cosmicfalloutwrites-blog

[cosmicfalloutwrites-blog]

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Credit to @awritingpromptaday​ for this prompt: “The birds and the lizards have a plan.” This was written so long ago that I don’t remember the prompt number, sorry! I think I expected myself to remember…

Anyway, story under the cut. Totally unbeta’d and written in one sitting.

“I think the birds and the lizards have a plan,” Benny says through a mouthful of peanut butter and pickles and toasted bread.

“What?” I pull out an earbud and let it hang down the front of my shirt. Benny is hogging the fan and the porch swing, and I wish we had some popsicles, even the shitty kind that turn your tongue different colors, but we don’t.

He chews, swallows, (how can he eat that shit? Peanut butter and pickles were meant to exist separately), repeats himself. “I think the birds and the lizards have a plan.”

I scoff. “Yeah, right, dude. Like what, eating the living fuck out of your ma’s garden? Besides, there aren’t any damn lizards around here.”

“I’m not kidding, man.” Benny props himself up on his elbows, a sweat drop changing course in the middle of sliding down the side of his head. “I think they’re out to get us.”

“And I think the heat’s getting to you. Maybe we should go down to the pool after all, stare at chicks for a while.”

“I don’t think your girlfriend would like that.”

“I didn’t mean pick up chicks, I just meant stare at them. Might clear your head.”

Benny tips his head back and laughs. I’m surprised he doesn’t have a girlfriend yet; girls love his laugh. Caroline once told me she would have gone out with him just because his laugh sounds like – whatever it was, I can’t remember anymore, but it was one of those things that always get used in shitty romance books. (It’s cool between the three of us anyway, but I think there was probably a reason she didn’t tell him that.) “Like hell it would. Just short out my brain instead of smoothing out the lumps.”

I shrug, lift my back away from the step and my shirt away from my back. It’s fucking hot out here. “Whatever, man.”

Benny finishes his sandwich with one last crunch and licks his fingers slowly, carefully, indulgently. It makes me think of a porn flick my brother rented and left around and that I watched when no one was home – some girl sucking the guy’s dick. I hope she got paid good money for it; I have never seen a bigger dick in my life. (She also got fucked so hard afterwards she practically split in half and I aspire to make Caroline come as hard as she did someday, but that’s neither here nor there.)

Now I really want a popsicle, one that we don’t have. If I had enough energy, I would go down the block and mooch one off Caroline, who seems to like making videos inside more than going to the pool and letting her boyfriend check her out. Maybe I’d drag Benny along. Of course, making out with her would be even better; it wouldn’t beat the heat much, but who gives a fuck?

“Hey, Jake, you off to Mars yet?”

“Oh – no, I’m still here.”

“Good. Y'know, I really think they’re out to get us.”

“Who, the birds?”

“And the lizards. Don’t forget the lizards.”

“Right. Can’t forget the lizards. So the birds and the lizards have a plan.”

“Yep.” Benny drops his weight, settles back, pops the ‘p’ a little bit like always.

“Alright, what’s the plan?”

Benny lifts the hair off his forehead, bleached blond and limp with sweat, and sighs. I can hear the radio inside playing something popular-sounding, Fall Out Boy or some other dumb shit. (It probably isn’t, but I don’t care.) “I think they’re plotting to work together and kill us.”

“What?”

“The birds and the lizards. I don’t know what the plan is, but they’re coming up with a plan to take over, kill us all.”

“How did you figure this out, dude?”

He looks at me like it was obvious the whole time. “Did you not notice how many fucking birds there are? All the time?”

“Well, yeah, but that doesn’t mean they’re taking over. It just means there are lots of birds around.”

He shakes his head like he’s the only one that understands, which he probably is. Benny cooks up a lot of shit like this sometimes. “Never mind, dude. But when the birdaclypse comes, I hope you’ll get to a bomb shelter and thank me. Bring Caroline with you so you can repopulate the world.”

I roll my eyes and stand up and take a breath. A breeze blows by, then I realize it’s just the fan. “Whatever. You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.”

“No, I’m not kidding, dude, you gotta believe me! Wait, wait, where are you going? I’m not done yet!”

“To see Caroline and get a popsicle. It’s fucking hot out here.”

I leave Benny on the porch, bewildered and sweating, and trudge down the block, thinking of the taste of lemon popsicles and Caroline’s lips.