Now What's Gonna Happen? (sequel to What the Hell...?), chapter 2
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I guess I fell asleep, because Adie woke me up about 9 the next morning.
"What?" I yawned.
"Come on. We're going shopping," Adrienne said, opening my closet. I went in, and located my band shirts and a pair of jeans. I went in my bathroom and changed. When I went downstairs, I was first greeted by Tre by getting jumped on, but I dodged, and he fell flat on his face. Next, there were Mike and Billie Joe.
"Nice shirt," Billie commented. I was wearing my custom shirt that said "I'm with the Idiot America" on the front and "Are You?" on the back. Mike nodded in agreement.
"Thanks," I mumbled.
"Not awake yet?" Billie laughed.
"Meh. Bite me," I said, biting into a bagel. "Or your food."
I went in the living room and turned on the TV. For some reason it was on the Weather Channel. I was about to change it when they focused in on Florida. I froze in my tracks.
"Shit. Not again," I said, turning up the TV.
"Florida looks like the prime target for this hurricane, which is a Cat. 4," the announcer guy said.
"SHIT!" I hollered, now sitting on the couch and staring at the TV. I grabbed my cell, and dialed Laury's number. "Laury! What's up with the cane?"
"Um, Ft. Lauderdale's going to get it! I've got Jimmie here because she spazzed and her parents couldn't do anything. But it's getting stronger- oh, crap, we're in for it," Laury basically screamed into the phone over the static.
"Why?" I asked, then looked at the TV.
"This just in, this hurricane just got upgraded to a Cat. 5 status," the announcer guy said, reading off a sheet.
"Oh, shit. Ft. Lauderdale's not going to be on the map," I muttered. I could hear Jimmie crying on the other line, and drills. "Please tell me you're evacuating."
"No, we're not. My parents want to ride it out."
"YOU'RE KIDDING ME! And here I thought your parents were smart! Are you at least putting up shutters?"
"HELL YES!" Laury screamed, and then the line went dead.
"Laury? LAURY! Jimmie! JIMMIE! Dammit! Lost the signal," I yelled, throwing my phone on the couch. Billie Joe came over.
"What happened?" he asked. I pointed to the TV.
"I'm going to lose my home of 14 years," I cried. "All because of a damn hurricane!"
Adrienne took me out shopping, but I was really distracted because of Hurricane Wilma (I used it from last year. Hope it doesn't bug you people).
"What store?" Adie asked.
I shrugged. "I don't really care."
"Well, Billie will also probably want to take you out to Hot Topic and stuff. I usually go into JCPenny's and such."
"Doesn't really matter to me." So we walked into Penny's, and people were staring at my shirt. This one guy was really glaring at me, so I said to him, "Got a problem, sir?"
"Yes. That shirt," he said.
"Guess what dumbass? I can say whatever the hell I want. Look at the Constitution for free speech." And with that, I walked right into the junior's area, found myself some jeans and some rock(ish) shirts, and went into the dressing room. After trying everything on, I picked out a shirt that said "Screw smart, I'm a Damn Genius!" and another pair of ripped jeans. Why Penny's had them, I don't know. So we paid, I flicked the guy off, and we went out of the store. While we were walking around, I saw an instrument store, and a clerk trying to get some attention to the store by playing the guitar. So I went over.
"Sir?" I said.
"Yes?" he said a bit excited.
"May I try something on the guitar?" Mark (that's what his name tag read) handed me the guitar, and I plugged it into a nearby amp. I grinned my evil grin, and started playing the entire American Idiot album. That got a lot of attention. By the time I finished with Whatsername, Adrienne was beaming, and everyone was clapping. Adie had called the rest of the group, and they were standing next to her. I knew because when I started playing Holiday, Billie Joe started singing it. I never looked up from the guitar I was playing the entire time. And Mike started on bass then, too.
"Damn!"
"Whoo-hoo!"
"Go girl!"
Those were just some of the responses I was getting from the crowd. I grinned, and the three of us bowed, which got more cheers. Then Billie's hat fell off, and everyone recognized him. Their jaws dropped, and I saw another amp closer to the crowd. I switched to that one, let a cord rip, and the entire crowd jumped. I laughed my head off, and so did Billie Joe. Then the rest of the crowd started laughing. I don't know if they were doing it because Billie was, or because they actually found it funny. Don't know, don't care.
So after the crowd left, we continued shopping. Adrienne wouldn't go into Hot Topic for some reason, so Billie and Nick went in with me. Everyone else had fanned out across the mall.
"Hey, Billie, come here a second!" I hollered over to him, picking a shirt up.
"What?" he said.
"Mirror!" I laughed.
"What?"
"Mirror!" Nick eventually came over and explained why I was saying mirror.
"Is your brain rattled or something?" Billie Joe laughed, shaking his head.
"No, yours is," I said, going over to look at the accessories. It took him a minute to register what I said.
"HEY!"
I laughed, and grabbed the hat I liked, and a matching shirt. The hat was light brown and had a fist giving the finger, and the shirt said "Fuck off". Billie Joe laughed when he saw them, and Nick muttered, "Typical." Did I mention I have a hat collection? I paid, put the hat on, and walked out of the store. Adie laughed when she saw the hat.
Next store we went into was a music store. I walked around to the pop/rock area, and looked for some sheet music books for piano. Yeah, I've been playing piano for 6 years, and was really good. I spotted the American Idiot book, and bought it.
"Why did you get that?" Billie Joe asked me.
"I've been looking for the piano edition for years," I answered. "And now I have it."
We went to a couple other stores, then headed back home, where I showed everyone the clothes I'd bought. Billie Joe laughed when he saw the outfit from Penny's. Everyone liked it at least.
LATER THAT EVENING
I went over to the TV, and flipped it to the Weather Channel to see what was up with Wilma. I saw it was supposed to move over Florida tomorrow. I was nervous. I wasn't there, but I felt like I was. I couldn't call Laury or Jimmie, the phone connections were probably down by now.
"Why are you watching the Weather Channel?" Joey asked.
"To see if Ft. Lauderdale will still be on the map after Wilma," I replied, not taking my eyes off the TV. Then I noticed something. It was originally headed for the Broward-Miami-Dade county border, but it had veered north a little bit, in a straight line for Ft. Lauderdale. I guess I looked pretty scared, because Joey went and got Adrienne and Billie Joe to see what was wrong with me.
"Kay," Adie said, sitting to the left of me, Billie Joe on the right. "Are you alright with this hurricane thing happening?"
"No, I'm not," I said. "Ft. Lauderdale might get wiped off the map, and Laury and Jimmie's families aren't evacuating, even though there's an evacuation order in place." I sighed. "I thought their families were smarter than that."
"Just in: Hurricane Wilma has just made a jog north that has set her up to more than likely devastate Broward County," the announcer guy said.
"NO SHIT!" I yelled at the TV. "YOU CAN SEE THAT!"
"It 'jogged north'?" Billie Joe said, confused.
"Wilma shifted north about 5 miles and is now going to wipe out my home."
I didn't sleep that night. I was too scared. So I went downstairs and put the Weather Channel on to see Wilma's progress.
"Can't sleep?"
"No way. I could never sleep through this. Laury and Jimmie might not make it through. Remember Katrina? Wilma's worse, being the strongest storm on US records."
Billie Joe sat down next to me on the couch. "Meaning they could die, right?"
"Hit the nail on the head." I leaned back and looked up at the ceiling. "I'm just so scared for them, their families, and their lives. If I lose them, I lose part of me, too."
"I know how it is. I'd be the same way if I lost the guys or my family. I was like that with my dad."
Wilma wasn't over land for long, and moved out to the Gulf (I flipped the path around). They started covering what damage she'd done. It looked like Andrew multiplied by 6. Then they focused on the hardest hit area, a small sub-division of Ft. Lauderdale-and my hometown-Davie. I stared, transfixed by the devastation that ravaged my hometown.
"3 tornadoes have come down on this poor town, 2 F-1's and an F-3. Davie will never be the same," the reporter said. Then I started crying. They were in the development my house was in, and I saw my house. "Let's see what one of these houses looks like after the destruction." They went into the rubble of my home. I saw my now non-existent bedroom. "This looks like it may have been a bedroom by the rubble." She went over to where my closet once stood, and rummaged through. "Looks like only one thing survived from this room." It was my safe case. I kept my birth certificate and such in there.
"Please," I asked, "can I fly down? Please, I need to be there."
They agreed, and I quickly packed. I grabbed my guitars, and we soon had a flight booked for that day to West Palm Beach, since the Ft. Lauderdale-Miami International Airport was destroyed.
Once back in Broward County, I went to my home. Reporters were still in the area. I went running over to the one I'd seen earlier that day.
"Excuse me, miss?" I said, tapping her shoulder. She was still broadcasting.
"Yes?" she said, turning to face me.
"Do you know what happened to that safe box? I used to live here, and that was mine."
She handed it over, and I took the key- which I had on my necklace- and unlocked it. I cried when I saw everything survived. I closed and re-locked it, then went to see what was left of my house. There was nothing left to look at. The only things I could recover were two pictures-one of me and my parents just before the murder, and one of me as an infant. Then I saw my parent's safe box, so I went and picked it up. It was made with fingerprint identification, so I had no trouble opening it. It was made for only me and my parents to open. I saw everything in there survived, and I walked out of the rubble. Several reporters had been filming me, and they were coming over to talk to me.
"Why did you come back down here?" one yelled at me.
"Because I wanted to see what was standing and if my friends were still alive," I answered coldly. I went back to the group, and we got in Mike's truck and drove to where Jimmie and Laury were staying.
When we got there, I spotted Jimmie, ran over, and hugged her. She was crying her eyes out. Laury spotted us, came running over, and tackled me so hard that I fell flat on my back. She was crying, too.
"Oh my god, thank everything you guys are alright," I cried, holding them tighter. We stood up, and saw the adults were talking to Laury's parents. Joey, Jake, Ramona, Frankito, and Estelle were walking around, stunned at the damage. They spotted us and came over.
"You two would not believe how much Kay was freaking out over this, worrying if you two were dead or alive," Jake sighed. "So this is really a relief to all of us."
They laughed. "So what really happened during the storm?" I asked Laury. "I watched it move over you guys, but I don't know what actually happened."
"Everything went alright, considering we won't have power for a couple months, or water pressure from anywhere to a few days to a couple weeks," Laury sighed. "You know FPL. They never get off their lazy asses."
"What?" I yawned.
"Come on. We're going shopping," Adrienne said, opening my closet. I went in, and located my band shirts and a pair of jeans. I went in my bathroom and changed. When I went downstairs, I was first greeted by Tre by getting jumped on, but I dodged, and he fell flat on his face. Next, there were Mike and Billie Joe.
"Nice shirt," Billie commented. I was wearing my custom shirt that said "I'm with the Idiot America" on the front and "Are You?" on the back. Mike nodded in agreement.
"Thanks," I mumbled.
"Not awake yet?" Billie laughed.
"Meh. Bite me," I said, biting into a bagel. "Or your food."
I went in the living room and turned on the TV. For some reason it was on the Weather Channel. I was about to change it when they focused in on Florida. I froze in my tracks.
"Shit. Not again," I said, turning up the TV.
"Florida looks like the prime target for this hurricane, which is a Cat. 4," the announcer guy said.
"SHIT!" I hollered, now sitting on the couch and staring at the TV. I grabbed my cell, and dialed Laury's number. "Laury! What's up with the cane?"
"Um, Ft. Lauderdale's going to get it! I've got Jimmie here because she spazzed and her parents couldn't do anything. But it's getting stronger- oh, crap, we're in for it," Laury basically screamed into the phone over the static.
"Why?" I asked, then looked at the TV.
"This just in, this hurricane just got upgraded to a Cat. 5 status," the announcer guy said, reading off a sheet.
"Oh, shit. Ft. Lauderdale's not going to be on the map," I muttered. I could hear Jimmie crying on the other line, and drills. "Please tell me you're evacuating."
"No, we're not. My parents want to ride it out."
"YOU'RE KIDDING ME! And here I thought your parents were smart! Are you at least putting up shutters?"
"HELL YES!" Laury screamed, and then the line went dead.
"Laury? LAURY! Jimmie! JIMMIE! Dammit! Lost the signal," I yelled, throwing my phone on the couch. Billie Joe came over.
"What happened?" he asked. I pointed to the TV.
"I'm going to lose my home of 14 years," I cried. "All because of a damn hurricane!"
Adrienne took me out shopping, but I was really distracted because of Hurricane Wilma (I used it from last year. Hope it doesn't bug you people).
"What store?" Adie asked.
I shrugged. "I don't really care."
"Well, Billie will also probably want to take you out to Hot Topic and stuff. I usually go into JCPenny's and such."
"Doesn't really matter to me." So we walked into Penny's, and people were staring at my shirt. This one guy was really glaring at me, so I said to him, "Got a problem, sir?"
"Yes. That shirt," he said.
"Guess what dumbass? I can say whatever the hell I want. Look at the Constitution for free speech." And with that, I walked right into the junior's area, found myself some jeans and some rock(ish) shirts, and went into the dressing room. After trying everything on, I picked out a shirt that said "Screw smart, I'm a Damn Genius!" and another pair of ripped jeans. Why Penny's had them, I don't know. So we paid, I flicked the guy off, and we went out of the store. While we were walking around, I saw an instrument store, and a clerk trying to get some attention to the store by playing the guitar. So I went over.
"Sir?" I said.
"Yes?" he said a bit excited.
"May I try something on the guitar?" Mark (that's what his name tag read) handed me the guitar, and I plugged it into a nearby amp. I grinned my evil grin, and started playing the entire American Idiot album. That got a lot of attention. By the time I finished with Whatsername, Adrienne was beaming, and everyone was clapping. Adie had called the rest of the group, and they were standing next to her. I knew because when I started playing Holiday, Billie Joe started singing it. I never looked up from the guitar I was playing the entire time. And Mike started on bass then, too.
"Damn!"
"Whoo-hoo!"
"Go girl!"
Those were just some of the responses I was getting from the crowd. I grinned, and the three of us bowed, which got more cheers. Then Billie's hat fell off, and everyone recognized him. Their jaws dropped, and I saw another amp closer to the crowd. I switched to that one, let a cord rip, and the entire crowd jumped. I laughed my head off, and so did Billie Joe. Then the rest of the crowd started laughing. I don't know if they were doing it because Billie was, or because they actually found it funny. Don't know, don't care.
So after the crowd left, we continued shopping. Adrienne wouldn't go into Hot Topic for some reason, so Billie and Nick went in with me. Everyone else had fanned out across the mall.
"Hey, Billie, come here a second!" I hollered over to him, picking a shirt up.
"What?" he said.
"Mirror!" I laughed.
"What?"
"Mirror!" Nick eventually came over and explained why I was saying mirror.
"Is your brain rattled or something?" Billie Joe laughed, shaking his head.
"No, yours is," I said, going over to look at the accessories. It took him a minute to register what I said.
"HEY!"
I laughed, and grabbed the hat I liked, and a matching shirt. The hat was light brown and had a fist giving the finger, and the shirt said "Fuck off". Billie Joe laughed when he saw them, and Nick muttered, "Typical." Did I mention I have a hat collection? I paid, put the hat on, and walked out of the store. Adie laughed when she saw the hat.
Next store we went into was a music store. I walked around to the pop/rock area, and looked for some sheet music books for piano. Yeah, I've been playing piano for 6 years, and was really good. I spotted the American Idiot book, and bought it.
"Why did you get that?" Billie Joe asked me.
"I've been looking for the piano edition for years," I answered. "And now I have it."
We went to a couple other stores, then headed back home, where I showed everyone the clothes I'd bought. Billie Joe laughed when he saw the outfit from Penny's. Everyone liked it at least.
LATER THAT EVENING
I went over to the TV, and flipped it to the Weather Channel to see what was up with Wilma. I saw it was supposed to move over Florida tomorrow. I was nervous. I wasn't there, but I felt like I was. I couldn't call Laury or Jimmie, the phone connections were probably down by now.
"Why are you watching the Weather Channel?" Joey asked.
"To see if Ft. Lauderdale will still be on the map after Wilma," I replied, not taking my eyes off the TV. Then I noticed something. It was originally headed for the Broward-Miami-Dade county border, but it had veered north a little bit, in a straight line for Ft. Lauderdale. I guess I looked pretty scared, because Joey went and got Adrienne and Billie Joe to see what was wrong with me.
"Kay," Adie said, sitting to the left of me, Billie Joe on the right. "Are you alright with this hurricane thing happening?"
"No, I'm not," I said. "Ft. Lauderdale might get wiped off the map, and Laury and Jimmie's families aren't evacuating, even though there's an evacuation order in place." I sighed. "I thought their families were smarter than that."
"Just in: Hurricane Wilma has just made a jog north that has set her up to more than likely devastate Broward County," the announcer guy said.
"NO SHIT!" I yelled at the TV. "YOU CAN SEE THAT!"
"It 'jogged north'?" Billie Joe said, confused.
"Wilma shifted north about 5 miles and is now going to wipe out my home."
I didn't sleep that night. I was too scared. So I went downstairs and put the Weather Channel on to see Wilma's progress.
"Can't sleep?"
"No way. I could never sleep through this. Laury and Jimmie might not make it through. Remember Katrina? Wilma's worse, being the strongest storm on US records."
Billie Joe sat down next to me on the couch. "Meaning they could die, right?"
"Hit the nail on the head." I leaned back and looked up at the ceiling. "I'm just so scared for them, their families, and their lives. If I lose them, I lose part of me, too."
"I know how it is. I'd be the same way if I lost the guys or my family. I was like that with my dad."
Wilma wasn't over land for long, and moved out to the Gulf (I flipped the path around). They started covering what damage she'd done. It looked like Andrew multiplied by 6. Then they focused on the hardest hit area, a small sub-division of Ft. Lauderdale-and my hometown-Davie. I stared, transfixed by the devastation that ravaged my hometown.
"3 tornadoes have come down on this poor town, 2 F-1's and an F-3. Davie will never be the same," the reporter said. Then I started crying. They were in the development my house was in, and I saw my house. "Let's see what one of these houses looks like after the destruction." They went into the rubble of my home. I saw my now non-existent bedroom. "This looks like it may have been a bedroom by the rubble." She went over to where my closet once stood, and rummaged through. "Looks like only one thing survived from this room." It was my safe case. I kept my birth certificate and such in there.
"Please," I asked, "can I fly down? Please, I need to be there."
They agreed, and I quickly packed. I grabbed my guitars, and we soon had a flight booked for that day to West Palm Beach, since the Ft. Lauderdale-Miami International Airport was destroyed.
Once back in Broward County, I went to my home. Reporters were still in the area. I went running over to the one I'd seen earlier that day.
"Excuse me, miss?" I said, tapping her shoulder. She was still broadcasting.
"Yes?" she said, turning to face me.
"Do you know what happened to that safe box? I used to live here, and that was mine."
She handed it over, and I took the key- which I had on my necklace- and unlocked it. I cried when I saw everything survived. I closed and re-locked it, then went to see what was left of my house. There was nothing left to look at. The only things I could recover were two pictures-one of me and my parents just before the murder, and one of me as an infant. Then I saw my parent's safe box, so I went and picked it up. It was made with fingerprint identification, so I had no trouble opening it. It was made for only me and my parents to open. I saw everything in there survived, and I walked out of the rubble. Several reporters had been filming me, and they were coming over to talk to me.
"Why did you come back down here?" one yelled at me.
"Because I wanted to see what was standing and if my friends were still alive," I answered coldly. I went back to the group, and we got in Mike's truck and drove to where Jimmie and Laury were staying.
When we got there, I spotted Jimmie, ran over, and hugged her. She was crying her eyes out. Laury spotted us, came running over, and tackled me so hard that I fell flat on my back. She was crying, too.
"Oh my god, thank everything you guys are alright," I cried, holding them tighter. We stood up, and saw the adults were talking to Laury's parents. Joey, Jake, Ramona, Frankito, and Estelle were walking around, stunned at the damage. They spotted us and came over.
"You two would not believe how much Kay was freaking out over this, worrying if you two were dead or alive," Jake sighed. "So this is really a relief to all of us."
They laughed. "So what really happened during the storm?" I asked Laury. "I watched it move over you guys, but I don't know what actually happened."
"Everything went alright, considering we won't have power for a couple months, or water pressure from anywhere to a few days to a couple weeks," Laury sighed. "You know FPL. They never get off their lazy asses."
