Chapter Ten

So Damien and I planned out the entire plan for the prank within a couple days. I was glad that he was finally starting to get really into it. For a while I thought he wasn’t too interested, but now that he started planning it with me, I felt a lot better.
“So are we sure we don’t want to tell Charlie or anyone about this?” I asked.
“Hm,” Damien thought. “I’m not sure. Because, this is a fairly complicated thing, right? We might need some extra help.”
“I don’t see with what, though.”
“What about the coffee part?”
“What about it?”
“Isn’t that going to be kind of hard to do?”
“I guess. But if we pull it off, it will be epic.”
“Yes, I understand this. But the coffee part is going to be the toughest.”
“Well, I don’t know, we can get some plumber to do it or something.”
“Why should we pay a plumber when we can get Charlie to do it for free?”
I raised my eyebrows at him, and widened my eyes. “Charlie can do that sort of stuff?”
“Of course. He’s brilliant with his hands.”
“Wow. Okay. Maybe. But I’m sure we could do it ourselves.”
“What’s wrong with Charlie?”
“Nothing! It’s just… hey, wait,” I said, trying to change the topic quickly. “Do you know where we’re going to get all the coffee from?”
“I thought we discussed this?” Damien said, looking a bit annoyed that I didn’t want to elaborate why I didn’t want Charlie to be a part of the prank.
“Well, tell me again. I’m an idiot, and I forgot.”
“You’re not an idiot. And I’ll say it again,” he continued. “I’ve got connections with guys at Starbucks, we can get gallons of coffee for nothing.”
“Awesome,” I said, smiling at him. “This is going to be so amazing.”
“Indeed it is. We start tomorrow?”
“We start tomorrow.”

Wednesday. The first day. The day we set our prank into action. The first day of epicness. I was extremely excited, and I could tell Damien was, too.
So at the library at lunch, we would both keep constantly smiling at each other, and Charlie gave us a worried looked.
“What are you guys up to?” he asked.
“Nothing,” I lied, and laughed.
“Well, as long as you’re not cheating on me with Damien, anything is fine with me.” He smiled, and I smiled back.
“Why would anyone want to cheat on you with ME?” Damien asked.
Charlie shrugged. “Various reasons.”
Damien laughed. “Yeah, I don’t think so.”
I laughed, too, and then my laughter died down when I noticed Chrissy walking down to us.
“Aw!” she mocked. “What did I tell you about the losers in love?”
Charlie stood up. If I were Chrissy, I would have been very intimidated because she was so short, whereas Charlie was a giant.
“You did not just call my girl a loser,” he snapped at her.
“Oh, don’t worry, dear, it may not be clear at first, but just start getting to know her better. Then you’ll realize. You could possibly realize it enough to break up with her! Wait, probably not. Who else could love her? Only a loser could love a loser. Oh! Maybe that Damien kid over there could—”
“You better keep your mouth shut, Chrissy,” Damien snapped, standing up as well.
“Aw, look it! Paige has two body guards now!” She stood on her toes, and attempted to look the two boys in the eyes, but failed miserably and looked into their chins. Even then, she didn’t seem scared or afraid at all. “Listen, you two. You both aren’t very frightening, especially to me. You may stick with that little… freak now, but don’t count on staying with her too long.”
“If I were you, Chrissy,” Damien started, his voice a little too loud, “I would keep my big mouth shut before anything happened to me.”
She laughed as if it were the most ridiculous thing in the world. “Something happen? To me? Oh, haha, dear, that’s very funny. I don’t think you quite understand yet. I am Chrissy White. Undefeatable. Untouchable. Immortal to all in the school. You couldn’t harm me even if you tried.”
“What if I crush you into a pulp right now?” Charlie threatened.
She laughed again, throwing her head back and trying to be as obnoxiously loud as possible. “Oh, you kids crack me up. I’ll see you around, all right, darlings?”
She kicked her leg up once so it touched her butt, and then walked away swaying her hips from side to side like she always did.
“God, I hate her,” Damien muttered under his breath once Chrissy was out of hearing range. “She can be such a bitch sometimes.”
“Really? We have not yet noticed this,” I said as sarcastically as possible.
“Yes, it’s like her being a bitch is completely new,” Charlie played along.
Damien laughed. “Sometimes your sarcasm is annoying, but sometimes it’s just plain amusing.”
“I know. There are times to be sarcastic and there are times not to be, but I’m usually sarcastic through both those times.”
Charlie laughed.
“That’s like the same thing with Charlie and being funny,” Damien said, laughing.
“Indeed. I even cracked jokes at my grandmother’s funeral, you know.”
“Oh, God, Charlie.” Damien shook his head. “You’re insane.”
He smiled. “Yes, I know.”
I saw Chrissy again at World History. She kept acting like she was all that, and totally dominant over everyone. She needed to have a pump attached to her head so all the air could be let out, and hopefully it would shrink a little bit. I couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for her. I felt the only reason she terrorized other people was to feel dominant. Well, that was obvious, but the only reason she wanted to appear dominant to others was because on the inside she actually felt really insecure with herself. I mean, was she smart? What kind of grades did she get? She obviously didn’t seem like the type of person who particularly got the best grades in the school. And what were her talents? What was she good at? What did she do as a hobby? Other than cheerleading, I mean. But was that really going to get her anywhere? In reality, she actually had nothing. Nothing and nobody. Well, except for the Great. But he was just there to perfect her alpha female appearance. So she would seem indestructible, but in truth she was a complete mess.
I proceeded and sat next to Damien again in Chemistry. We were starting to fill in what I liked to call “the Questions for Planning.” Damien found this to be a good strategy.
“Who? What? Where? When? How? Why?” I asked Damien.
“’Who’ would be you, me, and Chrissy White,” he answered the first question. “We’ve had that one down for a while.”
“Right. What?”
“The prank. We should give it a title. Hm….”
“’The Prank for Just Once,’” I suggested. “Because all the stuff we need to do begins with ‘Just Once.’ Just once Chrissy needs to know that she’s not on top of everyone. Just once we need to live up to our name. Just once someone has to teach that bitch a lesson.”
“All right,” Damien agreed. “We’ll go with that.”
“Sweet. Now ‘where?’” I asked, continuing with the questioning.
“Um…” Damien thought. “We’ll meet up behind Wal-mart. There’s a huge dumpster there, really hard to miss. It’s a good place to hide out and we can start off there. And I got Chrissy’s address from the school directory, so we’ll go there after we know we’re set.”
“Awesome. When?”
“Hm… Well, we get off work around 6:30… We’ll meet up say around 7:30? Or around 8 o’clock? It gives us enough time to prepare everything and even get ready ourselves and get all pumped up before we do this.”
“That works. And how?” I continued.
“We already know how, and it’s going to take too long to explain it all again right now. Shall we just move on to the why?”
“Yes, let’s move on to the why. I was actually really thinking about the why. I mean, why are we doing this? Does Chrissy really deserve this?”
Damien furrowed his eyebrows and gave me a look. “You’re honestly and truly thinking on why we’re doing this?”
“Yes.”
“You’re actually questioning it.”
“Mhm.”
“Why are you questioning it?”
“Well, I mean, when you really think about it, which I have been doing a lot of, what does it actually accomplish? Haven’t you ever read books? Revenge never actually solves anything.”
Damien scoffed at me. “That’s only in those old Greek Mythology stories and books and that sort of stuff.”
“Not true,” I said. “Normally when people try to seek revenge it always ends up feeling good in the short-term, but in the long-run something totally messed up happens. Trust me, I’ve read a lot of books.”
“So have I, Paige, you can count on that. But let’s not think of this as revenge.”
“If we’re not thinking of this as revenge, what the hell are we thinking it is?”
“Hm… what was that thing that we learned all the way back in Freshman year…? Oh right! It’s the Hero’s Journey.”
“The Hero’s Journey?” I asked.
“The Hero’s Journey.” Damien repeated.
“And what is that supposed to be?”
“You mean you didn’t learn about that?”
I shook my head. “If I learned about it, I wouldn’t be asking you.”
“Right, of course. Well, you see,” he started to explain, “the Hero’s Journey is sort of a cycle where a person gets called to an adventure, and they go into the unknown and face their fears and all that stuff and they come back and they’re at one with their new self and everything is restored and things of that nature. You get it?”
“Oh, right, I’ve heard of that,” I said, now realizing what he was talking about. “Yeah. But isn’t that like Greek Mythology as well? The very same thing where I told you that revenge was bad?”
“I’m not saying it is revenge! I’m saying it’s the Hero’s Journey! We’re being called to this adventure, and we will face Chrissy as our toughest part of our journey and then we will have everything restored. That’s our call. To restore order.”
“Restore order?” I asked.
“Yes, Paige. We must restore order.”
I raised my eyebrows at him, and thought about it for a second. The only thing I was really thinking about was whether or not getting revenge was a good idea, but the way Damien put it, it didn’t sound as bad as the word “revenge.” Instead, it just sounded extremely appealing.
“Fine. You’ve convinced me. I’m in.”
Damien gave a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. I thought I lost you there for a second. You seriously sounded like you were going to back out of it.”
I smiled. “Well, don’t worry anymore. I am so not backing out. This is going to be epic.”
“Is epic the only adjective that comes into your mind when you think about this prank?”
“The Prank for Just Once,” I corrected. “And yes. Because it’s such an epic idea!”
He smiled and shook his head. “So epic. I can’t believe you even considered dropping out.”
“Yeah. Well, at least we’re doing it, and it will be epically awesome.”
“Indeed it will be.”
And then we started paying attention to actual Chemistry. Well, I didn’t know about Damien, but I wasn’t actually paying attention. He said around 8 o’clock so we’d have some time to get pumped up, but I was already starting to get pumped up and totally excited for what was going to come.
Charlie joined the two of us during lunch, and I bought my own food along with the two boys.
“So seriously, guys, what are you up to?” Charlie asked, not stuffing food in his mouth and talking at the same time like Damien sometimes did.
“Nothing, Charlie!” I said, my voice cracking a bit as I laughed. “I swear, it’s nothing you need to worry about.”
“It’s nothing I need to worry about,” he repeated. “But it’s still something, isn’t it?”
“I guess.”
“Then what is it?”
“Dude,” Damien addressed, “just chill. Nothing is up. Just eat some food, relax, and we’ll go to our last class and go to another delightful day of work.”
Charlie made a face at Damien, and then looked at me. “I don’t trust that kid,” he said, his grin wide. “But I trust you. You sure you’re up to nothing?”
“Charlie, just like Damien said, just relax and don’t worry about it, all right?”
He smiled, a bit disappointed due to the fact we were keeping him out of the loop and not telling him anything. “All right, Paige. I’ll just forget about it.”
“Thanks, Charlie.”
So we finished our lunch in mostly silence and had to move on to our next class once the bell had rung.
Usually Drama was that class where I would take one simple step into the room and everything would be forgotten. My life and my troubles would be swept out of my head. I would become a different person in drama, and completely forget about Paige Aarroh as I got into character. But today was different. I couldn’t stop thinking about how amazing Paige Aarroh’s life was. Paige Aarroh now had friends. Friends such as Angela, Katie, and Damien. Damien possibly being Paige Aarroh’s best friend. One of her only best friends. In her life. Paige Aarroh now had a boyfriend. She liked him, maybe not as much as he liked her, but he liked her nonetheless. And Paige Aarroh was actually happy, which didn’t happen very much with Paige Aarroh in the past. I loved it.
Again, Charlie drove me instead of Damien to work. And again, Damien arrived at work later than usual. It usually wasn’t like him to do that, except for during the past couple of days.
“So you’re positive you and Damien aren’t up to anything?” Charlie asked.
I laughed.
“That wasn’t meant to be funny.”
“I know.”
“Then why did you laugh?”
I shrugged.
He sighed, then smiled.
“Morning, Charlie and Paige,” David greeted at the door.
“Hey, David,” I said back. “How’s it going for you today?”
“Really good, thanks for asking. You seem in a good mood.”
“I am, David. Definitely.”
“Say, is Damien with the two of you?”
I frowned. “I’m sorry, David, he’s not. I think he’s going to come in late again.”
He sighed. “All right, then. It’s best the two of you should be getting to work.”
“Will do, David,” Charlie said. “We’ll see you around, then.”
Charlie and I parted ways for we worked on opposite ends of the store, and we only really saw each other during our break. We kept in touch, though, via text messaging through our cell phones.
I got a text message from Charlie saying, “Hey, Damien is here now” and I got excited. I didn’t see Damien after ten minutes since I got that message, and I asked him where he was again.
“Paige,” he started explaining, “just like how Charlie doesn’t know about our plans because he virtually has nothing to do with it, and he really shouldn’t worry about it… in the same way, just forget about it.”
I frowned. Now I understood why Charlie was being so persistent and stubborn about trying to find out what Damien and I were up to.
“It’s just something I need to keep to myself, is that all right, Paige?”
“Yeah, sure, Damien,” I said. “I understand.”
He smiled. “Cool. Now. Let’s get to work.”
I half smiled at him, like how he sometimes did to me, and attempted to get some work actually done.
But I couldn’t focus entirely on work, because I couldn’t stop thinking about the Prank for Just Once, and how epic and amazing it was going to be, but then something occurred to me.
“Damien,” I said, a bit of worry in my voice. “What if the Prank doesn’t work?”
“Um,” he started, “then it just doesn’t work?”
“But what if we get caught? Or what if something goes horribly wrong? What if it’s not as epic as it seems like it’s going to be?”
“Then,” Damien started again, “we get caught. Something goes horribly wrong. It’s not as epic as it seems like it’s going to be.”
I shot him a look. “Aren’t you worried about that?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because if it goes wrong, it goes wrong. There’s nothing else that goes on about that, it just goes wrong.”
“Aren’t you afraid about that? Won’t you feel bad if something goes on?”
“Not at all.”
“What’s wrong with you?!”
“Nothing. It’s just I get over screw-ups easily. Because life isn’t composed of the past, nor is it composed of the future. It’s composed of the present. Life is composed of nows.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
He sighed, as if he was fed up of trying to explain it to me. “You see, Paige, normal humans are always thinking that life is composed of the future. You see, because they’re always planning ahead for everything. They go to school so they can go to college. They go to college so they can get a good job. They get a good job so they can make money. They make money to keep themselves temporarily happy, but also to give to their family and their children. So their children can go get an education, and so on and so forth.”
It took me a second to absorb all this in.
“However,” he continued, “there is another group of people. People who always live in the past. People who have made mistakes and linger on to them instead of learning from it and moving on. People who stay in their past memories and again, don’t enjoy life to the fullest. So that’s what I discovered.”
“That whether you plan ahead or think of the past you’re going to be miserable?” I asked, slightly sarcastic.
He smiled. “Exactly. Well, something like that. If you just think about it like this: living in the future isn’t going to make you happy, and neither is living in the past. So what other time period is there?”
I blinked, almost completely clueless to what he was talking about.
He chuckled lightly. “The present, Paige. We have to think about now, and enjoy as much as you could.”
“I guess I get it.”
“Yeah, not a lot of people do,” Damien continued. “I always try to explain it to people, but they always end up not listening fully or getting extremely confused to what I am saying. I’m glad there is someone smart enough to understand my way of knowledge.”
I smiled. “Yeah, I understand. So if we screw up…?”
He smiled back. “We forget about it and move on and live in the present, not the past.”
“And the reason we’re not trying to prevent mistakes from happening is what exactly?” I asked.
“Because we don’t want to be one of those people who constantly live in the future.”
“Ah.” I said after a moment of trying to process it in my brain.
He smiled again, this time only a half smile so he looked like Mona Lisa again. “Excited?”
“Definitely.”
And we didn’t really talk much after that. We both got back to work, and I couldn’t help but keep thinking about what Damien said. About living not in the future or the past, and how incompetent some people were about thinking like that instead of living their lives in the present to be happy. It was odd how his lecture about all that stuff that never even occurred to me before got me thinking so much, making me not think about the epicness that was the Prank which would be starting in just a few hours.
Finally, I was getting really tired of hauling stuff from the back and zoning the isles and checking to see if everything was all right, despite the fact that I enjoyed it all and I always had something going on in my mind while working. But at the moment, I was just physically tired, and decided to go into the break room.
“Hey,” Charlie greeted me as I walked in. Katie and Angela were there as well. Along with one other person whom I didn’t know, just walking out as I came in.
“Hi, guys,” I said back.
“What’s up?”
“I’ve just been thinking and stuff like that,” I answered.
“Thinking?” Katie said, as if in awe. “Wow, Paige kid. I was working!”
I laughed. “That’s great, Katie.”
She smiled, as if she was some little kid again.
Angela rolled her eyes. “And we’ve got to get back to work, because the two of us have been in here for a while now… c’mon, Katie.”
“Aw!” Katie exclaimed. “Angela girl, Paige kid just got here! Why can’t we stay?”
“We need to work, Katie,” she said, rolling her eyes. “And Paige is going to want to be alone with Charlie.”
“Oh, no it’s fine,” I said, but Angela interrupted.
“It’s no problem, Paige, we need to get back to work, anyway.”
I sat down next to Charlie, and the two girls left the room.
“Bye, Paige kid! Bye, Charlie boy! I will see you, and you and I love you and you’re amazing.” She blew us a kiss, and continued her exit, almost being dragged out by Angela.
I laughed. “You know, sometimes you’d think that Angela is her mother.”
Charlie smiled at me. “Yeah, well, you know…. Katie just acts like that and stuff, and she needs constant watching. At home her dad takes care of her, since her mom left them, you know?”
“No, I don’t know,” I answered.
“Oh, right,” Charlie said, his smile fading. “You wouldn’t know. Well, you see, Katie’s mother left her family when she was six and her little sister was six months. Since then their dad has been taking care of them.”
“Katie has a little sister?” I asked.
“Yep. That’s why she always acts really young. I guess it’s sort of a mental thing, but since she’s always with someone a lot younger than her, she sort of gets it. She’s always trying to keep her sister happy, so she acts all childish. And something must’ve gone wrong in her head, because she acts like that all the time.”
“Oh,” was all I could say. It seemed like a sad story, but it seemed that no one really got harmed from it. Katie had a happy family, and even if she did act like a child sometimes, she was a happy child.
“Yeah. But it’s all good, their family is doing just fine and Angela and I promised her dad we’d help out sometimes since we’re Katie’s friend, you know?”
“That’s really great of you two,” I said, because it was. It explained a whole lot on why Angela and Charlie constantly acted like her parents.
“Yeah. But hey, I’ve got to get back to work,” he said. He kissed me on the cheek, smiled, got up, and headed for the door. “Love ya.”
I smiled back. “Love you, too.”
His grin grew, and he left the room again.
A bit after Charlie left, Damien came in. “We need to work on opposite sides of the store again. I’m going to be leaving a bit early, so you’ll need to walk yourself home to get ready, okay?”
“Fine with me,” I said.
“I’ll see you tonight. Get excited.”
“I’ve never been more excited in my life,” I said, because it was true.