ANTI-VALENTINE'S DAY CONTEST - Amber's Date From Hell
Let me preface this story be saying that as a teen, I was not the dating
type. I was just a little bit guy-phobic and preferred to stick to girl
friends.
My close friends at the time, Cat and Holly, decided that this was just
not the way to be, and set up a kind of group date situation shortly after
my 17th birthday when the weather warmed up. They gathered up some
alcohol, a date, and me, and brought us all together at Cat's house. Then
they sneakily went off to do something, and I was left alone with Jack, a
guy I imagine Cat found in a sewer somewhere.
Jack seemed ok at first, a little perverted and kind of a dork, but not
bad looking or horrible company. We were sitting out on the porch trading
bad jokes and drinking. And then he pulled one of those mood swings that
always gives me a sinking feeling. He stopped smiling and put on a very
serious expression and stared at a point somewhere over my left shoulder.
"It's here," he said.
Bewildered but shy, I went along with him when he suggested I move beside
him. He pulled off his white t-shirt, pulled out a black t-shirt from his
pack, and put that on. Then he informed me, or perhaps his ghost, that he
was going to perform a spell of protection, and pulled out a notebook. It
was, I kid you not, a black book with a rubber skull on the front and Book
of Spells scribbled across the bottom in silver ink. He opened to a random
page, put his hand on it, and took on an expression I'm sure he thought
meant determination but looked rather more like constipation and started
chanting under his breath. My friends showed up at this point to check on
us, to my great relief.
He finished his "spell" then explained to us, very seriously, that there
was a very dangerous ghost following him. He found it in an old shed in an
abandoned field where a man had hung himself. He had been drawn to it
because of the strong psychic energy and the guidance of the Goddess, or
something. Back when he found it, he told us seriously, it threw him
across the room and nearly killed him, and he just barely managed to
escape by using his magic, but since then it's been following him around.
I, feeling more and more nervous about this guy, wasn't sure if he was
joking and so made some kind of mumbled noise of sympathy. It didn't
matter. I don't think he remembered I was there. Cat was looking at him
like he was a god, and started going on about how brave he was, and all
his attention went straight to her. I avoided Holly's eyes because I so
desperately wanted to laugh and wasn't sure I could hold it in much
longer, and I could tell she was having the same problem, and neither of
us wanted to hurt Cat's feelings. We excused ourselves to go to the
bathroom, and had a good laugh in privacy. When we got back, they were off
in their own world.
Eventually, before any of us had realized it, Jack had polished off most
of the beer and needed to go home, and I escaped with my sanity and a
stronger determination to pick my own boyfriends.
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