(NOT fan fiction!) Kurt Cobain and Tally Fisk

Chapter Twenty-One

The party isn't at Kyle's this time.

Kyle and Kade are gone for a week, visiting grandparents on the east coast.

But fortune smiled on our classmates who love to gather unchaperoned. Chris Belston's parents went on a weekend retreat.

The trick is sneaking Tally out without my parents figuring out we're sneaking Tally out.

Mavis parks in Kyle's neighborhood. That's part one. Then John and I leave the house, telling my parents we're going to Chris's with Mavis. It's over if they look out the living room window and see us, not leaving with Mavis, but joining Tally and then going through my front gate, through the back yard, and then through the back gate.

But it works. My parents are watching a YouTube lecturer on the living room TV and barely look up when we leave.

We meet Mavis on the other side of Westfahl Wood and pile in her car for the ten-minute drive to Chris's house.

"You never seem to have to sneak past your parents," I say to Mavis. I'm in the back seat directly behind her and I fold my arms against the back of her seat and rest my chin on them.

"My dad works two jobs. My mom works at the hospital and her shift is two in the afternoon until two in the morning. I'm on my own a lot."

"Must be nice," Tally says.

"Sometimes," Mavis admits. "Sometimes it's lonely. But my mom makes a killer brunch. I love that about summer. I get to be home in the mornings with my mom."

I wonder if Mavis looks like her mom. I wonder what they talk about. I wonder if her mom knows I exist. It's a crazy thing to imagine someone I've never met knowing my name.

Chris's house isn't smaller than Kyle's but it's different. Older, for one. It's made of flat, dark wood and it towers in the midst of some tall trees. Maybe it's an old farmhouse that has been constantly renovated for the duration of its existence.

There is no pool, I see, as we wander into the backyard. There is a large, freestanding patio that's covered with lattice, draped in twinkly lights.

"Guitar man!" Chris says as we walk up. "Mr. Rock and Roll is here."

I lift my hands as if to signal my innocence.

"I'm guitar-less tonight."

Please, don't let him say he has a guitar.

Please, let him say he has a guitar.

My craving for an audience is at war with my reserved nature.

No! I don't want to be that guy with the guitar at all the parties. You know the guy.

But I'm a better player than that stereotypical guitar-party guy, right? Man, I hope so.

"Too bad." He tosses me a can of beer. "I wish I'd know you were this cool a long time ago. We could have hung out a lot more."

"Yeah, well."

Chris offers more beers to my fellow Woodsmen.

"I'm driving," Mavis says.

"One won't hurt."

"Yeah, well, one might be enough to convince me that two won't hurt. So, no thanks."

"I don't drink that cheap sewage," John says. "You'll have to do better than that."

Chris laughs and says, "We might be able to work something out. And I know Tally only drinks shots."

He winks at Tally and I remember they used to date. I feel a little stab of jealousy but it's a surprisingly mild stab. A vaccine, not a knife.

This party is smaller. It must take Kyle's charisma or his lavish amenities to draw large crowd.