us said together, and we turned to run into the park.

          We went on a few rides before deciding to settle down and play some games and browse some shops. We bought a hot dog first, though, those foot long ones.

          We sat at a table next to the waterfall and ate them. “So, what should we do next?” Aly asked me.

          “I want to try Peach Basket.” Peach Basket was a game in the park. There were these barrels that were perched at an angle pointing downwards, and you had to throw a baseball, from a certain distance, into the basket without it rolling or bouncing back out. It really was the only game I was decent at, and I hadn’t played in a while.

          “Alright, let’s do that.” Aly smiled.

          So we finished our hot dogs and walked over to Peach Basket. “Aww, those teddy bears are so cute!” Alessandra exclaimed in a squeaky voice. I looked at them, they were really cute, and I wanted to win one. But then I thought...

          “Two balls please.” I told the lady managing the game as I placed $5 in the cash tray.

          I threw the first one and...it went in, and didn’t come back out. “Yay!” I jumped up and down and so did Aly. I took a deep breath and looked at the barrel for a second time, once the lady took out my first ball. I had to win this one too, I wanted to win one for Aly, because she was my best friend and she liked the teddy bears too. So I threw it and...it went in, and didn’t come back out, again! Aly was so excited now; she was screeching “You did it! Twice!” I laughed.

          “Which prizes would you like?” The lady asked me.

          “Uhm, I want that beige teddy please.” I pointed to the far left, and she grabbed one for me.

          “And your other prize?” She asked me.

          I looked at Alessandra, “Which one do you want?” I asked, with a slight smirk on my face.

          “What? Seriously?”

          “Yea!”

          “Ladies?” The girl in charge of the game cleared her throat.

          “Uhm, the middle teddy, with the light brown fur.” Aly pointed to the middle of the display, and the lady tossed her one.

          “Thanks Nicole.” Aly hugged the teddy.

          “No problem.” I smiled, cuddling my own teddy.

          “Hey, the Sweet Shoppe! Let’s go there!” Aly pointed out. “I want gummy worms!”

          “Okay, I never say no to sugar.” I laughed.

          So we waltzed into the Sweet Shoppe and got drawn to just about every form of candy. I found the old lollipops I used to eat as a kid and crystal candy. So I picked up one of each of those. And then we found the bulk section, where they were selling almost every single kind of candy from our childhood.

          “Oh my gosh! Remember these?” I held up the Peach O’s.

          “Yea! Those are awesome! Put them in the bag!” Alessandra had grabbed a bag immediately. So I put them in.

          “And these!” Alessandra squealed, holding up jolly ranchers, which she dumped into the bag.

          “Look! Those candy bracelets and watches and stuff!” I grabbed a handful of those packages and placed them into the bag too.

          “GUMMY WORMS!” We both shrieked at the same time, and all of the little kids in the store turned to stare at us. We laughed hysterically, and threw as many gummy worms as we could into the bag.

          The kids kept staring at us like we were aliens from another planet or something. We just kept laughing as we walked over to the cash register, whispering in each others’ ears “Look, that kid is terrified!”, and “That kid thinks we’re monsters!”

          “Ladies, this is going to come out to ten dollars.” The cashier raised her eyebrows at us.

          We looked at each other, still giggling, and we both shrugged. “We’ll take it anyway.” Aly said.

          I handed the cashier my other two items and then noticed Malteasers on the counter, and grabbed those too. “Oh, and these.” I placed them in front of the cashier. She rang everything in and announced “Your total comes to fourteen fifty-six.”  We split it, both of us paying half, and walked out eating the Malteasers.

          We walked around the park and decided to line up for another ride, while we were eating the candy. Then, I wanted to stuff my teddy in my very small knapsack, so the two of us were using both of our hands to attempt and shove his huge head into my bag. These little kids in the line looked up at us, teary-eyed, wondering why we were “killing” a teddy. We couldn’t help but laugh. Then I said “I kidnapped him muahaha.” You should have seen the looks on the kids’ faces! Aly and I laughed and continued to eat candy.

          Then, the two girls in front of us kept looking back at us and whispering. “They’re so talking about us.” Aly whispered to me. I looked over at them; sure enough they were looking at us out of the corner of their eyes, snickering.

          “Let’s freak them out then, since they can’t mind their own business.” I whispered back.

          “I think we are, with all of this candy.” Aly held up the bag.

          I laughed softly. “I mean, even more.” I raised my eyebrows.

          She caught my drift and an evil smile spread across her face. “Okay, lets.” She smiled.

          “So Aly, what happened with that jerk of a guy?” I asked, a little loudly.

          “Oh, well you know, he really wanted to kiss me, but I was like ‘ew no! I don’t like you, I’m into girls’.”

          “And what did he do?” I asked.

          “It made him want to kiss me more!”

          “No!” I shrieked, my eyes wide in mock shock.

          “Yea, so I told him I have a girlfriend.”

          “You’re darn right you do.” I winked at her. Then I looked out of the corner of my eye at the girls and saw that they had given up false pretenses and were flat out staring at us, with their mouths open.

          “Yea, I mean he still wants to kiss me, but like, I kiss girls, not guys.” She was trying to contain her laughter, but I heard her voice crack a little.

          I tried to keep a straight face, “Well, you tell him girl! No jerk is taking my girlfriend from me.” And I grabbed Aly’s wrist, pulling her close to me. She wrapped her arm around my waist and I wrapped mine around her neck. She put her other arm around the front of my stomach, so she could reach the candy bag, and pulled a gummy worm out. Then she released me to dangle it over my head. I opened my mouth and she dropped it in, then we laughed.

          We deliberately looked at the girls now, as the line was moving forward, but they were so preoccupied with staring at us that they didn’t notice.

          “What’s wrong with you?” Aly asked sarcastically.

          “Yea! The line’s moving! So close your mouth before a bug flies in there and move!” I could feel the edges of my mouth twitching into a smile but I tried to stop it.

          They gave us dirty but terrified looks and moved forward. Aly and I tried to hold in our laughter until we were actually on the ride, then we burst out into hysterical laughter, tears rolling down our cheeks.

          “Damn, my make-up’s going to smudge!” Aly was complaining through the laughter. I just laughed harder.

          The ride started then, and we placed our bags between our feet, so as not to lose them. The rest of the candy was inside. We went through tunnels on this ride, so everything went dark, and every time it did, everyone was screaming. Aly and I, on the other hand, were laughing hysterically.

          We found it hilarious that people were screaming in the dark, so we started screaming too. But things to mock them, such as “Oh my gosh! It’s dark! Help! We’re going to die!” and then we laughed.

          Randomly Alessandra yelled “Twilight!” And I died of laughter. When we got off, we could barely walk in a straight line, and it wasn’t because we were dizzy from the ride, although that probably played a small factor in it. It was because we were laughing so hard we were shaking.

          “Aw I should have started singing ‘I Kissed a Girl’!” Aly exclaimed as we walked back into the sunlight, pulling out the candy and my teddy.

          “I would so sing it right now.” I responded.

          “Seriously? Let’s do it!”

          “Okay!”

          “I kissed a girl and I liked it! The taste of her cherry chap stick! I kissed a girl just to try it, I hope my boyfriend don’t mind it! It felt so wrong, it felt so right, don’t mean I’m in love tonight! I kissed a girl and I liked it!” Alessandra and I sang at the top of our lungs, skipping down the path in Wonderland. We weren’t even paying attention to harmony and pitch; we were just belting it out.

          When we finished singing the chorus we ate some more candy and noticed that everyone within a 20 foot radius was staring at us. We just linked arms and skipped down the path to the kid’s area laughing.

          We bought sno-cones and sat under a tree eating them with spoon straws. We talked and hugged our teddy bears. Somehow, Alex came up again, but I was on such a sugar rush that I couldn’t care all that much. Alessandra was saying “You should totally do something that’ll show him that you’re over him. Because, it doesn’t seem like he believes you.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“Hmm...” Aly contemplated this for a while before saying “I got it!” and snapping her fingers, she asked, “You said your friend Ryan is gay right?”

“Yea...” I nodded, where was this going?

“Does Alex know that?”

“I don’t know, I don’t think I ever told him.”

“Perfect.”

“What-”

But Aly cut me off, “Ask him to pretend to be your boyfriend, and when you go give Alex that gift with his sister, you can introduce him as your boyfriend and act all lovey-dovey.”

Ryan was gay, though, so how did that work? He wouldn’t date a girl...

“And you can even kiss in front of Alex, I mean if you don’t mind. But, it wouldn’t faze Ryan, because he’s gay.” Alessandra explained, as if she had read my mind and answered the question in it.

“That’s perfect!” I said, and then, “But, Ryan lives in far away...for him to come here...and we’d have to change his name because Violet knows.”

“Yea I guess it could get complicated.” Aly said with shifty eyes.

“Wait, what if I said you were my girlfriend!” I exclaimed.

“That was actually my first idea.” Aly blushed a little, “but I wasn’t sure if you’d go for it.”

“I like it!” I said.

“Well, we’ll see, because I mean what would your friends think? For me I don’t care because they don’t know me, but you...you should think about it.”

“Sure.” I said, but I knew I’d do it. I don’t really care much what people think of me.

That’s when Aly’s phone went off, and so we noticed it was 7pm, which was slightly shocking. “Hello?” Alessandra spoke into the cell.

I just dazed out for a moment, and then I heard Aly shriek her high pitch shriek. “What? What is it?” I asked, jumping up.

She pointed to the sky with one hand and closed her cell with other saying “My mom was right, look!”

I looked into the sky and noticed the whole sky was grey, dark grey. It was definitely about to pour. “They want us to meet them in the store near the entrance.”

“Alright, let’s go.”

“Wait, you got an umbrella?” Aly asked, pointing to her hair, which she had straightened that morning. Well, her hair would go curly if it got wet so I reached into my bag and handed her my umbrella.

Half way to the store, the rain started pounding down, and Aly rushed to open the umbrella. All around the park people were screaming and running for shelter. I found it ridiculous; I mean it’s just water. Even if it’s slightly more acidic than it should be due to people polluting, but that’s their own fault.

That’s when Alessandra and I decided to have even more fun and started shouting “Oh no! It’s rain, run! We’re all going to die!” And laughing maniacally we walked into the crowded store, and attempted to push our way through the massacre of people to an interesting area of the store, so we could browse. I mean, we were here now anyway.

We looked at some of the key chains, and I found one that said “I’m so dangerous, I should come with a warning label.” It reminded me of myself, but also someone else I knew Aly would think of, so I showed it to her. “Oh. My. Gosh. It’s just like Bella!” She shrieked. “It’s perfect, she’s a danger magnet!”

I laughed and nodded.

“Aly! Nicole!”

It was our parents. We walked over to them and they were all laughing too. “Oh, cute teddies, where’d you get them?” Aly’s mom asked her.

“Nicole won them playing a game.” She answered.

“What game?” My dad asked.

“Peach Basket.” I replied.

“Alright!” He high-fived me.

“We should go now; it doesn’t look like the storm is going to let up.” Alessandra’s dad said.

“Yea, and I still have some stuff to get done before tomorrow.” My mom chipped in.

“Alright.” We said, and we all left for the parking lot.

Aly and I talked about how funny the day had been as we made our way to our cars. Hers came up first, so we stopped to say bye there. She was leaving for Cuba this Friday, and I was really going to miss her, so we hugged each other for a long time. We knew we’d talk again before Friday, but we probably wouldn’t see each other before then. “Bye Nicole. I’ll talk to you later!”

“Bye Aly, I’m going to miss you!” I released her.

“Me too.”

“It was nice seeing you guys again!” Silvanna said.

“Same here.” My mom said.

“Bye!” We all waved to each other, and my parents and I made our way back to our van.

Once we got there, I sat with my teddy in my lap and waited to leave, but my dad was circling the van, and he had a piece of paper in his hand. The first thing I thought was “oh please not another ticket.” But how do you get a parking ticket in Wonderland?

“What is your father doing now?” My mom asked of me.

“I don’t know.” I shrugged.

“Paul! Come in the car, what are you doing?” My mom addressed my dad.

“Someone left this on my dashboard.” My dad handed the piece of paper to my mom, who read it, and I read it over her shoulder.

 

Black Elantra

6C5 H8T

Dented your driver’s side door

 

“Well, is there a dent Paul?”

“Yea, a pretty big one on...”

But I wasn’t really hearing the conversation, it was just background noise, because my heart was thumping so madly, it was a wonder I could breathe. That first line stuck out in my mind “black elantra”. There was one person I knew had a black elantra; that I had been in, at three in the morning...

It couldn’t be...could it?