When In Doubt - Freshman Year

Chapter 29

Luke

The police were on his brother's front porch, and they'd asked to be let inside, claimed it'd been a noise complaint, but Brett has had countless keggers in his back lawn back when school first started, but of course the cops had come to the house when he'd left his delinquent little brother with a record in charge of his house...like that wouldn't make things worse when the cops check his ID into the system.

Jared, Madison, Lindsay, and Mandy all stared back at him; Lindsay's mouth even hung open and looked like she was about to cry. Someone else must've heard him, because the music had gone low, and Luke dazedly saw a flash of blonde hair as Heather had joined their little horrified circle.

"Did I just hear you right?" Heather lowered her voice. "Are there cops outside?"

Luke nodded, and Heather swore under her breath. He'd reluctantly went back towards the door, but Mandy and Lindsay had blocked his way.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Luke raised his voice in agitation.

"Don't answer the door," Mandy answered, her green eyes sharp. "They don't have a warrant, and if you don't open the door, they can't legally come inside."

"So, what...we're gonna hold ourselves hostages in here?"

"That's the stupidest thing I'd ever heard!" Heather stepped forward. "If we don't cooperate, they'll just come back, and it'll be twice as bad."

"We don't live here," Mandy reminded her. "Our names are not on the lease, we're all under twenty-one, do you honestly think it'll be any better if we cooperate?"

Luke didn't know what to do. He'd glanced into the other room, and winced as everyone had frozen in their spots while they'd sat, waiting. Brayden had luckily left earlier with the Bryans, but Zach looked like he was going to puke even when he hadn't drunk a drop of alcohol. What a night to choose to come out with the rest of them...Eden looked like she'd just received news her parents had died in a car accident.

Luke couldn't help but feel so guilty: it was his idea to have people over that night, to have it at his brother's place, and to let his brother leave because what were the odds that something was going to happen?

Heather and Mandy kept going back and forth while Madison and Lindsay watched, but Jared was no longer with them; he'd completely disappeared. He must've dipped when he heard the word 'cops,' Luke thought to himself.

For his sake, Luke had decided to side with Heather and went for the door. Mandy yelled at him to stop, but he'd hadn't listened as he'd slipped through the front door...

...The whole ordeal had felt like a blur, but what'd happened was Luke had explained the situation to the cops, who'd had him call Brett to come all the way back home from the bars. Brett had arrived and talked with them for a while after the cops got everyone's IDs and wrote down their info. Luke couldn't believe it, but the cops actually hadn't given them all drinking tickets since him and Brett had cooperated so well, and had only got off with a noise complaint ticket. They'd still had to dump all their booze down the kitchen sink, but honestly, it'd been worth it.

Luke couldn't look anyone in the eye, and had felt even worse after the cops eventually left, and Brett wasn't angry or upset with him. No, he was more upset at himself, and felt bad their night had been ruined. Luke and a few others offered to help pay for the ticket, but the night was pretty much over after that.

Mandy and her girls, except for Madison, left separately. They said to go to some other party, but everyone else had decided to walk back together towards HKMC.