Lust in the Mosh Pit | A Jared Dines Story

Midnight Manhunt

     I woke up the next morning to the sound of screaming down stairs. I jumped out of bed, seemingly at the speed of light, and darted down the stairs.

    "Is everything okay? What's wrong!?" I yelled as I ran into the kitchen. I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw Tony standing behind the camera, facing towards Austin who was behind the camera, swinging around a meat tenderizer mallet. "W-what?" Was all I could manage to say as I took in the situation. Tony and Austin both started laughing at me hysterically. "Hey.." I looked down to see that I was wearing nothing but my Nightmare Before Christmas boxers and an old, oversized Blood On The Dance Floor shirt, "Hey, it's fucking old okay! I got this in middle school or some shit!" 

     "This is golden." Tony said as he turned the camera around to face me. 

     "Get that shit off me," I said playfully waving off the camera, "I thought someone was dying down here. What the hell are you filming?" I asked walking over to the counter.

    "What we are filming here today is only the most prestige cooking show in all of Washington." Austin said pointing the mallet at me. "Ladies and gentlemen," He said turning back to the camera, "it seems we have an uncultured guest today on Dining With Dickey." I scoffed and rolled my eyes.

     "And what is it exactly that you've uh... created today?" I said looking down at the pile of various meats in front of me. Austin put his hand on his chest as if to feign injury at my choice of words. 

     "This here is a five cheese stuffed, three layered meat cake if you must know. Only finest in the country, aside from Uncle Tommy's of course." He said with an eye twitch. I made an awkward facial expression in response. "Oh, Jared Diiiiines!" Austin screamed with his hand to the side of his mouth. I covered my ears and flinched. Jared came running down the stairs and sighed.

      "What've you got for me today?" Jared said looking at the glob on the counter. He turned me and immediately started laughing. "The fuck is this?" He asked messing with the sleeve of my shirt. I yanked it away. 

     "Eat my ass." I rolled my eyes. We both about broke our necks turning to his as he basically pterodactyl screeched in our faces. 

     "And now," he said as if nothing had even happened, "for the taste test."

     We ended up actually finishing the meat cake Austin had made. I was told it was one of the better things that had been made during the Dining With Dickey series. While the guys were playing video games, I decided to go to the guitar room and mess around for a bit. I started playing Negative Three by Marilyn Manson on my acoustic guitar as the sun was setting. I had felt a really weird mood swing come over me so I decided to go to my room and think.

    "Leaving so soon?" Jared said as we passed each other in the hall. 

    "Mhmm." I said not turning around. I felt him start following me and sighed inwardly. 

    "Are you okay?" He asked, stopping in my door frame. I rolled my eyes.

    "Yes, I'm fine." I answered, opening up my laptop. He sat next to me on my bed and looked at me from the corners of his eyes. I closed my laptop out of irritation and looked at him.

   "What?" I asked shortly. He shrugged in response. "Look I'm just in a really weird mood and feel really anxious and I don't know if I'm going to cry or not so.." I said honestly, trying to get him to leave.  He put his arm around me and leaned his head against mine. 

    "I know how that is. I'm just going to sit here and be with you. We don't have to talk." He said quietly. I relaxed against him and opened my laptop back up. We scrolled through Netflix for a while looking for something to watch. We were just about to pick a movie when the power went out.

     "NO!" I heard Austin yell from downstairs. Jared and I laughed knowing his game probably got shut off at a boss level. We went downstair to find him and Tony scrolling on their phones. 

    "How about some midnight manhunt since the power's out?" Tony suggested, knowing our phones would probably die if we all kept scrolling through memes. We all nodded in agreement. 

   "Nose goes!" Austin shouted, putting his index to his nose. I was halfway paying attention so of course I had to be the last one to react. 

   "Fuck, I probably know the ins and outs of this house the least out of all of us." I said in defeat. 

   "That's the beauty of it." Jared commented while rubbing his hands together. 

     We had played about three or four games of manhunt, so I was finally getting the hang of navigating the halls in the dark. I walked upstairs and into the guitar room. I could feel a presence by the window and assumed one of the guys, mainly Jared, would have chosen the spot thinking it was too obvious for me to check. 

    "Well, I really hope no one hid somewhere obvious in here." I said sarcastically making my way towards the window. I heard breathing from behind the curtain and felt a sense of victory come over me. "Found y-" At the moment the power came back on, along with the lights, revealing that there was no one behind the curtain. "you.." I trailed off, finishing my sentence. I felt chills rush over my body and I bolted for the stairs. "Guys? This really isn't fucking funny. I know halloween is coming up but you can quit it with the spook pranks." I looked around the living room nervously. 

    "Boo!" Jared yelled, picking me up from behind. I screamed bloody murder with tears in my eyes. "Holy shit, calm down it's just me." Jared said, putting me down with a hint of perplexity in his voice. I steadied my breathing and put my hands over my head as Tony and Austin came down the stairs. After a few beers and some video games, I realized I was overreacting. Pranks are funny to me when I pull them, so there was no need for me to be upset over something harmless.

    "So what are you guys thinking we should do for Halloween?" Austin asked openly.

    "I'm thinking we should do a costume party slash horror themed show?" I suggested.

    "I'm intrigued." Tony hinted for me to further explain. 

    "So we get a few heavy locals to cover songs revolving around halloween things for examples, Black No. 1 by Type O-Negative, Every Day Is Halloween by Ministry, anything from Ice Nine Kills' new album, shit like that. As for refreshments, I was thinking we could hire someone we know who has some bartending background. They could come up with some halloween themed drinks like witch's brew, satan's fury, demon's blood, etcetera. For food we could just get catering from somewhere and have people bring additional sides, deserts, and whatnot. Obviously, we'd also have t-" Jared cut me off with a laugh.

    "Slow down, I can see smoke coming out of your ears." He said flicking my ear. I swatted his hand and rolled my eyes.

    "It's just an idea." I said defensively raising my hands.

    "If you can organize everything, the I don't see why not." Austin said, backing me up.

    "We have one yes." I said looking at Jared and Tony hopefully.

    "It's not my house, but I do think it would be pretty kick ass." Tony said looking to Jared. I turned to him and made an ugly, yet convincing, pouty face.

    "Fine, just no bobbing for apples. That shit gets way too messy." He said defeatedly. 

    "Yes!" I exclaimed, wrapping my arms around him. I looked up at him with a smile while he, Austin, and Tony resumed their game. My expression fell as I thought of my last interaction with Janie. 

   "Hey, is something wrong?" Jared whispered, looking at me out of the corner of his eye. I quickly snapped from my thoughts and realized I still had my arms around him. 

   "Uh n-no. I think I'm going to head to bed. I've got big event planning things to think of tomorrow." I said hurriedly getting up and heading for the stairs. I laid in bed thinking about everything. The more I thought about the little things I had been experiencing, they seemed too obscure to be part of a big prank. While I thought there could be some bigger picture, I also knew my anxiety could have just been causing me to feel overly paranoid about everything. Slowly my thoughts drifted to party planning. Who was going to help me with everything? I knew Janie would be the ideal person to assist me but just thinking about her made me feel guilty.