All is Fair in Love and War

Lanterns like Fireworks

That night I looked deep into my mirror trying to figure out who I saw in it. It wasn't me, or at least I couldn't tell if it was me. It was the same face, same arms, legs, body, even the same voice, but tonight I could tell that there was no part of me that was the same. I was nobody tonight, and it seemed that nobody was a better choice than Ella Cooper.

        I quickly slipped on my dark brown leather jacket, and put in my gold stud earrings. I had a dark purple dress on with sunflowers on them, I mean they were sunflowers but they looked more like the stars in Van Gogh's "Starry Night." I was better at applying eye liner now. I quickly coated my lips with a magenta lipgloss and pulled on my cowboy boots, which I thought went well with the dress. I walked down the stairs to find no one. Mom was about 3 hours away in Portland, Maine to meet with the faculty at Joey's school to discuss her behavior. She wouldn't be home till tomorrow afternoon, of course with Joey. I took one last look in the small mirror hanging over the stand by the door. I heard Flick’s car pull up. I looked out through the window. She was fixing either her obviously fake eye lashes or smokey eye shadow; I couldn’t tell. It was a quiet night, that was clearer than the rest. The stars were just peaking out through the tender, dark blanket of night. I opened the red car door and slid in.

“Hey.”

“Ready to party?” She was tugged on her false eyelash.

“Yep, are you?”

“Yep, just a stupid lash keeps poking me.” She flipped the small door mirror and tried to fix it. She was wearing a green sweater that only covered one shoulder with a pair of dark skinny jeans. “There. Okay, let’s go.” We went forward into the small road surrounded by the red trees. Luckily, Jacob only lived about 8 minutes down the road. “Hey,” Flick softly sounded.

“Yea?”

“Just, don’t let anybody get to you tonight, OK?” She was obviously gesturing towards the girls’ comments last night. I was silent. I leaned against the window. “You hear me?” I was still was silent. 

We pulled up by a red house. Of course the driveway and surrounding area was filled with cars. We both got out, quickly fixing our outfits as we approached the door. All th elnights were off, except for the lanterns hanging from the ceiling, which radiated a great deal of light. Vibrant colors clashed in the air above us like fireworks. The music was quite loud, and so were the people in the house. There I saw Jacob in a black t-shirt and jeans. His hair was messier than usual. He was clutching a beer can. He looked over at me and smiled.

“Baby, come over here. I want you to meet some of my friends.” I looked over at Flick for her approval of me leaving.

“It’s okay, I can fend for myself.” She remarked.  

“I want you to meet some of my friends from the community college.” He whispered in my ear. “Here, let me take your jacket.” 

“No, that’s ok.”

“Here, you look hotter without it.” He quickly slipped it off of me and threw it onto a chair with other coats on it. “So this is Martin, Drew, Lucas, and Henry.” 

“Hey, I’m Ella.” They all responded with the same greeting. They too were holding beer cans, except Drew who was holding a plastic cup with some sort of soda in it. “Nice party, Jake.”

“Thanks, Lucas knows a guy who got us this beer.” He reached into the cooler by us and pulled out a beer. “Here.” He held it infront of me. I really didn’t want a beer, I thought it had a terrible taste. Plus, if Flick got wasted, I needed to be able to drive her home. His one eye brow was raised as he slightly shook it for me to take.