There is Something...

“Just have a look at this! Inveterate rouges!” Mary-Ann heard Alice whispering through her sleep. In an instant she was wide awake but couldn’t open her eyes. The leads were so heavy as if someone put stones on each of them. When she tried to move she discovered that there was someone on her laps and her hands and her own head was resting on something unrecognizable and definitely uncomfortable.

Quick footsteps became louder and suddenly stopped when there was a sharp clang of empty bottles, “Alice, I can’t…HOLY SHIT!” after this outburst of Rory’s Mary tried her hardest and managed to open her eyes and there were annoyed grants on either sides of her from the boys.

“Hey, guys!” Mary greeted siblings with groggy and rather low voice. She was surprised by her own voice, she’s never spoken like that in her entire life and she didn’t drink last night. At least she was pretty certain about it. When she tried to move her head it struck her that it was a bad idea. Her temples were poundings as jungle drums. Rory moved someone still sleeping on her legs and by the sound of muffled “fuck” it was obviously Chris. Then he released her hands and more falling bottles pointed their existence in the room. He helped her up and when he was about to move away from Mary she started falling backwards. All her muscles were numb because of the uncomfortable and unchanging sleep position.

“Wow! I’ve got’ya,” Rory quickly grabbed Mary and lifted.

“Somebody’s got explaining to do…” Alice folded her arms. She examined the room and stepped closer to the boys. “Well, what do we have here? One pirate with a drawn moustache and eye-patch, one, apparently, Mexican. Does this look like a Mexican moustache, Rory?” she pointed at Chris and continued, “a-and a one Indian, I think.” She moved closer to look over Rou’s face which was covered with some sort of symbols and a Polaroid photo stuck to his check. When Alice ripped off the photo Rou belched right in her nose. “Ew, you are a pig!” she jerked away from him.

Rory tried to muffle his laugh not to wake Mary in his arms, “Um..I think I’ll carry Mary…Ann…Mary-Ann to her room.” When he processed this sentence all his joy from Rou’s eruption died away and he became red.

“Yeah, yeah..” Alice said without looking at her brother. She was busy threading through the sea of bottles and Polaroids to Chris. “Tell her she is grounded,” she waved some photos at Rory.

Rory carefully turned to the stairs and started walking. He passed the turned over chairs and the blanket. “The Blanket dinosaur…without me! How could they?” Rory gritted his teeth and Mary looked at him with her sleepy eyes.

“What did you say?”

Rory gave himself a mental slap, “Oh, nothing. Sorry. We are going to your room.” He gave her an apologetic smile.

Mary touched her pounding head, “Why I feel like shit?” she mainly asked herself and avoided eye-contact with Rory. He pushed the door to her room with his leg and placed the girl on her bed. The T-shirt she was wearing slightly went up to reveal the neat scribbling of the black marker “The property of Rob the Almighty” across her stomach. The inscription instantly caught Rory’s attention. His eyes became glued to it, and then they traced the curves of Mary’s body and followed every movement when she stretched herself on the bed and yawned loudly.

Mary gazed at Rory and dashed to the mirror. “Oh, let’s see how he would look with a black eye, shall we?” She licked her palm and rubbed the ink, but it remained unharmed. Mary grunted, “Thought so.”

“It will come off…eventually.” Rory appeared behind Mary’s back and looked at her through the mirror. “Ok, I’ll go,” he was about to turn around when Mary took his hand.

“First of all, thank you for carrying me here, and second,” Mary let go of his hand and gave him a raised brow, “Why are you upset?” Now she was standing with her hands on either side of her.

That question clearly caught Rory off guard, “Um…no, I’m not.” He tried to laugh, to push away the suspicion.

Mary came close to him, stood on her tiptoes and pierced him with her eyes, “Why I don’t believe you? Fine, don’t tell. But from now on I will call you the Ginger Man.” And she ran to the bathroom and closed the door behind her. She put her ear to the door to listen what was happening in the room where Rory still was, but she didn’t hear anything interesting just soft clicking of the entrance door to the room. She felt a little sad about that. She undressed and hoped in the shower. She tried all in vain to wash away the possession tag, but she only gave herself a very red stomach. She almost covered it with abrasions.

With a loud huff Mary opened the wardrobe and stared at it for some minutes. Her thoughts were going back to Rory and his mood all the time. She dressed, decided to leave her dreads in a free-mode and slowly went to the kitchen. She found there Alice rummaging through the refrigerator.

“Rory, quit it. Or make a move already. I think she is interested too.” Alice closed the door of the fridge and looked at the direction of the entrance. “Oh, Mary. I thought Rory was still in the house.” She pretended to be busy with cheese she just took out of the fridge. “Would you like a sandwich?” she asked with a serious tone.

“Oh, yes, please. I’m starving! I’ll make coffee.” Mary took a bag of coffee and poured some into a coffeepot.

“Great. But don’t try so hard. I told Rory to take boys home. Pigs.” Alice breathed out the last comment. “So, what did you do without us? Sorry we haven’t contacted you during the day. Were very busy with my aunt.”

“That’s cool. The guys made sure I was having fun.”

“I bet they did.” Alice put the plate with sandwiches on the table rather annoyed.

Mary noticed that and felt super-guilty, “I promise after breakfast to clean everything! I hope we didn’t break anything valuable.” Alice shook her head. “That’s a relief. So in the morning we went to get some breakfast and after that we spent the whole day in the park riding and goofing around. Then we had some dinner. Then came the Blanket dinosaur, snatched me and we started to watch a move and I fell asleep. I swear I don’t know why I have such a killer headache.” She poured some coffee into two mugs and sat at a table.

“Oh, dear. We have plenty of evidences that boys had little after party, but I don’t understand how you didn’t wake.” Alice shifted the mug in her hands and took a sip.

“Me either.” The girls continued to eat silently.

After some cleaning which consisted mainly of gathering the trash Alice went shopping for groceries, Rory still was out and Mary-Ann decided to explore the rest of the house.

“So..” she started talking to herself while coming up the stairs. “Kitchen – check, living-room – check, back-yard – check, my room – double-check, Alice’s – check. Oh, hello, Rory’s room, long time no see.”

She gently pushed the door which was slightly ajar and entered the green room of the Ginger Man. She wondered around looking at the pictures of the family and his friends, lots of happy and carefree faces. She smiled at that, but the room felt lonely and it had only a wardrobe, a mirror, a couch and a bed. Everything in plain colours. Everything as it was when she woke up in this room. But one thing was different. Now there was a scent of cologne. “That’s a lovely smell. He definitely should wear it.” Mary looked around but didn’t find the cologne bottle.

Mary-Ann noticed a music magazine lying beside bed. It was left open on the “HOT CD’s” section. When she stooped down to pick it up, she also found a dirty ashtray under the bed. “The bad Ginger Man.” She plopped on the bed and started to leaf through the magazine.

“Wow, I didn’t expect guests…Dread girl,” Rory chuckled.

Mary smiled shyly, “Oh, hey, I’ll see myself out.” She closed the magazine and stood from the bed. In a second Rory blocked her way out of the room. “Apparently, I crossed some sort of line. Um, for which I apologize.” She sent him a wink and tried to go round him.

Rory placed his hand on Mary’s shoulder, “I’ve never said that you have to leave.”