"Willow, are you OK?!" shouted Matt as he finally gathered upon the two feuding men turned girls.
Matt's approaching figure was shrouded in darkness other than his upper torso as well as his face, both of which were illuminated by some of the orange decorative lamps dotting the park. It gave the already sketchy boy an even more sinister appearance, like someone shining a flashlight up to their face around a campfire.
To Bill however, this greasy haired, rodentine little pervert was her... *his* savior. He felt his heartbeat lower a tick underneath Willow's sweater as Matt's presence caused Eve to noticeably calm down and the green glow in Eve's hand to gradually dim down to nothing.
"I saw you took a pretty big wipeout when you flipped over that bench, Willow. You have a nice trip? What's Eve doing here?"
"Oh! We um, we..." Bill squeaked out lamely in his new voice as he spun out a lie on the fly. "Eve and I are um, we're on a late night hunt for Josiah Shermer's buried treasure! You've heard of the legend that the town founder buried a chest full of gold doubloons and diamonds the size of your head and pieces of eight somewhere inside this park, haven't you?"
Matt shook his head in the negative.
"I can't say that I have."
"Well it's true! Look it up!"
"Are you trying to tell me that our town founder was secretly a pirate? Wasn't that an episode of The Simpsons?"
"Yes I am saying that, and The Simpsons probably stole that story from us!"
Bill gave one of his winning smiles, which despite Willow's full set of braces was utterly adorable. He turned to Eve and winked.
"Oh yeah!" Eugene immediately nodded back approvingly, the middle aged janitor's personality regaining motor control, Eve's red ponytail bobbing up and down with him.
He didn't enjoy the fact that his body was now a time share.
The Eve part of Eugene's brain, currently dormant, was still quite upset at Willow for not following her directions, which were obviously right because Eve Kazinski is always right about everything, and the world would be so much better if people like her were in charge, duh.
The Eugene part of his brain, on the other hand, while admittedly not nearly as intelligent as the young lady whose body he was involuntarily inhabiting, still had a pretty uncanny survival instinct, which was how he had been able to make it to fifty five years old despite an endless stream of bad luck coming his way. He knew that a third party entering this situation, especially that little punk Harris, would complicate this magic rock business immensely. So he went along with Willow's hare brained story.
"Willow and I are both really big into the history of Shermer ever since we shared an elective class together, and we thought, hey, wouldn't it be neat if the two of us became treasure hunters!" Eugene giggled cutely.
"Yeah!" Bill added. "And we agreed to come here in the middle of the night so nobody would see us digging, otherwise you'd have a hundred different losers trying their luck to get rich too, and we'd have to split the loot a hundred something different ways! Isn't that right, Eve?!"
"Um, right! Willow and I want that booty all to ourselves! Girl power!"
Eugene followed Bill's example and gave Matt an award winning smile, a smile that since it came from the radiant face of Eve Kazinski could potentially start a war one day, not unlike Helen of Troy.
Under normal circumstances, seeing two hotties like Eve and Willow beaming at him would instantly have Matt's cock sailing at half mast. He'd believe anything they told him if it meant that he had a chance at fucking them, preferably both at the same time. However, despite all appearances to the contrary, and the opinions of most people including his parents(And secretly, his therapist), Matt Harris wasn't stupid. Unstable? Definitely. A douchebag? Without question. Crazy? Perhaps, though crazy like a fox, but he wasn't stupid, and something in Willow and Eve's story wasn't adding up.
"Where are your shovels?"
"Huh?" Eve peeped, clueless as to what this little interloper meant.
"You said that you were digging for treasure. So where are your shovels?"
He watched as Eve bit her lip trying to think.
"Unless you girls are planning on digging with your hands, which I find hard to believe. You wouldn't want to break a nail, would you Eve?"
"Oh!" Eugene squealed, having thought of a proper excuse. "The shovels are in the back of my car! Let me go fetch them! Sorry, I just got distracted by you and Willow's make out sesh on the swing set! You two are so cute together!"
The red haired teenage dream who was secretly a middle aged man bounced from the awkward teenagers as fast as she could, not exactly sprinting but walking very quickly towards the parking lot to fetch two imaginary shovels.
Matt turned to Willow and pointed an accusatory finger at Eve as he saw her sashaying away.
"That bimbo is the valedictorian? That doesn't speak too well about Shermer High."
Bill faked a giggle.
"Eve's just nervous. She's probably thinking about how she's going to spend her half of the treasure!"
"Yeah, you can cut that buried treasure horseshit right now. I know that story isn't real. You're embarrassing yourself."
Bill paused for a very long second and sighed.
Goddamn it, Matt. Why did your creepy ass have to show up?
"I KNEW IT!" screamed Matt jubilantly, jumping up and down, stamping the grass. "You didn't deny it, that means that I'm right! Fuck, you two broads actually thought that I'd believe that stupid ass lie? Boy oh boy, are my feelings hurt. Your first mistake was trying to convince me that Eve Kazinski would leave her little gated community in the middle of the night in the dreams of becoming rich when her parents are already millionaires or close to it."
"Oh no Matt, you caught us in a lie! I'm sure the FBI is going to be recruiting you soon to tackle the big time cases!".
"I wouldn't turn them down if they called me!" Matt replied, having not picked up on Bill's sarcasm. "So what are you really here for? You two got something going on? Were you two about to fuck in the park or something?"
"No!" Bill said very firmly. Although like most other people with a working pair of eyes, a part of him really wanted to.
"Too bad, I'd pay to see that. I'd spend a years allowance just for ten minutes with the two of you. In my fantasy, one of you would be on her knees sucking me off, and the other one is licking my face like a cat while I finger her. Of course, she'd have to be dressed up like a cat too while this is happening..."
"Gross, Matt!" Bill yelled. In Willow's voice, he sounded once again like a whiny little girl, but the disgust in his tone was very clear for anyone who was paying attention. Matt, as he does, was not paying attention to anything that didn't immediately benefit himself.
Matt sighed dreamily, glad that he finally admitted one of his fetishes to somebody.
"OK, so if it's not that, if you two aren't fucking, then what is it? Is she paying you to do her homework or something?"
"No, it isn't that either" Bill said flatly as he tried to think of ways to get Matt out of here before Eve decided that she's had enough and take off.
"The dumb bitch probably pays *somebody* to do her coursework for her. If it isn't you, it's somebody, because there's no away she's smarter than me. Nobody that hot has to be."
"I don't think so. I think Eve is exactly who she says she is" Bill lied.
"Maybe Eve blows all the teachers to pass her classes. Or maybe her parents paid the school off so their little princess received all the praise and accolades that people like me deserve! Wait, Kazinski, isn't that Polish?"
"I guess? Why?" Bill asked, already pre-disgusted by what the answer was going to be.
"Because Polish people are all dumb as a box of rocks, that's why! Haven't you ever heard of Polish jokes? You never heard the joke that Polish scientists sent a rocket to the sun at night? Or that they built a submarine where everyone on board drowned because it had screen doors? Nothing? It's OK, I know that girls like you don't really have a well developed sense of humor. They don't have to when they're so cute."
Matt grinned, knowing that it would push Willow's buttons a little bit.
Bill had in fact heard of those jokes, his grandfather used to tell them to him as a little kid while Bill sat on his lap, but he didn't want to give Matt the satisfaction of engaging with him. He was so over the creepy Sophomore.
"Congratulations, Matt. You're arrogant, entitled, whiny, misogynist, and a racist too. You just won incel bingo."
Matt's grin didn't falter, though his voice took on a darker tone.
"And you're a cock tease."
"What?"
"Don't think I forgot about you flirting with me on those swings a few minutes ago, only to push me away the second that Eve decided to show up. You fucking slut."
Bill rolled his eyes.
"That's it, we're done here."
Bill began to walk towards Eve's car.
"Don't you turn your back on me!" Matt screamed petulantly.
Bill turned his head and saw Matt predictably starting to follow him.
Then he saw, behind Matt, someone else in the distance making their way towards the park.
"WILLOW!" they cried out.
Though Bill had only known her for the better part of a few hours, he could easily recognize the frog's croak of a voice calling out to him.
It was Paige!
Bill sighed internally as the pug faced girl waddled closer and closer into view, becoming the forth person and second interloper to find themselves improbably stuck inside this dingy little park at almost two in the morning.
Paige was not dressed well for the occasion. The unattractive female nerd had clearly left her home in a hurry, as she was clad in her pajamas, a XXL zebra print top and bottom set, both of which clung to her fat body in a way that Bill found repulsive. The only source of warmth from the cold was a Shermer High football jacket, which Bill found odd, since Bill didn't figure Paige to be much of a high school sports aficionado. Then again, Bill had never interacted with the Sophomore girl before tonight, so who knows? Maybe she was. Paige's feet meanwhile were wrapped in cute yellow Pikachu shaped slippers.
"Willow, is that you?!" Paige yelled out again, her poor eyesight sabotaging her mission, making her not sure if one of the shapes shrouded in the dark inside the interior of the tiny park was indeed her bestie of over ten years.
After a few moments of what to Paige seemed like Sherlock Holmesesque study, Paige noticed light reflect off of Willow's glasses in a way that briefly gave her a clear glimpse of the corner of Willow's face.
"Oh thank god, it is you!" Paige yelled as she hustled over towards Bill and Matt, her fat jiggling as she peddled her pudgy little thighs.
"Willow, honey, are you OK?" she asked tenderly as she approached the unlikely duo of Matt and Bill, laying her hand gently on Bill's shoulder.
"I'm fine Paige, what are you doing here?" Bill asked rather gruffly, glancing with his peripheral vision to see if Eve had taken off without him. Luckily for Bill, she hadn't.
"I saw you wander out of your house almost an hour ago, that's what! I've been worried sick about you ever since you got rejected from the cheerleading team. You haven't been acting like yourself at all ever since then! Once I saw you sneak out, I knew something was wrong. I almost decided to call the police, but I knew how easily you get scared, and I thought that would be a bad idea. So I decided to follow you instead."
"How'd you find me?" asked Bill.
"It wasn't easy. I looked all over and almost got stopped by a patrol car. I just got lucky and figured that you went to the park to have a cry by yourself."
Bill smirked jadedly at his pseudo best friend.
"That was the plan, at least before Dylan Klebold over here decided to stop by."
Matt glared at his unrequited love.
"Oh fuck you, Willow!"
"Fuck you, Matt!" snapped back Bill.
Paige was taken aback. Willow was never this angry normally, and she almost never cursed. A repeat of her behavior at dinner. This only added to Paige's suspicion that something very, very weird was going on, but at the moment she was more concerned by the unwanted stalker insulting her best friend.
"Fuck you, Matt!" she added, joining into the impromptu roast of one Matthew Harris.
"Fuck you Paige!" rejoined Matt. "I'm fucking sick of always being painted as the bad guy! I didn't do jack shit! I just stopped by here like I always do and saw Willow sitting by herself looking all depressed. I thought she needed some company. Then she told me that fucking Titsapolous and Ingerbitch turned her down for the cheerleading team, isn't that right?" Matt fumed, turning to look at Bill.
Bill nodded reluctantly.
"I guess."
"Oh, you guess! Is that what you bitches today call gratitude?"
"Maybe you'd get some gratitude if everyone wasn't afraid that you're going to shoot them up someday!"
Matt gave Bill a death glare which Bill returned. A tense silence followed.
Bill was about to scream at Matt for his bullshit and possibly choke him with Willow's weak as a kitten hands, but before he could, the three teenagers were blinded by a pair of bright car beams approaching the park.
The car beams gradually dimmed as the SUV they belonged to silently parked in one the spots ringing the park.
The driver of the dark red Lexus RX 350, whoever it was, turned off the engine.
Bill felt his heartbeat increase in his chest. A simple task of meeting Eve in the park had somehow gone so wrong.
Paige felt just as worried as her best friend, but for a different reason. She was afraid that the three of them were about to get into trouble somehow, possibly from the police thinking this was a drug deal or something crazy like that.
Matt was grinning ear to ear as he had nothing to lose anyway. He didn't care who this joker was. He'd bite their nipples off through their shirt if they got too close to him.
The driver exited their front seat and slammed the door shut.
"Willow, is that you?" Emily McLeod asked in the distance.
"Hey Emily!" Bill shouted, internally screaming. "Nice night for a walk in the park, huh?"
The skinny brunette gave a polite but unenthused laugh.
"I suppose. What are you guys doing out here so late?"
"I was supposed to meet Eve! Then my two buddies here decided to stop by out of the blue and say hello, and we got off track" Bill giggled, putting his arms around Paige and Matt.
"Oh. I see. That explains everything" Emily said in a tone that implied that Willow's explanation explained nothing.
"It's not as shady as it sounds, I assure you!"
The trio of misfits started walking towards Emily's car, Bill still keeping Eve in his peripheral vision, Matt's lecherous eyes solely focused on Emily's body, and Paige solely focused on Willow.
"What are you doing here?" Bill asked once he was within spitting distance of the cheerleader.
"OK, maybe you can help me understand what's going on" Emily said with a touch of anxiety in her voice.
"Ever since you came to audition for the team, which was very random by the way, auditions ended two weeks ago, Eve has been acting seriously weird and out of character. I don't know what you two were chatting about in the hallway, but as soon as you left, she wasn't acting like her usual self at all. I felt it. Joanna felt it. Gloria felt it. The entire team felt it. There was just something off, and all evening I tried texting Eve because I was getting worried, but she wouldn't answer her phone!"
Bill gave a false laugh of reassurance.
"Oh, Eve and I are just close friends. We're digging for buried treasure here in the park. It's a local legend about the founder of the town, and the reason she was so nervous was because...."
"Bullshit!" Matt yelled out loud sarcastically.
"Don't listen him, he's...!" Bill paused to wave his finger aren't his temple, indicating Matt's insanity. "We're out here late at night because we didn't..."
"Whatever" Emily said, cutting the frizzy haired nerdette off. Even though Emily was insecure as one could be, and at the bottom of the cheerleader totem poll, she still felt superior to these dweebs. "I'm just going to go ask Eve herself."
"How'd you even find us anyway?" Bill asked, trying his damnedest to steer Emily away somehow.
"FriendTracker app" Emily stated with mild disdain, waving her pink cased smart phone at Bill before dropping it into her pants pocket. "I guess you wouldn't have heard of it since you don't have any friends."
Emily strolled over to her bestie's pink convertible, where said bestie was still pretending to search for nonexistent shovels...
"Eve?" she asked gently.
"Ahh!!" Eugene shouted, spooked by all of this interference. Like Bill, this situation had ended up vastly more complicated than he had wanted it to be. All he desired right now was to wake up in his ratty apartment in the Sunset Arms in his middle aged but male body.
He poked his head out of the convertible's trunk and stood up.
"Hey...Emily" he said with a false smile, half forgetting the brown haired girl's name from earlier in the evening.
"Please tell me what's going on! You've been ghosting me all night. As your best friend, I feel that I deserve an answer."
Silently, Paige agreed with her, albeit her fear was about Willow instead of Eve.
"How did you even find me?!"
"Ugh" groaned Emily, already tired of repeating herself. "This is all so sketchy! At least tell me why you and Willow are out here in the middle of the night? Don't you care that we have a game at Highland Meadows to drive to in a few hours?"
"Um" Eugene meeped.
"OK!" Bill shouted. "I have an explanation for all of this!"
Everyone present turned their heads to face the tall girl with the braces and glasses.
"OK. OK. OK. OK. OK" Bill stammered, stalling for time to think of something to say. He waited a few more moments.
"OK" he said again, somewhat comically. Bill walked confidently over to Eve and without asking her, grasped the hand which was gripping the Ahn'Ger Stone.
"Matt, you were right! Well, not about fucking, but you were right that Evie and I here are more than friends! That's right! We're lovers! We love each other more than any man has ever known, but like Romeo and Juliet, we happen to be star-crossed lovers! We come from different backgrounds who hate one another who hate each other, Eve from the popular upperclassmen, and me, a funky little lesbian Sophomore who plays D&D. We came out here tonight to..."
"Oh, cut it out Willow!" Paige yelled, getting slightly indignant for the first time. "You're in love with Tom Ackerton. I know that you're not a lesbian, otherwise you would have told me! Seriously, I'm with Emily here, what the fuck is going on?"
That was when Eugene's anger bloomed for all to see. He had had enough of these mouthy little kids. The stone in his and Bill's hands began to glow.
Nobody knew exactly what happened next, but at some point, all five teenagers in their petty desires had reached for the Ahn'Ger Stone, and there was an explosion of emerald light that briefly illuminated the entirety of the park.
A tenant of the apartment building across the street would make a complaint about the noise the following morning to the super, who cynically informed the man that he had been imagining things.