-ellen-
"Fucking asshole," I said to Logan as he laid down a "Z" on our Scrabble board. "Za is not a word. You can't do that, mister, no siree."
"Is, too," he said matter-of-factly. "'Za' is an abbreviation for pizza. It'll be in the dictionary; care to challenge me?"
"Yes," I said immediately. "Look it up."
Logan smirked and pulled open the Official Scrabble Dictionary on his phone, typing something in so that I could be proven right.
We'd been playing Scrabble a lot, Logan and I. The way we did it was sort of harsh and cutthroat, though- if one of us thought a word was incorrect, we could challenge the other to see if it was real or not. If you lost and it turned out that the other person was right, you had to lose a turn.
"Here it is," Logan said triumphantly, shoving the screen in my face. "That means eleven points for me and a skipped turn for you."
"Bitch," I muttered, sitting back in my chair.
"Guys, stop your little nerd-war," Noah said from the driver's seat. I felt the RV slowly ease to a stop, and I looked up to see some huge building crowded with people. They were swarming in and out and all around the building- we were obviously in the heart of a city.
"Where are we?" I asked curiously. "Noah, I swear to God..."
He unbuckled his seat belt and strode to where Logan and I were sitting. In one swift motion, he swept all of the Scrabble tiles off of the board and onto the floor. They bounced off the ground in a harsh cacophony of clattering noises. I was quiet for a moment.
"Okay, you get to pick those up," Evelyn said from behind him, hopping out of the passenger's seat and joining us in the living room.
Noah shrugged. "Yeah, it was just for effect, I'll get them later. Now, listen to my plan, because Evelyn and I spent a lot of time on it and it should be really fun."
"I'm all ears," Logan said nonchalantly. "We've been kinda cooped up for awhile."
Evelyn smiled and whipped out two pieces of paper from the kangaroo pocket of her sweatshirt. One was labeled "Team Nogan" and the other said "Team Elvyn".
"We're going on a scavenger hunt," Noah said excitedly. "It's boys versus girls. We're going to go all around the city and find all of the stuff on this list, and whoever is back here with proof first wins."
I jumped up happily, accidentally knocking over my tray of remaining Scrabble tiles. "Yes, oh my god, let's go right now!" I cried.
"Wait, where exactly are we?" Logan asked, holding his list and skimming his eyes over it. "Because I'm not sure if some of this stuff is native to the area... especially this time of year..."
"We're in Richmond, Indiana," Noah said exasperatedly. "And I double-checked everything, so we should be good. Everyone ready?"
I jumped up and down, making the RV shake a little. "Yes, let's go!"
"Okay... GO!" Noah called. We all raced to the door and tried to get our shoes on at the same time, which led to a lot of bumping into each other and knocking everyone down. I finally slipped on my black converse and Evelyn was already in her boots, so we raced out the door before the boys were done lacing up their sneakers.
"Okay, okay," I said, jogging alongside Evelyn. "What's on the list?"
I grabbed it from her and skimmed it over.
Team Elvyn:
One strand of red hair, preferably off of someone's head
Two pieces of candy stolen from a grocery store
Three selfies with three different children across town (the kids must be aware of and in the selfie)
Four pine needles, fresh off the tree
Five grapes, which may also need to be stolen
Six high-fives from six different people (record videos of the high-fives, or no credit)
Seven blades of grass (good luck finding it under all the snow)
Eight selfies with people who are unaware of it happening
Nine pinecones
Ten dimes
***If all of these items are not found by sundown, return to the RV anyway***
"So you be on the lookout for a redhead," I said to Evelyn as we ran. "And I'll look for kids and grocery stores and pine trees and stuff."
"Sounds good," Evelyn replied. "But there's all these people around, why don't we take the eight selfies now?"
I abruptly stopped running and nodded. "Yeah, let's do it." I got my phone from my pocket and stealthily snapped pictures so that people were in the selfie with me. "Is this illegal?" I asked on the fourth one.
"No," Evelyn said as she pivoted around so that people were in the frame. "I looked it up, it's not illegal if you're in a public place."
She pocketed her phone and looked up at me expectantly. "What now?"
I pursed my lips and skimmed my eyes over the crowd of people, looking for a redhead or some children maybe. But my eyes landed on something else entirely.
"I think I have something that could help us," I said. .
I grinned and squared my shoulders, then walked up to an attractive-looking guy who was milling around by himself. I beckoned Evelyn over as well, and we flashed him award-winning smiles.
"Excuse me?" I said in a faux-falsetto tone.
The guy turned around and grinned, sizing us up like we were meat. He was probably only seventeen- a little young to be checking us out, if I do say so myself.
"What's up?" he asked, flashing us his pearly whites. "I'm Kale."
Evelyn pretended to swoon. "Well, we're new here," she began in some dumb-blonde airhead voice. "And we don't know our way around... can you point us to the nearest grocery store?"
"I could," he replied, shaking some chestnut-colored hair out of his eyes. "But why do that when I could take you there myself?"
Evelyn and I exchanged glances. "Well... okay!" I chirped happily. "In fact, we might need you to show us a couple other things too."
He nodded with some sort of constipated look on his face. I think he was trying to be sexy, but in reality he sort of reminded me of a cow giving birth. "Of course. What are your guys' names?"
I thought quickly. I wasn't interested in this guy at all, and I didn't intend on seeing him after today. I didn't want him to be able to find us, so I thought on my toes. "I'm Jasey Rae Andrews," I told him with a giggle. Dammit, Ellen, I said to myself. Of course you had to go and pick a name from a wildly popular song, that won't make it seem fake at all!
But Kale didn't catch onto my All Time Low reference. Instead, he shook my hand in both of his and asked Evelyn for her name.
"My name is Georgia Rose," she said confidently, playing into my song name. Hers was obviously from Best Song Ever by One Direction. I stifled a laugh- this guy was such an idiot.
"Okay, Jasey and Georgia," Kale said, taking our hands and kissing them. "I'd like to use your girls' thighs as earmuffs, but we'll take it slow."
Evelyn and I shot each other disgusted looks, pretending to gag behind Kale's back. He was officially idiotic and a douche.
"There's a grocery store this way," Kale said with a smile. "Follow me."
He held Evelyn's hand in one and mine in the other. We strolled along merrily as Evelyn and I asked him questions about the town.
"So are you like, really popular here?" Evelyn asked, feigning adoration. "I bet you are, you're so handsome and muscular."
Kale ate up her compliments like a starving dog. "Well, yeah, I'm pretty popular. Especially with the ladies, if you know what I mean." He paused, looking immensely proud of himslelf. "But guys also like to hang out with me. I'm captain of the basketball team."
I rolled my eyes. I bet even Noah was better at basketball than this lunkhead, and Noah only played for a couple years.
"Wow, I bet you're really good," I said airily. "So buff."
"Yeah..." Kale said, not even dignifying my compliment with a thank you. "So on your left is the grocery store, let's head on in. I'm pretty tight with the employees there; they give me free stuff from time to time."
"Me, too," I muttered. "It's called free samples."
"What's that, Jasey?" Kale asked, leaning down to my level.
I smiled and waved him off. "Oh, nothing. And I go by my full name; Jasey Rae."
Kale smiled at me- I wasn't even sure if he understood what I just said- and we headed into the grocery store.
Immediately, that marketplace-smell flooded my nostrils, and I inhaled deeply. It reminded me of when I was little and my mom would take me to Wal-Mart with her. "Ellen, don't touch that," she'd say sharply if I tried to take something off the shelves. "Ellen, leave that be. Ellen, stay here. Ellen, no." But whenever my younger brother did the same things, it was perfectly acceptable.
"Hey, Gladys," Kale said to some lady with a hairnet as we strolled through the store. "Linda, how are you? And Lisa! Always a pleasure, how are the kids?"
I rolled my eyes yet again as I watched Kale rendezvous with all his middle-aged grocery store ladies that were wrapped around his finger. It was almost painful to watch, but at the same time it was so interesting. How could all of these women- most of them probably married with children- be so charmed by Kale? I'd only known him for minutes and it was clear to me that he was a douchebag.
"So, what is it that you ladies need?" Kale asked, snapping me out of my thoughts. "I know this place pretty well."
I didn't pause to think about what he meant by that. "Uh, we just need some candy," Evelyn said quickly. "Where's that at?"
Kale walked us over to some plastic machines filled with various types of candy. "You can get four for a quarter," he informed us seriously. "But it's also very simple to steal."
Evelyn and I exchanged mischievious looks. All three of us pocketed a tootsie roll.
"Hey, maybe you could help us with some other things," Evelyn said suggestively. I was about to whack her very hard, but it was fun playing this character that I'd created and I didn't want to blow our cover.
I'd thought up a whole backstory for Jasey Rae- just like the All Time Low song, she'd been hurt by a guy. But that had transformed her into a total whore, where she didn't have any problem with trust at all, having one-night stands left and right and she hadn't had a relationship since the incidents in the song.
"Yeah, I can help you thirsty ladies out," Kale purred. "Now, where should we go to do this?"
"The fruit section," Evelyn replied. "We need grapes."
• • •
Five grapes and several sexual innuendos later, we were almost done with the list. Kale had shown us to some woods where there were both pine trees and kids- Kale had asked them to take the selfies with us and all of the children eagerly obliged. He was like royalty in this town, it seemed.
"All we need left is a strand of red hair," I said happily. By then, Kale knew about our bucket list, and had agreed to help us as long as we gave him something in return.
"Oh, go ask Lucy over there," Kale suggested. I looked to where he was pointing and saw a freckled girl playing with some boys that were probably twice her age. She looked to be about seven years old, and had firey red hair woven into two braids. "Lucy and I are pals, she'll give you some hair if I ask her to."
I wasn't too keen on making a child rip her own hair out, but we did it anyway and soon we were thundering back to the RV.
"Wait, you guys live in an RV?" Kale asked in disbelief. "With two other guys?"
"Family," I said nonchalantly. "Nothing to worry about."
Kale let it go as we hopped up into the RV and scribbled down a quick note to Logan and Noah.
Dear team Nogan,
We kicked your asses. In the enclosed paper bag is our grapes, candy wrappers, pine needles, hair, grass, pinecones, and dimes. We've texted you the rest of our proof as photos.
As for our whereabouts, well, we'll be back in the morning.
-Team Elvyn
"Now it's our turn to help you out," I said to Kale, caressing his bicep. "Anything you want."
Suddenly, Evelyn yanked me aside. "What the hell, Jasey Rae?" she hissed in my ear. "We're both in relationships!"
I pulled her into my bedroom and sat her on my bed, then pulled out my bucket list from where I'd hung it up.
"See this?" I said in a hushed tone. "It's my bucket list. Now look at number thirty-four."
Evelyn brought the paper closer to her face. "Have a one-night stand." She looked up at me and shook her head. "Why?"
I shrugged and hung the list back up. "I don't know, I didn't have a boyfriend at the time and I just wanted to do something risky and daring. C'mon, Ev, no one has to know."
She pursed her lips and brought me closer. "Okay, bitch, and I say that lovingly. I will do this, because between you and me, I'm going to break up with Noah. I've wanted to do it for awhile now."
A rush of protectiveness flowed over me. I knew how in love Noah was with Evelyn, but of course I didn't want her in a relationship she wasn't happy with. "Oh, my god."
"So I'm going to do this so I'll purposely hurt him, and he'll break up with me."
I furrowed my eyebrows. "I'm not sure if that's the best idea..."
But Evelyn pulled me to my feet and rushed me back out to Kale. He sized us up hungrily, then nodded. "This'll be fun."
(A/N) Photo of Kale attached, I sort of really like him. He was fun to write in.
There's also a video of Jasey Rae by All Time Low, the song that inspired Ellen's pseudonym.
Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed!