Sister to Jonas

Beach

Brexley's POV

"They're right over there, guys," Kevin says, pointing Sophie and her friends out to the rest of us upon our arrival at Venice Beach.

Our whole family makes our way over to the rest of our group for the day, lugging towels, a cooler, a speaker, a football, and a volleyball along with us. Us Jonases simply can't go to the beach without all of these essentials, and when inviting guests who are new to the city along with us on our trip, we just couldn't have left them behind.

"Wow, you guys are loaded down!" Sophie jokes, and I nod.

"Tell me about it," I say with a giggle.

We find as big of an opening on the beach as we possibly can, laying all our stuff down before applying sunscreen and doing introductions between everyone who doesn't know each other. Our parents and Frankie have to meet everyone, but Joe, Nick, Kevin, Danielle, and I only have to meet Sophie's best friend Maisie Williams, Peter Dinklage, Richard Madden, Natalie Dormer, and Jason Momoa. Soon after, we have the speaker turned on with Joe's phone connected and are trying to settle on a type of music to listen to for right now. It doesn't sound overly complicated in theory, but we have a group of seventeen people and everyone has a slightly different taste with the goal to cater to everyone.

"I'm not bothered. Honestly. It is your speaker and your phone; you guys can decide," Richard says, and Peter, Natalie, and Jason nod their agreement.

"Can't go wrong with today's worldwide hits," Maisie says.

"Do you guys like Coldplay?" Sophie asks, and Joe looks at me, a grin on his face. The amount of times Joe and I have jammed out to Coldplay in our apartment in New York can't even be counted.

"One of our favorite bands, actually," I answer her, returning Joe's smile as he puts on the playlist we use all the time. Then, leaving the speaker lay on a towel, Joe, Sophie, Maisie, Kevin, Nick, Kit, Peter, and I all race each other to the ocean, diving straight into a wave as it crashes onto the sand behind us.

"I think I won," Nick boasts, resurfacing and beaming at all of us.

"Yet I'm the competitive one," Joe says, rolling his eyes jokingly.

"You all are competitive," Sophie weighs in, and, with a glance at each other, all four of us siblings shrug in defeat. She's definitely not wrong there.

For the next hour and a half we all act like little kids in the water, swimming around and drenching each other as the waves roll past us. It's the perfect weather for a beach day, and everyone looks to be immensely enjoying themselves. I know I am. And then, after we all get out and dry off, Kevin has the bright idea to start up a volleyball game on the sand. Only eight of us are interested in playing, but everyone else has agreed to sunbathe and watch us, so it works out.

"Come on, we can do four a side, with Nick, Jason, Richard, and I on one team and Brexley, Joe, Frankie, and Sophie on the other," Kevin says.

"Isn't that kind of uneven, having one team of all guys and one team with two girls?" Frankie asks.

"Don't underestimate Brexley or Sophie, Tank. Guaranteed they're better than Kevin any day," Joe says, giggling a little at the look on our elder brother's face.

"I think those teams are good. Let's go," I say, and we form our teams, taking opposite sides of the net. We make a decision that whoever scores 15 points first wins, so it'll be a quicker game. Nick decides to serve first, and we're off.

"Man, I've got my money on Sophie's team," Kit calls from his towel.

"Me too!" I tell him, earning a laugh.

But while our team scores the first two points, Kevin's scores four unanswered ones and we're already down. They score a few more times, and we're losing 9-2. Not good at all.

"Come on, guys, you're letting us down over here," Emily says from the sidelines, and Frankie sticks his tongue out at her before we put five on the board for them. 9-7 now. This is going to be a close one, and it appears these teams are pretty well matched, actually.

"I wanna serve. Joe, can I serve?" Frankie asks.

"Sure. Here," Joe says, handing our little brother the ball. He puts it over the net in the perfect spot, and Nick can't get to it before it hits the ground. 9-8.

"Damn, Frank, have you been practicing?" Kevin asks, laughing a little and getting set again.

"Emily's a volleyball player, and I help her practice sometimes," he responds, putting another great serve over the net. This one Richard gets to, but we volley back and forth a little bit before Sophie spikes it into the ground on their side. Game tied, just like that.

"I thought we were gonna get away with an easy victory for a second there!" Jason says, shaking his head at us.

"With Sophie on the opposing team? Seriously, Jason?" Maisie teases him, making Kit and Sean laugh.

"She has a point," Sean says, and the game continues fast and furious.

Our team scores one more, and then Kevin's team returns us with two points. 11-10. We answer back with three in a row, bringing the score to 11-13. Richard sets the ball over to Joe, but, as is usual for him, he trips and can't get back to it. 12-13. And then, just like that, the score is tied 14-14. Match point. Whoever wins this point wins the game, and it better be us. It just has to be us.

"We got this, guys. Come on. We've been playing a great game," Joe says, huddling us all up for a pep talk.

"Here's what we can do. Frankie, you can serve, but put it right up against the net on our side. Sophie, you be there, and spike it just over the net to them. Joe and I will be at the ready, in case it goes a little to one side or the other, and we can put it over. They'll have trouble handling that for sure," I explain, and everyone seems on board. This has to work.

"I see you guys, coming up with some stupid plan over there. It's not gonna work," Kevin taunts us.

"We'll see about that," Frankie yells back, perfectly serving the ball to Sophie.

Sophie smacks it straight down, just as planned, but Jason is too quick. He puts it back in the air, diving onto the ground to do so, and Nick sends it back over the net to us. Joe handles it easily, and we volley it back and forth before I get the next big opportunity to spike. I take advantage of it, putting the ball just to the left of the foul line. It hits the ground, and it takes a second to sink in, but then I realize it.

"YES!" I screech, and my own glee is mirrored on Joe's face.

"Let's go! We won it!" Sophie says, high-fiving us and Frankie.

"Good game, guys," Richard says, sighing as he walks back to the towels.

"Good game, weirdos," Kevin says with a slight laugh, and Nick fist bumps us. Jason just grins, rolls his eyes at Sophie's excitement, and follows his teammates back to our stuff.

We grab dinner at a nearby restaurant, spend another hour in the surf, and then decide to call it a day since it's getting late already. Just like that, it's the end of one of the greatest vacations of my life, but I wouldn't change any bit of it. All of us exchange parting words, and then it really sinks in. They're leaving, and we might never see any of them again.

"Well, thank you for the best first trip to Los Angeles," Sophie says, coming over to say her goodbyes last.

"No problem. Thank you for hanging out with us!" I tell her, and she beams.

"Sophie, keep in touch, alright?" Joe says, and with one look at him I can tell he's really sad to be going separate ways from her.

"Yes, I definitely will. I'll probably be texting you soon as we get home," Sophie says, and Joe grins.

"Sounds good. Bye, Soph," he says, and then she's gone with the rest of her friends.

I guess it's back to New York now, back to business. And on to watching a lot of Game of Thrones, because if Joe wasn't already obsessed with the show, he sure as shit will be now. That's a guarantee.