This is Me Trying ⭑ Rafe Cameron

nine

CHAPTER NINE
[9]
song: ugly ending by best frenz

Cassie was deep into some cheap, tattered book she'd found at her house the morning prior. She was reading the words, yet processing none of them. It was a meditative state, her mind held up elsewhere as her eyes focused on the pages in front of her. Cuddled up in a hammock, hung on the bannisters of the garage at The Chateau, she sat opposite Kiara, who strummed a quiet tune on an ukulele. Besides them was JJ, waxing his board, and Pope, who was rewiring an old fan to get it work again.

"You wanna surf today?" JJ spoke.

When no one else responded, Cassie realized it was her he asked. She leaned up, lazily letting her head fall to the side of the hammock to face him. "Not really."

JJ looked disappointed, but at least he'd tried. The mood was down. Had been all morning, had been for a few days now. How could it not be? All four of them hanging out at John B's house without John B.

"Kie?" JJ asks next.

Kiara doesn't look up from her ukulele as she tuned it by ear. "Too hot."

JJ looks up at Pope and gives him a look. "Yes, that's why you get in the water."

Kiara shrugs it off.

"That's a lot of wax on your board." Pope says, gesturing towards JJ before returning to his own task. "Put too much and it's gonna be slippery."

"Are you telling me how to wax my board Pope?" JJ asks.

"No, I'm just saying that's a lot of wax—"

"No, no, no, you're telling me how to wax my board—"

"Can we go back to twenty seconds ago when no one was speaking?" Cassie groans, closing her eyes and letting the book fall onto her chest.

"I'm just saying, that's a colossal waste of wax." Pope shrugs.

A car honks.

And then everyone is silent, everyone is still, as they wait to hear if the sound they just thought they'd heard, was real.

"Did you hear that?" JJ asks.

A car honks again.

But not just any car.

In between the trees busts out the old, rusty van, with chipped paint and broken windows, charms dangling from the mirror, plastered with old stickers, and in the front seat is John B.

"What the hell?" Was the collective reaction, as everyone got to their feet and rushed over to the van.

"Guess who's out the clink boy!" John B yells excitedly as he gets out of the driver's seat.

"No freaking way, man!"

"Are you serious?!"

The five collided into a rough hug, one made up of sweat and the smell of outdoors. Cassie felt someone patting the back of her head like a dog, but with the tangle of bodies she couldn't tell who it was.