BATTLEFIELD

Schools Out

As the four pack left Greenfield Junior-High School, David looked back at the school and said, "This place will never be the same!"

"It will never be the same because of that medallion. I think it should be destroyed!" Zenja said and the other three looked at her in amazement. 

"Your'e right Zenja, but I think that decision should be up to David! What do you think David?" Steve asked David, which put him on the spot in front of the two girls listening intently.

"Well, that cant happen now with Principal Gulfert holding onto the medallion and I don't think he is ever going to give it back," David said in a knowing manner.

"But if there is ever a chance, that medallion must be destroyed. It has caused enough trouble and it will continue. What if it actually kills a person? David, if they ever return the medallion to you, then you must destroy it!" Zenja directed her passionate words to David.

"You know he is going to call your parents and have them come to school for a big meeting," Maya said to David. 

"I know they will call my parents and I know the medallion must be destroyed. When I go back to school with my parents for that meeting, I will demand  the principals to destroy the medallion. I am ready to take responsibility for the my actions and the actions of the medallion!" David said to the other three as if he had just committed himself to jumping on a hand grenade or to some sort of Japanese ritual suicide.

Zenja smiled and held onto David's left hand. They held hands as they walked, which Steve and Maya also saw, so they decided to hold hands too.

David got an idea and said, "Hey, lets go to my house and I'll get some of my birthday money and then we can go out to Mother's."

"That's a great idea, lets do it," Steve said energetically.

" What's Mother's, I've never heard of that!" Maya exclaimed in puzzlement.

"It's a restaurant, record shop, and tattoo parlor in a old house next to the railroad tracks," Steve said with a sense of wonderment. 

"My father says its a dive. I have never been inside, but we ordered out from there a lot and I love their Builder Subs. They have the best root beer floats in Greenfield. No one can make root beer floats like them," Zenja said with great enthusiasm. 

 "Come on let's go!" David said as he lead the way.

"No, we don't need to go your house. I have plenty of money!" Zenja volunteered as she stopped, opened up her Warhawks book bag and took out her wallet. She opened up the wallet and out came a fist full of bills in dominations of hundreds, fifties, twenties, tens, fives, and ones, all together over seven hundred dollars.

The other three friends stood there with their eyes popping out of their eyes. 

Zenja looked up and said to them "Don't worry! I have a lot more money than this at home and in the bank. I have a paper route early in the morning every day and I also work for my father in his office in the morning after my paper route during weekends." Then Zenja thought a little more and mentioned, "I  also babysit every Friday and Saturday evening. I also collect cans and bottles for recycling."

They all stood in place without moving a step, just totally amazed hearing that Zenja was a workaholic. Everyone in town knew she was a rich kid and expected her have money, but not money bags money earned from a series of small hard working jobs.

"I thought you received an allowance from your father," David chimed in.

"Oh, no, no, no, no. My father does not believe in allowances," Zenja responded.

 "You don't receive anything for doing house chores, like taking out the garbage, cleaning your room or washing dishes?" Maya inquisitively asked Zenja.

" Oh no, I do all those house chores and more, but thats for free. Thats what you're expected to do to help out the family. All my other little jobs are for me. I've saved up in the bank over ten thousand dollars. Cool, right?" Zenja explained to her new friends.

David, Maya, and Steve could not believe their ears. All three of them felt pretty lazy compared to Zenja and all three received weekly allowances for doing minor chores around their houses and most of the time their parents would have to force them to take out the garbage, which was usually done with great complaining. 

The four pack stopped at the a local convenience store, also next to the railroad tracks called the Prairie Dairy, which had a little arcade room in the back. The Prairie Dairy only had six video game arcade machines, Joust, Moon Patrol, Berzerk, Defenders, Pac-Man, and Centipede, but that was enough. Zenja bought each of them a glass bottle of Mountain Dew pop and bought them each two candy bars. Zenja selected two bags of Skittles, Maya picked a Salted Nut Roll bar and a Payday bar, Steve chose a Nut Goodie bar and a Watchamacallit bar, then there came  David, who wanted a 100 Grand bar and a Nestle Milk Chocolate bar.

They ate their candy and drank their pops, while playing like maniacs on video games arcade machines for two hours. After that, the four pack left the Prairie Dairy and walked over to Baron's News, a walk in magazine and pocket book store, which people said had the best selection of magazines in the entire Green River Valley. Zenja bought each of them one magazine. David selected the latest issue of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero comic book, instead of a magazine, but at the same time he felt uncomfortable selecting that comic book. 

Finally, the four pack made their way to Mother's Eatery, Record Shop, and Tattoo Parlor. Mother's yellow colored house was built in 1914 and was right next to the railroad tracks with some old shacks and a huge cargo shipping building right across on the other side of the tracks. The eatery was on on the main floor, the record shop was in the basement, and the tattoo parlor was on the second floor. When they entered the eatery, the place was dead and the three booths were unoccupied, but Zenja did not like the looks of Mother's with maroon colored paint on the walls, posts, and tables, which also had graffiti and carvings all over the place. Zenja did not want to eat there, so they got take out and brought it  back to David's house.

The four entered David's house with a large pepperoni pizza, four custom Builder subs, and four root beer floats. David's dog Napoleon happily and excitedly met the four at the door with the customary dog greetings of licking faces and sniffing crotches. They went out to the living room and David turned on their Zenith colored TV console and switched on the VCR. David and the others wanted to watch a comedy, so they selected Time Bandits, which a little ironic due to their adventures today, but they all thought is was a very funny movie.

David walked out to his bedroom as his best friend and two new friends sat laughing and eating in the living room. He opened up the door, turned on the light, threw his new G.I. Joe comic book onto this bed, and walked in the room to search for the VHS tape of the movie. David found the movie under a pile of war comics. He paused for a moment and looked at all his toy soldiers, war games, toy play sets, war comics, and military model kits spread all over the room. He walked over to his bed, picked up the new G.I. Joe comic book, walked over to the stack of war comics that had been lying on top of his Time Bandits VHS movie and placed the new G.I. Joe comic book on top of the war comic books stack, opened up a drawer on his study desk, threw the whole pile of war comics roughly into the drawer and shut it hard. 

David's dog Napoleon ran into the room to see what he was doing. David picked up the his VHS movie tape and bent down giving Napoleon a big hug, which the dog loved and started running around the room.

David could hear the laughter of his friends coming from the living room and said to Napoleon, "Come on boy, lets go see our new friends!"

Napoleon responded and followed David, who turned off the light switch and said to Napoleon, I think we're going to change your name. What do think about Gandhi, you know that was a good movie. Do you like Gandhi, I like Gandhi!"

With that last comment to his dog, David shut the door firmly and walked back to his friends, who were waiting eagerly for his return.