Saturday Morning Rascals

Saturday, September 28th

Nurse Fallon smiled at the handsome thirtysomething-old doctor. Stretching her back, Bridget gave an “oops” as one of the buttons popped off the white nurse’s uniform. A hand shot up to the busty blonde’s mouth as she gasped. The gasp accompanied the pushing out of her chest as a second button broke off, flying toward the surprised doctor.

“Oh, no! Would you look at that? My uniform is ruined, Dr. Cockrum. Whatever should I do?” Bridget teased as she began to unbutton the still attached buttons.

Revealing a flimsy white bra, Bridget smirked with approval as a very impressive bulge pushed out of her superior’s pants. Leaving the opened top on, she reached back to unzip her skirt.

"What are you waiting for?" Bridget challenged, nodding toward Cockrum's pants. "I need your thermometer free to check my temperature. And you better check my throat first; I've been *cough* feeling *cough* scratchy today."

Suddenly, a loud banging on the examination room's door created a frightened expression on Dr. Cockrum's face and a scowl on Bridget's. Then, as the voice behind the door yelled, Bridget cried as the doctor and the exam room faded away.

“C’mon, Bridget! It’s time to get up!”

Grumbling into the pillow, Bridget twisted her head enough to free her mouth.

“Leave me alone!”

“But we need to leave soon. Mom said to get you–” Brandy’s voice came through the door before getting cut off.

“Shut up!”

A frustrated cry sounded as Brandy kicked the door in anger. However, the silence that followed told her older sister that she’d walked away.

Pleased at the seemingly swift victory, Bridget rolled back over. Recalling the sexy dream that had been about to get steamy, the blonde teenager willed herself to fall back asleep to resume the action. At least in her dreams, Bridget would get her man.

A smattering of clinking and clanking sounds snapped Bridget awake again. Unsure what grabbed her from the arms of Dr. Cockrum for the second time, Bridget rolled onto her back to listen. Straining, she heard another slight clinking sound. Yet, this noise came from the opposite direction as her bedroom door.

“Oh, hell, no,” Bridget growled. Tossing the bedsheets off her, the blonde teen hopped out of the bed to storm over to her window. Yanking on the cord raised the blinds quickly.

Peering outside at the ground below, Bridget saw nothing. She scanned left and right for a full minute before turning away from the window. Grumbling about all the damn noise, she crawled back into bed. Just then, the phone rang. On the verge of screaming, Bridget threw the pillow behind her head, folding it to cover her ears.

Shortly afterward, Bridget felt a presence in the room. Ripping the pillow away, she turned to face the door.

“Dammit, brat. Leave me alone!” the older sister ordered. Then, she stopped and glared at the little blonde. “Wait…Did you pick my lock?!” she asked incredulously.

“NO!” Brandy shrieked before lowering her voice. “I don’t know how to do that yet. But Fawn’s learning.”

“Great. That’s all I need,” Bridget mumbled, noticing a key in Brandy’s hand. “Now get out of here. I’m tired.”

“No! You need to get up. We have to leave in less than an hour. I can’t be late. This is my big moment. Don’t ruin it for me!” Brandy exclaimed, stamping her foot.

“Gawd, why do you always have to be a brat? What happened to the sweet girl from last night?” Bridget questioned.

Brandy had practically waited hand and foot on her upset sister the previous night. She'd spent the car ride home suggesting ways to get back at Coy and his date while the mother continually shot the ideas down from the front seat. And after they'd gotten home, the grade school girl had made a snack for her big sister before drawing a hot bath for her.

“Today’s my time to be the captain,” the eight-year-old in a cheerleader uniform shot back. “So stop moping about McCrazy!”

“Sometimes I hate you!”

“Like I care!” Brandy responded, but her lip quivered for a moment. “Bev always hates me, and Mom sometimes gives me that look.”

“Would you two stop? All I asked was for you to wake your sister, Brandy,” Pepper stated as she walked down the hallway toward the bedroom. Once in the doorway, she studied her two youngest daughters. “Bridget, stop telling your sister you hate her. Brandy, I don’t hate you. You get those looks when you’re in trouble.”

“But I’m always in trouble!”

“And who’s fault is that?” Pepper questioned.

“Bev’s!” Bridget and Brandy answered simultaneously before sharing a giggle.

“Oh, really? And was Beverly the reason why Virginia just called me? Brandy, you know better than to throw rocks at OUR house,” Pepper reminded, pointing a finger sternly.

“I didn’t throw rocks. They were pebbles!”

“Don’t play semantics with me, young lady,” the exasperate mother warned before turning toward her other daughter. “Bee, time to get up and dressed. You need to move forward and not mope over boys. No matter how much it hurts. Besides, your father is making a special breakfast this morning.”

“I tried to convince Dad to wiretap Coy’s phone for ****, but I guess he decided breakfast is enough,” Brandy muttered.

“Sometimes I love you,” Bridget said, grinning as she leaned to kiss her little sister’s forehead. “And I don’t know if cereal can be called special.”

“Your father is making French toast and bacon…well, I’m also helping,” Pepper added knowingly with a chuckle before heading downstairs.

“Hurry up,” Brandy ordered as Bridget made her way to the upstairs bathroom. “I can’t be late.”

“Yeah, yeah,” the older blonde muttered. “And get changed. You’re not wearing that.”

“But it’s my uniform!” Brandy yelled down the hall.

“We’re going to work on the float and hold tryouts for the cheerleaders of the future,” Bridget stated, poking her head out of the bathroom.

“I need to wear it. I need to show the newbies who’s in charge!”

“Cheerleaders don’t wear their uniforms to practice. You’d know that if you were a real cheerleader,” Bridget replied, shutting the door.

“I am a real fucking cheerleader!”

“Language, Brandy!” Pepper yelled from the first floor.

---

“Thanks, Dad. That was great,” Bridget said, placing the fork down after finishing the last bite of French toast.

“Yeah, Dad, it was delicious! Wow, I can’t believe you cooked that all by yourself. Mom sure is lucky to have you,” Brandy gushed.

“You told them you helped, didn’t you?” Seamus questioned his wife with a knowing look.

“Who me?”

The side door opened as Fawn and Wrenn walked in. Pepper offered the two young girls breakfast, which they turned down, while Brandy peered behind them.

“Where’s Darla?”

“She changed her mind,” Wrenn reported while Fawn went into the fridge to get the orange juice container.

“She what?! Bee, we’ll need to stop at the Dawkins’ house on the way. I don’t care if I have to drag her kicking and screaming to the car,” Brandy threatened.

“You will do no such thing, young lady. If Darla doesn’t want to go, that’s her decision,” Pepper replied.

“Actually, I’m with you on that, Mom,” Brandy responded, changing her mind. “It’s better this way. Darla gets flustered too easily. We don’t need her doing that while on the float. She’ll totally fall and break her neck.”

“Brandy, that’s a horrible thing to say about your friend,” Pepper admonished.

“What? I’m not saying I want her to die. It’s just easier for me now. I can concentrate on being captain instead of Darla’s protector.”

“Who said anything about you being captain?” Fawn asked, finishing her glass of orange juice.

“I am the only super junior varsity cheerleader. So it’s a given.”

“No, it’s not,” Bridget stated before asking her mom for the car keys. Both older Fallon women ignored Brandy’s sputtering outrage.

“Now, I want you to bring the girls back at a reasonable hour. And make sure you don’t lose the keys,” Pepper reminded, running down a list of her concerns about her daughter taking her car. “And don’t park next to Tinsley. Virginia is playing with fire by letting her borrow her car again.”

“I guess money isn’t as tight next door, Mom. They don’t freak out over insurance premiums going up over nonsense,” Brandy added, but she also moved toward the door to get away from her mother. “Or some parents allow their children to learn through trial and error.”

"I had to get that kind of precocious child," Pepper grumbled, glaring at Seamus as she considered Brandy's behavior his fault. "Now, make sure to behave. Your behavior is a reflection of your sister."

“Hey, I make Bee look good,” Brandy defended.

“Now, you’re to listen to your sis—No, listen to Faw—Uh…You know, just do whatever Cassie tells you,” Pepper ordered, settling on the most responsible person. Then, she had an additional thought and called after the departing girls. “Don’t listen to Tinny!”

“Shotgun!” Fawn announced. That earned her a hard punch in the shoulder.

“Stop beating up your friends, brat!” Bridget yelled, checking to see if their mom had seen the punch. Then, she turned to glance next door as she heard a commotion.

Three twelve-year-old boys raced out of the Days’ back door, slamming the screen door shut. Then, it whipped open as Tinny followed her brother and his two closest friends.

“Get in the car, you little shits!” the petite brunette roared.

---

“That’s a dangerous level of acceleration for a turn of that degree,” Wrenn observed as they watched the car in front of them skid into the grass before righting itself onto the dirt driveway.

“And that’s why I refuse to race Tinny,” Bridget commented, furthering her point from Brandy’s earlier demand.

“You’re boring,” the young blonde remarked.

“So this is Howell Farms,” Fawn said, studying their surroundings as Bridget performed a safer turn down the dirt driveway.

“Oh, it is? I thought we just turned down some random farm road,” Brandy responded sarcastically.

“It looks a bit…rundown,” Fawn commented, ignoring her BFF’s smartass remark.

“You think?” Wrenn responded, her voice filled with disdain while she peered against the car window.

“We’re on the back side of the farm. Kimberly’s family is friends with Howells, so they agreed to let us use their old barn to store the float. The newer barn and house are much nicer looking,” Bridget explained.

“I’d hope so,” Fawn remarked.

Several cars were already parked near the barn. The three younger girls noted there were also two additional buildings nearby. One looked similar to the rundown barn, with the other building appearing much worse. The barn and silo were surrounded by an overgrowth of grass, shrubs, and weeds.

“It appears that a fire may have dictated the abandonment of these structures,” Wrenn speculated.

“Oh, yeah, stay away from the silo. Kimberly said it might crumble at any moment. And stay away from that storage building unless accompanied by one of us. The Howells still use it to store equipment,” Bridget explained, stopping her car several spots from Tinny’s.

“Yes, I’m alive!”

Exiting the car, the four girls turned toward the scream. They saw Teddy sprawled out on the ground after leaping from the passenger side door. He kissed the ground while going on about surviving another ****-defying car ride. His older sister didn’t find the performance as amusing as some of her friends.

“Keep it up, buster, and you’re walking home,” Tinny threatened.

Of course, Brandy sprinted over toward the Days. She only slowed down upon reaching Teddy, whose back she stepped on.

“Oops! Oh, no, I didn’t see you there, Teddy. Why are you on the ground?” That brought a chuckle from Dean Dawkins, whom Brandy pointed at. “Tell your sister she’s a coward.”

“Whoa! Check out all the babes,” the third twelve-year-old boy exclaimed.

That earned him a slap to the back of the head.

“Don’t test me, Rhett,” Tinny warned Rhett Ravine, her brother’s athletic friend. “You leer at my friends all day, and your mom hears all about it. Got that?”

“Isn’t Ted the one that does that?” Wrenn asked, causing Fawn to shoot her a murderous look.

“Only at Bridget,” Brandy joked, rejoining her approaching friends.

“Brandy! What was that? You know that behavior is unacceptable. Also, farms can be dangerous places. You need to be mindful of your surroundings.”

“Sorry, Cass,” the young blonde apologized to the redhead.

Bridget rolled her eyes at how her sister listened to her friends more than her.

“I see you two are late as always,” Cassandra commented, checking her watch.

“Give us a break. We’re less than ten minutes late, and we had to bring the kids,” Tinny argued.

“I’m sure it was tough work having your passengers show up on your doorstep. I had to leave a half hour early to pick up Fiona and Lotus,” Cassie pointed out.

“Fi’s here? Come on!” Brandy gestured at her friends to follow as she dashed off to find Fiona Wynwick and her cousin, Lotus Thirlby.

“Whoa! Fiona’s crew is here! You weren’t lying, Teddy,” Rhett said, noticing a handful of girls a year older than him. “Let’s get our game on–”

“Nope, not happening,” Tinny interrupted. Then, pointing, she asked, “You see that girl? That’s Rain. She’s in charge of you today. Go over and see what she wants you to do.”

“I know who Rain is,” Teddy replied indignantly.

“Oh, you do? I thought you only paid attention to my big-titted friends,” Tinny remarked. “Now get over there, or I’ll suggest we add you as our male cheerleader and put Brandy in charge.”

“But, Tin,” Teddy whined.

“I only allowed you to come with me so you’d help with the float, not flirt with girls. Now, go!”

“Morning!” Shalya greeted, walking over with Maura, Haley, and Zita.

“At least she didn’t add good,” Tinny mumbled.

“Good morning, Tinsley!” Miranda greeted, coming from the opposite direction. “Early bird gets the worm.”

“Ugh! Did Rachel pay you to act like her this year or what?” the petite brunette grumbled.

“She’s only cheerful 'cause somebody got laid last night by her new boyfriend,” Haley teased.

“New boyfriend? What did I miss last night?” Bridget asked, getting several smirks in response.

---

“Ohmigawd, I can’t believe it. Well, I can believe Annie getting caught blowing a guy, and I guess Tinny getting **** for me does sound like my bestie,” Bridget commented, giving the brunette a side-hug. “But, Cassandra, when did you let Tin talk you into being bad?”

“I only sang one line,” the bookish redhead protested.

“It’s a slippery slope,” Shayla teased.

“And Thane? Good for you, girl. He’s a catch,” Bridget congratulated Miranda.

“As if Miranda wasn’t already Topaz’s favorite,” Zita teased.

A commotion interrupted the varsity cheerleaders. Naturally, they followed the noise to find Brandy and her friends standing in the barn's large doorway as they studied the partially constructed float.

“What’s the problem now?” Bridget challenged, already exasperated by the younger girls.

"That is not structurally sound. I refuse to perform any cheerleader maneuvers on the top. I won't even stand up there," Wrenn declared.

“It does look a bit dangerous,” Fawn fretted.

“Great! Just fucking great! Darla’s rubbed off on you two,” Brandy complained before lowering her voice to a hiss. “How dare you two embarrass me!”

“Wrenn, how about you go discuss the float’s structural integrity with Rain?” Cassie suggested. “I’m sure she’ll be able to explain why the float is safe.”

“Is it safe?” Haley asked once Maura led Fawn and Wrenn over to Rain.

“Yes, it’s safe,” Cassie insisted. “Monty will be here closer to noon. He’s bringing some extra material for us and can help reassure the girls.”

“Okay, I wasn’t expecting Wrenn to last. Maybe Fawn. So, who and how many girls are here for the tryouts?” Bridget asked, perking up her little sister’s interest.

"Well, losing Fawn and Wrenn leaves only another pair around Brandy's age. Do you know a Trista Guillory or Sherry Stackhouse?" Miranda inquired. Seeing Brandy's headshake, she continued, "I didn't think so. We don't have anyone else close to their age for the really young batch."

"I'd like at least three for the three batches," Bridget said.

“Well, Lotus is twelve but could pass for younger if she works out,” Shayla suggested.

“I think we have a solid crop of thirteen-year-olds,” Miranda stated. “Fiona learned all our cheers the last couple of years by attending practices with Sela as punishment. Audra never did the same, but I know she’s watched Annie and I go over routines enough times at their house.

Besides Annette's younger sister, Audra, Miranda praised Audra's two close friends, Brooklyn Tillery and Calista Baird. Maura's fourteen-year-old sister, Marielle, brought several of her junior high school cheermates, as did Lauren Caputo's fifteen-year-old sister, Lisa.

“I like Marielle’s friends, but I’m not sure about Lisa’s,” Shayla observed.

“Yeah, that Cherry complains about as much as Wrenn,” Miranda added.

“Really? Cherry is in Sandy’s class. I swear, she’s one of the few kids that he doesn’t complain about,” Cassie revealed, referring to her younger brother. “I think Mr. Swift’s daughter might be a quick rejection.”

“From the Daily Flyer?” Bridget asked.

“Yeah, I think her name is Hillary. She does seem to ask a lot of questions,” Miranda remarked, chuckling.

“Oh, I almost forgot!” Haley exclaimed, slapping her forehead. “Graham said he’d be running late.”

“So?” Tinny challenged.

“He’s bringing Frida to try out,” Haley finished.

“Frida? Oh, I like her! She’s quite fiery,” Bridget complimented. Then, she gestured toward Brandy, “I think we might have someone to keep Brandy in line.”

"Hmm, my money's still on Dee," Tinny stated, nodding at her surrogate little sister.

Strangely enough, Brandy wasn’t paying attention to the talk about her. Instead, she watched a pair as they approached the barn.

“Who’s the creepy dude that looks like Jeffrey Dahmer?” the eight-year-old asked. Sufficiently leery, she knew enough to whisper her question.

“What?”

“Who?”

“Thank you, Dee! I knew I wasn’t the only one,” Tinny exclaimed. “I told you this place is fucking creepy. Somebody’s bound to get sliced by a slasher.”

“That guy?” Bridget asked, slyly gesturing to the young man with Kimberly. “That’s Gilbert Howell. His parents own this farm.”

“And he’s Kimmy’s homecoming date,” Shayla informed Brandy.

The young girl cocked her head to the side as she watched Kimberly and her old childhood friend walk past them and into the barn. Both Bridget and Tinsley recognized the younger girl’s expression.

“You're imagining all the ways that he’s going to kill us, aren’t you?” the petite brunette asked.

"Just Kimberly," Brandy clarified before glancing at her big sister. "I think we better tell Dad to keep an eye on that guy."

“Okay!” Miranda said, clapping her hands. Hoping to change the subject, she inquired about the tryouts.

“I better stay with the work on the float. The change was my idea,” Bridget admitted. “How about Miranda, Shayla, Haley, and…Tinny organize the tryouts?”

“Me? Aw, crap!” the varsity co-captain complained.

“Would you rather deal with Teddy and his friends?”

“Oh, I’m good with the mini-cheerleaders!”

“I thought so,” Bridget remarked. “Uh, maybe Sabrina and Tanith can help out. They were on the same squads with a few of the girls last year.”

"Sounds good to me," Shayla replied, with Miranda nodding in agreement.

“C’mon, Dee. Time to meet your underlings,” Tinny announced, motioning at Brandy.

“Oh, that’s not good,” Cassie said.

"Whatever. We'll deal with the fallout later, as usual," Bridget responded.