April 8, 2010 (19)
5:00 p.m.
Chelsea’s Lake House

Ding Dong
“Yo,” a tall, muscular boy said when he answered the door to Chelsea’s lake house. His eyes were bloodshot, his speech was slurred and he could barely stand up straight. He was obviously drunk.
“Um, hi,” I said to him. “I’m looking for Cole Wilson.”
“Who?” he asked, looking confused.
“Can I just come in?” I replied, figuring it would be easier to just find him myself.
“Whatever,” he murmured. He stepped aside and went back over to the living room of the lake house, where about two dozen people were all dancing and fist-pumping to some Kanye West song I vaguely recognized. From the looks of it, all of them were just as intoxicated as the boy who had answered the door for me.
Sighing, I scanned the room for Cole. I couldn’t see through the crowd of partygoers though, so I reluctantly decided to go in and search among all of the people.
I stepped past a couple, who were grinding up against eachother, arms raised above their heads, fists pumping in the air. “Oh God,” I uttered to myself. This was that kind of party. The kind where everyone got drunk, grinded, hooked up with eachother and smoked weed on the back patio.
I’d heard about these types of parties before. Kristy had been invited to one back in high school, but I never had. The next day, she’d described the vulgarity of it all to me. To be honest, I used to always wish I’d be invited to one of these parties when I was still in high school. Mainly because these were the parties that the popular kids threw. People like Julianne Wiggins and Kelly Richardson.
However, now that I was actually at one, I realized just how awful they were. I wasn’t very shocked that Cole was at this party though. I hated to admit it to myself, but he was the type of person who would attend these parties on a regular basis. I just hoped he hadn’t gotten very drunk. I didn’t want him to make a bad impression on Addison and her boyfriend.
“Hey, watch it,” some girl in an ultra-short mini skirt snapped at me when I accidentally bumped into her.
“Sorry,” I muttered back to her. She just rolled her eyes in response and went back to grinding with some guy who had a plastic red cup in his hand, the liquid sloshing around in it as he danced.
I made my way past them and continued to work my way through the throng of drunken partiers. Many of them pushed, shoved and cursed at me as I bumped against them, but I just kept on going, searching for Cole. He wasn’t among the crowd of dancing people though. So I got out of there as quickly as possible and went to look throughout the rest of the house.
I stepped out of a short hallway leading from the living room to the kitchen, which was also crowded with people. People seated around the kitchen table, drinks in front of them. People standing around the island in the middle of the kitchen, talking, laughing, drinking. A few couples scattered throughout the room were making out with eachother. But none of these people were Cole.
I groaned and turned around, about to head outside to the back patio. But a half-open, half-shut door caught my eye before I did. I saw flashing lights and heard loud music blasting from inside of it. Curiously, I approached it and opened it the rest of way. Before me, was a flight of stairs leading down to what had to be the basement.
I followed the blasting sound of Ke$ha’s “We R Who We R” all the way down to the extremely spacious basement of the lake house. There were strobe lights over head, which gave me a slight headache, and made it even more difficult for me to look for Cole. It seemed like the entire basement was a dance floor. It was jam-packed with people, all dancing and partying with eachother.
I sighed and squinted as I made my way through the huge cluster of dancers, not that squinting improved my vision very much. I could barely make out anyone’s face with those stupid strobe lights flashing. If only Shaun hadn’t stepped on Cole’s phone. Then I could have just called him. Not that he’d be able to hear his phone ringing over the music playing. It was so loud that the pounding of the bass made the ground vibrate.
There was a moment when things quieted down as the song switched. And in that moment I heard a girl’s shrill voice calling out to the host of the party. “Hey, Chelsea! Girl, this party is amazing!” she squealed.
I spun around just in time to see the girl throwing her arms around a gorgeous brunette. This must have been Chelsea. The next song began, making it impossible to hear what she said to Chelsea once she broke their embrace. But that didn’t matter. What mattered was that I’d found Chelsea, the host of this party. Maybe she’d be able to help me find Cole.
I walked up to her just as the other girl was walking away. “Hi,” I shouted over the music. “My name’s Evalynne. I’m Cole Wilson’s girlfriend. Do you happen to know where he is?”
She stared back at me, one of her perfectly arched eyebrows raised. She didn’t respond to my question though. Instead, she took my arm and pulled me along with her as she headed up the stairs to the kitchen.
“That’s better,” she said, shutting the basement door behind her. “Sorry, it’s just a little hard to hear down there.” she added.
“Yeah, it is,” I replied.
“You said you were looking for Cole, right?” she asked me.
“Yep,” I said.
“What a coincidence, so am I.” she remarked, a hint of spite in her voice. Because I was his girlfriend, maybe? “Well, I told him to meet me at the hammock out back, so that’s probably where he is. I was actually just about to go out there to see if he’s there yet.”
My ears perked up when she told me this. She had told him to meet her at a hammock out back? All by themselves? I’d have to watch out for this girl.
“Ok, well do you mind showing me where that is?” I asked her, trying not to glare at her. With her glossy lips and tight top, which revealed a bit of her tanned midriff.
“Follow me,” she replied, turning around and heading for the sliding glass door, which led out onto the patio.
There was a group of about five guys all sitting on folding chairs, smoking joints. They looked completely out of it, like they were dreaming, even though they were awake. But once they saw Chelsea step out of the house, all five of their heads turned to look at her. The one closest to her, reached out a hand and smacked her rear end as she walked by him, grinning at his friends triumphantly.
She rolled her clear hazel eyes and came to a sudden stop, turning around to face him. “Scotty,” she said irritably, “what did I tell you about personal space?”
“Don’t know, and don’t really care,” he replied casually. Then his dilated eyes landed on me, giving me a quick once over. I felt uncomfortable, like just by looking at me, he was violating me somehow. He just had that creeper vibe going for him. “Who’s your friend?” he asked her.
“Her name’s Evalynne and she’s not my friend.” she snapped back. “Don’t even try it though. She’s with Cole,” she said, smirking back at me. I wasn’t exactly sure what this little smirk of hers meant, but I knew I didn’t like it.
“Oh, is she?” Scotty remarked, a smug look on his face. He exchanged a look with Chelsea that I couldn’t read and then grinned back at me. I was so confused now. “Well tell your boyfriend I said hi,” he told me. Then he turned back to his group of stoner friends and continued smoking.
“What was that all about?” I asked Chelsea as we began trekking down a narrow pathway, which led down to the small beach at the shore of the lake. It was pretty chilly out so nobody was there swimming or anything.
“Nothing,” she said. But I could tell by the sound of her voice that she was hiding something. I tried my best to shrug it off and forget about it, but I just couldn’t.
Soon enough, I spotted the back of Cole’s head. He was lying peacefully across a hammock, which was tied to two trees in order to hold it up. Chelsea had obviously spotted him too, because she called out to him in that smooth, alluring voice of hers.
“Hey, look who crashed the party.” she said. He sat upright and turned his head to look at her as we approached him.
“Evalynne?” he asked in shock, his eyes lighting up when he saw me. “Hey, what’re you doing here?” His normally low, sexy voice was a jumble of slurred words and syllables and his entire face looked flushed. I couldn’t help but notice the can of Miller Lite he held in his hand.
“I was actually here because there’s some stuff I need to tell you. I didn’t know you were going to be at this party though.” I replied.
“Oh, well how’d you find me anyways?” he wondered aloud. He stood up and staggered over to me on wobbly feet. I caught Chelsea smirking out of the corner of my eye. What was it with this girl and her constant smirking?
“I went to your dorm to look for you, but you weren’t there. So Shaun told me where I could find you.” I informed him. “But we really have to go. We’re supposed to be meeting someone really soon.”
“Aw, don’t make him leave yet.” Chelsea spoke up, wrapping a thin arm around Cole’s waist. “He just got here,”
“Yeah, Evalynne, I just got here,” he repeated.
“Well sorry, but you have other plans, so we’re leaving now.” I remarked, trying not to sound as irritated as I actually was. I was really getting sick of this Chelsea girl though. I’d only known here for about five minutes, yet I was already on the verge of pushing her into the lake behind us.
“Do we have to?” he whined, sounding like a five-year-old. This was definitely not the Cole I was used to. This was the drunk Cole who attended parties hosted by skanky, popular girls like Chelsea.
“Yes, we do.” I stated firmly. I wasn’t in any mood to sit here and argue with him.
“Fine,” he groaned, pulling away from Chelsea. I smiled, finally reaching a point of satisfactory.
“You shouldn’t let her push you around like that, Cole.” Chelsea said. “Just because she’s your girlfriend doesn’t mean that she’s in charge of you.”
I gritted my teeth together in rage, really beginning to despise this girl. “Cole,” I began, “if you don’t come with me right now, you’re not going to get anymore of what you got two days ago. And you remember how great that was, don’t you?”
“Ok, time to go,” Cole said immediately, my plan obviously working. It wasn’t that I was actually going to just start sleeping around with Cole regularly or anything. What happened two days ago was a one-time thing. At least until after we grew a little bit older and got married. I was just using this to bribe him into coming with me, because I knew it would work. After all, he was a guy and he was drunk. How could it not have worked?
I watched with content as Chelsea’s expression switched from haughtiness to one of shock and malice. “That’s what I thought,” I replied. And with that, we were off, leaving Chelsea alone at the hammock.