𝙩𝙚𝙖𝙧 𝙞𝙣 𝙢𝙮 𝙝𝙚𝙖𝙧𝙩 // 𝙟𝙚𝙧𝙚𝙢𝙞𝙖𝙝 𝙛𝙞𝙨𝙝𝙚𝙧

[ 𝙩𝙬𝙚𝙣𝙩𝙮 𝙨𝙞𝙭 ]

the crew was out at the beach. conrad was sitting in a beach chair with stella sitting on the floor in between his legs. nicole was there too. steven and shayla was sitting across from them near gigi.

just then, isabel approached the group with a pitcher of the "belly special" which was just the pomegranate margaritas. conrad was quick to pour a cup for stella then one for himself.

"hey, guys!" a familiar voice called behind them. stella smiled simply at the thought of jeremiah. she didn't know why. "hey! check out who i found!"

it was cameron. he was isabel's... boyfriend? friend? stella didn't really know. conrad offered him a drink but he was quick to decline. "oh, i'm good, man. thank you, i don't drink."

"yes, that's right," conrad recalled, tapping his plastic cup against stella's. "more for us. that's fine."

jeremiah was immediately becoming the life of the party. he sat down across from stella and greeted everybody on the way there.

even though conrad and stella weren't together and would never do that, jeremiah couldn't help but feel a little jealous of them sitting so close together. i mean, they had always been like that, but it had been bugging him recently.

stella was laughing at something conrad had said while handing jeremiah a cup of the "belly special".

"it's not a race, con," nicole said, watching conrad down the drinks.

stella was already on her second cup, but nobody had really noticed. except for jeremiah and her best friend.

"yeah, save some for the rest of us, please," jeremiah teased the two, acknowledging the girl in front of him. "that means both of you, stel."

stella chuckled and finished the rest of her second cup along with conrad. she raised her empty cup in the air and said, "okay, wait, wait, wait. but what if it was a race? i mean, isn't that... isn't that, like, every drinking game?"

"oh, yeah! let's play whatever stel just said," isabel announced, making gigi raise an eyebrow at her.

"you want to play a drinking game?" she asked, almost in disbelief.

i mean, we were all thinking it, stella thought, referring to gigi's comment. stop, that was mean, stella.

"why not? i mean, it's the fourth of july, right?" isabel threw her hands up in the air.

a proud smile made its way to stella's face. "hell yeah!"

"fuck it," her best friend added to the chorus of cheers among the group.

they started playing a few games where you had to make a coin land in this glass bowl. something like that. stella had obviously had a little more than enough alcohol already but she wasn't like andy. she could take a few margaritas and still be fine.

it was a new tradition for stella and conrad to link arms and down a drink. of course, stella and jeremiah tried it too.

jeremiah wasn't drinking as much as he wanted to. maybe it was becacuse he was hopeful for the rest of the night. stella-wise.

speaking of stella, she was easily on her fifth or sixth mini cup. she wasn't drinking out of the huge glasses that isabel was using.

they were in the middle of a game when it was stella and jeremiah's turn to go up against each other. he put two fingers in front of his eyes and pointed them towards stella, basically saying, i'm gonna win.

stella couldn't help but feel small butterflies in her stomach but she played it off with a playful eye roll. "watch your back, j," she chuckled, taking another sip of her drink.