Chasing Blue

#33: Shell for your thoughts?

Present

Isabella

Up until one month ago, it would've been an alternate universe where I'd be seen even a tiny bit excited about prom. Prom and I are like curds with noodles. We just like to stay on completely different pages of completely different books of completely different genres. A few days ago I didn't expect to have a date even. But since then, since high school has ended, my life has taken the stage spotlight for drama. 

After the prank we pulled on Jacob, he seems to be hanging around a lot with the boys. It seems like the incident never happened. It seems like freshman year all over again, where we're six and not five in the recycle bin. A part of me is glad, but a part of me remembers the lake house event and I don't think I'm completely free of it, as much as I wished for it. 

Apart from the water activities, non-stop beach volleyball matches, and a lot of cold coffees and sunset gazing, we have pretty much worn out everything that was possible for us to engage ourselves in. 

With prom scheduled in the same banquet hall this evening, it is hard to enter without bursting into laughter. I can still picture Jacob's petrified face and Liam's most successful cinematic masterpiece. Jason's camera has recorded a wide-angle video that Liam uploaded on his vlog channel yesterday. Liam's been obsessed with that Instagram/YouTube account since freshman year. All the collections of pranks we've done in the last four years have video proofs and memories in both of these accounts. He's an online celebrity with about 90K followers who love the way his mind works. Liam Davis is an absolute genius and he used it as evidence for a co-curricular hobby for his college application. 

As much as Liam's been obsessed with his social media accounts, Jason adores technology. He keeps creating prank sites, webpages, and any technical issue you need to be solved, Jason Cody is the best go-to person. They've found their callings and it's so evident. The main reason why I appreciate their calling is because it makes it so easier to decide what gifts to give them on their birthdays. 

With Maya Sen, one look at her will tell anyone how much of a book-lover she is. You can never run out on books, and even if we did, we love how she organizes and journals her daily timetables. A planner, a binder, an organizer, a duct tape, a post-it even would serve as the best birthday gift in her books. 

Jacob, as I still remember, loves to taste the varieties of alcohol. He achieved that liking when he started to go on these vineyard trips with his father and he tasted wine at the age of fourteen. His tasting is apparently just a shot. I remember how he said one gets to know the taste of wine the best with just one sip. If you don't, either the wine's really bad or you are. 

And with Austin, it was hard at the first. I couldn't place a finger on what exactly made him happy. But I thought out of the box one year and we decided to give him something that is not materialistic. We decided to give him time. We planned a hike in the baby hills of Jacobiweiher and he loved it. We camped for three days and I'd never seen him happier. He loves it when people give him time and stay with him. 

I smile to myself when I try to place myself on this grid and understand what it is that made me really happy. The bin usually makes me pick from a pile of chits to plan my birthday and I was happy with all of it. Not one thing was in particularly needed to make me happy. Liam said there's always one thing that makes one the happiest and he said he'd figure it out but he still hasn't. Maybe everything that's especially thrown my way with love makes me happy. 

I look down as the waves come crashing down on the blue surface of the ocean. They slowly surface to my feet and make them disappear under the water. I wait for the water to retrieve itself and join back to its core. I don't have the power to steal a portion of it away. I'm not Frank Cooper.