Perhaps Vampires Is A Bit Strong, But

A FORWORD

In the light that most of the story you’re about to be told is true, and that it’s a pretty well known story, if you watch news or read newspapers, also, because some parts, if not all, are purely my own interpretation of the events that took place, I felt compeled to changed the names of most places and most people. I did not apply that to the members of the Chowder Society, because I feel that names tell a lot about people sometimes, and this, in my opinion, is such time. However, if you go looking for a small town on the East Coast named Brookdale, and even succeed in finding it, you can stop right there – there’s no Kelly’s Hill there; and even if there was one, neither me nor Franco, Dean, Summer, Alice or Johnny have ever been there. There is a hill, and there is a house on it – just like hundreds of houses stand on hundreds of hills in the less inhabited parts of the country. I’m not a liar. Just a considerate person. I hope you can respect that.

Perhaps vampires is a bit strong, but

- Arctic Monkeys



Hey there, there's such deadly wolves 'round town tonight
Round the town tonight

- Neko Case

· · 1 · ·

The first thing you have to learn is that those creatures do not need to wait until dark to do their bloody work. They wait for it, because people need dark.

I thought I might have learned it the easy way. In fact, it was the easiest way I could imagine. To be absolutely honest, I didn‘t even have to learn – Johnny explained everything. With the patience of a newly sanctified martyr, with the grace of a beautifully crafted space shuttle, with the wit of.... well, himself. No doubt he was one witty bastard. Johnny Miller, that is.

They say that places cannot hurt you. And that is true. They are not the things you should beware of. Places might be harmless, but the things that haunt them, those can rip your lungs out and split your mind. You‘ll never get that last breath back. You‘ll never get back your sanity.

„There are at least two ways to deal with this.“ Says Johnny and his eyes flicker a little. „You can either be scared, or you can not give a shit about it.“

„Which one should I pick?“

„The one that fits you better. I‘d say it‘s not giving a shit. That seems to stick with you pretty well, if I recall correctly.“

I know Johnny is refering to the time him and I first met. I felt like a bag of trash, ready to be thrown away into a dumpster to socialize with other trash. Johnny picked me up almost outright, it was uncanny. Now, when I think of it, Johnny knew exactly what he was doing. Picking up litter.

„No, really,“ Johnny says, „you have to look more alive than this. You look terrible, friend.“

And I feel terrible. As if my insides are about to be ripped out. And they‘re planning a revolt, before that happens.

„This is a little weird, though.“ Johnny says. „I feel like a kid again.“

„Do cemeteries always give you that feeling?“ I say, looking around for a shovel Franco left here an hour ago.

„I suppose that might be the case,“ Johnny chuckles, running right hand fingers through his relatively short dirty-blond hair.

I can see black spots under his fingernails. It seems that bruising never goes away – as if it‘s a hobby of his to shut a piano top onto his fingertips. As I lean forward to take a box of matches from his jacket pocket, I smell a faint odor of sawdust. I can see road dust and little bits of dead leaves stuck in his hair. So tiny, I‘m almost positive I‘m only imagining them.

It has always struck me as strange, that Johnny seemed to be emiting heat like an old heater. I‘ve had a cat once, a weary little fellow, he was always so very hot to touch. His heart beat three times faster than mine. He died when he was nine years old. I was six, I cried for four hours straight and my mom brought me to the hospital. She was convinced I was going to die as well as the cat. Such a hot little fellow he was.

I can‘t find the damn shovel. Johnny is getting angry. He never shows it, but I can tell. He never used to get so angry. Sometimes he‘d be irritated or get annoyned, never angry though. But things change.

„Fucking Franco,“ he says. „I can‘t believe we‘re still here.“

I start doubting he even left the shovel in the cemetery. Not around the freshly back-filled grave, at least.

„Perhaps we should just go.“ I say. „My leg is killing me.“

„Fucking Franco,“ Johnny says as he circles around the tombstone for the fiftieth time.

„My leg is killing me,“ I repeat, with growing anxiety. Oh it‘s hurting, alright. My left knee feels a lot like jello at the moment.

I thought sitting down would help, but that only made matters worse. I can see the sky lightening up in the east. It‘s around 5 a.m., last call at Sam‘s Place was more than three hours ago. We can‘t stay here any longer. Forty five damn minutes was long enough. The ground is cold and my leg is starting to go beserk on me.

I tell Johnny he‘s going to have to carry me all the way back to Kelly‘s house if we stay here any longer. He smiles eerily; then says:

„I‘ll tell you what we‘re going to do.“

Fifteen minutes later we‘re walking up the Kelly‘s hill. Johnny‘s carrying the shovel and me – well, I‘m carrying my left leg.

ØØØ

I wake up in the morning feeling as if last night was just a dream. My leg is still hurting, but I am able to walk with a less apparent limp. My neck is sore from sleeping on a sofa, and I know I‘ve been awake several times before because of an annoying snoring sound, that Franco is making.

I make a couple of „training“ laps around the soft, deep Persian carpet that is layed down in the middle of the living room. Feeling confident enough, I embark on a journey to the first floor bathroom.

The house is old but very neatly kept. And filled with the most amazing things. There are boats in the first floor hallway: boats of different shapes and sizes, in form of pictures and figurines and little wooden hooks on the wall to hang your coat on. Everywhere you look – there are boats and boats and more boats. It makes me feel as if I‘m at sea. Faint smell of sea salt and silent sound of swooshing – the beach sand in the wind – almost reaches my ears. And that‘s just the beginning.

It‘s easy to find the bathroom – I‘ve been here many times before. I couldn‘t count the times I‘ve slept on that vintage sofa, either. Nor can I remember how many times I‘ve stood still, my ear and cheek pressed to Alice‘s bedroom door, trying to hear if she‘s awake yet. If you think that‘s creepy, you‘ve never been nowhere near Brookdale. I must congratulate you on that. Brookdale is a strange place, sometimes I wish I‘d never come here, too.

I go in and lock the door behind me. The bathroom is a spacious, well-lit room with hefty islands and a big mirror above the sink. There‘s a wastebasket nearby where I‘m standing and I can see scrunched paper tissues inside. Everything is in ivory-cream color. I raise my eyes and, for a second, there I am – an ivory-cream-colored man, not a man, really, just an eighteen-year-old boy, a child almost.

ØØØ

Now I know it will take a day or two for my leg to heal properly. My hands are shaking, as I untie my shoes. Alice stands in the doorway, watching as I struggle with the shoelaces. She is wearing a semi-long dark blue cashmere sweater and sparkling black tights. Her chestnut-colored hair is tied into a loose ponytail. She has some lipstick on; it’s the color of raspberries.

“It’s not bad, is it?” she asks trying unsuccessfully to mask the curiosity in her voice.

“It could be worse,” I say, heroically. It could be much better, I think to myself.

“I’m sorry,” she says, and walks without a sound. As she sits down next to me on the sofa, I realize just how little of what she says she actually means.

“I believe you,” I say. I know she doesn’t mean it. It doesn’t change anything; I’m still in love with her.

It started the first time I saw her – she was eating a plum under a big northern red oak. It was in October, already chilly even in the daytime, so she was wearing an oversized woolen coat. Her eyes were musty green and watery, and her lips were blood red with the flesh of the fruit. The sun was caught in the leafage of the tree and she was standing in the shade. Her skin was ivory-colored and smooth, it seemed to glow a little as her jaw moved intensely. All I wanted from that very moment on was to put my hand on her breast and never move again. She smelled of summer, I knew, although I was standing on the other side of the street with Johnny next to me. Johnny was reading a comic book, but suddenly he lost interest, raised his head, and saw her. Hey, Goodwin, he yelled. She waved us, and laughed. I knew she saw me staring before. Her eyes were musty green and watery and she smelled like plums.

“I’m sorry I asked you to go there,” she says. “I was aware it could end badly.”

“But it didn’t,” I say. “It’s alright. My fucking leg will be better than ever in a couple of --“ I want to say days, but I can’t. That would be telling the truth. “It’s okay; I’ll be fine in an hour or two.”

She smiles. We are leaving in two to three hours my leg has to get better until then. As I looked at her smile, I remembered the first time she said my name, it was in October, and we were both sixteen years and four months old.

“I need a drink,” I say, and walk out of the living room with my fists clenched, trying so hard not to run back, take her face in my hands, and kiss her, madly.

I remember it like it was yesterday. Usually when people say that it sounds like a cliché, and I know if I’d say it out loud it would, too. Nevertheless, as I’m thinking it, it seems perfectly honest in my mind: I remember it like it was yesterday; past always lingers close to present for me.

Her lips were still wet from the fruit, and Johnny patted me on a shoulder whilst introducing us.

“Adam,” she said nodding slightly, “so truly pleased to meet you.”

“Likewise,” I said, hoping to sound confident and nonchalant, hoping so desperately I still feel stupid remembering.

She brings a bottle of Kahlua and a pack of 3%-fat milk from the kitchen.

“Hold steady,” she says, while pouring milk into an empty coffee mug. As if I’m able to stop my fingers from trembling.

Every kid in the northern hemisphere knows a drink called White Russian. Probably drinks it as well quite regularly. We used to flatter ourselves to being sophisticated that way. It tastes like liquid cake, that’s why Dean always loved it. He used to say, even if the cake is a lie, we will always have Caucasian. Every lazy afternoon watching Coen brothers run their characters into the impending depression or Smith portrait the meaningless life so perfectly we felt like actually living it, we used to sip it. We drank milk in gallons every day. Never had a pack of milk gone bad in the house on the Kelly’s Hill.

“What do you want to do today?” she asked me on that chilly afternoon, almost two years ago.

“Show me a good time,” I said.

They both laughed.

“Want to catch a movie?”

“I don’t care.”

“There, hold it.”

She goes across the living room, chooses a book from a shelf and comes back to me. She takes a cup of drink from my hand and sips.

“James used to write short stories when he was young.”

“James is still young enough.”

She gives a laugh. “James is well near seventy. I know you love him, I do, too, but you have to admit he’s fucking old.”

“Okay.” I say. “I admit it.”

She sits next to me, straight and graceful, as a proper lady should.

“It starts from some war stories, those are no good, really.”

“Alright.”

“But he wrote some others a bit later, and those are different.”

“You want to read one to me?”

“If you’d like?”

“Of course.” We have time.

“I wish others were here, too,” she says, suddenly.

“You want to do it later, with others here?”

“No, it’s fine. Just you and me. Having a good time.” She smiles.

I smile.

“It’s called “A Guy Walks into a Bank” ” she says.



Write the following, my friend, he said. Write it on the walls, on the glass doors in the supermarket, on your palms and on people‘s cars. Write it, and no one gets hurt.

But someone was going to get hurt. I could see it in his eyes. Someone was going to get hurt, probably the blonde near the poster with a huge exclamation point in it. I could see in his eyes he was the hurting type.



Then she closed the book and looked at me, hard.

“Is that it?” I ask.

“No... It goes on like this for a while. I was just thinking, though.”

I wait.

“Do you think, well, do you think I am the hurting type?”

“Why would you say that? Of course not.”

“No, Adam, just be honest with me now.”

“Why would you ask me this. Why did you think that in the first place?”

She looks away.

“It’s just... A lot of small tiny things, you know.”

“No, tell me.”

She manages a taut smile.

“Like now. I know you think I’m a terrible person for making you go through this.”

“I don’t understand what you mean.”

“Yes, you do.” Yes. I do. And it hurts a million times more to know that she does, too.

“I just think sometimes that if we died no one would ever miss us.” She pauses. “You know?” I sit there silent. “Do you ever think about things like that?”

I say nothing.

“Of course you do,” she says, “You’re beautiful that way, amazing.”

“Sometimes things just strike up to my mind. I have ideas that make sad things sadder and good things great.”

“I wish I was you. Then I could look at myself in a mirror and not wince.”

“You’re so very beautiful. And a good person.”

“And still... I’d like to be you. You’re better than me. You’re better than all of us here, than anyone.”

“So let’s go see a picture,” Johnny said.

The movie theater was in an old building and the letters above the entrance read “THE BOAT”. It was showing “Trick ‘r Treat” again, because it was October, and Halloween was relatively near. It smelled of dust inside, and everything felt so ancient and dead, but I didn’t notice, or didn’t bother to pay attention; I was feeling more alive than I’d ever felt. I knew I was in love with the most beautiful girl, and she was sitting next to me, eating caramel flavoured popcorn and smiling as she watched young Anna Paquin turn into a she-wolf on screen.

“I wish I knew this was going to be so much fun,” I said.

“It’s always fun with Johnny,” Alice said and winked at me.

“Let’s hang out tomorrow night, okay?” said Johnny.

“I don’t know if I can.”

“Of course you can!” Alice was laughing. “Tell your old man you have urgent matters to attend with your a-ma-zing new friends, who love you and need you, and miss you already!”

“Be still,” Johnny told her, but she didn’t pay him any mind. “Listen, I mean, man, it’s completely up to you, but you have to meet Franco and Dean and Summer some time. If not tomorrow – it’s fine, we’ll hang later. Anyhow, we do it all the time.”

“Like a family,” Alice grinned.

“Would you stop fooling around?”

“He doesn’t like me being like this,” she laughed, “He thinks I’m being silly.”

“I think you’re cool.” I said.

“Thank you!”

Sal just shook his head smiling. “You have to meet Summer,” he said, “now she’s a firecracker.”

I looked at Alice thinking she might feel hurt, but she was nodding wildly.

“You have to meet Summer and Franco, and Dean, you’ll love them to pieces. They’ll eat you up!”

I sit on the sofa, looking at Alice look through the window. Summer is a firecracker. Pretty and tiny, with her sleak dark chocolate hair and dark hazel eyes. She’s like a force of nature. Small, yet strong. And Alice... was in love, I remember now. Never forgot, just pushed it out of my conscious mind for a while. Well, she always loved Johnny. That’s for one. But we all love Johnny; equally, even, I guess. And he’s not the one to fall for; not rewarding at all. The guy she was head over heels for as they say in stupid romance novels was named BJ. Billie Joe. And he had a face of an angel, that had an accident, tripped and tumbled down a flight of stairs and broke his nose in a couple of places. Raven black hair, even blue-ish, he died it, i’m sure. And he looked sort of short, constitution of a light-weight wrestler, though he wasn’t strong enough to be one.

He was fast. The fastest kid I had ever seen run, and he never showed his magic in PEd, he failed the course, although all it would have taken was one decent run, and the coach would have kissed his sneakers for the rest of the season. Dean was the star of PEd, he was a really good runner, too. No match for Billie Joe, still. And Alice loved him, she watched him skip classes, she watched him kiss other girls in the parking lot near Johnny’s Pizza place, she watched his murky eyes narrow as he was talking to Johnny. Now when I think of it, Billie Joe was the reason why at the time Alice was the only person – except myself – from the Chowder Society who was out there in the world. Dean was dating Summer and they spent all of their free time hanging out at Kelly’s house. Franco was too involved with books and movies, and classes and weed; he always took things more seriously than the rest of us. And Johnny was a different story altogether. Alice used to not be there sometimes, when we sat on the porch eating crisp autumn apples and drinking hot cider with cloves we made in Kelly’s house kitchen. We used to hold movie marathons, involving handcuffs and mandatory story telling, in Kelly’s house TV room, and I can clearly recall several times she wasn’t present.



ØØØ

He was a strange man. Everyone would say at certain times in his life that he had so much potential to become someone important in the upcoming phase of his life, but he never did. The only thing he had was that potential, that „almost-there“ thing.



We sit not talking for a while, listening to the wind gushing outside. I wonder if it really means something, if that is how James felt, as a young man, someone that’s “almost-there”. Or did he have someone else in mind? I wonder if I feel now like I could relate to that because I feel I possess that quality, or because I have someone else in mind. Johnny? Franco? Dean? Summer? Alice? Or is it Billie Joe that springs to my mind, for a moment forgetting the terrible things that happened to him.

“I wish I could stay curled up like this all day”, Alice gives me a warm smile.

“Me too.” But I don’t mean it.

· · 2 · ·

Forthright as always, Dean McVrice, Dean for everyone who had ever exchanged a couple of words with the guy, started our friendship by kissing me hard on the lips. I was sitting on the Kelly‘s House porch steps with Johnny, waiting for Franco and Dean to show up. I was a little nervous. Johnny had told me a lot about them by then. How Franco is a fucking genius, and how Dean can make you wonder what it was like to sleep with a man. Johnny was sucking on an unlit cigarette, he was eager to quit smoking at the time. Alice and Summer were out for the day, shopping in the outlets of a nearby town. It was the second half of November. No snow. Just wind as cold and strong as the devil. Dead leaves flying all around us, dry rustle the only sound in the dead air; with skies hanging heavy above us – dark purple, scarlet, viridescent and powder-blue, I felt my spirits sink.

“Storm is coming,” I said.

“Yeah.” Johnny looked tired.

I rubbed my hands together and exhaled a cloud of steamy air.

“You’re not going to light it up, are you?”

“You want to go inside?”

“Yeah, it’s too cold for me here.”

“Sure.” Johnny removed the cigarette from the corner of his mouth and put it back in the pack.

We started up the porch steps, then suddenly two figures appeared at the far end of the alley. Straight as a needle it was, both sides guarded by overgrown beeches, and led straight to the big Victorian house that everyone in town called the Kelly’s House. Johnny hesitated.

“Who is it? Franco and Dean McVrice?” I stopped, one foot mid-air.

Johnny narrowed his eyes.

“As good guess as any. We’re not expecting anyone else.”

I stepped down back on the lawn and started shifting from one foot to another. Johnny smiled, as he took a note of that, but said nothing. The two figures were moving towards us, slowly.

After more or less a minute, I finally was able to make out most of the details. I guessed (correctly), that the tall bearded guy on the left was Franco Holloway, and the somewhat shorter, lean and black-haired, black-dressed person on the right was Dean McVrice. Dean’s face was all but covered entirely by a dark-colored thick woolen scarf, he wore black skinny jeans with a black crew-neck sweater and all-black All Stars sneakers. His eyes were radiant green color and he had black mitten gloves on his hands. Holloway was wearing jeans and a plain khaki T-shirt, on which he had a brown tweed sort-of jacket. He had rather old looking Timberland boots on him. Franco was smoking a rolled cigarette, the smoke was rich and sweet.

When they finally reached us, both had fallen silent.

“Hey, man,” Franco and Johnny shook hands, Dean gave Johnny a warm pat on a shoulder.

“And who are you?” Dean asked, his voice muffled by the scarf covering the bigger part of his face. Still, it was obvious he was smiling.

As if to answer that, Franco shook my hand, saying: “Hey, man, nice to finally meet you, my name is Franco. Although my friends here seem to enjoy calling me by my last name.”

“Adam. Nice to meet you, too.” I said.

“And I’m Dean,” McVrice said. “No one calls me by my last name, or by any other name for that matter.”

I smiled. “It’s really difficult to make out what you’re saying, with that scarf and all,” I said.

Franco laughed. Johnny smiled.

Dean drew the scarf down off of his nose and mouth, leaned in as quick as a wildcat pouncing on it’s prey, and pressed his lips hard onto mine. Perplexed, I stepped back, only to trip on an old garden chair, and fall right into it.

“Jesus,” I managed to utter.

“Like I’ve said before, it’s Dean,” Dean said, smiling brightly, and started into the house, while Franco was letting Johnny have a draw of his smoke.

ØØØ

Franco was really good with technical side of things, as well as abstract notions and WWII trivia. But Johnny made sure I understood that the most valued talent of his – at least to the Chowder Society – was being able to always keep a clear-minded view on things. Whatever happened, there he was, a calm and rather objective by-stander, who knew how to pick locks and quoted Orwell on daily basis. Franco’s second most-valued talent was cooking.

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” said Franco, chopping onions, “But how did you end up in this hell hole?”

The three of us were sitting around a pinewood table in the Kelly’s House kitchen, while Franco was making us something to eat. Dean was sitting between me and Johnny, not for a minute taking his eyes off of me, arms crossed over his chest.

“And by “this hell hole” I suppose you mean the evil town of Brookdale, not Alice’s lovely kitchen?” Johnny smiled, lifting his eyes from a newspaper he was reading.

“Correct.” Franco put the chopped onions in to a heated frying pan, stirred for a short while, and started dicing baby carrots.

“My dad got a job here.” I said, curtly.

“And?”

“And we moved.”

“Such a dull storyteller,” Dean remarked, not taking his eyes off of me.

“What do you want me to say?”

I glanced at Johnny looking for help, but he was reading the obituaries. Franco put the carrots in to the frying pan, and stirred. Then, he held a bunch of asparagus sprouts under the water in the sink, until he decided they were clean enough, cut those in three-four pieces, and added to the mix in the pan. Increasing the heat, he also added some water. Franco glanced at the table and gave me a smile.

“Don’t feel bad, man, I’m just curious.” He started working with a large piece of corned beef.

“I don’t really know how I feel,” I said honestly. “It’s not about you asking questions. There’s nothing wrong with that. It just that I hate it here, and can’t decide if that’s the town’s fault or mine...”

“For being an ignorant big-city piece of shit?” Dean offered.

“McVrice!” Franco said, pointing with a knife as a warning. “We’re all friends here, for fuck’s sake.”

Dean gave me an apologetic shrug.

“No, you’re kind of right,” I said. “I miss Atlanta so bad, I feel like drowning in here. At the same time I wonder if it’s really so awful here, or if I’m just not giving this place a chance.”

“You end up torturing yourself, man,” Franco said, adding the diced corned beef to the frying pan, and starting to search cupboards for spices and herbs.

“That’s what I’m starting to think.”

“And you know what they say,” Dean said, “Acceptance is the first step towards change.”

“Who says that, exactly?” Franco asked, stirring the stew.

Ignoring him, Dean said: “Anyhow, you’re not that far of. This place is no peach.”

“But we’ll get through it together.” Johnny announced and closed the paper. “Is it ready or what, man? I can’t take smelling this deliciousness and not being able to taste it, anymore. Time to eat.”

After we ate, and the meal was superb, as Dean declared and as we happily acknowledged, we went to the living room, where Johnny lit the fire. The dusk was starting to envelope the farther corners of the yard. I looked at the big, old, seemingly expensive and very well looked-after clock on the wall. It’s hands were pointing at 3.45pm.

“Did Summer call you to say when they’ll be getting back?” Johnny asked casually.

“Nope.” Said Dean.

“Me neither.” Said Franco.

Franco left some leftovers in the plastic conteiner in the fridge for Summer and Alice.

“It’s getting dark,” I pointed out.

“So it is,” Franco said with a smile, but kept his eyes on the screen of an Ipad tablet. He was surfing some news site for the latest headlines on Palestinian-Israelian conflict.

“I guess, it’s time for me to go...” I started.

“Don’t be silly, Adam,” Dean said, “It’s barely the afternoon yet. How old are you, five?”

I gave a nervous smile.

“I still get lost here sometimes.”

“We’ll walk together, really, it’s too early to even be thinking about leaving,” Johnny said. “I was thinking we could start watching something.”

“A movie, perhaps?” Dean drew closer to the flat screen TV.

“I was thinking something from the early 90s,” Johnny said, looking over a DVD case.

“What about Ed Wood?” Franco asked from the sofa. “We never get to that one.”

“Yeah, okay, why not.” Johnny took the DVD and put it into the player.

“Ed wood?” I said.

“Wait and see,” Dean said, streching like a cat on the vintage armchair. “We have only one rule here, during the watching sessions – no questions about the film.”

“Well, that’s not really true,” Johnny gave me a warm smile. “Pointless commenting is not very welcome, either.”

“Shut up, kids, the titles are already rolling.”

ØØØ

I’m not going to tell you anything about the movie, only that I did like it very much. When we finished watching it was almost 6pm. After about five minutes of deliberation, the door opened, and two girls walked in to the living room, carrying colorful quality paper bags.

Alice I already knew well enough, and she was as beautiful that night as ever. Her chesnut colored hair were down, and she was wearing a white belted cocktail dress under a wine red velvet coat. She had some burgundy colored lipstick on, and looked very mature, older, at least twenty or more. “Hey, guys,” she said. “Ed Wood, huh?”

Right beside her in the doorway stood a tiny dark eyed girl, wearing a robe-like red and orange dotted white dress, and faux-fur coat over it. She had on orange high heels and big vintage earrings. Her hair were long, straight and shiny, and the deep rich color of dark chocolate, and she had more make up on than Alice did. But somehow she still looked completely natural, and sweet. For a moment there, I thought to myself, that’s the kind of girl you should fall for and marry and have children with. That’s the kind of girl that’s worth comitment, and that will reward you more than you’d ever know.

But I was in love already. With a somewhat taller girl, with somewhat lighter-colored hair, and musty green eyes. She had a very friendly look on her face, that could not be said about Summer, who had a menacing frown. But somehow, even then, I could already tell, that Summer was the forgiving, loving and caring one.

“You little shit!” Summer said. “See? You even made me swear!”

“Talk dirty, baby,” said Dean, standing up, and walking up to her, with his hands raised defensively in front of him. “I missed you like crazy.”

“Sure you did. Well, if you would have answered your phone any one of those FIFTEEN times that I’ve called you, OR answered ANY ONE of my texts....”

Alice smiled at Johnny, and then noticed me.

“Oh, Adam! So good to see you! Finally, I see you met the whole Chowder Society.”

Summer pushed Dean away, and after peaking at me, gave a little wave and a smile.

“Hi, I’m Summer Holloway. Just call me Summer.”

“Adam,” I said, smiling. I couldn’t help it. I liked Summer from the second she walked in. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Yeah, me too,” she said, making her way through Johnny and Alice, and finally standing just in front of me, with her arm extended, intending to give me a firm handshake. I shook her small hand. “Sorry about all the shouting, though.”

“I understand is not all your fault,” I smiled.

“You wouldn’t believe,” she sighed, and sat on arm of the armchair. “I like you, Adam. Good that Johnny finally brought you by.”