Just Another Star - The Eye Of The Storm

31st December, 1996

*Matt's P.O.V.*

I looked up to the sky, squinting at the setting sun. Ambers and pinks swirl with a marbling effect in the sky. The sand was soft next to my legs, it was so nice to sit on, even if it was getting into my shoes. I took a swig of beer, glancing along the beach, gazing at the horizon. Not a person in sight. Just me and my buddies. With my beer in the air, above me head, I hollared for no reason.

"Fuck you beer!" I slammed the bottle into the sand, the hazy, fizzy liquid spewed out. Nature's bottle holder!

"You never loved that beer" Michael said gazing into his bottle, he held it close to his face, all you could see was half of his face through the translucent emerald glass. "Not like I love my beer." He kissed the bottle, eyes shut. Silence for all of a second, before we all burst out laughing. Rolling around on the sand, laughing like mother fuckers!

The tears were rolling down our faces, Jay was gasping for air! When we got round to breathing properly, I sat up and wiped the tears from my face.

"Yo Moose! Anymore beers in the sand?" He raised an eyebrow as if to say 'you mad?' He leaned over and pulled his jumper towards him, and there under his jumper, was a 3ft hole, filled with a crate of beer. Sand toppled to the bottom of the hole, sticking to the bottles.

"Sorry it's sandy", he sniggered as he plucked out a bottle at random. He didn't even look up when he flicked the bottle out of his hand. I jumped like a mother fucker for that bottle! Caught it with both hands too. We were rocking this fucking awesome atmosphere, laughing, joking, drinking, in our favourite area of Santa Monica.

I was had a mouthful of beer when I started to talk, I choked down my mouthful of beer so I could out the words.

"This was a great idea for a new year's eve bash Michael! How the fuck did you afford this again?"

He smirked like the Cheshire fucking Cat.

"I told you dip-shit, My Gran bought the tickets so we could come here. You know, my Gran? The person whos spare apartment your staying in?" He laughed like hell

"Yeah yeah I know!"

"Is there anything under that hair of yours, where your hair should be?"

I just flipped him off, ooh tension!

"Hey dude, what time is it?" I didn't look up to see who asked me, I just glanced at my watch as I slumped against the wall of the beach, the only thing seperating us from the main road on the Santa Monica high street.

"7:15. the sun's setting slowly today." I took yet another swig of beer, still gazing down the beach. Same as before.

Less than five hours until '97 kicks in, fuck yes!!!!

By 9:00 we were out of beer, we'd completely emptied the crate. And there was no way in hell we were gonna be able to get more beer due to the state we were in.

Moose had to gone to his apartment to see wether there was any left in the fridge, he'd been gone a while before we concluded that there wasn't any alcohol, never mind beer.

We were fucked. None of us really knew the area at all, we couldn't buy anything that we actually wanted, so we just had to sit and enjoy ourselves while we were still off our faces on drink.

The sun was almost down, the pinks and peaches which were once dissolved in the sky were replaced by midnight blues, highlighted with subtle purple tones. We're all lying on our packs looking into the sky like love sick puppies. Padge had been sucking on the same cigarette for what seemed like hours. But still, I found myself transfixed on the sky, even as the guys talked. Moose returned with nothing but a lighter.

"So, who's the sexiest American chick?" Jay's head rolled over in our direction, he rubbed his fingers together to signal to Padge that he wanted a smoke.

"I dunno man, some of these girls are fucking crazy, they just walk around in bikinis all day!"

"Moose, don't get so excited, you'll burst a blood vessel or something man!" Jay shrieked like a little kid pretty often, now wasn't an exception.

I sat up, my arms holding me up, I looked like a fucking tri-pod. I shuffled back up against the wall, the guys followed me, and we ended up all lines up against the cold, concrete wall.

"This is fucking awesome guys, I'm with my best friends, having a good time in an awesome fucking country!" I called out, it shattered the brief silence we'd ended up in after Moose's episode about bikinis.

"It's nice to be with my guys,having a good time." Padge said quietly. Padge was like the Daddy of the group, he was the wise one that kept us tame when we needed to be, we all loved him, even if he could be a bit of a buzz kill at times.

Around 10pm we heard to this scuffling behind the wall, it sounded like a girl laughing, she was shushing someone.

"Shh! Shh! Shut the fuck up!" She giggled like a little girl "when she turns up, grab her stuff yeah? Then run, she'll kill us if we stay around"

We could over hear everything, Jay was raising his eyebrow at it all, we all were pretty confused, we shouldn't of been listening in the first place, but still, we all kept it schtum so we could listen in. Who the fuck were they ambushing? Not that it mattered. Not that I cared. Not much anyway...