Hometown| Mike Wheeler

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

"If he's cool, than you be Winston." Lucas argues.

"I can't!"

"Why not?"

"B-because..."

Lucas begins to mock Mike, "'B-b-because' you're not black?"

"No!" Mike denies.

"It's 'cause you're jealous than, right? Because Venkman's dating Dana, and Lizzie is Dana." Lucas assumes.

"What!?" I cut in, my nostrils flaring a bit. I was just scared that Lucas was gonna blabber my secret out to the whole party. To Mike.

Mike looks flustered, but quickly regains composure, "What? No."

"Then it is because I'm black!" Lucas sneers, "You think I can't be Venkman because I'm black!"

"I didn't say that!" Mike shouts.

"You thought it." Lucas counters.

"Come on, guys, please," I groan, "If you guys don't stop I'm gonna have to be Venkman."

The two only start to argue again, and I look to Will, rolling my eyes.

He stifles a laugh.

"Guys!" I hear Dustin shout, making my ears perk up, "Guys!"

Lucas and Mike stop, all of us looking over to our friend who was staring out at the parking lot.

"What's wrong?" I ask as we all join his side.

"Why is no one else wearing costumes?" Dustin questions, and I fight to hold back a smile.

"Crap." Lucas mutters.

The bell rings, and we walk inside. I was basically skipping beside Lucas, singing out, "I told you so, I told you so!" Lucas whacks me in the arm, cursing at me, which only makes me grin wider, "How's it feel to be wrong?"

"Stop rubbing it in." Mike grumbles from the other side of the hallway.

"I'm not. I'm simply showing you guys that you should have listened to me; the only sane one in the group." I snicker.

But I wasn't the only one. Kids were laughing and ridiculing my friends. My face falls, and I glance over to them, seeing they looked very embarrassed, and I was only making it worse.

"When do people make these decisions?" Dustin utters.

"Everyone dressed up last year." Will mentions.

"It's a conspiracy, I'm telling you." Dustin claims.

"Just be cool." Mike says.

We all divide to go to our lockers, and I stuff my sweatshirt inside, sighing as I begin to reach up and grab my notebook. My mood instantly perks up as I see Max riding towards me on her skateboard, "Hi, Max."

"Hey," She greets, hopping off the board. She stores it in the locker, grabbing her binder from the top part, "Oh, uh, I hope i'm not taking up to much space."

I peer in, seeing her skateboard was pushed all the way to the side. I chuckle, shaking my head, "No, not at all."

"Cool," She nods, "Walk with me to Mr. Clark's?"

I nod eagerly, grabbing the rest of my things from the locker before shutting the door, the two of us conversing as we walk to first period.

|

"Yeah, it was so gross," Max laughs, "He was like on-top of her and..." Max fake gags.

I shudder, "That is nasty. I would have gone blind if I witnessed that."

"I'm surprised I didn't," Max looks over at me, fixing her bag strap, "How about you? You have any siblings?"

"Well, I did," I state, quickly realizing my mistake, "Uh, she moved away. We weren't, like, real sisters but, we were so close it felt like we were."

Max nods slowly, "Oh. I'm sorry."

I weakly smile, shrugging as we approach the locker. Max puts in the combination before opening it, both of us putting in our things.

"Hi, Max," I hear a voice beside us, and immediately recognize it as Dustin, "I'm Dustin, and this is-"

"Lucas." Lucas finishes with a wide smile.

"Yeah, I know. Elizabeth told me," She glances at me, "The stalkers."

The two boys start to stutter, looking at each other before Lucas finds his words, "Uh, no. Actually...we weren't stalking you."

I look at Lucas with my eyebrows raised, and he immediately wipes his brow.

"No, we-we were just concerned because, you know, you're new and all." Dustin lies.

"Y-Y-Yeah. Yeah, for your safety." Lucas adds.

"Mhm. There are a lot of bully's here." Dustin starts.

"So many bullies, it's crazy." Lucas speaks up.

"Yeah." Dustin nods.

"I have Elizabeth, I think I'll be okay." Max leans against the locker.

"W-w-well, Liz could be a bully too." Dustin replies.

I widen my eyes, crossing my arms as I give Dustin an intense glare, "Is that so?"

"What he means is...uh, Lizzie can sometimes be mean to new people. Like, this one time she almost punched someone in the face because they were-" Lucas begins.

"It doesn't matter." I cut him off.

"She seems pretty nice to me." Max shrugs.

"That's...good." Lucas says slowly.

"Yeah, really good," Dustin nods, "We were just looking out for you, to make sure that she was being nice and all."

Max looks at the boys weirdly, "Is that why you're wearing proton packs?"

"Well, these don't function. But..." Dustin reaches down, grabbing his little box that 'catches ghosts', "I do have this handy-dandy little trap here. And look, it even opens and closes. Look, look, look..." With a wide smile, he opens the box, chuckling, "Voilà! It's cool right?" Max only stares back at them, "No? Okay. But, um...so, we were talking last night, and you're new here, so you probably have no one to take you trick-or-treating, and you're scared of bullies, so we were thinking that it would be okay if you come with us. It's perfect because Liz is also trick-or-treating with us, so you won't feel awkward!"

"'It'd be okay'?" Max questions as I begin hitting my head against the locker door.

"Yeah. Our parties a democracy, the majority voted you could come." Dustin responds.

"I didn't know it was such an honor to go trick-or-treating with you." Max sarcastically states.

"We know where to get the full-sized candy bars," Dustin boasts, "We figured you'd want in."

"That's presumptuous of you." Max states.

"Yeah. Totally," Dustin smiles as Lucas looked a bit shocked, "Uh, so, um...you'll come?"

Max scoffs, grabbing her skateboard, walking away, "Catch you later, Elizabeth."

"We're meeting at the Maple Street cul-de-sac at 7:00!" Dustin calls as I close the locker, making eye contact with Lucas, both of us shaking our heads, "That's 7:00 on the dot! 'Presumptuous'. That's a good thing, right?" Lucas sighs, and I link arms with him, both of us walking away from the oblivious boy, "Is it bad? Guys, is it bad? Lucas? Liz? Son of a bitch, guys. Is it bad?"