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Author's Notes, Warnings, Disclaimers found on GOOJF Main page.
Get Out of Jail Free -- It
all started when... |
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"Oh, yeah, man." Blair turned his smile up a few thousand watts. "I asked for a coupon booklet." "What? Like for Wonder Burger?" Jim gaped in shocked disbelief. Blair laughed and slowly moved away from the table towards the imagined safety of his room. "Kind of, but these coupons are like get out of jail free cards, like in monopoly. You know, one for coming home late after curfew, one for forgetting to call, one for missing a meal, all redeemable at the Ellison Bank of House Rules. Maybe a packet of fifty. What do think my chances are of getting them?" -Excerpt from
FF #20 “Who’s Been Naughty and
Who’s Been Nice?” ~*~*~ “Come on, Rafe…Pleeeeease? Please, please, please?” Blair wrung his hands in front of the young detective in an exaggerated begging motion while looking at him with his best ‘I promise I’ll never ask another favor of you if you’ll just do this one thing for me’ look. Rafe tried to remember where he’d seen that look before. Oh yeah…when he was a kid the neighbor lady…Mrs. Bauer…had a cute little Bassett hound puppy whose eyes held the same innocent stare whenever he expected you to drop everything and rub his tummy…a look that was impossible to resist. Blair began bouncing slightly, reciting an intercession chant to a little known Mayan deity under his breath. He really needed an ally…an unsuspecting ally…if he was going to pull this off. ~*~*~ It had been two weeks since the ‘incident’. Although Jim tried not to show it, Blair recognized all the telltale signs of a major Ellison guilt trip and way down there in the remote recesses of Blair’s subconscious was the teeniest, tiniest voice whispering to him to be ready to play on that guilt when and if necessary. Sooner or later he was bound to slip up, right? Break a rule or two? He had been trying…he really had…to cash in on some of that guilt. He had flirted with trying to make small, almost imperceptible changes to his schedule. He had dallied with attempted meal-skipping and curfew-breaking. Since it was Jim who had jumped to so many wrong conclusions, Blair theorized that the big guy should be a little more lenient…forgiving even…of small ‘indiscretions’ on Blair’s part concerning the ‘RULES’. But Jim had become the mother hen from hell. He had become positively anal about checking and double checking and then checking one more friggin’ time with Blair on everyplace Blair was going, who he was going with, how long he’d be gone, why he was going, did he have his cell phone and was it charged, would he get home okay, had he eaten, did he have enough money, did he have a hankie, was he wearing clean underwear…arrrgh! Blair knew, subconsciously, it was because Jim didn’t want to make the same mistakes that had led to the over-reactions and resulting unfair punishment of a few weeks earlier. Jim needed to be sure he had his facts straight…all his ducks in a row…all the i’s dotted and the t’s crossed. But it sure was making it extremely hard for Blair’s subconscious to test his theory. ~*~*~ “Tell me again why you need me to do this?” It was Checkers all over again…Rafe could see his twelve-year-old self abandoning the hedge clippers to kneel in the soft grass, playfully tickling and rubbing the puppy’s soft underside. Funny how that part about his irate father chewing him out for ‘being taken in by the manipulative little runt when he should be finishing his chores’ eluded him. Blair steeled himself with a deep breath and chose his next words very carefully. “Because my car is in the shop again and Jim’s out of town with Simon at that conference in Seattle and they won’t get back into town until after 10:00pm at the earliest and the lecture starts at 8:00 and Jim doesn’t want me to go unless he knows I can get a ride there and back with someone he trusts.” He took another deep breath…accentuated by a pitiful sigh and the sorrowful blue eyes. “I’ve been waiting for weeks to go…I don’t know when I’ll get the chance again. I’m not asking you to stay…just drop me off and pick me up again a couple hours later. Please? I’d really be grateful…and I know Jim would be too.” A chance to add points in his favor to Jim’s tally list helped Rafe make up his mind. “Sure, Blair…I’d be glad to help out.” ~*~*~ After years of honing his skills, Blair had learned that the best way to obfuscate was to tell the truth…at least enough of the truth to serve one’s purpose. Everything Blair told Rafe was true. He’d just neglected to add one little thing. He had no intention of staying at the lecture. He had caught wind of the rumors that had started circulating around the campus a few days earlier. A fire in Seattle had left several bands from the Cascade area without gigs, so an impromptu rave party had begun to take shape. Conveniently, it was scheduled to be already under way at the same time as the lecture by Dr. Mason…the lecture that Blair had already convinced Jim to let him attend if he could find a chauffeur. The actual party was not what interested him. He wanted to observe the ‘rituals’. Things he had heard about raves from friends and information he had gathered on the net had started his brain percolating. He had come across descriptions of a rave being anything from a wild drug-crazed four-day dance marathon to a profoundly moving almost religious experience promoting love and understanding. It reminded him of a tribe he had once spent time with who had allowed him…no, they had insisted he remembered with a grin…to attend a similar weeklong coming-of-age festival. The comparisons would make a great article for his next submission. Jim was already on his way to Seattle. Blair would have Rafe call Jim on his cell phone and ‘volunteer’ his cab service. Rafe would drop Blair at the campus, promising to return in three hours…or better yet, Blair would reason with him that sometimes the lectures went long and discussions ensued…no need for Rafe to come back to the campus just to have to sit around listening to a bunch of academics…Blair would call to be picked up when things wound down. Once on his own, Blair would hook up with several other grad students, snagging a ride to the abandoned airfield outside of town. Perfect. And on the way-off, no-possible-way-could-it-happen-chance that Jim found out, that tiny little voice whispered to him that he could always use his get out of jail free card. ~*~*~ Blair was enjoying himself immensely. Not only had his plan worked like a charm, the rave had turned out to be one hell of a party. The music was great and he found himself pulsating along with all the other young bodies to the jungle-like cadences. He filled page upon page of his notebook, having found an eager bunch of college students ready and willing to share their philosophies regarding the social relevance and pure thrill that went along with attending a rave. Aware that drug use could be a popular part of a rave, Blair noted with some relief that on this particular night it seemed to be limited to alcohol and marijuana. If anything stronger was in use it wasn’t being flaunted. He thought back to the third night of reveling with the young men in Ecuador and how he had thought nothing of sharing the fermented beverages and hallucinogenic herbs they had offered. Remembering how it had enhanced his own experience that night, he scribbled frantically in his notebook…drawing parallels between that world and this one. ~*~*~ |
| Yes, Blair makes it back to campus without getting 'busted'. |
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