Educational Experience

Part III--Chapter 6

They sometimes say that no good deed goes unpunished. Celie proves how true that can be in this one. Is she a villain...or is she just revealing truths Colton is too much in love-or too young-to understand?

Needless to say, we slept in the next day. And when I finally started to wake up a little after noon or so, I could barely open my eyes. It hurt to even move. Like I'd worked out 'way too much or something. You wouldn't think bowling would do that to you, right? But my arms and legs felt like they'd been run over by a truck or something.

I was also still spinning a little bit, from the bud-Wyatt was still spinning, too. I could tell by how she moaned and threw both arms over her face to keep the light from making her head explode.

I reached over and gave her arm a "Me, too" squeeze and she rolled over and buried her face in my chest and moaned, "Shoot me, please."

I put my arms around her and said, "You don't get off that easy."

She raised her head a little bit to look at me. And I smiled because her eyes were little slits like they always were when she was high. But she was smiling, too. Good sign.

And she said, "How did we get back up here? Do you remember coming back up here? I don't remember us leaving or taking our clothes off or anything."

Now, she never talks like that. You know how she usually sounds. So I knew she was in very bad shape, just by how she said that.

So I said, "You don't remember Joie dancing down that tube thing? Doing Singing in the Rain like in the movie?"

She frowned...and then the smile came back. Joie had gone all Gene Kelly on us, dancing through the skyway like s/he was onstage somewhere. S/he almost tried the Make 'Em Laugh wall trick-you've seen that right? When Donald O'Connor runs up the wall and flips over backwards and lands on his feet?

Yeah. Imagine doing that after smoking a whooooole lot of super weed. That would've been a 911 call for sure. And I think s/he realized that when s/he tried to jump up and click her heels and her legs went all wobbly like that scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz.

"You are all completely mad," she told me. That sounded more like Wyatt.

I pulled a few locks of her hair back so I could see that face, and said, "Fun, innit?"

And then there was a knock on the door followed by all three girls just cannonballing into bed around us, laughing their silly asses off. I think they'd just kept on drinking all night or had something already that morning already.

Because Mike crawled up me 'til her face was right above mine and said, "Are we interrupting something?"

I slapped her ass and said, "You drink a whole bottle o' mouthwash or what?"

"Count your blessings," Cat said. Which made me laugh, actually.

Mike kicked at her and said, "I'd be number one on that list."

"Damned if that's so," Aisha told her. "Number one waitin' for you to get down off her man."

Mike rubbed Wyatt's shoulder and said, "This is 'Good morning' where we live."

"And assault everywhere else," I said, shoving her off me. She slapped my thigh and then grabbed a bunch of pillows to set behind her against the headboard.

And said, "So! What are we having for breakfast?"

Just the word "breakfast" made me feel barfy. So I tried not to think about that while the other two found their own spaces on the bed and just laid there looking all devilish, heads propped up on hands.