Social Experiment

33 | The Idiots

I walk into the cafeteria on Friday afternoon after a very exhausting morning and I'm more than pleased to see that Mike and Holden are missing from the lunch table. I take my regular seat beside Tess with a content smile, suddenly in a better mood. "Hey, where are the idiots?"

Tess cracks a smile as Vincent chuckles. "They skipped today."

I nod in understanding as Asher puts his hands down on the table to grab out attention. "So," He says conversationally. "I've been looking at places in the Poconos." 

"Yeah?" I ask excitedly and leaned into the table. "Did you find a place?"

"This place is in the mountains and has four bedrooms and two bathrooms. Plus it's right on the lake," As Asher is speaking, Tess literally squeals, a noise I've never heard come out of her. "It's only going to be three hundred for a four day weekend."

Three hundred? Split between the five of us, it will only cost us sixty bucks each. "Only three hundred?" 

Asher grins mischievously at me. "The renter is a family friend." 

"After buying beer and food, we'll each probably have to pay eighty," Vincent whistles as a smile slowly creeps onto his face. "That's not bad at all."

"Eighty bucks for a four day weekend?" A deep voice asks behind me. "Count me in."

Nathan rounds the table and sits down in the seat across from me with an impressed look on his face. My excitement grows tenfold at the thought of going on a vacation with my new friends, albeit a long weekend. They were all right: the price was reasonable and it was bound to be fun.

"Me too," I add happily with a wide grin to Asher. 

"I can't wait," Tess nudges me. "I'm so happy that I'm not the only girl now. Or, the only girl that isn't a Barbie."

"You can thank Asher for the previous Barbies," Nathan muses with a smirk directed toward Asher.

Asher rolls his eyes and gives Nathan a blank look. "As if you didn't take part in that phase of my life."

As much as I hated to admit it, a little pang of jealousy went straight through me at the mention of Nathan with other girls. It was no secret that last year, he managed to get in the pants of countless girls, and then leave them hanging. While I hadn't seen him continue the behavior ever since we've been friends, it still left an uncomfortable feeling on my chest. 

"Phase?" Vincent mocks with a smirk. "That's what you call it, Ash?"

"It was a phase for me," Nathan argues, and his eyes dart to me briefly before his gaze rests back on Asher tauntingly. "I can't say the same for you. I saw you talking to Morgan Pratt and Cecelia Yates last Friday night."

Asher just smirks at the memory instead of trying to refute the accusation and I shake my head at the fighting boys. Instead, I dug in my backpack and pulled out the lunch that my mother had been kind enough to pack me. The boys finally settled whatever it was they were fighting about and peace was restored around the table. 

"So," Nathan's voice turns serious. "Are the idiots coming to the Poconos?"

Asher smirks a little and glances at me and then back at Nathan. I knew why, too: both of us had referred to Mike and Holden as the idiots. Nathan's brow furrowed as he followed his best friends gaze to me, and then to Vincent, who was smirking to himself.