'Tis confusion!

Read my texts

"What did you wish for?" Murr asked. Emily shook her head at Murr. "She can't tell you, or else it won't come true, silly!" He smiled back at her. "That's right." Joe shrugged. "Murr knows this, yet he asks every single person this  when they blow out their candles. Except for Sal."

"Well, it's not like I care that much about what Sal wishes for," Murr quipped.

"That's obvious. My shoes can vouch for you there." Sal grumbled, but he was smiling.  

Q clapped his hands together. "Ok, ok. I think we still have a pinata to be smashed!" Everyone nodded in agreement. Q leaned in close to me and whispered "and later, there might be some more smashing of sorts..if you get what I'm saying." I blushed.He pulled away and smiled before heading to the kitchen.

Half an hour later, the party was in full swing. Joe had managed to bust the pinata open, and everyone was now wearing Ring Pops and blowing gum bubbles. Q made sure to get two of the same colored Ring Pops from the fray, and handed one on to me, sliding it on my finger like a giant blue raspberry engagement ring. He then asked the group. "Ok, so, who wants some hot wings?" Everyone raised their hands. "Ok, so let me just get this figured out, and we'll place the order. OK. Joe, I know you'll eat anything. Murr, you don't like super spicy -" "Wuss" cracked Sal. ( Murr ignored him.) "Right. and Sal prefers boneless. Girls?"

"I like hot, doesn't matter about the bones." Barbara said.

"I like mild," Emily said. "With lots of celery and ranch." Murr turned to her. "I love celery and ranch too!"

"Mara?" Q looked at me. 

"Hot is fine, I vote for celery as well..but I'd like blue cheese. And I prefer on the bone, but I'll eat either."

"Ok." Q said. "Why don't you come into the kitchen with me and we'll place the order." I dutifully followed him. Q went to his fridge and grabbed a magnet off it. The magnet said Zingy Wingz, and had a giant dancing hot wing on it. Q pulled out his phone and dialed the number from the magnet. 

"Yeah, hi. I'd like to order your Party Platter number five...Uh-huh..Yeah. Yeah, ranch and blue cheese...ok. And, do you guys do anything for birthdays? Oh, you do? Can you hang on one second? Thanks." Q turned to me. "Would you be interested in a slice of chocolate mousse surprise, or cherry berry cheesecake?" "Mousse surprise please!" He turned back to the phone. "We'll take the chocolate one, thanks. Do you guys deliver the party packs?...Ah, shit. Well, it was worth asking, right?" He laughed and rolled his eyes at me. " Forty-five minutes? Ok, great. Name for the order is Brian. Thanks man. You too." He hung up. " So, they don't deliver the party platters, which means some of us- I'm thinking you and I- will just have to go get them. The place is about twenty minutes from here, so we do still have some time before we have to leave. Shall we join the others?" "Sure." I told him. "Let me just get another drink. " I pulled a cold beer from the back of his fridge, then slipped my hand into his. "Let's go." We rejoined the group . I got the distant feeling that we'd spent more time alone than with the rest of the bunch, and I was starting to feel a little bad about the constant disappearing act we had been pulling. But a quick survey around the room told me Murr and Emily were nowhere to be seen. Sal noticed me looking around. "James and Emily went that way," Sal said, motioning to the front porch." "Ah, ok. What are you guys up to now?" He pointed to Barbara, who had the laptop in front of her, and was giggling like mad. "Watching more compilations. This one is very Murr heavy-"

"This one is basically exclusively Murr"- Barbara corrected him.

"Which I think is the reason for his leaving. I don't know why he couldn't just sit here and suck it up. We're watching a Joe compilation next, then a Q one." Joe jumped in. "And we're saving the best-nay, the funniest- for last, with a nice big Sal compilation. I found two or three of them that will work quite nicely." Q laughed. "Let's check this out! Zingy Wings won't deliver such a large order, so Mara and I are gonna duck out in about fifteen to go pick it up." He sat down on the other side of Sal and once again pulled me onto his lap. 

The Murr video was almost eleven minutes long, so time flew by pretty fast. We watched Murr and Joe do their dino mating ritual dance, then saw Murr search for 'Mom Murray' in the store. There were also bits of his punishments, including the lie detector, the nude art model again, strip high-five, and the dodge-ball attack. The video ended with a clip of what seemed to be the most well known Murray punishment- skydiving. Sal and Joe were crying with laughter by this point of the video. I could see Barbara's shaking shoulders, and could feel Q doing the same. I could also feel his hand slip discreetly down the back of my skirt. I 'readjusted' my position in his lap, making sure to subtly grind my ass up against his hand. He pulled my shoulder gently, urging me to turn around. I did so and looked into his dark brown eyes. He stared at me, a small smile crossing his face. And I knew. There was no doubt in my mind what he was thinking, and I was thinking it too. I slyly pulled my phone out of my pocket and sent him a text.

'Cheeky bastard ;D  don't think I don't know what you're getting at <3" I hit send and waited. Q's phone buzzed, and I jumped a little. He must have had it in his side pocket. I waited some more. Then I heard my phone go off.

"I have no idea what you're talking about ;) I'm just happy to be with you, is all."

I laughed and put my phone away. I hopped up off his lap. "Come one, we should go get the food."

Q nodded, but remained seated. I decided to have a little fun with him. "Oh, hang on a sec. My boot's untied. I leaned over to retie it, deliberately sticking my butt in front of him. "That's not fair," Q groaned. "What a tease." I smiled and offered my hand. "Come on, up!" He took my hand and allowed me to pull him up. The second I did, he'd grabbed my butt again. He whispered in my ear "Didn't know you liked to play dirty." He kissed my neck. "I'll keep that in mind for later on." 

We left Joe, Sal and Barbara in the living room and headed outside. Murr and Emily were sitting together on a blanket in the grass. Q paused. "That better not be my blanket."

"I get the feeling Sal would have said something to you if it was." I pointed out. "Yeah, you're probably right."  We approached them and saw that they were stargazing. Murr had his arms wrapped around Emily, who was snuggled against them, her head against his chest. They both looked so peaceful, I felt bad about interrupting them. Q seemed to feel the same. He cleared his throat uncertainly. "AHEM..guys? We're gonna go get the wings. We'll be back soon." "Ok," said Murr, barely glancing in our direction.

With that, Q and I headed to the car. We got in and drove towards Zingy Wings. "They looked so peaceful out there." I told Q. "I kinda feel bad for even interrupting." Q nodded. "Me too. Ya know, for all the crap we give James, he really is a good guy. It's nice to see him with someone who makes him happy."

I was quiet for a moment. " Do you think they- I mean, the guys- would say the same thing about you?" Q was quiet for a moment, then slid his cellphone over to me. "Why don't you see for yourself? Check those top messages with Sal."

I opened the texts.

Sal - 'So Q, you seem to be pretty fixated on that Mara chick. What's the story?'

Q- " Idk, man. There's something about her that's..different. When I'm thinking about her, I can't stop smiling. I keep thinking of new reasons I can use to see her after the party. I just..fell there might be a connection here, and I can't let that slip away. She's pretty great."

Sal- " Lol. I think we can all tell what you're thinking. I've never seen you smile so much.. I'm really glad for you, buddy."

Q-  "Thanks man. Hoping for the best here. For you also. Barbara seems pretty good for you."

I handed the phone back. "Wow. I really don't know what to say. I mean, I could kinda tell how you felt about me, but just seeing this...like I said, wow. I'm flattered."

Q smiled. " Does that answer your question?"

I leaned over and squeezed his thigh. He twitched in his seat. I laughed. "I think I may have found a secret spot. I didn't know I could make you twitch like that."

"I'd prefer if you kept that little tidbit of info to yourself" Q teased. "Last thing I need is the boys having yet another way to get a rise out of me." "Fair enough." We pulled into the parking lot of Zingy Wings. "Let's go get those wings."