Walking on Thin Ice: Chapter 4

While Boxer, Mike's one year old black labrador mutt, sniffed his shoes and licked his hand alternately, he began to realize that if something had happened to him, this poor thing would have suffered the most. Not the group, he could be easily replaced, so he thought. No, this dog would have been in the shelter and put to sleep almost weeks after his death. So Mike, already in a great mood, fell down to his knees and wrapped his arms around the small beast's chest, hearing it's pounding heart and almost stupid happiness as it panted and whined in pleasure.

"You great big lummox, I missed you." Mike muttered, eyeing the dog almost with the affection he'd hold for his own child.

"Whoof!" The dog responded. Mike sighed dreamily, seizing Boxer's bright red leash and leading him to the miniscule yard in the back of the building, shovel and plastic bag.

He whapped the dog lightly with the shovel. "I should buy diapers. Sufficient training, and I'd never have to use this shovel again. I could sell it and make money. Hear me, dog? Boxer?"

Boxer was busy sniffing and marking his territory, but he was also straining now and again to go around the side of the house, where the bright red car was parked. A short and very fat man walked out of the front of the small house and opened the trunk of the car, placing a soft vinyl case in a rather guitar-y shape in the back before returning to the basement of the house for his money. Boxer growled, his white underbelly glinting in the sun as he strained again against the leash.

"Hush! It's just Larry!" Mike chided. The mutt, who was mostly black lab, began to bay loudly at the house, almost sounding like a beagle.

Mike shook his head. "Honestly, you become another breed of dog and I'll go insane. Nutters. Mad. That's no good. Mad people don't give dogs kibble."

At the word kibble, Boxer spun around and began to pant with another "dogs' smile" on his face. He ran up to Mike's feet and ran his side along Mike's leg affectionately. His owner sighed loftily. "That's what I get for picking the runt that was raised in a house of cats. Would you like some tuna too?" He inquired the mutt, eyeing its stare with affection nonetheless.

It spun around again, and bayed loudly at the young woman that had exited the house. Mike hissed through his teeth and forced the dog back into his ground floor apartment with a panicked walk. Gemma spun around and eyed the same black labrador puppy being dragged back inside by the owner of the red leash. She grinned at the dog and tried to see Mike before the door closed, but she heard it snap shut. Her grin slowly fell down as she trudged to her car and slipped inside. She started it up and drove home to get some sleep.

"What day is it?" Mike asked Boxer, staring at the cover of Nietzsche's "Beyond Good and Evil."

Boxer simply cocked his head and chuffed to show he'd been listening. Mike chuffed right back and smiled as the dog attempted to cock its head even more.

So as Mike sat down knowing it was Friday morning, the dog curled up on his feet and tucked his head down so it was a tiny black ball. He reached down and ran his hand along the dog's back and returned to reading.

An hour of reading proved he'd forgotten quite a bit about Nietzsche's philosophy and his outlook on quite a few things. As he set the book down reluctantly to scrounge up some sort of meal, the phone rang. 

"Eh?" He asked into the phone, not feeling all too much like talking at this point.

Eric snickered. "I was hoping you'd be a little more sociable today, Palin."

Mike looked at Boxer, sprawled out on the floor with his head buried under a paw, back legs twitching. "Bleh..."

"Prince of Sleeping in the Worst Possible Situation must come out and plaaaaay!" Whined the phone.

He smiled and snored loudly into the phone. "Sorry, mate, it's one of those days though, know what I mean?"

Eric feigned sympathy. "Oh, poor thing, is it that time of the month again?" 

Mike sighed. "Afraid so,"

His friend clucked his tongue. "You want me to bring over some movies, maybe a few Paul McCartney posters?"

He laughed. "Well..."

"Seriously though, I need a reason to go out and have a good time, so give me one. Dog alive? Good, let's party!" Eric chided.

Mike looked both ways, as if checking for people eavesdropping. "That paramedic gave me a ride home because Graham never showed up. We talked for the whole ride home about philosophy. Bloody brilliant!"

"Ooh! Did you put the moves on her, Mikey?" There was a pause.

"Well, I did give her a peck on the cheek before I got out of the car-" He began.

Eric let out a very loud whoop. "This is great, Mike! Now if she didn't assault you or scream rape, I'd say ask her out. Now! Right now!"

He blushed, alone in his home. "No! That's crazy! I can't just waltz into her house at twelve o' clock and demand that she go somewhere with me, it's absurd!"

His friend sighed. "Palin," it was a dangerous sound.

"No!"

"Mike!"

"No!"

"Michael!"

"NO!"

"MICHAEL EDWARD PALIN!"

"EHHHHHH!" He slammed the phone down. Slowly the hilarity of the small scuffle began to dawn on him and he began to laugh. He only laughed harder when he realized that Boxer was staring at him with incredulity etched on his stupid face.

The phone rang again; Michael answered. "Come off it Idle!"

Eric laughed on the other line. "Very funny, I was kidding. Not sure about you, however."

"I was kidding too, so don't worry about it. Now, about reason for festivities..." He trailed off, smiling boyishly.

His friend snickered. "You kissed that sexy paramedic. Let's party!"

"Place and time my friend, place and time!" Mike retorted.

"The Wave, seven thirty. Dinner and open mic night, we'll get to scope out some fun." Eric replied after a moment's pause of indecision.

Mike nodded in agreement. "Yeah, that sounds great. I'll call the Terrys, you call Gray and John."

Eric nodded. "Seen and heard, mate. See you at seven thirty!"

They hung up and whooped, as far apart as they were.

Boxer lifted an inquisitive eye to Mike as he danced comically in his house. "What're you lookin' at, dog?"

"Whoof!"

Almost sick of the dog's insanely simplistic dialogue, Mike seized the rubber chew toy he had been forced to hide from Boxer when he went ballistic after losing it under the couch. Boxer leapt up and howled pitifully. Mike eyed the couch were the upholstery had nearly been torn to shreds by the dog's claws as he dug his way to the toy.

"Sit!" He commanded, holding the treat behind his back.

Surprisingly, Boxer sat and whined at his owner with puppy eyes.

Mike knelt before the dog. "Lie down,"

With a bit of help from Mike, the dog laid itself down.

Holding the dog on its side, Mike moved the toy quickly from Boxer's right side to his left. The dog rolled over quickly and seized the treat from Mike's hands.

"Good boy, you rolled over!" He scratched behind the dog's ears and grinned.

"Whoof!"

With a roll of his eyes, Mike walked back out into the kitchen and finished preparing his meal. Gemma on the other hand, sat in her house, eyes narrowed in concentration as she tuned her guitar and tried not to break the rusty pliers she was using. Cranking the pegs, she successfully tuned the guitar to near perfection. She pulled a pick out of and old Altoids box and began to strum various chords, trying them out on her fingers which had almost forgotten what it was like to play.

"Zilla," she turned to her black cat who was eyeing her with disgust. "Do you suppose we're hermits?"

Seeing the infernal noise had stopped, Zilla ran her side along Gemma's leg and began to purr. Gemma reached down and scratched her cat's ears before returning to the guitar. She began to pluck out the various strings needed to play the Spanish song "Malagueña."

Zilla mewled pathetically before stalking off to find one of her clawing posts.

"Play list...I need a playlist," Gemma spoke aloud, scrambling for paper and pencil. Upon finding one, her first song was scrawled out.

Janis Joplin's "Piece of My Heart" being written, Gemma continued to search for more recent songs that she had mastered on the guitar. "Son of A Preacher Man" by Dusty Springfield followed that as she racked her brain. "Leaving On A Jet Plane" by Peter, Paul, and Mary...she continued to think.

"Bleh, that's enough for now." She concluded, flinging both pencil and paper into her gig bag and turning in for the day.

It was 1969, and her musical choice had narrowed down quite a bit since she first picked up a guitar. Gemma, twenty-four years old and still bitter about her childhood. Plenty of secrets secured her past. She looked forward to seeing her cousin Noah again. He understood her, to say the least.

She rubbed her eyes and sprawled out on her bed, black sheets, walls, curtains, and carpet to prevent light from working its way in during the day. Zilla purred and curled up near Gemma's head, stretching every so often and sighing contentedly.

"Aww, Zilla, I might not go out tonight after all. Just work and come home, how's that sound?" Gemma reached up and scratched her pet's ears affectionately.

The cat mewled again and slid down so Gemma could cradle her. "G'night you insanely stupid cat."

Zilla began to purr again.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"So Graham, care to tell me why I couldn't have a ride home?" Mike questioned, eyes sparkling. Gray lifted his red-rimmed eyes to Mike's and guiltily shifted his feet to and fro.

Finally he seemed to see Mike wasn't chewing him out. "So sorry, Mike, I went out last night and slept clear into one o' clock!"

Mike shook his head, eyes still sparkling. "No problem at all, Gray! You know WHO I got a ride home with?"

"No, who?" Gray was not interested at all.

"Marilyn Monroe. Stopped by and picked me up. It was great. Then we had wild sex back at my place, all thanks to you, Gray."

His friend pulled a double take and then squinted an eye. "You're cruel to me, you know. Very cruel."

Mike snickered. "But seriously, the paramedic Terry was talking about, her name is Gemma. She offered me a ride home. We spent the entire ride talking about Nietzsche's works."

John lifted a pair of eyebrows as the music played in the smoky club. "Really? Did you have any insight for her or were you too busy pulling an Eric?"

Eric smacked John's arm softly, a scowl surfacing as the others laughed softly.

"Actually we had a sort of quote contest." Mike's eyes drifted off.

Terry smiled. "So you let her win, right?"

His friend from Oxford cast his eyes down. "Well, she let me win I think-"

Eric slapped the table with horror in his eyes. "You didn't let her win? God, Palin, that is the stupidest thing you've ever done!"

Mike blushed a violent shade of pink while the others, including Graham, smacked their foreheads in unison.

"Let the lady win! Let her know you're not afraid to lose!" John emphasized his point by lifting his glass of ale and grinning at an attractive waitress.

Mike shrugged. "I told her she'd won and then she gave me another shot. I said the worst one I could think of, and she said I'd won. I didn't argue; her mind was set."

Gil was suddenly distracted by the music on stage. "Honestly, when are we going to get some sort of good musician up there? This is starting to-"

"Really piss me off." The others echoed, rolling their eyes.

He grinned sheepishly, looking up at the man on stage with a doubtful expression.

Mike straightened up suddenly. "I don't suppose I've just screwed myself over, right?"

"Well, you don't think you did, so you're right. We, however, all agree you'll be single forever." Eric pointed out before standing up to get another drink from the bar.

Gemma slipped inside, guitar slung over her back and glanced nervously at the hundred or so tables strategically set out along the floor. She slipped along side about four before finding her cousin Noah, the owner of the club.

"Noah!" She slipped the guitar off and embraced him tightly.

He grinned at her, blonde hair long and shaggy, hanging in his blue eyes. "Gemma! Where have you been?"

She snickered. "You know where I've been, the question really is whether or not I can play before my shift starts or not."

He paused, looking at the roster hung up on the wall. The colored lights danced around the remainder of the club, over tables and onto the dance floor. A few couples were up, slow dancing to a slow song and looking entirely bored. Possibly bored out of their minds as they swayed with no particular reason at all.

"Eight to eight thirty is open, actually. You have ten minutes to set up." Noah finally stepped back from the roster, replacing a pair of square-ish glasses to his pocket.

She frowned, eyeing her playlist. "I have about twenty minutes of material right now, can you shorten it?"

Noah grinned. "Why don't you pull another one of your ten minutes comedy routines?"

Gemma grimaced. "Oh, God no-"

"Come on, that was hilarious!"

"Noah, I flopped around on the floor like a fish out of water for three minutes while Jonas pretended to be Hitler. That wasn't funny!" She pouted her lip to avoid him from seeing her starting to crack up. 

Noah was too busy laughing himself to notice. "I can't believe he put permanent marker on his lip to make the mustache. How long before that actually came off?"

"About two weeks," Gemma finally cracked and began laughing.

Noah shrugged, laughter ebbing away. "I can't shorten it unless you brought records with you. Mat sold the rest of my records so I have no music other than live entertainment and one Beatles album..."

"What's wrong with the Beatles?" She defended.

He sighed. "You try to listen to 'Yellow Submarine' whilst wooing the possible love or your life. It gets old for the regulars."

With a sigh, Gemma nodded.

"Alright! Get up there in five, Tony is starting to wind down." Noah clapped.

Gemma caught his arm. "I don't have a routine off the top of my head, Noah! I might be able to stall if you do some work behind the scenes. Throw stuff at me, I don't know!"

Her cousin grinned. "Throw stuff at you? I might be able to do that!"

She rolled her eyes. "I don't care what, I'll introduce myself and you just interrupt me somewhere along the part where I start reminiscing about 'the good old days,' alright?"

"Seen!" Noah saluted her and stalked off, keys jangling off his back pocket.

Mike glanced up and watched as the man on stage started to gather his applause and exit. He clapped politely and continued to stare as Gemma swung herself up onto the stage.

Eric glanced up at Mike's slack jaw, and then to the stage. "Whoo boy, Mikey!" He cackled gently.

Mike gulped and looked at Eric with embarrassment rising to his cheeks. "Er, I-"

"Don't say a word, mate, just make sure you do it right this time." Eric responded.

"Do what right?" Mike whined as the others too glanced up at the nonchalant girl unpacking her guitar and completely ignoring the audience as a few men whistled and a few women whooped in hopes of annoying her.

Terry laughed. "Well, obviously! You're going to ask her out, and let her win a bloody round of that game!"
 
"Guys!" Mike whined, starting to back up.

The others surrounded him slowly, grins covering their faces.