Urgent Message

Racing down the track-field my side began to twist in pain, begging me to stop. In my heart, I wanted to stop and forget everything recorded on this disc. My mind, however, reminded me of its relentlessness and how I would regret this until at least 40 years old. I had to keep going.

"Leo!" A bird-like voice called behind me.

Slowing into a walk, my hand grasped my side, "Hey, Wendy."

Wendy was a petite girl with chocolate curls that often covered her face. Her bright smiled, stretching across her face as she spoke, "are you racing to the time capsule assembly?"

"Yes! Come with me?!" My voice cracked from exhaustion.

Taking my hand, she leads the way in a quick walk. My side begged with every step to stop. Wendy must have known for she made a detour to the water fountain. Falling into the push handle, I gasped every sip. Chuckling to herself, Wendy checked her phone to give me privacy. 

"Wow, leave some for the rest of us!" A deep voice came from a large shadow.

It was Josh, by the looks of his grass-stained shorts, soccer had just ended. He stepped back to let me know he was joking; which, was a blessing since my lungs were still aching. Taking a few more sips, I stepped aside.

"Leo!" Wendy exclaimed, "your shirt."

Ah, of course, my shirt. A nice band-tee, you know the ones you get from who-knows-where, it was completely soaked. 

"Eh, I'll dry." 

"Ew, no way." Wendy wrinkled her nose. "You smell like a wet dog. I have an extra tee in my locker," looking down at her phone clocked a soft smile resonated in her eyes, "we have still time!"

Shaking my head, I tried to keep us on course to the assembly. When suddenly, Josh's giant goalie's hand stopped me.

"Get on my back, you stink, so do I, so it doesn't matter. What does matter is getting you to the assembly."

Reluctantly, I jumped on. If someone asked me who I'd trust with my life, it would be a toss-up between Wendy and Josh. Wendy took care of me like a girlfriend, like Josh took care of me like a boyfriend. Neither of which was even close to the truth, but hey, I didn't mind. 

Making our way down the steps, we turned the corner to Wendy's locker. As she opened it, a million angels sang. Wendy had the cleanest locker in school, which never made sense. I've seen her room, I think a swamp monster lives in the corner of it. Inside of her locker, she had two pairs of men's clothing neatly folded and in Ziplocs. Why? Well, because Josh and I usually look like we do now, a mess. In my Ziploc, there were black jeans and a pink band tee. Josh had baggy shorts and a plain white tee.

"You know, I am going to miss you two," Josh said, pulling the shorts over his underwear.

Wendy stared down at her phone to be polite, but Josh's abs were out of this world. Whenever I looked down at mine, they were hibernating, forever. 

"I'm going to miss you guys so much," I mumbled.

"Leo?" Wendy whispered, "Josh?" Taking a breath, she wrinkled her nose tightly. "Can we skip the, skip the assembly?" 

"Skip putting the disc in?!" Josh and I cried out.

"Yes."

You would have thought she told us the sky was purple. We both looked at each other with complete bewilderment. Josh's mouth could barely shut, and I could feel the shock on my brow line. 

"Y-yes." Josh finally replied.

I couldn't believe it! Both of my friends didn't want to place the one thing we worked so hard to get. All of those weekends and after-school' study sessions' were gone. Gone! The worst part, I was outvoted two to one, the worst kind of odds.

"What?"

"I think you gave him a stroke, Wendy."

"Did not! Come on Leonid, please?!" Whenever Wendy used my full name, you knew it wasn't the time to take things lightly.

"Okay, okay," my voice cracked, "what would you rather do?"

With a smile, she grabbed both of our hands, "I know what to do with the disc."

Following her like two lost puppies, we went to the football field. Racing down the bleachers my body felt reenergized as I accelerated quicker and quicker down. Maybe too quick, because my toe caught my heel, and well the next part kind of went black. But I do remember seeing Josh turn course and bee-line to me. 

"Wendy!"

"On it!" She turned back to the announcer's box.

"Leo, look at me." Josh's stern voice commanded my throbbing head. "You hit your head and are bleeding."

"You hit your head," I said, shoving my head in my hands. 

Josh wasn't wrong. There was a lot of blood. It quickly covered the skeleton's face on my fresh tee. I could hear Wendy racing down.

"Careful!" I called up to her.

Shaking their heads, Josh and Wendy both cleaned me up and made sure it wasn't worse than it looked. 

"You're lucky that it's just a cut," Wendy said, patting the antibiotic cream on me. 

"I can't believe you could manage something like that." Josh gingerly stood me up.

With a giant, period pad thing on my face, we walked down to the field. My head ached, and all I wanted to do was lie down. Once at the football field, I collapsed down on the turf.

"This stuff is awful." 

Laughing, they joined me. Wendy stretched out like a cat, while Josh hid his blushing face. Maybe I have been blind all four years, but I didn't know he thought she was attractive. I mean, her hair is springy, and her eyes are like the sun on a warm beach. Wendy's lips always looked like two giant pillows, which made me sleepy when I looked at them for too long. Josh compliments her well, like day and night. His lips were a regular size and weirdly very pink. 

"Josh, did you kiss someone?" My mouth spontaneously asked.

Looking at me sideways, he puckered his lips, "Nah, just your mom."

Wendy's laugh sprang up, filling our space with light. Josh's face absorbed her light, causing him to fall on his back and hide his face. He did like her! Time to work my mag-

"Do you guys want to watch the disc?" Wendy rudely interrupted my inner thoughts. 

"I thought we were supposed to wait for like 20 years or something." 

"Where would we even watch it?" Josh asked, still hiding his face.

An evil smile curled Wendy's cheeks, "The assembly." 

If you ask any doctor, they would tell you that only yawns are mimicked but, that evil smile was just as contagious. Josh and I both agreed to do the one thing that could destroy our school. No time to waste, right?

The only way to get to the assembly was on Josh's back. Hoping on, I mushed him to go faster. He did grunt in frustration at me, but he did run very fast. Making our way to the doors, I hopped and rolled across the floor. Which caused my head to throb harder.

"Ouch, come on!" I whispered to them.

Josh lightly pushed Wendy towards the doors. Grabbing the handle, she down looked at me then over to Josh with a short nod, she was gone. Following tightly behind her, Josh and I sat on the top steps. 

"I'm so nervous," Josh admitted.

"Why? No one knows who made the video."

Suddenly, the vice-principal, Mr. Johnson, made the announcement that a video was going to play in honor of the senior class. Wendy then suddenly appeared between Josh and me. I slid closer to her, causing her and Josh's hips touch, then backed away. Step-one, make them admit how they feel. I'm still working on step-two, but I'm sure it'll be just as good as to step-one.

An old school countdown appeared on the screen. The destruction was about to begin. 

Smiling, I peered out into the chairs. I wanted to see if those who were at fault were in the audience tonight. It was time for revenge. 

A shaky screen steadied to show the gym teacher and the principal whispering quietly. Cut to a scene in the cafeteria where Mrs. Dingmon, our lunch lady, was serving meatball subs. Cut back to the first scene, now with subtitle and timestamp of 11:05. 

"You're going to have to be the one to do it," Mr. Johnson whispered.

"Fine. But you owe me. Huge!" The gym teacher, Bilon Buton, shook his fist at Mr. Johnson.

It was happening! No one was taking out the disc, which was weird. Turning my head, I found out why. Wendy had gotten two football players to lock the door and press against it. Three musical theater techies pretended to try and try every key for Mr. Johnson. He looked frantic, like a raccoon picking through a trash can. Justice was about to be served!

The next scene showed Mrs. Dingmon going to grab another batch of meatballs. Everyone in the audience let of gasps of fright and realization. The timestamp was now 12:30, five minutes before everything changed. Nerves threw through my body, making me grasp Wendy's hand. To complete the hand holding loop, I grabbed Josh's hand as well. In the video, you can see Bilon race out of the serving line. Well, we highlighted it, so everyone could see the sneaky dog leave his droppings. 12:35 and bam, a whole tub of meatballs explode everywhere! Poor Mrs. Dingmon was burned from the fresh sauce. I heard some people cry as some people shout expletives. Mr. Johnson ran out of the assembly while Bilon turned red in the face. The biggest mystery of our high school year was just uncovered most explosively. 

"Maybe we should have waited." Josh joked.

"What's the point in waiting?" I winked at him.

The wink was a nudge if you didn't get that. Let's call that step-two. Chaos was exploding around the three of us, while some students tried to rush the stage. Other students were taking photos and calling those who missed this masterpiece.

I was satisfied, I got to see my friend gush over my other friend, complete chaos was made, and while my moms face will never recover, I got revenge. My face was so busy smiling, I almost didn't hear the announcement.

"Those students who made this video better be ready for some serious hell." Mr. Johnson sounded like he was grinding his teeth.

"Oops, what are we going to do?" Wendy gasped sarcastically.

"I guess we could go get some coffee." Josh smiled.

"I'll meet you guys there, I need to make a call," I winked again at Josh, like come on, dude! 

It's the last day of classes, and you haven't said your piece yet!

"Leo? Is your eye okay?" Josh asked.

"Yes, I just think that it being the last day, big things should happen!" 

Walking into the hall, I dialed-up my mom. Picking up, I could hear the oven going off. 

"Cooking, ma?"

"Yes, yes. I made pot-pie for everyone when you get here!" Her voice sang through the phone. 

After the meatball explosion, she was horribly burned on her face. The reason for the meatball explosion came down to two possibilities, either Bilon or Mr. Johnson wanted her gone so they could date her. I'm not going to say my mom is attractive, that's gross. However, she did have me very young, and also, she doesn't age fast, so yeah, I could see one motive. I bet they didn't expect to actually hurt her and cost us thousands of dollars in medical bills.

Which the school was so kind not to offer any help, but Wendy got some girls from drama to put on a play, which helped a ton. Plus, Josh and the soccer team mom made food and took care of me while mom was in the hospital. 

"We decided to show the urgent message today at the assembly."

A crash in the background suggested she was shocked.

"Oh, how did everyone take it?" She almost laughed.

"Complete chaos, plus Mr. Johnson threatened everyone," I replied calmly, in case anyone was listening.

"How are Josh and Wendy?" She liked to change the subject quickly.

"I'm currently on a step-by-step process of getting them to admit their feelings." 

"Leonid! Do not mess with their hearts, they will find the right time on their own." 

The school's bell rang through the halls, drowning me out.

"Love you, bye!"

Looking up, I caught the last moments of Josh and Wendy's kiss. They kissed! By the looks of it, Wendy made the first move. I knew it. Did you?

"Yes!" I shouted at them, "Love is in the air!"

Josh flipped me off while Wendy laughed. Grabbing them by the shoulders, I hugged them as tightly as I could. So not tight at all, I am physically weak, in all honestly.

"You know what? I'm glad this 'urgent' message was delivered."

"Yeah?" Wendy asked, still chuckling from embarrassment.

"We created a beautiful piece of art."

"Chaos?" Josh questioned.

"Yes," I sighed, "chaos is the melody of art and the soul of human expression."

"Who said that?" They both asked.

"Me." Smiling, we walked out of the school, masters of our own fate.