A Drop In The Lake

celebrating anything

Cameron

    The rest of the week floats by me. Every practice is a jumble of screamed commands and blistered fingers while every class is a filing cabinet of homework assignments and tangential life stories.

    It's officially Friday, and while nothing exciting has happened this week, I find myself fixing the collar of my polo shirt and zipping the zipper of my low-hanging jeans as I prepare to head out to a party. We aren't celebrating anything in particular except the absence of Anthony's parents from the island.

    Anthony's father is the headmaster of Harvey Cedars High School, and while they live down the street from campus, Anthony is insistent on boarding because he wants the "full high school experience". Translation: he wants easy access to any and all available females.

    As I'm finishing up getting ready, I get a text from Jack.

        Jackson: Heading over to AB's now. Can meet u @ WN?

        Cameron: I'm ready 2 so yuh. Meet me @ back.

    Jack replies with a quick "k," and I rush to grab my keys and fob. Jack is a day student, though he lives less than a five-minute walk from campus and stays on campus until at least ten o'clock every night, so he's basically a boarder.

    Seven minutes later I get a text from Jack saying he's outback, so I lock my door and head out. When I slide into his car I start by asking, "You realize his house is like a two-minute walk from campus right?"

    "Tisk, tisk. We ain't goin' there." He replies fervently.

    "What do you mean?"

    "Tony's parents live here, yes, but they also have a house in North Beach Haven so, we hit up some Haven girls, Tony supplies the booze and a multipurpose family-house, and voila! You got a bangin' party." He replies as if he's the one that owns the house.

    Harvey Cedars is the hobbit hole of rich folk, so the fact that his parents not only own a multi-million dollar "house" here, but they also have a "vacation home" in North Beach Haven is ridiculous. I know it probably sounds hypocritical because my parents have a house here too, but the pockets of some of the kids that attend Harvey Cedars High School are astronomical. And of course that only aids in inflating their egos to ungodly heights.

    "You're kidding right?"

    "Absolutely not!" He exclaims, slamming down on the gas pedal. "They run a school full of spoiled rich kids in one of the wealthiest areas is LBI, which means they've got connections to all sorts of money through alums, so yah, they have the funds."

    I roll my eyes and settle back into my seat, preparing for the thirty-minute car ride ahead. The duration of the car ride is swarmed with random rap music and monotone indie bands, while we talk about nothing and everything: from workload to the weather, from hot chicks to letters of rec, literally nothing is off the table for this guy.

    Thirty minutes later we pull up to a house with a hysterically small flower bed in comparison to the mini-mansion with green side paneling and enough curb appeal to attract a horse.

    "This is the place?" I ask, dumbfounded by the rundown appearance of the house.

    Anthony's house in Harvey Cedars is the pinnacle of Harvey Cedars living. The house is HGTV level extra, with daunting diamond pillows and yard-stick leveled knickknacks. No crumb or crust is out of place: it's intimidating as fuck.

    "Are you coming in?" Questions Jack, noticing I'm still sitting in the car staring at the house.

    "Yeah, sorry," I reply, adjusting my shirt as I get out of the car.

    We head inside to a relatively empty house. Jack told Tony he'd be here early to help him set up, so the only thing we see is a large keg of beer in the middle of the kitchen floor, with peach-picked bottles of rum and vodka strewn across the kitchen counter.

    For the next thirty minutes, we move all of the family heirlooms and glass-clad memorabilia to the second floor sweet in the South building, locking the door to keep any dark corner seekers at bay. Then we set up the music station outside, plugging Anthony's laptop into two speakers and connecting it to the surrounding BlueTooth speakers that line the outdoor patio.

    Anthony's Haven house is made up of three buildings. The main building has four bedrooms, three bathrooms, a living room, a kitchen, and a wet bar. Two of the bedrooms on the main floor are unlocked to give people a place to piss, whereas the top floor is all locked up except for the family room and the patio. The south building, which is where all of the precious relics are being housed, is all locked up. The north building is the guest house, there's a bedroom upstairs with an ensuite bathroom, and a mancave-Esque family room on the first floor, all of which is completely open to party-goers.

    At around nine o'clock guests started showing up and funneling into the main and north buildings. By now, most have made their way out onto the wraparound deck that connects each building together. Outside, bone-battering base shatters through peoples' systems while rickety chatter waves across the beach.

    "Cam! Can you go grab a couple more cups from the kitchen in the cupboard above the sink?" Asks Anthony as I head over to the fence lining the dune on the property.

    Jack, Tony, and I have been making the rounds to keep everyone on the near side of the dune so that we aren't held liable for some drunk idiots trying to go for a swim.

    "Yeah. You want another drink while I'm there?" I ask, addressing the whole group.

    They all reply with a dejected grumble as I gather their cups and head inside.

    Inside, faces float through each room. Conversations take front stage as people bop around to the vibrations of muffled music. As I head through the living room, to make my way into the kitchen, the strike of an ashy blond blunt cut cuts into the corner of my vision.

    "Alessa?"