Blake “the Snake” Sloan and Friends

We stayed up talking about things that happened at school the past week. Jeff “The Nose” said that Ross and Lacey were going steady. I asked him how he knew that. He laughed and said he had a nose for things like that. Then Slo-Mo reported he saw the principal kiss his teacher. We all looked and reminded him that they are married. The Mackster looked at Sy and said “you really are slow aren’t you!” They turned to me and asked if I had any news. At first I couldn’t think of anything really exciting that happened. But then I remembered we got a new student in our class room and her name was Rose. As I said this, all three of them stopped and looked at me and began asking all kinds of questions. “I’ve heard about her! “The Nose” exclaimed. “I hear that she’s a looker”, added The Mackster. “I can verify that she is indeed”, I said. “What is her name again”, asked Slo-Mo. I told them that she came from Hawaii. I related that she has really nice shiny dark hair and shiny dark eyes to match. “Man, you’re lucky that you have such a looker in your class”, said The Mackster. Not only is she in my class but she lives just three blocks from here. “No way”, said The Nose. “Oh, yeah …way”, I said back to him. About that time mom opened the back door, leaned out and said for us to get ready for lights out. She turned off the back porch flood light and told us good night. Dad added that he wanted our lights out within 30 minutes. “Yes sir”, we all chimed back. At 11:00 dad stuck his head into the RV and reminded us that it was time for lights out. We all crawled into our places and after the lights went out we said good night to my dad. Well, we continued our conversation for about 30 minutes longer…and it all centered around Rose. Then Slo-Mo got a brilliant idea. “Let’s sneak over to her house”, he blurted. “No!” We all said at once. “Come on. Let’s do”, Slo-Mo came back with. After a few more back and forths we got out of bed, got out of our pj’s and put back on our clothes. We eased out of the RV very quietly. I asked if everyone had their walkie talkies and Slo-Mo slithered back into the RV and obtained his. About a half block down the street I gathered us all together. I reminded them to keep their Talkies on low volume and keep them close to their ears when talking over them. A few more blocks and I pointed to Rose’s house. “That’s the one…I think”, I said as we edged a little closer. We hunkered down between some bushes that were across the street from her house. Some lights were still on and we could see movement going on inside. We were very intent on our observing when we heard footsteps coming in our direction that couldn’t have been more than 20 feet from us. Our heads turned toward each other and we all put our fore finger to our lips so as to remind each other not to say a word. The footsteps stopped about 10 feet away. It was my mom and my dad. They talked for a short while, and then went on by and then across and down the street. That was a close one I stated after they got out of sight. I guess they were out for a late stroll I told my buds. We huddled and decided to meet in the alley in the back of Rose’s house. This we did with each of us leaving 15 seconds apart from each other from out of the bushes. One by one we gathered again at the designated place…Slo-Mo was last to arrive. “Guys, we have a problem”. I stated. The concern was that the fence was too high for us to see over. Heads together; we planned to scale the fence. I had to explain to Slo-Mo that to scale the fence meant that we had to climb over it. Well we did, climb over the fence that is. The back yard was bushy and had three tall trees in it. I flashed on my flashlight and then quickly back off. I did that so we could orientate ourselves to our surroundings. Each of us took a position and waited. Shortly, I heard coming from my talkie … “This is The Nose…I see movement.” We all relayed back through the talkies and confirmed the same. The Mackster then reported that someone was approaching the back sliding door. “It’s Rose”, I stated back. Rose slid open the back door and spoke to someone as she said “go on Lady…do your thing”. At that second a large black and white spotted barking dog came rushing out. Four boys got a lesson and experienced their first heart attack that night. But no time for that as we scrambled around the yard trying frantically to find the back fence. I heard “The Nose” say he was wrapped up and being eaten by a snake. I flashed my light toward his direction and saw that he was tangled up in a garden hose… “not a snake”, I firmly stated. I continued toward the fence and was about half way over it when I saw my three friends open the back gate, run through it, and into the alley. A man came running out as I dropped my flashlight and bounded down the backside of the fence and onto the hard alley ground. It was easy to see which way the others had ran…I just followed the dust to the street. After that I followed the smell of …well…you know, the burning of shoe rubber on asphalt. It didn’t take me long to catch up with them. Well we made it back to the RV safe but not too sound. I had to listen to them whine about how I almost got them killed. I reminded them that it was Slo-Mo’s big idea to go over there and not mine. Then The Nose started in on his nearly being eaten… “Yeah, by a garden hose”… I reminded him. “Would you guys like some cheese with your whining”, I stated. That got us all to laughing and finally we went to sleep. The next morning at breakfast my mom and dad asked us what was going on at about midnight in the RV last night. We all looked at each other and said “what do you mean?” They explained that they heard us talking up a storm. “Oh, well, we thought we heard something outside”, we said…”it must have been a bear”, The Mackster blurted out. “Aactually… I think it was a raccoon”, I quickly recovered as I motioned to him when my parents weren’t looking. “Oh, is that all”, my dad said…”I’m glad it wasn’t a lion or a Sea Turtle. Well, anyway, I hope you guys had a fun time”, he said. At school on Monday, Rose came up to me and handed me something and said, “I think this belongs to you?” I looked at what she gave me and it was a flashlight that had my name engraved on the side of it. I looked up and she was looking at me. Our eyes met and we grinned …and then we laughed. After school I met up with my buds at the usual corner at the end of the school grounds. I told them that I talked to Rose. With clenched fists in my face, they immediately reminded me that I was not to say anything about our Friday night adventure. I backed away and as they lowered their fists I said, “too late for that”. I then showed them the flashlight that I had dropped while on our adventure. “She gave it to me this morning”, I hurriedly stated. I showed them my name on the side of the flashlight…then they understood.