Hi, I'm Greg from Geese Aplenty, and Cloudy asked me to do a guest post. She said I could make up a story in which we both appear. So I did, although this story is true in all the ways that really matter.
CLOUDY AND GREG MEET A SPACE ALIEN, a story by Greg and starring Cloudy
You could recognize one of Cloudy's party invitations from three blocks away, because each one of them was a work of art - a brightly colored paper rectangle crammed full of illustrations and song lyrics. The letter "A" was always written as a tiny pyramid.
On a chilly October night in 1986, my friend Donovan and I made our way across Cloudy's lawn. The blades crunched under our feet like salad. Music from the new Jesus and Mary Chain album floated out the window. Jenny Justus met us at the door and faintly clawed at the air with her hands; I pegged her as being three hours into a shroom snack.
"This is a GREAT party," she said. "I feel GREAT." She talked as though she was underwater. Donovan snickered, and she snapped at him: "It's my party and I'll fry if I want to."
We pushed her out of the way and went to meet our friends, including the real hostess. We waved to our funny friend Sacha, another Jenny we actually liked, and quiet but lovable Jacki. Kathy looked at us and observed dryly, "Oh, you both came together. How unusual." We bowed to her; in Kathy-speak, social judgments constituted a very friendly "hello."
Cloudy came out of the kitchen to meet us. Her parties brought together a wide crossection of people from our high school, including the cool alterna types and relative misfits like me and Donovan, but she always loved to see everyone. "HI!" she said.
Donovan often greeted people by making them laugh, and here he grabbed a handful of yearbooks off the nearest bookshelf and said "Cloudy, I'm very sorry that I never signed your junior high yearbooks, even though I didn't meet you until last year. I'll do that now."
Cloudy giggled as Donovan started scribbling something about "U R 2 Good 2 B 4-gotten," as well as a postscript about being touched in a funny way by the music teacher. I suddenly noticed a blue light seeping through the curtains. A squad car? The police couldn't be here to bust up the party already; Dan Lopez hadn't even thrown up yet.
The light grew into a searing, blinding flash, and I clamped my eyes shut. When I opened them, Cloudy and I were aboard a spaceship and a shiny, metallic blonde girl with a funny nose was standing in front of us.
"I'm Hilton Unit 245," said the shiny blonde girl. "In your future, approximately March 28, 2006, my evil alien friends and I will take over the world after posing in your popular culture as witless celebrities. As you can see, this is going to take a long time, so I entertain myself by kidnapping people at random and telling them their future. So, Cloudy, I'm going to tell you yours."
"Okay!" Cloudy said. "Is it going to suck?"
"Well, you will have a tough time for a while-some boyfriends and a marriage that doesn't work out and some jobs that you don't like. Eventually, you will marry Sasha-"
"Whoa!" I said. "You're marrying Sacha? That's kind of hot."
"NO you idiot. Not your female friend Sacha--a man named Sasha that she won't meet for years and years. And then you'll find a job in which you move up the ladder and which helps people, and you'll live in Seattle and Dan Lopez won't throw up all over your nice house because you won't even talk to him anymore."
"Cool!" Cloudy said.
"Hey, that's fun," I said. "Tell me my future too, Hilton Unit 245!"
"I'm not here for you," the funny-nosed alien sneered. "But I will tell you this-you will both keep 'blogs,' which is a kind of diary that everyone in the world can magically see, and these diaries allow you and Cloudy to keep in touch with each other and comment on each other's thoughts and lives although it's twenty years after high school."
"Hooray!" we said.
An annoyed voice interrupted us: "Where are you, Hilton Unit 245? Lohan Unit 421 needs you to help arm the plasma cannons."
"Tell her to hold on to her damn silicon implants, Richie Unit 679," Hilton snapped. "I'll be right there." She looked at us. "My advice? In twenty years, start watching the skies."
The light blinded us again and then we were back on Cloudy's frost-covered lawn.
We went back inside, and Sacha said "Where did you guys go?"
"We had a life-changing experience!" Cloudy said.
"Oh, I totally just did that too," said Jenny Justus, stumbling out of a nearby closet. "Also, I'm pretty sure that I have three heads."
- THE END-