I sat on my chair looking through the web. It wasn't a very eventful evening. I just started web searching from boredom. We came back from the store cause Star wanted some lights for some reason. I bought it for her and she ran inside and started doing her thing. I looked web to web till one got me so excited. It's a movie marathon of Mackie Hand! My favorite marital artist! I didn't know they were planning to do a marathon of playing every movie he has! And it's tonight! I searched up about the marathon looking to buy me tickets.
"Hey, Marco. Can I get your help with something?"
"Can't help right now. I just found out there's a movie marathon tonight, and I can't miss it."
"Ooh. Who's Mackie Hand?"
"He's the greatest martial-arts superstar who ever lived. He died thirty years ago while performing one of his own stunts on himself. Accidentally." I look back at my laptop. "Come on, come on, come on." I look at the screen seeing the one thing I did not want to see. I stood up and took a deep breath. Then smacked my face on the keyboard groaning. I smacked myself with the screen sad.
"Ooh!!"
"What is it? What's wrong?"
"It's sold out."
"Oh. I'm sorry, little guy."
"It's okay. It was just a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity," I say bummed out.
"Don't worry. I'm sure there's a chance you can still get a ticket," Star say's trying to cheer me up.
"Good things don't happen to me." Suddenly A giant blast of fire bursts out of my desk, knocking me and Star over. I look up seeing the familiar Demon.
"Hey. What's up?"
"Tom?" We say.
"What are you doing here?" I get up to dust off the mild dirt.
"Actually, I was wondering if we could hang out?"
"Ugh. No, no, no. A million times no!" Star tells him.
"Not with you, Star. I meant with Marco."
"Huh?" I look up at Tom confused. "Uh, no?" Unsure why he would even ask me that.
"Oh. Okay then. Guess I'll just find somebody else to go with to the Mackie Hand movie marathon." Wait did I hear that right?
"Wha-huh? What? Wait, you're a fan of Mackie Hand?"
"I'm a super fan," he responds.
"Why do you want to go with me?" I say still unsure.
"I really thought we connected . Over ping-pong?"
"You kidnapped me."
"Look, I know I've been a little aggro in the past, and I'm sorry. I promise not to get mad this time." I didn't believe him. I push Star to the side to talk to her. One to one.
"Star, what is he up to?"
"I think you should go with him. He's obviously trying to bury the hammer or whatever."
"Hatchet? Bury the hatchet," I correct her.
"Well, the marathon is all the way on the other side of town, so are you coming or not?" He asks one last time showing the tickets. I awed at the tickets.
"Fine. Let's go. We can take my bike."
"I got my carriage waiting outside. We can take that. My treat." Hmmm.
"Alright. Star do you need help getting out of that?"
"No, I'm good. Go have fun." We walked out my room shoving my hands into my pockets. I walked down the steps to outside. "Have fun!!!!" Star yelled as she closed the door somehow. I see the carriage and walk to it. I was about to pull my hand from my pocket to open the door, but it opened itself. I look inside as music plays.
"Whoa!" This looks cool I admit.
"Let me just give you a tour." I walk in as Tom follows.
"Giddy up, skeleton horse!" After the door closes, the carriage moves.
"So here it is. We got six flat-screen TVs, a photo booth, karaoke machine."
"Is that a white tiger?" I ask pointing to the animal. Tom places a hand on my lower back leading me to another area.
"And up here is the lounge. Here. Have a seat in the throne." I sit down very sketched. "Are you comfortable? Can I get you anything? Some cereal perhaps?" Flames shows and a tray pops up with cereal and milk on my lap. I pick up the tray and place it on the table.
"Look, you're being super nice to me right now, and you're never nice to me? What's this really all about?" I say folding my arms still not believing him.
"Wha - I'm just a huge fan of Mackie Hand." I look at him dead in the eye serious.
"What's your favorite Mackie Hand movie then?"
"Uh, it's" he stammers.
"I knew it!" I stood up anger. "You don't know the first thing about kung-fu. I'm outta here." I say walking to the door of the carriage.
"No, no, no, wait, wait." I turn to look at him. I don't know why I'm even letting him. "It's just because I have two favorites. Hand To Hand To Hand, and Hand To Hand To Hand 2. And now that I'm saying it, I'm gonna have to go with the original." I was shock, but kinda happy actually.
"Oh. Yeah, you're right. That is the best one."
"But not the English version. I'm talking about the original in Swedish."
"Huh. I guess you do like... stuff. I'm sorry," I say feeling bad. Maybe Tom is telling the truth.
"No, no, no, I get it, I get it. It can be hard to break through people's preconceptions of me. That's why I don't have many friends. I haven't even been to a movie marathon before." What? I was about to say something, but a voice comes out from outside. I look seeing two guys in a convertible.
"Hey, where did you pick up your sweet ride?" Tom walks to the window and I follow, standing next to him. "At a funeral home? Are you gonna go pick up someone's dead grandpa and hold a respectful service for him?" I see Tom starting to get angry. I didn't like them taunting him.
"You think you guys are fast?" I place an arm over Tom's shoulders. "I can guarantee that we'll beat you to the next light without even breaking a sweat," I say grinning.
"Yeah. What are ya, chicken?" Tom says.
"Whaaat?!" They say,
"Bro."
"Bro."
"Bro!"
"You're on, punk." I see the light turn green and the car speed off. I hear Tom growl.
"Oh, I'll show them." I place a hand on Tom's shoulder still looking at the car speeding.
"No, no, no. Wait, wait, wait." And right on que, sirens were heard. The cop car pulls them over. I grinned looked at Tom. "Those guys are going to jail. Now you can move right pass them. And look like nothing happened." Tom told the horse to move slowly. Tom's carriage slowly passes by, and we look at the guys that were in the convertible in the backseat of the cop car all innocently. When we fully pass them, we went back inside, and Tom was laughing with a big smile on. It made me happy seeing him like that.
"Oh, that was that was so much more fun than obliterating people."
"Yeah! This whole thing reminds me of one of my favorite songs, Awesome feeling!" I start hearing the song in my head.
"Wait, wait, wait." I start hummin to the song. "Isn't that a song by Love Sentence?" I stop humming.
"Uhhhh. Yeah?" I say unsure if he likes them or hates them.
"Come with me." Tom leads me to the side that had a curtain. He pulls it back showing me stuff of Love Sentence. I was shocked and awed at it.
"No way!" I gasp seeing the photo. "You have a signed picture of you and Justin Towers?"
"I also have a vintage five-disc CD player with automatic shuffle." He places a disc in it and the music started playing. I was hyped. We got on the white tiger riding it. We went wide playing around, dancing and even taking pictures in the photo booth. We music finally came to an end, and we were finally relaxing. I laid on the floor as Tom took the chair.
"Man, I can't believe I'm actually having a good time with you," I say feeling my heart start to calm down from the rush.
"I know. Right? Heck, I could just skip that whole movie marathon and –" It hit me.
"Oh, my gosh. Oh, the marathon! What time is it?" I pull out my phone seeing the time.
"Don't freak out."
"It starts in ten minutes?" I get up and head to the door, but magical chains appear and block the exit. "What the heck?" I grab the lock and try to pry it open. I let go and look at Tom. "Hey, can you unlock the door?" I ask.
"Actually, I can't let you leave yet."
"What? But we gotta go. We're gonna be late." I say so we don't miss it.
"Couldn't we just chill here for, like, another four-and-a-half minutes?" I didn't like how he said it specifically a time.
"No. Seriously, let me go," I say now wanting to get out. I turn to the lock and tug on it. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I shove his hand off.
"Please. Just wait a little longer."
"What is wrong with you? I said let me go!"
"And I said wait!" He yelled with his eyes glowing red, levitating, and surrounded us by a wall of fire. It reminded me of the Blood Moon Ball and the Fire... I froze some reason. He came closer but I didn't move. I couldn't. The fire disappeared when a whistle blows. I look at the direction where the whistle came from. The white tiger?
"Sorry, Tom." Suddenly Brian came out from the costume? "That's an instant fail for you. Hey, you almost made it this time."
"No, no! Wait, wait! You gotta give me a second chance." Okay I was confused and creeped out.
"Okay, seriously, what is going on here? Dude, I cleaned your litter box."
"Well, Master Tom here was just about to earn his anger management graduation badge. All he had to do was spend three hours alone with the person he hated the most without blowing up." Hated the most..... I opened my mouth to say something, but my voice became dry. Tom walked right in front of me.
"But you, you had to be selfish. You could wait another four minutes and fifteen seconds! All you care about are your precious karate movie tickets. Well, guess what." He pulls the tickets out showing them. I gasp. He tears them up. "Mackie Hand movies are garbage." He sets the pieces on fire. I look at him for a second before feeling the anger inside me rise up. I was pissed.
"Are you kidding me?" I started to march at him. "You lied to me about being a Mackie fan, and pretended to be my friend so you could earn some badge? Dude, you're a jerk and a liar, and that's not even the worst part." I walk to the chained door. Feeling all the anger come out. I pick up my foot. "I was dumb enough to fall for it!" I yell kicking the door open making it break off the carriage. After I did that, I realized what I did. I started to take deep breaths trying to calm down. But I was done. Done being here. Here with Tom. I did not want to see him. I get off the carriage.
"Marco, wait." I kept walking. "I do like Love Sentence. That part wasn't a lie."
"Too little, too late. Which is my second-favorite, by the way," I say shoving my hands in my pocket hoodie. I turn to walk again. I look at the signs knowing where I was at and started to head the direction of home.
"Oh, girl," I stopped my tracks. "You know I never mean to hurt ya When you're sad, you know I'd never desert ya. Mm-mmmm, you were my angel. My beautiful dove." He's singing the song...
"We spiraled high on a gust of love," I sang.
"And I knew right from the start. Nothing could tear us apart." I look down hearing those words replay in my head. Hated the most....
"Till the day you broke my heart. And now it's..." I look at him. "Too little too late. Ooh-oooooh." I start walking again. I feel the tears form but I hold them in. I don't know why it hurt. I just need to get home. Suddenly I feel heat and light form. I turn.
"What the-" I see a blast of flame and Tom on the top of it. Some ghost figures next to him. I see him say some words. I was getting tired of it.
"Yeesh, what a drama queen." Th ground begins to shake. I look down seeing a crack form down and between my legs. I jump out to the side, but lava steams pop so had to jump out the way again and again. I fall back. When I look again the crack it is opening bigger. A coffin comes up from the crack. I look back at Tom seeing the fire gone and Tom falling from the sky to the ground. The coffin glows and breaks open to revealing a skeleton in a karate uniform. I was astonished. I kept watching becoming shocked as the skeleton glows showing who it really was.
"It's - it's Mackie Hand!"
"Oh-oh! I took quite a tumble there. How long was I out? I hope I didn't make us fall too far behind shooting schedule." I started muttering my words from how excited I was.
"But Mr. Hand," I started kowtowing. "I can't believe it's really you!" he looked at me.
"Say, you must be the new PA." He shakes my hand. "Kevin, right? Nice to meet you."
"Oh, my gosh." I started checking my pockets hoping I have a pen or something to get his signature. "I wish I had something for you to sign."
"Eh, don't sweat it. I gotcha covered." He pulls out one of his ribs with a grunt. "Hold still." I did as he signs my forehead with his rib. "There you go." I started running to Tom getting on my knee.
"Tom, I can't believe you brought Mackie Hand back from the dead just for me! That was that was cool of you," I said smiling to him. Tom looks at me back smiling to. I felt my heart skip.
"Wait, I'm dead?" Mackie Hand asks. I shake my head. Suddenly the movie marathon came back to my head.
"Now let's get to that movie!" I say standing up and helping Tom up.
"Wait yo- I mean. I ripped up the tickets."
"Come on Tom! They have to let us in! We have the Mackie Hand!"
"Alright." Tom led us back to the carriage. He ordered the Skeleton horse to move closer to the theater. I started jumping up and down from where I was standing. Even though the movie marathon just started I'm sure we didn't miss much. Mackie was wondering around till it finally stopped. I jumped out and running to the theater. I went up to the employee.
"Three for the Mackie Hand marathon, please." He points to the sold-out sign on the booth.
"What does the sign say?"
"Wait, but," I grabbed Mackie's wrist, "do you know who this is? This is the Mackie Hand in the flesh."
"Look, nice costume, but no one gets in without a ticket." He puts his hand on Mackie's shoulder and pushes him away. "Now shove off, grandpa, before I have to get physical." Mackie does a 360 on his head to look at the employee and glares at him. I watch Mackie backhand punch the employee. He gets in the stance. Security start to come.
"Hey! You!" I look to the side seeing Tom gone. I look at the carriage seeing him walk back to me with bowls of cereal. He hands me a bowl and sits down on the curb. I sit next to him as I look back at Mackie fighting the Security people trying to swarm him. We eat the cereal as we watch the fight.
"You were right. This guy's for real."
"Yeah. I told you. ...I still don't like you, Tom," I said smiling. It was a half lie and truth.
"I still don't like you, too, Marco." We continued watching Mackie Hand fight the security guards. As much I hate to admit it. It was fun and Tom made up from what he did. I look at Tom seeing him still watching Mackie. What Tom did was actually sweet in a way. As much I want to not admit it, but Tom really tried to make it up with me and we did have some agreement in the fight. He's not that bad. Just need to know him better and give him a chance. I mean I did, and he tried to get Star again.... and again, but this time using me well wanted that badge. But he did make it up from bringing back Mackie Hand. I didn't realize I stared at Tom for a while till he turned.
"Ummm Marco?"
"O sorry I saw a fly ummm going to your cereal?" I say as a small blush formed.
"What? Gross. What a waste."
"Here you can have mine. Kinda full, from earlier anyway."
"Cool." He took his spoon from his bowl and grabbed my bowl and started eating. I looked back at Mackie karate kick the security to the pile. I smiled. I never thought I would get the chance to meet Mackie himself and he signed my forehead. Another smile formed on my face. What a night. I didn't realize I started to get tired from all the excitement. It was a rush and now it was taking a toll on me. I fell and landed on something. It was warm. And I liked it a bit. I snuggled close to it. I felt the thing move a bit and my forehead touch the surface. It got a bit warmer. It was nice. I felt a hand move my arm on my stomach. The hand moved onto my back. The other moved around it to then move under my legs.
"Alright Marco keep those there," I heard the soft voice say. I was lifted up. I relaxed on the touch. I felt a chill come. I snuggled closer to the warmth. I let my body relax. I dozed off. I thought it was for a couple minutes I drifted off, but when I felt cushion on my back, I peeked my eyes open seeing Tom chest. I look to the side seeing the familiar desk and flames on top like from earlier. He placed me down and I closed my eyes a bit. The warmth was gone and replaced with a blanket over me. I peeked them back open seeing Tom levitating back to the flames.
"Tom...." he turned to me. "Thanks.... Good nighttt...." I slurred feeling sleep slowly consume me.... I let my eyes close letting it take me but not before I felt the warmth one more time on my forehead where Mackie Hands signed his signature. A smile formed on my lips as I let the darkness come.