Truth or Dare

Creative Forums Creative Writing
1

Chapter 1~
Mason Rivers sat impatiently on the front steps of his high school, Rosewood High, awaiting the arrival of his friend. He was just a sophomore, but he and his friends were still some of the most well-known and respected guys throughout the entire campus. And that was saying a lot for going to the same school as legendary prankster freshmen, Bradley Davis and Jake Randall. But of course, they were expelled now for chucking a dissection frog at Principal West’s face.
“Mason!” Mason shifted his gaze from the cold cement step where he sat to see his best friend, Jared Triller, running towards him, the autumn wind blowing his blond hair around his glowing brown eyes.
Mason waved weakly, then stole a quick glance down at his watch. It was already twenty minutes after three o’ clock, and he was supposed to be home at three-thirty. Leave it to Jared to make him late coming home again.
“Dude, you’ll never believe what I’ve got to tell you!” Jared exclaimed once he finally reached Mason. The way he seemed even more hyper and springy than usual made him look like an anxious puppy who wanted to play.
“Oh, yeah?” Mason asked, obviously not concerned. The last time Jared had said something
like that, his “big story” was that for the first month of school, all grades were allowed to go off-campus for lunch, and everyone had known tha since the first day of their freshmen year. Guess you could say Jared Triller wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, considering it took him until tenth grade to figure that out.
“Yeah! Some chick in my homeroom was telling me that she’s settin’ up some kind of Truth or Dare game for the freshmen and sophomores. She said it was tommorow, and we’re supposed to meet on the stage during lunch!” Jared explained.
Mason looked at Jared like he had just said the stupidest thing known to man. For all they knew, maybe he had just said the stupidest thing know to man. “Yeah, that is really big news!” Mason replied, every word dripping with sarcasm.
Jared’s ecstatic expression dropped as Mason turned to walk off. “C,mon! If we go to the game, we’ll see a ton of our classmates doing some pretty crazy dares and spilling thier best secrets! We have to go!” But Mason still wasn’t buying it. The idea of a ton of kids he knew (and some he didn’t) going through the same slew of dumb questions and practical dares didn’t sound like a whole lot of fun. That was kind of the thing with Mason: everyone loved him, but he could be a total wet blanket.
Mason, desperate to get off the topic of total idiocy, turned to Jared as they continued walking down the sidewalk to thier houses and asked, “Hey, are you, Travis, and Peter still coming over later?”
“Mason, don’t even try to change the subject!” Jared said. Mason started laughing at this. Sometimes he felt like Jared knew him all too well. “No, seriously. Are you guys coming over?” he asked again through his light laughter.
Jared shook his head. “Nah, I think we’re coming over tommorow.” He kicked at a lone rock that littered the sidewalk out into the street and watched as a passing car plowed over it. “But really, please come to the game tommorow! Me,Travis, and Peter are already going!”
Mason looked at Jared. How had he gotten thier other two best friends at Rosewood High, Travis Wretcher and Peter Brook, to agree to such a retarded idea?
“Fine. I’l think about it,” Mason sighed finally. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going! I’m just gonna think about it!” he added quickly before reaching down into his bookbag and pulling out an MP3 player. He scanned through his songs, then snapped the headphones on his ears, letting the sound of Fall Out Boy drown out the rest of the world going on around him.

The very second Mason stepped foot in his house, he was greeted by his mother, an aged woman who had a decent-sized stick up her butt and always seemd to be in a state of worry and/or anger. Today was no exception.
"Mason, where on Earth have you been?!" she demanded as soon as her son walked through the doorway. "You're late again!"
"I know," Mason said in an apologetic tone, allowing his bookbag to drop to the floor next to the door. "Sorry. Jared made me late again."
"You always blame Jared!" his mother accused. Whenever her children told the same story again and again as an excuse for being late or whatever, she eventually refused to believe. Parents. They were all the same according to Mason.
"Because he's the one to blame!" Mason snapped. "Now if you don't mind, I'de really enjoy some privacy right now!" He pushed past his mom and walked quickly upstairs and into his own room, making sure he locked his door tightly. He didn't feel like his family barging in on his buissines today. In fact, he never felt like his family barging in on his buisiness.
"God, Mom's totally getting on my nerves," Mason muttered to himself, laying himself down on his bed. He absentmindedly ran his fingers across the top of his blue and gray comforter when he heard his cell phone ring on the bedside table. He picked it up on the first ring.
"Mason, are you going to the game tommorow or what?" Jared asked on the other before Mason even had the chance to say, "Hello."
Mason groaned at the very sound of Jared's voice."Okay, I guess," he found himself saying.He still wasn't sure if he really wanted to go, but he would say almost anything if it meant Jared wouldn't bug him about it. 
"Awesome! I knew you'd go!" Jared said enthusiastically. Mason could really tell that Jared was excited about this whole thing. For what reason, Mason wasn't sure yet. And knowing Jared, he would rather no find out.
"Look, I'll just talk to you tommrow, okay?" Mason said. It was only four in the afternoon, but it was already getting pretty dark and he was feeling particularly tired today.
"Okay!" Jared replied like it was no big deal. "Thanks again, man!" Then he hung up.
Mason hit the end button and threw the phone back onto the mini table. He stretched his arms over his head, then let himself fall back onto his bed. And just like that, he was out like a light.

(Yup, my first chapter. This is a story an eigth grade teach at my school wants to get published. =D> )

2

Nice. I’m waiting for the next installment.

3

Chapter 2~
“Come on, Mason! Hurry up!” Jared begged the next day at lunch. It was Friday, the day of that stupid Truth or Dare game Mason had stupidley agreed to go to. Word passed through the school about it and now it seemed like every freshmen and sophomore knew and were getting ready to go. Some eager, naive ninth graders left lunch early to get to the auditorium already. But Mason, unlike all of them, was in no kind of rush to get there. So he continued to eat his lunch at a steady pace, ignoring his friends as they urged him to go faster.
“Mason, quit messing around! Or we’re gonna go without you!” Travis told him, like it was supposed to be a huge threat or something. When Mason let his comment go in one ear and out the other, just like he had done with Jared and Peter, Peter got up from his seat at their table, walked around to where Mason was sitting and grabbed his soda bottle.
“Mason, if you don’t hurry up, I swear, I’m gonna shake this whole bottle up and shoot the cap right in your eye!” Peter said, already shaking the soda up. The sontents inside the bottle went from liquid to a giant mass of fizz almost instantly.
Mason heard those words and instantly quit eating at his salad. Peter had been in the anger management classes since they were in fifth grade, and you never knew when he might actually shoot a soda bottle cap in your eye. Even though Mason had picked up on the hint of playfulness in Peter’s voice, he didn’t want to take any chances. Mason picked up his almost-completely done salad and tossed it into the nearest trash can in the cafeteria. He then turned to his friends that stood behind him. “So, we gonna get out of here or what?”
His friends nodded vigorously, then allowed Mason to lead they way on their way out of the cafeteria and to the auditorium. On their way out, Jared asked Mason, “Hey, you still going to the dance with that Lana girl in our Health class?” He sounded a little anxious and desperate for an answer, making Mason wonder. “Yeah. Why do you care?”
Right as Mason said that, Lana walked past them in a rush, glancing at them all out of the corner of her eye. Mason smiled at her in a sweet, normal way, whereas Jared let out a long whistle and sly wink in her direction as she passed him. Lana gave him grossed-out look, then sped up her pace to get away from them.
Once she was out of sight, everyone but Jared started laughing. “What the hell was that all about?!” Mason asked through his laughter. Jared glared him, then said, “I know you two are going to the dance next Friday, and that there was my attempt to get her to forget all about you and get to thinking about me!” When he said those words, Travis started giggling even more. “That’s gotta be the stupidest attempt to get a girl I’ve ever seen!”
“Let’s see you do any better!” Jared snapped, obviously annoyed. “Can we just go, please? They might’ve already started the game!” Without waiting for an answer, he pushed past his friends and started again on his way to the auditorium. It didn’t take long before Mason, Peter, and Travis followed him. Jared pushed open the double doors leading out to the back of the cafeteria, where the auditorium was located. A sudden gust of Fall wind washed over the group as they made their way quickly past a few outdoor senior classrooms and over to the front doors of the auditorium.
“Well, this is it,” Mason sghed once they got there. He stared at the chipping blue paint of the double doors, then at his friends. “Are you guys sure we should go in?” He was silently hoping they would start feeling the same way about this whole game as he did and decide not to waste their time going.
“Well, I’m going in,” Jared announced, reaching for the metal handle on the doors nd wrapping his fingers around it. Then, with no hesitation, he pushed the door open and let himself inside.

(Okay, this chapter is a bit shorter! :smiley: )

4

Chaper 3~
They all stepped silently onto the royal blue carpet of the auditorium and looked around with caution. Fold-out seats filled most of the entire place, except for the stage, which had gold curtains sheilding it.
“Hello?” Travis called. His voice echoed off the walls, but no response could be heard. Peter narrowed his olive green eyes at Jared, who was scanning the area with a confused look on his face. “Nice going, you dumbass!” he said, then, with great force, kicked Jared in the leg. Jared toppled into one of the aisles of seats, clutching his leg where Peter had kicked him.
“God, what was that for?!” he shouted, cringing with pain as he got back to his feet. “Nice of you to give us the wrong information,” Mason told him, although he was secretly relieved that there really was no game.
“But I swear to God, that one girl told me that it was here!” Jared insisted, looking around the auditorium once more. But there were no signs of anyone there but him and the others.
“Trust me, Jared,” Travis sighed, pulling his baseball cap back over his golden brown hair. “This wouldn’t be the first time you didn’t use your listening skills, or lack of, really.” He turned to leave when a voice sounded from behind the stages curtains, making them all jump.
“We’re on the stage,” the voice (which belonged to a girl) said in a quiet tone, as if she already knew what they were there for. Mason looked for his friend’s reactions, but they were already sprinting down one of the many aisles leading to the stage. He followed close behind.
As the boys got closer to the stairs that lead up to the stage, the faint sound of voices got louder and louder until they were actually up on stage, the dozens of kids who, to Mason’s surprise, had shown up staring right at them.
‘Okay, I can already tell this whole thing is gonna be stupid,’ Mason thought silently as the other students proceeded to stare at him as though he were a total freak. ‘I’m leaving!’ He was about to leave the group without a single word to any of them when a girl stood up from the crowd of people gathered on the stage.
“Are you all here for the game?” she asked suspiciously, refering to Mason, Jared, Peter, and Travis. Her weirdly-shaped brown eyes sayed fixated on them, awaiting an answer.
“Yeah,” Jared blurted out almost immediatly. Then, for basically no reason at all, he recieved another kick in the hip from Peter. “Peter, you need help!” Jared shouted through his tightly clenched teeth, holding his bruised leg. “I’ve been telling you this since ninth grade: go to those anger management classes!” But this remark only got Peter more pissed off, and he socked Jared right in the eye. Travis tried to keep Jared from tackling Peter after that stunt he pulled while Mason backed away from them a little. The last thing he wanted was to get sucked into this totally meaningless fight.
“Hey! You three!” the same girl shouted above their noise. “Sit down and quit your fighting if you’re gonna stay!” To Mason’s shock, his friends did what they were told and sat down in a group near a circle of other sophomore girls who were drinking somethig out of red plastic cups. As Mason walked and sat down with his friends, he noticed everyone there was drinking something. But what was it?
“Hold on,” the girl told them once Mason and them were sitting down in a calm (well, almost calm, since Jared was still mad at Peter for punching him) matter. “I’ll be right back.” She made her way off to the back of the stage, then came back to them a minute after. She handed them each a plastic cup filled to the brim with some weird-smelling carbonated drink. “Drink this,” she instructed them each.
Mason glanced at Jared, who sat next to him on the hard wood floor, sniffing the contents of his cup. “Wait, why do we have to drink this?” Mason asked the girl.
“You’ll see,” the girl grinned, then sauntered away from them and sat next to a group of sophomore boys and girls who were drinking as well as her and everyone else.
Mason raised one eyebrow, then hesitantly brought the drink to his lips to take a sip. But the second the foul taste flooded mouth, he spat it out onto the floor without a second thought. It only took a few moments until Jared, Travis, and Peter spat theirs out, too.
“Dude, what is this crap?!” Mason exclaimed loudly to no one in particular.The girl, who had been talking with her friends, looked over his way and laughed at the sight of Mason an his friends trying desperately to get the awful taste out of their mouths.
“It’s beer, duh!” the girl laughed in response to Mason’s question.“What did you think it was?” She started laughing all over again. Even some of the other people there started laughing at him like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
“How do you get beer?” Peter asked her from his spot on the ground. “I mean, it’s not like you buy it yourself, 'cause you need an ID for that stuff.”
“I sneak it all from my house,” the girl told him, continuously rolling her eyes at them. “My dad keeps a practically endless supply of it in our basement. So I thought that for my first game, I would bring some so all of us could get a little drunk. You know, so all of you unexperienced people can get a feel of what it’s like! Plus, when you’re a little tipsy, dares always get more crazy!”
“All right, you’re officially nuts!” Mason told her, shaking his head. He set his beer down on the floor next to him and got to his feet. “I’m out of here!” He began to walk away from them all when three pairs of hands clamped onto his shoulders and yanked him down onto the floor.
“Come on!” Mason heard Jared say behind him as he took his hand off of Mason’s shoulder. “It can’t be that bad!”
“Yeah, Mason! Please stay!” Travis nearly begged. But Mason only shook his head no. “I’m not gonna stay here and be stupid like the rest of these guys!” he said. “If you were smart, you’de come with me,” he told Travis and the two others.
“Look, if the little whimp wants to leave, then let him!” the girl smirked in a defiant, cocky way that made Mason sick.
“Whimp! Whimp! Whimp!” a freshmen boy started chanting. No longer had he started chanting when the rest of the people on the stage joined him.
Mason felt overwhelmed by the sound of thier voices. He wasn’t being a whimp. He was being smart not to drink. But when he thought about it, he did have a reputation to uphold. Would he be less popular if he decided to leave? Would he be more popular if he stayed?
The chanting came to a stop when Mason finally shouyed, “Okay, I’ll stay!” Everyone cheered for him as he sat back down and reached for his beer. Like Jared said: it couldn’t be that bad. Right…?

(Hope you all like this chapter!)

5

“a total wet blanket” : ) I like that

6

(I like it too, so that’s why I used it! :laughing: )

Chapter 4~
Mason returned to homeroom for his final period of the day, Study Hall. But with his condition, he could barely see two feet in front of him. He, as well as Jared, Travis, and Peter, was completely wasted at this point. In the last thirty minutes, he had drank countless amounts of beer and done more dares and such than he could even remember.
He and his friends stummbled into the tenth grade hallway to attempt to find thier classrooms, but had no such luck. Halfway through the hall, Peter went into a drunken giggle fit and fell into a row of lockers. “Heh, why does everything look so purple?” he slurred mindlessly.
Jared staggered past him a little, still trying to find his class, but fell over his own feet and onto the floor. “Peter, shut up. No one thinks you’re funny…” he hicupped, his cloudy eyes rolling around in their sockets sleepily.
Travis held his sides, his face looking green with nausea. He leaned againt one of the walls in the hallway, a dazed expression on his face as his frantic but sleepy looking eyes searched around him.
A few inches ahead of his friends, Mason’s breathing was slow anf forced, like he was dying, and his entire body was broken out in cold sweat. He looked down the hallway, which now seemed a mile long and all tilted around. Slowly, he began walking again, leaving his equally drunk friends behind. But his vision was so blurred up, he couldn’t go on. Instead, he slumped up againt a wall and let the alcohol overwhelm his body. And before he even knew it, he was passed out.

Mason could hear voices around him. He wanted to sit himself up and ask what was going on, but his head was heavy and throbbed like an 18-wheeler had run over it, put it in reverse, then ran over it again.
"Oh my God, I think he's waking up!" a shrill female voice exclaimed suddnely. Mason squinted his blue eyes and forced them open to find himself laying on a bed placed in the nurse's office, surrounded by his mother, his younger brother, Steven, and obviously, the school nurse.
"Dang, what hit me?" Mason groaned, clutching his head in pain. When there was no immediate answer, he asked again in a louder voice, "What happened?!"
"A teacher found you, Jared Triller, Peter Brook, and Travis Wretcher passed out in the sophomore hallway," the nurse answered him. Mason blinked at her, not understanding. When had he passed out? How could he have passed out? He couldn't remember anything except for eating lunch with his friends like he did everyday.
"Well, do you know how we passed out?" Mason asked his mom and brother when the nurse had left the room to go to the main office. He didn't care who answered him just as long as he got a logical answer.
"We're not exactly sure, but the nurse says it was most likely just stress," his mom explained to him. "High schools these days really do put the pressure on you kids," she sighed.
Steven, who was standing next to Mason's bed, scoffed and rolled his blue eyes. Even though he was twelve and only in seventh grade, Steven was considered a spitting image of Mason, only younger and, in most cases, smarter. He always knew just what to say when someone asked him a question and he normally ended up being right. Sometimes Mason wished he could be as intelligent as his brother, even though he would never admit it. "What does the she know?" Steven asked. "I mean, I don't see any teaching degrees around here! I'll bet she's not even a certified nurse!"
"Steven, that's enough out of you!" their mother warned, kneeling beside Mason. She ran her hand through his spiky black hair in a concerned way. "How are you feeling?" she asked him.
"Like crap. How else do you think I feel?" Mason replied grouchily. His head was still throbbing madly and evey muscle in his limp body ached. "Can we please just go home?"
"Of course!" she cooed, taking Mason's hand. "Here, we'll help you." Steven took Mason's other arm and they both lead Mason out of the school building and out to thier car, which was sitting in the front parking lot.
"Steven, sit up front so your brother can lay down in the back!" thier mother told Steven as she climbed into the driver's seat. Steven did as he was told and slid into the passengers' seat next to her. Mason got into the back, laying himself down instantly.
As he felt the car pull out of the parking lot, Mason tried desperately to figure out what had happened. How could he and Jared and them have passed at school, of all places? None of it made any sense. He replayed his whole day back in his head for any kind of evidence, but there was nothing. All he remembered was being in the auditorium. That's where his memory went blank.
Deciding to just stop thinking about it, Mason rested his head down, giving into the extremely sleepy feeling he now had.
7

Chapter 5~
“Hey, Mason. Open your mouth real quick,” Steven said to Mason as they sat on the living room couch later that evening.
“Why?” Mason whined, wrapping the blanket that shrouded his shoulders more tightly around him. After he had gotten home, his mom had forced him to take a ton of various medications to take care of his pain, then ordered him to lay down and sleep until dinner was ready. But how could she expect him to sleep when it felt like an endless rock concert was going on in his head?
“I wanna check something,” Steven replied. Not in the mood to protest, Mason opened his mouth as wide as he could and Steven leaned over to him, sniffing his breath.
“Mason, be honest with me,” Steven asked when he pulled his head away. “Have you been drinking or something?”
Mason stared long and hard at his brother. “Of course I haven’t been drinking! What makes you say that?” What was Steven getting at? Did he seriously think Mason was drinking?
“Your breath reeks of alcohol!” Steven told him. “I thought I would check your breath to see if you had eaten or drank anything that might’ve affected you in a way that made you pass out, and I smelled alcohol right off the bat!”
The very second that sentence escaped Steven’s mouth, it was like Mason’s memory came back to him. That stupid Truth or Dare game Jared had got him to go to and that girl who had given him the beer- He remembered it now! He had been convinced to drink and that was why he had passed out!
“Steven!” Mason said so suddenly it made Steven jump. “You were right! It was alcohol! I remember now!”
“But how did you get it at school?” Steven asked, looking around to make sure thier mom wasn’t within hearing distance.
“Well, there was this thing going on at school, and me and the guys went to go check it out today during lunch.” Mason began. “So there was this one girl there who was running the whole thing and she gave everyone beer and I just gave it a shot and drank.” He ended his long-story-short with a heavy sigh only to be met with a smack across the face.
“You are such a moron!” Steven shouted, not caring if thier mom heard. “How stupid can you get?!” He smacked Mason again, harder than the last time.
Mason, getting ticked off, lifted his foot and kicked Steven in the stomach, making him fall back and trip over their fat, wrinkly Bloodhound, Maxie. “You ever hit me again and you’ll see what happens, punk,” Mason muttered angrily.
“But seriously, why did you drink?” Steven asked from his spot on the floor. Maxie growled at him for disturbing his nap, then got up and waddled over to the couch to sleep instead.
“I’m not really sure,” Mason sighed, shrugging his shoulders. “I guess it was that peer pressure stuff that all kids get lectured onat least once in thier lives. But how did you know to check my breath and whatever? That was pretty smart, after all.”
Steven smiled up at Mason and laughed a little before saying, “I’m young, but I’m not stupid.”

"Mom, I'm fine! I swear!" Mason insisted the following Monday. He'd had a crappy weekend and haden't been able to sleep at all the last three nights. In addition to that, he haden't heard from Jared, Travis, or Peter since school on Friday, making Mason wonder if they were okay. But despite how bad he was feeling, he still wanted to go to school for some unknown reason.
"No, Mason!" his mother snapped at him for the fourth time that morning. She turned back to making breakfast as she said, "I still think you're much too weak to be going anywhere right now!"
Mason sighed heavily as though admitting defeat as he watched his mom flip bacon out of a sizzling pan and onto Steven's plate. He felt a lot better today than he had yesterday, and he didn't want to miss a chance to see Jared and the guys again to hear what had happened to them on Friday. But at this point, it seemed as though there was no way to convince his mom to let him go to school.	
"Dang, Mason. I never thought I'd see the day where you actually wanted to go to school!" Steven said, biting into a strip of bacon. Mason pretended like he didn't hear Steven and instead looked at the microwave clock in the litchen. It was about ten minutes before he usually would leave to walk to school. Could he come up with a way to get out of the house in that time?
"Mom, I'll ask you one more time," Mason sighed. Their mother turned to him sharply and looked like she was about to say something when Mason interupted. "Just let me go to school! I feel fine!" He knew he was kind of lying, but he didn't care.
His mom planted her hands on her hips, her tired, weary eyes burning holes practically right through Mason. Mason ignored her stony gaze as well as humanely possible, waiting for an answer. "Please?" he added in for emphasize.
"Fine, just go!" his mom answered finally, looking pretty annoyed.
'Wow, it took you long enough,' Mason replied silently. He got up from his dining room chair and sprinted upstairs to his own room, where he grabbed his bookbag from near his door and turned to back downstairs, where his mom was now watching the early morning news on T.V. and Steven was still eating at his breakfast.
"See you guys after school," Mason told them, and then, without another word to either of them, disappeared out the front door.
8

Chapter 6~
Mason haden’t been inside the school building for less than ten seconds when every freshmen, sophomore, junior, and even a few seniors turned to their full attention to him. A chorus of "Oh my God"s arouse from the crowd and the instant whispers and murmurs began.
“Did you hear about Mason and Jared? They got drunk and passed out in the hallway yesterday!”
“I heard Jared had been doing weed and had been sent up to rehab in Southern California on Friday!”
“Wait, what about those two other friends of theirs? Weren’t they going to rehab, too?”
Mason could hear bits and peices of this mindless gossip but tried to ignore it all as he worked his way through the crowd in attempt to reach his locker. But before he could even reach where he wanted to go, he went slamming into someone, sending the person’s books, as well as his own, flying all over the place.
“Oh, crap. I’m so sorry!” Mason stammered, feeling like a complete idiot for not watching where he was going. He bent down to help whover he had ran into gather up their books again, trying to make up for his slip-up. But whe his hand reached for the last book, the other person’s hand met his and Mason looked up only to come face-to-face with the same girl from yesterday. The Truth or Dare girl.
“Mason, is that really you?” she asked him cooly, a crooked smile spreading across her sickly pale face.
Mason was almost at loss for words. This girl was definantly the last person he wanted to talk to, after what happened yesterday. “How do you know my name, anyway?” he found himself saying to her suddenly.
“Your little friend Jared told me,” she answered him simply.
Mason furrowed his eyebrows, trying to figure out why Jared would’ve talked to this girl ater what she did. “Hey, by the way,” he said to her before he left to go find Jared. “Thanks for getting us drunk last week. I found myself waking up in the nurse’s office 'cause of you!”
The girl gave Mason a hurt and shocked look. “Mason, you can’t blame that on me,” she said in an I’m-so-innocent-and-I-can’t believe-you’re-trying-to-blame-this-on-me tone. “It was your decision to drink. I never told you to do anything!”
“Whatever,” Mason mummbled, pushing past her and walking down the hall to his locker. Even though this girl was right, he wasn’t about to give in and just admit to it. And what was that about her talking to Jared about him? Thankfully as Mason got near his locker, he saw Jared, Travis, and Peter standing around that area, so he could talk to them.
“Hey, guys,” Mason greeted when he got to them. Jared, who stood with his back to Mason, turned and smiled at rhe sight of his friend.
“Hey!” Jared said in his normal peppy-like tone. “What’s up? Didn’t hear from ya at all this weekend!”
“Sorry,” Mason apologized even though he really didn’t feel sorry whatsoever. “I was feeling like crap since what happened Friday!”
“Oh, yeah. That sucked pretty hard,” Jared said, shrugged like ti was nothing. He looked around a little over at Travis and Peter, then said, “I heard from that girl that there’s gonna be another game today after school.”
“Oh. Well, why are you telling me this? None of us are going!” Mason chuckled a little, but when he saw Jared, Travis, and Peter’s serious expressions, his jaw dropped. “Are you kidding me?!” he asked them. “After what happened to us, you wanna go back!? God knows what she’ll have us do this time if she got us all drunk the last time!” Mason felt so shocked, he could’ve sworn the whole hallway was tilting. He was instantly overcome by the memory of his drunken experience and shok his head vigorously to get his mind off it.
“Well, if you cancel out the drunk part, it was pretty fun!” Travis piped up. Peter looked at him and nodded his agreement.“I gotta agree. It really wasn’t that bad!”
Mason gave his friends a disgusted look, then opened his locker and gathered his books up as quick as he could. He then slammed his locker shut and turned away from his friends, walking down the busy hallway and to his homeroom. How could they possible want to relive what had happened the first time around? Ecspecially Jared, who was basically so stupid he didn’t even know what he was getting himself into.
‘Whatever,’ Mason thought in his head as he continued on his way. ‘I’m being smart by not going. Really, I am!’ But no matter how many times Mason told himself this, even he had a tough time believing it.

9

Whoops, posted chapter 6 twice.

10

Chapter 7~
The bell rang through out the school, singnaling the students to go on to their fourth period classes. Students poured out of the classrooms and scurried around the hallways like little lab rats to go to another class. Mason was among them, going at his normal, casual pace to his English class. But even right now, he continued to keep thinking about that retarded Truth or Dare game and how everyone around him was talking about it. Mason saw them as stupid. It was a game, for God’s sake! How could anyone get so obsessed with it?
Mason had just entered the classroom when Lana, the same girl he was going to the up-coming dance with, came up to him with a slightly nervous look on her face.
“Mason, I’m sorry,” she said softly, twirling strands of blond hair around her manicured fingers. “But I kinda can’t go to the dance with you anymore…”
Mason stared back at her, a little confused. “Um, okay. But why? Did something suddenly come up or whatever?” he asked.
Lana bit her lower lip, then shook her head. “Natalie told me that if I wanted to start going to the Truth or Dare games she’s doing now, then I had to accept my first dare. I told her I was going to the dance with you and she told me to dump you and go with one of your friends instead. I’m really sorry!” Then, without another word, she tpushed her way past him and disappeared into the crowded hallway.
Mason just stood where he was, barely believing what had just happened. His date had just dumped flat on his ass just becasue she was dared to do it! And who was Natalie, anyway?
He was about to let the sudden situation go when he heard a loud laugh come from the other side of the classroom. Mason looked around for the source of the noise and his eyes landed on the girl. The same one from the game and the same one he had run into in the hallway. She was standing near her desk, laughing to herself and staring Mason right in the eye. At that moment, Mason was positive that this girl was Natalie, the one who had the mindless kids in their school brainwashed or under some spell or something like that.
Without taking much time to think about it, Mason dropped his books down on the nearest desk and marched over to Natalie, who was laughing even harder now. With every loud step he took, Mason felt his anger rising up a little more, nearly to the point where he might’ve blown a fuse.
“All right, you just made the wrong guy pissed off!” Mason shouted at Natalie when he reached her. “I mean, you and this stupid game are putting all the freshmen and sophomores under some freaky spell or something, and now all they can talk about is Truth or Dare!” As he kept talking, Natalie just continued to stare up at him, a cocky, defiant smirk worn on her face.
“Poor, naive Mason,” she said when Mason was finished. “I’ve only hosted one game and here you are, telling me how awful it is and how you’re totally against it! It’s almost like you can’t get the idea of a couple of people getting together and hanging out through your thick head!” She reached her hand out to tap Mason’s head for emphasize, but he immediatly smacked it away and kept glaring at her.
“Look, it’s just that…well, look around!” Mason exclaimed, feeling his anger lowering at a stready rate. “All anyone can talk about right now is your game, and apparantly it’s bugging the crap out of more people than just me!”
Natalie raised her thin eyebrows at him and smiled. “Okay, if you think that people are bugged by my game, then name one other person that feels the same way as you.”
“What, wha-?” Mason was suddenly taken aback, not expecting that question at that moment. “Um, well…” he stammered, feeling himself blush madly while Natalie laughed right in his face.
“Ha, I knew it. There is no one else, Mason!” she cackled, sounding just like a witch in a teenage girls’ body. All she was missing was a huge wart on her nose and a broom stick up her butt. “Face it, but every freshmen and sophomore already loves my game and I’m so sure they want more!”
Mason wanted to say so much more, but was interupted by the bell. Natalie sighed and shook her head almost mockingly, then turned on her heel to go to her desk. Mason sighed through his nose, then went to his own desk.
As the teacher began taking roll, Mason drowned him out and got lost in his own thoughts. At this point, he wanted so badly to put a stop to Natalie and her game before it started going too far. ‘But how am I gonna pull this off?’

11

Chapter 8~
“Aw, come on, guys!” Mason begged. It was lunch, and Mason was sitting with his friends at their usual table. But instead of thier normal talk, Jared, Travis, and Peter were forced to watch as Mason practically got down on his knees as he begged them to help him stop Natalie’s game.
“Sorry, but I can’t help ya this time around!” Jared shrugged simply, wiping his blond bangs away from his face and taking a swig of his root beer. “I actually like the games.”
“You’re retarded!” Mason told him, slamming his fist on the table. “I don’t get how you guys can see she’s only causing trouble!”
“Because she’s not,” Peter butt in. “All she’s doing is getting a coupla people together to hang out and crap. Sorry, dude, but that’s not exactly ‘causing trouble’.” He plucked a his straw that poked out of his soda can and flicked it aimlessly across their table, striking Travis in the eye.
“He’s right, Mason,” Travis said, holsing his eye as Peter laughed hysterically. “I definetley think you’r just overreacting about it all.”
“You two are starting to sound as stupid as Jared!” Mason snapped suddenly without thinking about what he was saying. Jared’s jaw dropped at the insult and Travis and Peter glared at him icily.
Mason’s face flushed red, knowing what he said was pretty pissy. But seriously, why couldn’t the three of them see this whole thig the same why he did?
“Look at who’s talkin’ there…” Travis mummbled, turning away.
Mason ignored him, then sighed deeply. “Look, you know I didn’t mean it like that!” he told them all. “But just think about it for a minute! If these games can stop now, then things will be normal, like nothing ever happened!”
“You’re paranoid, man,” Peter told him, shaking his head. “Sorry, but I’m gonna pass on helping you. Everything around here is normal.”
“Me too,” Travis spoke up shortly.
“Well, now that I know I can’t count on you guys…” Mason said, trying to play the guilt card on them. He wanted this to just be over with, but he couldn’t exactly do it alone. He needed some help.
“Mason, don’t even try it!” Jared told him. “We already told you: we aren’t helping!” He sighed, drinking up the last bits of his drink. “Good luck, though!”
“Whatever. I guess I’ll just see you guys later, okay?” Mason said, a subtle feeling of defeat gnawing at his stomach. He picked up the bookbag that sat beside his seat and lifted it up onto his shoulder as he got up and began walking out of the cafeteria.
“All right, so if they won’t help, then who will?” Mason asked himself as he wandered down the hallway. He lost himself in deep thought as he made his way out the front doors of the school and sat down on the front steps, watching a few freshmen boys and girls tossing around a frisbee on the front lawn. “Natalie’s got tons of friends and crap, so I gotta find someone who doesn’t know her…” And that’s when the most perfect idea popped into Mason’s head. Already anxious to put his idea into action, Mason got up from the step he sat on and scrammbled back inside the school building, running down the halls and ignring as he passed teachers who told him to quit running.
Mason only stopped running when he got to the main office. He stood in the doorway panting, the secratary at her desk eyeing him in a suspicious manner. “Can I help you, young man?” she asked him.
“I need to call home,” he said, still panting from running so hard. “I don’t feel well.”
This only made the secratary more suspicious. “You look like you just ran the whole way here. If you can do that, I’m sure you’re okay.”
“No!” Mason replied too quickly. “Err, I mean…” He forced a cough out of his mouth. “I really do feel sick. I just ran because I thought I was gonna throw up, but on my way to the bathroom I came across here and thought I should just call home instead.”
The secratary, who still glared at Mason a little, gestured toward the black phone on her desk. “Make it quick.”
“Thank you,” Mason fake-coughed, lifting the phone up off its receiver. He punched in his home phone number, waiting for someone to pick up. Two rings later Mason heard Steven’s unusually deep voice through the phone. “Hello?”
“Steven, is mom home?” Mason asked, trying to sound truly sick and frail in the prescence of the secratary.
“Yeah, why? You sick or somethin’?” Steven asked him.
“Yeah. Not feeling very good,” Mason relplied.
“Okay, I’ll tell mom. Talk to ya later,” Steven said before hanging up.
Mason sighed deeply, causing him to couch for real. He dropped the phone back down on its receiver, and the secratary said, “Wait over there if your parents are coming,” as she pointed at a red couch near her desk.
“Thank you,” Mason said in barely a whisper, lowering himself down onto the couch and waiting for a good twenty minutes until he saw his mother come into the office, followed by Steven.
“Honey, Steven told me you called and weren’t feeling well,” his mother said, coming over to Mason and helping him up from his seat.
“Yeah, I did call,” Mason nodded, trying to look sleepy. “Started feeling sick after lunch today.”
“Well, let’s get you home, then!” his mother sighed, seeming worried about her son. She went over to the secratary’s desk and signed Mason out of school, then walked out of the office.
Mason was going to follow her when Steven got next to him and said, “You really aren’t sick, are you?”
“Nope,” Mason said, smiling a little and resting his arm around his brother’s shoulders as the rwo walked out of the office. “But I gotta ask you a big favor…”

12

Chapter 9~
“You need me to do what?” Steven asked later that night. After getting home, thier mom had really bought into Mason’s sick act and shoveled medicine down his throat and forcing him to go to sleep. Now it was nearing late afternoon, and Mason and Steven were in the living room, watching The F List on Fuse.
“I told you, I need your help!” Mason said, glancing at the Avenged Sevenfold video playing in the TV every now and again out of the corner of his eye. “Look, you remember when I came home that one day because I was drunk off my ass, right?”
Steven nodded, his chin resting in his palm as he leaned forward from his seat on the ground. “What about it?”
“Well, it was all because of that Truth or Dare game I was telling you about earlier. And now I really wanna stop it before it can get out of hand and crap. But I can’t come up with a plan to do that alone, so I need your help!”
Steven, who had the remote in his hand now and was flipping through the channels, looked like he was taking this into consideration. “Well, what makes you think I’m reallly going to help you?” he asked finally, smirking a little.
“Wha-?” Mason asked, caught off guard. He had fully expected Steven to agree right off the bat.
“Yeah. Why should I help you?” Steven asked, still smriking with a small devious glint sparkling through his blue eyes.
“Steven, I don’t have time for this!” Mason sighed, getting irritated. “Just please help, then I won’t ask you for anymore favors!” He wasn’t really sure if that was true, but he would say anything if it meant getting Steven’s help.
“Well, I guess I could,” Steven shrugged, fiddling around with the zipper on his navy blue sweatshirt. “Just depends on what I have to do.”
Mason was geting ready to explain what Steven had to do for him, but got a better idea. “Here, why don’t I show you instead?” He grabbed Steven’s arm, lifting him up from the ground and dragging him out the front door and all the way down the street.

"All right, why are we here?" Steven asked, his teeth chattering as a gust of fall wind flooded over him. Mason had dragged his brother down here, and now they were standing outside Rosewood High's auditorium doors, trying to stay silent until it felt safe enough to actually go inside. 
"Because," Mason said, eyeing the door intently. "I want you to see what I really need yor help with right now. Ya know, just so you get it."
"Why can't you just tell me?" Steven whimpered, his arms wrapped tightly around him to keep warm. "It would sure beat standing out here in the freezing cold!"
"Look, just quit your whining and keep quiet!" Mason snapped, litfing his leg behind him as he pressed his ear to the auditorium door and kicking his brother in the knee.
"Ow!" Steven yelped, jumping back and clutching his knee. He hissed in pain, then looked up at Mason. "You know, it really isn't too late for me to back out of this..."
Mason bit his lip and cursed under his breath. "Sorry I kicked you, okay? Just please be quiet! Please!" He hoped his tone of voice made him sound needy and almost helpless.
Steven rolled his eyes and scoffed. "Whatever. Can we just go in now? Freaking freezing my ass over here..."
"Yeah, just be sure to be to stay as quiet as you can!" Mason said, his hand reaching out to grab the door handle. Slowly to make sure it wouldn't make too much noise, he pulled at the door open and poked his head inside the auditorium. Nothing but the soft chatter of kids on the stage, which was concealed carefuly behind gold curtains.
Mason crept inside, motioning his brother in with his hand. Steven walked in silently behind him, looking around him. "Lucky. Your guys' gym is cool!" he said almost too loudly.
Mason cringed and whipped around to face Steven. "You moron, I said be-" He was immediatly interepted by a swift movement behind the curtain and a female voice saying, "Hey, who's out there?"
"Dammit!" Mason and Steven exclaimed at the exact same time. Mason's panic started building up as loud footsteps echoed off the walls, the noise sounding like they were descending down the steps that lead to the stage and coming closer to them.
"Quick, hide!" Mason hissed, blindly pushing his brother. Steven yelped, tumbling down the aisle that seperated two rows of seats. "Hurry!" Mason said again. Steven scrammbled to hide behind a row of seats as the footsteps grew nearer.
'Man, gotta hide! Gotta hide NOW!' Mason thought frantically, his heart beating out of his chest as he looked around. The person was getting closer and closer every second...
Giving up, Mason threw himself over the back row of seats, landing in the same row of seats Steven hide behind. Breathing heavily, he stopped and listened to see if the person was still around.
"Dude, you're sitting on me!" Steven groaned, squirming from underneath Mason.  Mason shushed him, holding his breath as he listened closely for any signs of movement.
"Who's out here? 'Cause I WILL find you!" the girl shouted. Her footsteps seemed to grow even closer to Mason and Steven when another voice emerged from the stage. "Natalie, who are you talking to out here?"
Mason gasped a little louder than he had intended when he heard who it was, It was Jared, only he sounded kinda weird. In fact, he sounded really weird. His voice seemed hollow and far away, most of his words slurred.
"I-I thought I heard someone out here..." Natalie told him, her voice getting more distant as she walked back down the aisle and toward the stage.
"Man, you really should lay off the weed right now, 'cause I don't hear anything!" Jared said, his laughter fading away as he and Natalie left back onto the stage. Now Mason and Steven were both surprised.
"Man..." Steven breathed, struggling so Mason would get off him. "Are the seriously smokin' weed back there?"
"Dunno," Mason sighed. He tried his hardest to sound not bummed out about it, but there was no hiding it, really. He felt his brother squirming from underneath him, so he slid off Steven and silently got to his feet. He grabbed Steven's arm and oulled him up, glancing back over at the stage. They were both quiet for a minute when Steven broke the silence. "Should probably get home, huh?"
Mason stole another quick look at the stage, then shrugged. "Sure."
He and Steven walked out of the auditorium in a state of silence, wandering off the school grounds and down the street back to thier house. But as they neared thier street, Steven turned and looked up at his brother. "Well, at least I know what I'm dealing with now when I help you..."
Mason sighed thorugh his nose. "Yeah, I guess so. But any plan we come up with needs to be really good, ya know? I wanna be able to stop this whole thing in one attempt."
Thier house was now in view as Steven chuckled a little and a slight smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "Well, if that's how you're feeling, then it's 'bout time you buckle down and get focused, 'cause something tells me it's gonna be preety tough bringing this girl down..."
13

Chapter 10~
“Man, Mason. You should’ve been there yesterday!” Jared exclaimed the next day ay school. It was first period History, and, as usual, Jared and Mason were seated in the very back row together. But today, the only freaking thing Jared could talk about was Natalie and her stupid game.
“Yeah, I heard you the last seven times,” Mason replied through tightly clenched teeth. He was about one more story about yesterday away from wringing Jared’s pathetic, scrawny neck.
“Gentlemen!” There was a loud bang from the front of the class and the two boys shot thier heads up to see thier History teacher glaring at him, a long ruler in his hand that he had used to bang his desk. “The classroom is a place for learning. Now I suggest you pay attention!”
As the teacher turned his back on the class to scrawl some notes down on the white board, Jared instantly lifted his hand up and stuck his middle finger up in the air in the teacher’s direction. Mason saw this and uted up laughing. Now that was the old, normal Jared he had known and loved since fourth grade.
“That’s it! Enough out of you!” the teacher snapped suddenly, turning to scowl at the boys. “Detention, both of you! After school!” Before he turned back to writing on the board, he tunred back to look at Jared. “And don’t think I didn’t see that little hand gesture of yours, Mr. Triller!”
Jared’s cheeks flushed red while the rest of the kids around him giggled into thier palms. Mason, on the other hand, had his face buried in his arms, laughing so hard it sounded like he was crying.
“Mr. Rivers, that’s two after school detentions!” the teacher shouted, his face flushing out of outrage and fury. “I refuse to tolerate this sort of behavior!”
“'Kay, my bad,” Mason said, still smiling while trying to force his laughter down.
The teacher refused to say any more. Instead, he turned swiftly back to the white board and continued on with his speech about God-knows-what.
When the teacher went back to what he was doing, Mason reached down into his binder and grabbed his notebook, flipping through the pages with his thumb until he came upon the one page thay was covered in his and Steven’s idenical, loopy handwriting. When they had gotten home last night, they had immediatly went to Mason’s room and began trying to devise thier put-a-stop-to-Natalie plan. But seeing how Steven only had Mason’s explanations and descriptions of Natalie to know about her, they haden’t a whole lot done.
“Well, if what you’re telling me is true,” Steven had said last nigh. “I’m telling you now, to be able to really take her down, you need to get her to trust you. You know, get inside her head. Then you do something that’ll stop her!” Mason had completely agreed with this statement. But other than that, they haden’t managed to think of anything else for thier plan.
“Uh, Mason? You there?” Mason’s thoughts were interupted with a start by Jared, who was frantically moving his hand in front of Mason’s blank eyes. “We gotta go to Literature, like, now… The bell just rang…”
“Uh, right. 'Course we do…” Mason nodded blankly, gathering up his books and getting out of his desk, hastily following Jared out of the classroom and down the hall to thier next class.
“Hey, you feeling al; right?” Jared asked with a hint of concern as they walked into Literature and sat at thier desks, which were in the very back row.
“Yeah,” Mason replied, setting his books down under his desk and sitting down. “Why?”
“Dunno,” Jared shrugged, snickering a little as he sat. “You looked like you were tweaking out a little, like you were high or something!” He threw his head back and laughed.
Mason felt his insides freeze up. His mind did an automatic flash back to yesterday, knowing for a fact that Jared and the others had smoked weed and gotten high. He felt Jared eyeing him suspiciously and Mason wiped the semi-shocked expression off of his face while resisiting the urge to say, “You’re one to know about getting high!” at Jared.
Jared just kept staring at him for a few more seconds, then shook his head and looked down at his desk, where he was doodling little pictures all over the surface.
Mason sighed discreetly, then rested his head down in his arms. He had a feeling this was going to be one long day.

14

Chapter 11~
“Do we have to do it now?” Mason whined. Just as he had thought, the school day had passed slowly, like someone had hit a slow motion button on his life, and everywhere he had went, talk of the up-coming dance followed him. It had been bugging him all day, and now he was at home, sitting at his bedroom desk and listening to New Found Glory on his stereo while working at his History homework.
“Yeah, we have to do it now!” Steven said, pressing the stop button on Mason’s stereo.
“Hey, c’mon! I listening to that!” Mason protested.
Steven ignored him completely. “I thought you wanted to stop this whole game thing fast!”
“I do,” Mason replied without looking up from his paper. “But in case you haven’t noticed, I’m kinda busy!”
“Oh my God, this is coming from the same guy who burned his ninth grade English homework in the fireplace because he sayed it was gay and wouldn’t help him in the real world!” Steven retorted almost defiantly.
Mason opened his mouth to say something in defense but laughed instead. He remembered doing that last year, clear as day.
After a few more silent seconds, Mason slammed his History book shut with his homework paper sticking out of it. “All right, let’s just get it over with, I guess…”
Steven nodded and shrugged at the same time. “All right, come on, we can work in my room this time.”
Mason furrowed his eyebrows. “Why not in here?” he asked, even though he honestly didn’t care.
“Well, for one, it smells like a dead goat,” Steven said, waving the air in front of his nose for effect.
Mason shook his head despite the fact that that statement was very true. “Whatever, I don’t even care what room we go to as long as we just get it done!” he said, trudging behind Steven as the exited his room and walked down the hall to Steven’s room.
When they reached Steven’s door, Mason reached out to turn the doorknob when Steven snatched his hand away from it.
“No way,” he said, shaking his head. “Gotta make sure Carl’s in his cage first…”
“Who?” Mason said, trying to grip the doorknob again. But Steven stood in his way.
“You can’t see him!” Steven whisper-yelled. “Mom can’t know about Carl!”
“Who the flip is Carl?!” Mason muttered back, looking quickly over his shoulder to make sure thier mom wasn’t there.
Steven bit his lower lip, his hand grasping the doorknob behind him. “I don’t know if I should tell you,” he said, hastily.
Mason elbowed his brother out of the way. “Come on, Steven,” he chuckled, pushing the door open and taking a few steps inside. “Whatever you’re hiding can’t possibly be-”
Mason stopped mid-sentence when he felt himself step on something a little slippery. Mason looked down to see what he had stummbled over only to have his breath stop short at the sight, because slithering around on the cluttered, messy rug of Steven’s room, squirmed a long, black, scaley snake.
“St-Steven…” Mason gasped, backing away with his eyes bulging out of his head. “What…the hell…is that thing doing in here?!”
“Shut up! Stay quiet, you retard!” Steven snapped, kneeling down by the snake and gathering it up into his arms.
Mason was speechless. “Why do you have a snake in your room?” he asked, unable to tear his eyes away from the creature sliding along his younger brother’s shoulders.
“Mason, meet Carl,” Steven said, smiling proudly. When Mason didn’t reply, he added, “I found him near the canal the other day and thought we might be able to use him in our plan…”
“How would we use a freaking snake to stop Natalie?!” Mason asked, resisting the urge to shout. “Sick the snake on her?”
Steven shrugged. “That wasn’t what I had in mind, but that isn’t a bad idea…”
Mason shook his head slowly back and forth. “Get rid of it,” he said. “We can’t use a snake for what we’re planning. Plus, if mom finds it, she’ll freak out on the both of us!”
Steven stared sulkily down at Carl, who was now wound around his right elbow. “But I’ve already gotten attached to him,” he told Mason sadly.
“I know that, but still. You can’t have a snake hiding out in your room like this!” Mason said to him. He just wanted his brother to get Carl out of here as quick as possible; snakes were up there with horses and cats when it came to his, “Animals I Wish I Could Strangle Everytime I See One,” list.
“I know I can’t, but I’m going to anyway!” Steven said firmly, taking Carl and setting him back in his cage, which Steven had to have found on the street, because it was dirty and the metal on the top of it was mangled and rusted.
“I’m telling you, you shouldn’t do it,” Mason replied, crossing his arms over his chest while giving Steven a last chance to get rid of the snake and save the both of them from getting in huge trouble.
Steven pretended like he haden’t heard Mason and set Carl back down gently into his peice-of-crap cage. “For now, just pretend like he’s not here, okay?”
Mason wanted so badly to protest more, but he decided against it and sat himself down on the end of Steven’s bed. “All right, if we’re going to get some plan thoughts down, we oughta do it now.”
Steven grinned, and swiped a blue notebook that was sitting on his nightstand, sitting down on his bed. “Fine by me.”

15

Chapter 12~
“Jared! I have to ask you something!” Mason said Wednesday before school. After an hour or two of contemplating and strategizing, Mason and his brother had come up with something: the next game was the night of the dance. Mason would get to the stage twenty minutes before everyone else and get himself looking wasted. Then, right before Natalie and the others got there, Steven would call the school security and they would come and find Mason basically tipsy, and he would blame Natalie for giving him the alcohol. Obvious enough, she would deny the whole thing, so then Steven would come running into the auditorium, explaining how he had seen the whole thing. This way, she would probably be forced to transfer-which wasn’t what Mason and Steven had intended to happen in the first place, but hey, whatever happens happens- and everything would be nice and normal again.
Mason was still sprinting across the front lawn, his bookbag falling off his shoulder every now and again as he neared Jared, who was sitting on the school’s front steps with Travis and Peter. Even though most of the plan was confirmed, he just had to make sure the next game was during the dance and at what exact time they would be on the stage, so that he had enough time to make himself look convincing enough for Natalie to get booted out of the school. And when his friends were regular attenders to the dumb games, it was pretty conveniant ro just ask them!
“What do you want?” Jared asked when Mason finally got to them. He was perched on the highest step, flipping through his Biology book without even really looking at it.
“I just wanted to ask-” mason panted, but got cut off before he could go on.
“Dude, where were you yesterday?” Peter interupted. He was sitting on the stone ledge next to the steps, listening to Halifax on his iPod.
“Huh? What’re you talking about?” Masson asked him, genuinly confused.
“You said that you’d come and meet us over at my place, but you never showed,” Travis told him, sitting on the same step as Jared. “So we were stuck at my house for at least three hours, calling your cell. But no answer…”
“Oh… I-I don’t remember making plans at all…” Mason stammered, feeling like an idiot.
“I’m not surprised. You’ve been blowing us off a lot more lately. What’s your deal, anyway?” Jared said, sounding annoyed and kinda upset at the same time.
“It’s just that I’ve been busy and stuff,” Mason lied, kicking himself for not coming up for a better excuse then that.
“Like? Since when are you busy with anything?” Peter acussed, yanking his headphones away from his Dumbo-like ears.
Mason stayed silent, not even trying to come up with any more lies. No way talking himself out of this one.
“Seriously, if you really are ‘busy’, then can’t you at least tell us that instead of telling us one thing and then not being able to back it up?” Jared sighed. Then he got to his feet, snatched his backpack, then walked into the school building. Not exactly wanting to be alone with Mason at that moment, Peter and Travis followed him.
Mason watched them go, then sat himself down, cusing under his breath. ‘Well, this is great,’ he thought bitterly, watching a group of uperclassmen swinging off of the strong, thick branches of the tree in the front lawn. ‘I really need to know this information, and fast. Things are only getting worse…’ He knew he should be more concerned about Jared and the guys and how he really wasn;t acting like a friend to them very much, but all he really cared about right now was getting this plan finished so he could go back to acting like a friend.
“Gotta find out the time of the game,” he mused to himself quietly, running his hands through his hair. But since his friends (and only real sources) had bailed on his, he had to find someone else. Too bad all the other “sources” he could use were complete losers in Mason’s case.
‘There has to be someone!’ he thought miserably. And at that moment, that’s when spotted her: Brown hair blowing in the wind. Tall, slouchy pousture. Golden eyes that flickered with mischief. The last person he wanted to talk to-Natalie.
“Oh, God. I don’t wanna have to talk to her!” he said to himself, his eyes still following her. “I’m not that desperate…”
‘Yes, yes you are,’ a nagging little voice in the back of his head told him.
Mason shut his eyes and shook his head in response to the little voice.
‘Just go and talk to her,’ the voice continued. ‘You know you want toooooo…’
“Okay, I’ll go!” Mason shouted out suddenly, causing a group of senior girls to whip thier heads around and give him weird looks.
Mason blushed slightly and got up from his seat, ignoring thier stares as he let himself be dragged over to Natalie, who was on her way over to the school building.
“Uh, hi…” Mason mummbled incoherently when he was face-to-face with her. His tongue felt thick and dry in his mouth, making his words sound like slurred gibberish.
Natalie’s infamous smirk came to her lips. “Mason,” she replied. Long strands of tangled hair whipped around her shoulders. “Kinda nice to see you again.” To Mason’s surprise, she sounded sincere.
“Wish I could say the same about you,” Mason said back, meaning every word. He dug his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans. Just looking at her made him feel like he wanted to puke.
“Hm, clever,” Natalie retorted, still smriking. “Now what’d you want?”
“Uhhh…” Mason stalled. He had almost forgot what he’d even came over here for. “I, uh, needed to know what time you guys are having your next game and whatever…”
Natalie furrowed her thin eyebrows together. “But you hate Truth or dare,” she observed. “At least, you hate the way I play it. So why would you wanna know?”
“Can you please just tell me?” Mason grumbled, not wanting to breath the same air that Natalie was breathing. It was making his stomach churn.
“It’s at 7:30, during the dance, if you have to know,” Natalie said. “We’ll be on the stage, same as always.”
Mason sighed. Getting the needed information was like having a weight lifted off his chest. “Great, thanks,” she said hurridley, then turned on his heel to walk away. But he felt a hand placing itself on his shoulder before he could get very far. He turned around to see Natalie smiling at him.
“Y’know, it’d be kinda cool to have you there…” she told him softly, gazing into his shocked blue eyes with her slightly embarassed brown ones.
‘What the hell?!’ Mason thought. His face involuntarily flushed red and he shook Natalie’s hand off of his shoulder. “Um, okay,” he stuttered, turning his back on her quickly and walking as fast as he could without tripping back into the school building.
As he pushed and shoved his way down the hall to his locker, Mason couldn’t help but panic a little. ‘Okay was she like, flirting with me?’ he thought, pulling his locker open once he got to it and rummaging through it. Mason shuddered." The fact that Natalie might possibly like him gave him the chills.
“Well, I don’t think she’ll be into me when I’m done with her,” he told himself quietly so no one else could hear. And with that, he grabbed his books for his first three periods and set off for homeroom.

16

Chapter 13~
Back at home, Mason was laying on his back on his bed, Plus 44 blaring through the headphones glued to his ears and slowly drifting in and out of sleep. The book he was supposed to be reading for English was left uncracked on his bedside table.
“I wake up at the end of the long, dark lonely year. It’s bringing out the worst in me-” Mason hummed along to the song, staring up at his blank white ceiling with his cell phone resting on his stomach. When he had gotten home, he had gone straight to his room and grabbed his cell to call Jared, but then he had decided it was better not to piss his friends off even more. Then he had thought maybe he should call, to explain himself. But that would mean telling the guys about what he was planning to do, and-
Mason’s cell phone rang loudly, snapping him out of his stressed-out daze. He tore his headphones off his ears and grabbed the ringing phone and flipped it open without bothering to check the display screen to see who was even calling.
“Hello?” he asked, half wishing it was Jared, Travis, or Peter.
“Hey, dude,” Jared said on the other line. He sounded almost sad.
Startled, Mason got up from his bed and started pacing back and forth on his hardwood floor. “So, uh… what’s up?” he blurt out finally.
Jared sighed deeply. “Why didn’t you tell me you were gonna think of something so Natalie wouldn’t have her games anymore? I just found this out today, after school.”
Heat crept up through Mason’s neck and cheeks and he gulped nervously. Busted.
There was an awkward silence between the two for what seemed like forever when Jared said, “Seriously, though. I don’t get why you didn’t say anything to me.”
“Because I knew you actually like the games and stuff and I thought if I told you, you would tell Natalie and God knows how I would end up then,” Mason explained quickly. He was still pacing back and forth frantically.
Another short, awkward silence. “Why would you think I would do that?”
Mason shrugged to himself. “I dunno. I guess I was all paranoid and stuff.” The more he talked out his pent-up secrets, the less stressed he felt.
“Well, if you need help with your little take-down, I’m in,” Jared announced.
“Huh? Really?” Mason asked, squinting his eyes.
“Definetely. After the first game we went to and got wasted and crap, I told myself I wouldn’t go back. But then Natalie came over to my house over the weekend and said she’d pay me to keep coming back and telling all of our friends to go, too.”
“Wha-?” Mason said, dumbfounded. That made her sound like a complete whacko. Then again, what else did he expect from her?
“I know, I thought it was pretty stupid, too,” Jared continued. " At first, I told her no, and that’s when she said she’d pay me for sure. But you wanna know what’s even crazier? She paid me extra to try and get you to keep coming."
Now this caught Mason right off guard. He immediatly stopped pacing, lowering himself down onto his bed. “Are you kidding?” he asked, leaning his elbows down onto his bent knees. Jared had always been a pretty big jokster; he was probably just saying that to freak him out.
“For once, I’m not,” Jared said. “She said, and I quote, ‘And, if you tell that friend of yours, Mason, to keep coming, I’ll pay you double.’”
“Dang,” Mason mutttered, running his left hand through his hair. “So, how much did she pay you?” He was getting desperate to change the subject a little.
“Five dollars a day since last Friday,” Jared answered simply, like it was nothing.
“Jeez, so she was willing to pay you that much every day just so she could get people to come to her loser-fest?” Mason laughed. “Wow, guess she really is crazy.”
Jared laughed a little, too. “Guess so.”
“So, how much did she pay extra to get me to come?” Mason questioned, finding himself eager for an answer.
“Well, uh…” Jared stuttered nervously. “You could say she payed me in a different way than money…”
Mason nodded, feeling a little sick all of a sudden because he had a feeling he knew how Natalie had “payed” him.
“You gonna kiss and tell or what?” Mason asked finally, laughing and trying to fight the sick feeling in his stomach.
“Uh, I’d rather not get into it,” Jared answered sheepishly. “I was still hungover when it happened. I’m pretty sure that was the only reason I actually let her do it.”
“I would hope so,” Mason replied, laying down on the bed on his back. He drummed his fingers on his leg.
“Well, like I said, if you need any extra help, I’m here,” Jared reminded Mason.
“Do Travis and Peter know 'bout it?” Mason asked.
“Yeah, I told them about it when I found out like, two days ago and they’re willing to put in their share of help if they need to,” Jared said. In the background, Mason could hear the shattering sound of something breaking.
“Uh-oh…” Jared said over the phone, sounding guilty. “Uh, I think I just broke that vase. Here, I gotta go, man. Talk to you later!” he said in a hurry before hanging up quickly.
Mason hung up too, then tossed his cell phone to the side. He breathed in deeply, staring up at his ceiling once more and getting his thoughts straight. So Jared knew about his plan, and was even willing to help? And all the time he had thought Jared and his friends were slaves to the game, they were just faking it?
He sat up and shook his head, getting up from where he sat and walking over to his bedroom door, throwing it open. Things were only getting weirder from here.
After a very short walk down the hall, down the stairs, and into the living room, Mason found Steven on the beat up brown tweed couch sitting lumpily in front of the TV, watching Jackass on MTV2 with thier overweight Bloodhound, Maxie, laying sprawled out on the stained white rug near the couch.
“Jared knows,” Mason announced shortly, plopping down on the couch next to Steven, watching on Johnny Knoxville make a total ass out of himself on the TV.
Steven’s huge blue eyes widened even more and he turned to Mason. “You told?” he asked accusingly.
“I didn’t tell him anything,” Mason answered, shrugging. “But he found out somehow. But he said that if we need any help, we’ve got his support.”
Steven furrowed his eyebrows. “Why would he want to help us, though?”
Mason sighed, then thoroughly re-told the whole phone conversation to Steven.
When Mason was finished, Steven leaned back into his seat on the couch and shook his hair from his eyes. “You said that Natalie girl was pretty weird, but I didn’t know you meant that weird.”
Mason nodded in agreement. He stretched his arms up over his head and glanced up at the red, round clock hanging on the plain white wall to his right. It wasn’t very late.
“Well, see ya later,” Mason said to his brother, then stood up from the couch and started back up to his room. Who knew, maybe he would actually start that book he was supposed to read for one of his classes.

17

Chapter 14~
After talking to Jared Wednesday evening, Mason felt more at ease at school on Thursday. His classes seemed to fly by, and the fact that his friends were actually talking to him again made him even less stressed. By the time school was over on Friday, the day of the dance, he felt relaxed and normal, like he had before all the nonsense that had been going on lately. And it felt great.
“Well, tonight’s the night,” Mason sighed, walking down the street that his house was on. Jared walked a few paces behind him on their way home.
“Yeah. I hope everything goes the way you and Steven planned it,” Jared replied earnestly, hitching up the straps on his backpack as they kept walking.
“I hope so, too,” Mason said quietly, more to himself than to Jared.
“Well, this where I get off!” Jared said, turning left and walking up the green lawn of his white and blue one-story house. He waved to Mason over his shoulder. “See ya tonight!”
“See ya!” Mason called back and kept walking. He took a breath of cold, fresh air, trying to ignore the stray, dry Fall leaves that hit him in the face while he walkeddown the still, quiet street and up to his own house.
“Hey, I’m home!” Mason yelled softly, pushing the front door to his home open and walking into the living room. His mom was sitting in her armchair, reading a leather bound book that was rotting and falling apart. Her thick, wiry black hair hung limp around her long face and wire-rimmed reading glasses masked her bleary blue eyes. Mason noticed for basically the first time in his life that his mom looked pretty old for being forty-six years old.
His mom looked up from her book and smiled softly. “Hi, honey,” she crooned. “How was school?”
“Good,” Mason said mechanically, walking over to the hall and up near the stairs.
“What’s your hurry?” his mom called after him.
“Uh, homework?” Mason replied, but it came out sounding more like a question than a statement.
There was a silence, then his mom said, Okay, then…"
Mason went up the rest of the remaining steps and went straight to his room. He shut his door behind him, dumping his bag into the nearest corner of his room. Homework? Yeah, right…
It was three-thirty right now. He had three hours until he could sabotage Natalie and could get everyone back to normal after the crazy week they had all had. Yesterday, he and Steven had put the final touches on thier whole plan: Mason would go into the dance and Steven would stay hidden in the auditorium until 7:15, then Mason would sneak out of the dance and go into the auditorium, go up on stage, and guzzle one or two beers just so he would be drunk enough to convince school security. He could act out the rest. Then Steven would call the school security and tell them to hurry down to the auditorium because of a “big emergency” by then, Natalie and her gang of idiots would be there, and the security would catch her there with Mason. Natalie would deny any accusations, and that’s when Steven would rush in, explaining how he had seen the whole thing. With a plan like that, they just couldn’t lose.
After half an hour, Mason found himself standing in front of his mirror, staring back at his reflection. His black hair was spiked up still and his blue eyes looked bright. Tired, but still bright. And he had changed out of his clothes from earlier that day and now wore a black collared shirt with long sleeves, faded light blue jeans, and white and black Vans that were covered in dirt but he decided to wear anyway.
“Hope it goes well,” was all he could say.

18

Chapter 15~
After nearly two hours of waiting anxiously, it was finally six o’ clock, time for Mason and Steven to head down to the dance. As the two brothers walked out of the house and down the quiet street, Steven asked, “Why didn’t we just ask mom for a ride?”
“Because she can’t know that you’re coming with me,” Mason answered, shivering when a wave of chilly air hit him. “She’d know something was up.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Steven shrugged.They walked without speaking for the rest of the way until the dark silheuotte of the school grounds came into view. The setting sun sat like a fat, glowing orb in the orange-pink sky behind the school building, giving it an empty, abandoned look from far away.
Mason and Steven came through the school’s front gates and began walking off in the direction of the auditroium. The grounds around them were basically empty because everyone was in the gym already except for a few parents’ cars in the parking lot that were dropping off thier kids last minute.
“Okay, now here’s what you’re going to do,” Mason instructed. They were both standing outside the chipped double doors of the auditorium. “You’re gonna go inside, and go up on the stage and part the curtains a little, so you’ll be able to see me when I’m up there, okay? And while you’re up there, set the beer up there.” Mason paused. “You do have the beer, right?”
“Right here,” Steven nodded, holding up a big black tote bag with a six pack of Budweiser, stolen from their basement from when there dad had still been around.
“Good. Just set that up on the stage where I can see it when you go up there,” Mason further instructed. “After that, just go and find a place to hide where no one can see you, and make sure you can see the stage okay.”
“Got it, sir!” Steven said with enthusiasm, saluting his brother just for fun.
Mason nodded, then retrieved a silver and gold watch that he’d had since sixth grade and handed it to Steven. “Keep this to keep track of time, 'kay?” he said, and Steven nodded.
Mason sighed and dug his hands into his pockets. “Man, Steven,” he sighed. “I gotta say, I probably couldn’t have done much of this without your help…” He scratched the back of his neck, feeling kinda awkward.
Steven shrugged and smiled. “Hey, anything to help out in a time of need,” he said, still smiling.
Mason smiled back, then ruffled his brother’s already-mussed-up hair. “Good luck,” he said before leaving his brother at the auditorium and walking off in the direction of the gym, which was only a short walk away.
“Good luck to you, too!” Steven yelled after him, and Mason felt a knot of appreciation in his stomach. They would need all the luck they could get tonight.

19

Can I just ask what the plot is? Can I have a synopsis or something?

I’m trying to stay interested while reading it, but I haven’t a clue what is going on.

20

Um, if you’ve read and payed attention to the whole thing, then you should get it, but whatever:

So there’s this sixteen-year-old sophomore named Mason Rivers, who attends Rosewood High in the town of Rosewood(not a real town), CA. He’s quiet, pretty easygoing, and popular. So when his best friend, Jared Triller, comes to him and tells him about a big school game of Truth or Dare that most of the underclassmen are going to, Mason thinks he should go. After all, he’s got a rep to keep.

But when he, Jard, and thier two friends, Travis Wretcher and Peter Brook attend the game, the girl who runs it all, Natalie Fisher, gets them all drunk off thier ass so the game will prove to be more interesting. Mason and his friends end up getting poisoned from the alcohol.

Mason by this time is 100% against Natliae and her game. But what scares him is that the rest of the game-goers(including his best friends) are in love with the game and keep going. Mason doesn;t liek this and is certain Natlaie is up to no good, so with the help of his twelve-year-old brother, Steven, he sets out to come up with a way to put an end to the game so things can go back to normal.

There, was that a good summary? :slight_smile: