Escaping Reality

Chapter 26: King of the Cove

It didn't take long before we came up with our next challenge. Apparently, it was one of their favorites. Hamilton had a set of golf clubs on board, a grass pad, and a bucket of biodegradable golf balls. It was only a matter of time before we were smacking balls off the top deck into the ocean. After getting a couple of practice shots in we had a long drive competition. Shocker, I didn't come close to winning. Hamilton and Charles were members at multiple fancy-schmancy golf clubs and were neck and neck until Hamilton whiffed, defaulting the win to Charles.

Then we decided to get creative, the alcohol starting to really show its colors. We blew up one of the cheap little tubes and tied an anchor to it, tossing it about twenty-five yards out from the boat, creating a perfect target. We spent the next hour, pitching wedge in hand, seeing who could make it in the tube. After depleting our golf ball supply we moved to drunk dancing and screaming lyrics.

Somewhere along the line, we decided it would be an awesome idea to give each other sunburn tattoos. We got out the tape and assigned each person a tattoo artist. We had fifteen minutes to create a tape design on the back of our human canvas. We could only see the design of the person we were assigned. After the design was in place we all played in the direct sunlight for 45 minutes solidifying a tan, or rather burn. I drifted off and woke up to the alarm 45 minutes later, excited to see all the guy's designs.

I had been assigned Charles back and my drunken immaturity had leaped out. I thought I was funny and had crafted a giant penis along his back. Turns out I wasn't the only one who thought that this was funny because every other guy including myself ended up with male genitalia on their back in varying sizes and shapes based on their artist's creative abilities. At that moment I realized that most high school guys were alike, oddly fixated on drawing penises at every given opportunity

We all thought it was hilarious and spent an embarrassing amount of time laughing about it. Right as we began to get over it someone would yell.

"Hey man, you have a giant dick on your back!"

That would send us back into fits of laughter and we repeated this cycle a few times too many. We cracked open a couple of brewskies and sat on the reclining chairs enjoying each other's presence.

"You guys wanna paddleboard?" Hamilton asked after a while.

We all nodded our heads no except for Charles, but we held the majority so we told him to stuff it.

"I've got three paddleboards down below. We can each pair up and take them out. It's kind of fun just to mess around on the ocean and it will give us a chance to cool off. We all cheered in agreement and sprinted down the steps to the paddleboards, pairing up along the way. I was with Nico, Jason with Tyler, and Hamilton with Charles. We threw the paddleboards in and jumped in after them leaving the boat unattended.

"Hamilton, you sure it's okay to leave the boat unattended," I asked.

"Yeah man it's fine, we do it all the time don't worry," he responded.

We paddled around for a little bit, enjoying the sun and the water. Our friendly fun turned into paddleboard king of the hill seeing who could remain standing. Given the size of the paddleboards and the levels of alcohol, we had consumed no one was ever king for more than a couple of seconds. Still, we had fun and it was almost cathartic to shove each other off the board and into the ocean.

Eventually, we decided to paddle over to the small little island. It couldn't have been more than 1,000 square feet but it felt giant among the endless miles of water that surrounded it. The island was pretty barren, littered with a tree or two and some shrubbery but it was mostly sand. Hamilton went over to one particular tree and was looking at its base pretty intently. He dug around the base for a little bit before producing a tin can.

"I found this a few years back when I was out here with my dad. I think it was buried by a geocacher. There's a deck of cards in here, a Michael Jordan wizards jersey, and a newspaper dating back to December of 2001." Hamilton said as he took out the deck of cards. "Let's play a quick game of blackjack"

We gathered around the beach area and Hamilton acted as the dealer dishing us each two cards. We gathered a handful of rocks that we used as our chips. After half an hour of hitting, standing, and doubling down I had come out victorious, about the only thing I had won thus far.

"You're pretty good at this Luke. When you turn 21 take us to Vegas why don't ya." Tyler said jokingly.

We put the cards back in the tin can and reburied it where we found it. All of us were pretty tired and decided to head back to The Boat and call it a day. When we got back to the yacht, Hamilton threw me a pocket shirt with The Boat's personal The Boat logo.

"Here you go, man. I know that we were just playing for fun but I figured that a tee-shirt was a better prize than a couple of rocks and pride. You're a part of the family, we all got a The Boat shirt." Hamilton said.

"Thanks, man, means a lot," I said as I slipped the shirt over my head to cover my raw, sunburnt, penis tattooed back.

We all crashed in the cabin area and rode back in silence. I drifted in and out of sleep, awakened by the harsher waves crashing against the boat when Hamilton got going too fast. Lola was just getting off work so I shot her a quick text.

"Hey Lola, the afternoon with the boys has been a blast, I think we're gonna go grab a bite to eat and do something tonight so I don't know if I'll see you but I'll have my phone nearby. How was work?"

"Sounds good, just keep me posted if you need anything. Work was good, slow, but manageable" she shot back quickly.

I put my phone back in my pocket and shut my eyes drifting into a light sleep. I awoke to Hamilton's yelling.

"WE'RE BACK BOYS, WAKE UP LOSERS"

We groggily stirred and gathered our stuff and exited the terribly named yacht. We were beginning to sober up and our stomachs were craving a big meal.

"How's the seafood down here?" I asked, "I haven't had good crab in forever."

I got a few grumbles in reply which I took as affirmations. Jason knew a place just a few blocks away that was really popular and right on the beach. It sounded good enough to me. We all put our stuff in our cars and made the trek on foot, trying to work our appetite up even more.