Scene V

I kept at the speed limit of fifty-five all the way from the school to the road I lived on, making sure I kept Cameron in the rearview mirror the entire time. With the ecstasy from a great band and my rupture from Kemple, I was nearly flying. All I wanted was to go home to dance and just have fun, but I was limited, yet that didn't stop me from wanting to express my feelings and my happiness.

My house was nearing and I noticed that my father had left the front lights on the porch on. I didn't think they would be expecting me, since I shouldn't be home for a few more hours. The tips of my fingers began to chill as I began to coast before I would turn the signal to turn into my driveway. I then flipped the signal and turned into my driveway, ready to get changed and talk to Anya.

What I didn't expect, however, was Cameron to pull in behind me.

I park at the bottom of my driveway and he pulled his bigger and more powerful Ford – I drove a small Pontiac Grand Prix that my mom uses when she's home – up next to me. I could feel the frame of my car shake from the muscle of his vehicle. He shut the engine off and got out, acting like he lived here. As quick as I could, I undid my seatbelt and scrambled from the car, leaving my purse and sweater.

"What are you doing?" I asked, running in my heels to catch up to him.

"I'll ask your parents for you. I want to meet your parents, to gain a little trust with them."

I get in front of him and stop him in his tracks. "Uh, no, you aren't. One, because my mom has to work and she's already asleep. Two, my dad get's paranoid when guys come to the house. And three—"

"I want to meet your dad at least. I want to ask him about Friday. You and your sister can come, if I forgot to mention it. Just to show how trustworthy I am."

I open my mouth to say something, but the garage door opened and I saw my dad standing in a strict stance. Crap, I thought, I'm in trouble. I come home early, bringing along a guy. This was not going to end well.

"Get in here before you freeze!" he whispered hoarsely, his tone one of annoyance.

"Was your dad in the military?"

"No. He's always like that."

My dad stands six foot four with a full head of hair and the physique of a biker. Just looking at him made you want to cringe in fear, yet my mother is five foot three and innocent looking. A big difference, no?

At least dad didn't have a gun.

I lead Cameron to where my dad stood waiting for me. He just stood there with his arms across his chest, looking skeptical at the guy behind me. His eyebrows rose as I stopped.

"This is—"

"Mr. Collins, my name is Cameron Bates. I am a friend of Mara's. I was wondering—"

"Let's go inside. Be quiet, because her mother is trying to sleep."

It was going fine as we went into the house. The kitchen was clean; thank you, Anya, for not making us look like fools. I excused myself, saying I was going to get changed for the night. The guys let me go, knowing I looked uncomfortable. I went up the stairs and Anya burst from her room with a book in her hand and a surprised expression on her face.

"Cameron Bates. Mara, that's Nate's brother. What did you do now?"

"Nothing. He kind of saved me from Jacob Kemple."

"Do tell."

As I changed out of my dress and into a pair of pajama pants and my Versailles tee, I told her about the other night at the party and at the dance. It was mainly about how Kemple was determined to either make me hate him or make a huge fool of himself. With that, he would gain some sort of personal pride, yet get dragged down by my lack of interest in him. The guy was a creep and he didn't know it; so I would let him know by making myself play hard to get…or rather just ignore him intensely.

"And you didn't tell me until now? Mara, how dumb are you? You know I would have made tonight's incident not even happen! I, your brave and valiant little sister, would have made him whimper in fear at the very thought of you."

"Thank you, but I think I did that already. He's so dumb. Just the fact that it was me he had a crush on makes my skin crawl."

Anya looked like she wanted to say something, but I stopped her as I realized I was forgetting something. I was home, that much I knew. Dress was on a hanger, shoes put away until prom, Cameron on his way home…my purse and sweater? I excused myself from talking to Anya and headed down the stairs, my thick fuzzy socks muffling my steps.

I hit the bottom of the stairs and heard my dad talking. Looking around the corner, I saw Cameron still here, looking like he was having an interesting conversation with my father. I thought he had gone after he asked the permission for the party Friday. I was wrong, however, as I heard a little of the conversation; they were talking about cell phones and cable. Really interesting conversation, eh?

"I left my stuff in the car. I have to go get it."

"Oh, I'll come with you. I should get going," Cameron turned toward the door, questioning my choice of clothes.

"I thought you were gone already. I figured you asked my dad and left."

"Your dad turned out to be an interesting person to talk to. We could almost get along."

"Right," I retorted as we headed out to our cars. We, I in my plaid pajama pants and band tee, with him in his nice dress clothes, looked like a couple of students at school – the sports players dressing up and the geeks wearing pajama pants because we were too busy the night before passing the final Kingdom Hearts level.

We stopped behind our vehicles and he dropped the tailgate and sat, patting next to him almost as if he wanted me to sit next to him. I hesitated a moment, not sure if I would be allowed to stay out here in the cold. He must have read my mind, because he cocked his head like he was thinking it childish to question it.

"You'll be fine. I just want to talk really quick before I go. I just didn't want to stand."

I hopped on and kept a little distance from him. He didn't mind; he looked like he was collecting all of his thoughts before starting. I looked at him, waiting for him to start. I was beginning to get cold as he thought.

"Cameron—"

"It's okay. I asked him if I could talk to you where we wouldn't get a chance to wake your mom. He might be watching, but I wouldn't try the luck."

"I don't think I was going to."

He gave a short laugh. "I knew that. I wanted to see your reaction.

"So I talked to your dad and he said you two can come Friday, unless your mom goes out of the country. I informed him there were going to be several other girls there and my mom will be gone most of the time. She's going to stay for pizza and leave after. I swore to him – swore, not promised – there will be no alcohol and other…acts like that there. It's going to be a clean party, to the disappointment of many there."

"Yeah. It seems interesting now. Any kind of dress requirement, like black tie affair or bring your pajama pants and funky hats?"

He smiled a face-splitting smile. "Just casual clothes. It would be a hassle to wear a gown and a tux while eating pizza and dancing."

"That's true."

"Not to get too far off topic," he started, turning to look at me, "but why do you call your friend 'Steve'? Why not just keep calling her Victoria or whatever?"

He was new to the school, so he wouldn't know. "My friends and I like to cosplay – dressing up like fictional characters –"

"I know what that is. Anyway…"

"Yeah, so she dressed like a pirate and called herself 'Steve the Pirate' and the name kind of stuck. It's something amongst my friends. Of course you had stuff like that with your friends?"

"Sort of. I was the only one who liked to be a fan of other things. They put up with it, only they must have been glad when I moved. This school doesn't provide for my fanatics."

"It doesn't, but my friends and I find ways to take part."

He nodded. "Well, I'll get going. You need to get the stuff from your car and my mom will be getting home soon."

We hopped down from the tailgate and he slammed it shut. Then he turned to me, looking me in the eye. He patted my head with a couple of light pats and smiled. With a slight bow, he went around to the side of his truck and got in. He started the truck and backed up, moving his truck so he could get out. Pulling out, he gave a quick honk as he drove off into the night, going home to his family after a crazy dance.

I get my things from the car and go into the house, feeling a sensation of elated happiness and an almost giddy feeling. I didn't think it would be possible, but I think I was falling for Cameron. I didn't want to realize it, but it was starting to happen. I wanted to blame the band thing, but I think it was the fact that we had matched, but on what?

Thinking it was silly, I went into the house, trying to think about what Anya would say about Kemple. That was right, I learned Cameron and I had originally matched from Jacob as he admitted to forging the survey to get close to me. Wow, my life was really turning for the crazy, no?