Love and Fame Games (Book 1)

15

                  Present Day

Not long after Seth and I fled the record store, I finally got word that the girls had arrived. They were with Ethan and Tristan outside, by the Off-Kilter van, which was parked at the row of parking spaces nearest to the freeway.

I wasn't crazy about the black, outdated van with tinted windows that these guys rode around in when they were doing band stuff. Sure, it was practical and spacious enough for various equipment but it was also incredibly creepy.

On the other hand, it was a genius choice if they wanted to be left alone. People did tend to stay away from these types of vehicles. The giant decal of the band's name on the side kind of defeated that purpose, however. I supposed complete anonymity wasn't ideal, either.

All five of our other friends were on top of the low concrete wall that separated the mall property from the street. While most of them sat facing the lot, Tristan stood with his back to us, playing a handheld game.

"Dude, we thought we'd lost you," Ethan called out, laughing, as Seth and I walked toward them. He was sitting right in the middle of that wall, looking very pleased with himself.

"I should kick your ass . . ."

"Try it, fool." Ethan made a dorky kung-fu style hand gesture.

Seth grinned, ran to the wall and leapt up to his side. Both laughing, they tried to shove each other off the wall but they were evenly matched so they gave up and soon enough had their arms around each other's shoulders.

"Dumbasses," I muttered under my breath and rolled my eyes.

"Move," Seth told Ethan when I got to the wall. Ethan scooted over and Seth reached out to help me up. I shrugged off the offer in favor of grabbing hold of the wall with both hands and hoisting myself up, and wound up sitting between him and Ethan.

"I don't know why you're so mad," Ethan spoke to Seth over my shoulder. "We're the ones they caught up to. How'd you give them the slip, anyway?"

Seth shrugged. We caught each other's eye and chuckled. "Just lucky, I guess. Where'd they get you?"

"Food court," Tristan butted in, sitting on his haunches to talk to us. "Darnedest thing, they said they'd leave us alone if we took a picture with them. Then they said it was only fair because we've taken a million pictures with this one girl--"

"It wasn't a million pictures. God!" Everyone gave me a funny look and I composed myself. "I'm sure it wasn't a million pictures."

"What else did they say?" Seth asked.

Tristan told us that the Saint Agnes girls had seen countless pictures, taken at multiple locations, of them with the girl in question. I had to grit my teeth to keep from protesting once more. And then he and Ethan went on to relay the Saint Agnes girls' description of the girl in the picture, who was actually me, but neither he nor Ethan seemed to make the connection.

"Those girls were probably making it up." Seth kept a completely straight face. Sometimes it was scary how good a liar he was.  "You know that never happened."

"Yeah, I'd remember if it did. That girl sounds hot," Ethan nodded. I rolled my eyes. It was such an Ethan thing to say.

"I swear I could remember taking that picture!" Tristan sounded a little too excited. Who could blame him? It seemed like the kind of extraordinary event that dorks like him would be interested in.

He wasn't the only one into it. Erin turned to us, and in a low keening voice, said, "Maybe you're being haunted . . . by fans from the beyond!"

"Nobody said she was from the beyond!" I exclaimed, taking issue with being referred to as a ghostly figure.