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Dallas

Walking up to the Smyth’s house kind of felt a little like

being a bacon wrapped ham walking up to a den of hungry

wolves. Or lions. Except maybe the wolves were friendly.

Maybe the lions were okay. Maybe they weren’t wolves or

lions at all. Maybe she was just exaggerating her worries so

that she just felt like a ham. With the bacon. Because bacon is

always supposed to make everything taste better.

Quinn told her after ice cream, before they all parted ways

until the evening, that everything would be fine. Dallas felt

like it would be fine until she left her hotel room. Then the

panic started. The thoughts about lions and wolves and hams

set in. And bacon. Except in this case, it didn’t make much of

anything better. She didn’t want to be a tasty morsel.

Dallas had Billy’s hat gripped between her fingers. She’d

brought a gift for Danica too, which she had in her left hand.

The Smyth’s bungalow still looked exactly the same. It was

kind of a trip when Quinn told her that her parents still lived in

the same house. It was a nice house. One of the nicest on the

street. Dallas loved going there as a kid. Quinn had her own

room. The house had a huge kitchen where they baked cookies

and tried out other recipes. The back yard was massive and

they’d always had an above ground pool. The basement was

developed and Quinn’s parents had turned it into a sort of

theatre with a larger TV and tons of movies. First it was VHS,

then DVD’s. Now everything was probably digital, if that

room in the basement was still the same.

It was kind of hard, getting hit with that huge blast of

memories all at once. It felt like a big wave had just washed

over her and instead of riding it out and coming up on top, she