‘You’re right,’ I said, giving up.
‘So …’ He put a spoonful of the sundae in his mouth. When he spoke, he spit melted ice cream onto the table. ‘You boys enjoy the ice cream. Gabe, call me if you ever want to … you know. Hang out.’ He stood up, then stopped himself and pointed at me. ‘Both of you.’
Vic smiled and wiped the ice cream from his mouth with the back of his hand. We watched him walk toward the door.
‘That went well,’ I said.
Gabe smiled. ‘Better than I thought. I didn’t think he paid attention duringV. Mars. Should we go?’
I watched as Vic strode out. ‘Give it a couple seconds … Okay, now.’
We got up, apologizing to Grant for leaving the ice cream, and ran to the door. When we burst out into the cool April air, Vic was screaming.
We ran after him, and he stopped a few feet from his car.
Morgan and Ava popped up from behind it, something gloppy dripping from their hands.
‘You two couldn’t have distracted him a little longer?’ Morgan asked. She popped a Sunset Estates prepackaged butter and a margarine packet onto the top of Vic’s car, which was covered in different sticky foods.
Ava grabbed an egg from the Trader Joe’s bag in her hand and smashed it on the hood. ‘Seriously, you guys had one job.’
‘What are you bitches doing?’ Vic screamed as he walked around the car, pulling at his hair. As Gabe and I got closer, I saw the discarded cans of sardines, jars of pigs’ feet and gefilte fish, and butter packets surrounding the car. Goop dripped off the sides.
Honestly, any more time and I think they would have destroyed their masterpiece. Sensing they were about done, Ava took out another jar of pigs’ feet and handed it to Morgan. Then she took the carton of eggs from the bag.
Morgan opened the jar. And together they dumped the contents of their containers on the hood and front windshield of Vic’s car. The eggs cracked, their yolks mingling with pickled pigs’ feet. I kind of wished it had been noon on a summer day when we did this so it could be baked in. Oh well.
‘Next time you decide to fuck with our friend …’ Morgan said, dropping the jar and letting it roll to a stop at the windshield wipers.
Ava continued the sentence for her. ‘Just remember the smell of all …’ She waved her hand over the car. ‘This.’ Then tossed the egg carton at him.
Vic batted it away and ripped his phone from his pocket. ‘I’m calling the cops on you bitches.’ He turned and pointed at us. ‘Allof you!’
My time to shine. ‘Before you do that, Vic, you might want to think about the incriminating video we have of you.’
He threw his hands up in the air, still in character. Which was fine. ‘What video? The one you guys just tried to take in there? I don’t know what you were even talking about!’
I took James’s phone out of my pocket. ‘No, not that one. This one.’ I opened the video I had sent to the group text before going into Oscar’s. As the video started to play, Vic’s face slowly fell. Kinda wished I gotthaton video.
In James’s cell phone video, a hand knocks on the window of Vic’s car. Vic rolls the window down and smiles a friendly smile.
‘Hey, man,’ James’s voice says.
‘What’s up?’ Vic asks.
‘How you doing tonight?’
‘Good, good, you?’ Vic in the video asks.
Vic in real life looked me dead in the eye. ‘What the hell is this?’
‘I think you know exactly what this is,’ I said.
In the video James says, ‘I could be better, but I was hoping you could help me out with that. Are you over twenty-one?’
Before the video went any further, Vic snatched the phone and smashed it to the ground.
‘Dude!’ Ava yelled. ‘That was the only copy! Oh … wait.’ She took out her own phone and the video played again from the top.
