The Magnificent Seven

The lights flashed on at Candi’s house. They were eyes peering into the darkness of the outside world. Yellow spilled out onto the front lawn and illuminated the green grass and a thick grove of trees, but that wasn’t all. Among the shadows of the pines, seven wide-eyed teenagers stood frozen like deer caught in headlights – and I was one of them.

Candi Samples had been my girlfriend since Old Mrs. Crabtree’s third-grade class. When we reached Briarwood High School, home of the mighty Buccaneers, I joined the football team. She joined the cheerleaders. In a year I was a starting tackle. Candi was the star of the cheerleading squad and had rekindled an old flame – Preston Weston.

Preston was the captain of the football team and starting quarterback all the way through high school. By the end of our junior year, Candi and Preston’s on-again-off-again romance was once again switched to the off position. That’s how he found himself one of seven teenagers trying in vain to hide behind pine trees at 2 in the morning in her front yard.

As a junior, Preston had led the mighty Buccaneers to the best season ever, winning the region championship and losing in the state finals by only a field goal. It was the last week of school, and the first-string offense wanted to celebrate their upcoming senior year. What better way than to roll the head cheerleader’s house?

White strands from 75 rolls of toilet paper fluttered like appendages in the light June breeze, reaching down from the treetops to wrap around and protect us from what about to happen.

Alas, no amount of camouflage could hide us from the mounting anger erupting on the front porch. Over the years, the yard had been rolled nine times, and Mr. Samples had decided that the 10th time would be the last.

We all knew we should run for our lives, but like the giant pines all around us, our feet seemed to have grown roots of their own. There’s something about the power of the father of a teenage girl. When he speaks, teenage boys are compelled to listen, especially when said father has strung together every cuss word in the English language into one very loud sentence.

As Mr. Samples started to un-mummify Goofy Steve, our feet became un-rooted. The Magnificent Seven, minus one, were free and on the run. Out of breath, we reached the top of the driveway and freedom ... just in time to be greeted by the police.

It was just our luck that it was the same two policemen we’d hit accidently with water balloons the week before.

The barrage of water balloons that almost drowned the officers was truly an accident. Sgt. Talbert and his partner were on night patrol and were caught in crossfire of the now legendary water balloon war between the kids from Flamingo Street and the rich kids from the Duke of Gloucester.

Bubba Hank tried to tell them we were sorry and that they should look on the bright side: at least now they didn’t have to take a bath. Unfortunately, soaking wet police officers had lost their sense of humor.

I learned many things from that water-balloon experience and the rolling of Candi’s yard with 75 rolls of toilet paper.

First, you must catch the rolls before they hit the ground. If you don’t, the thumping when they hit will wake up the teenager’s father. And trust me, he’ll not be happy.

Second, there’s not a pine tree large enough to hide Bubba Hank’s 250-pound girth.

Third, Goofy Steve looks like a strawberry-headed mummy when wrapped up in toilet paper.

Fourth, once you douse police officers with water balloons, it takes longer than one week for them to forget about it.

And most importantly, the fastest and safest way to remove endless streams of toilet paper from pine trees is not to light the end of them with a match. It is, though, an extremely quick way to clear a front yard of a grove of rain-deprived pine trees.