My body tensed up as I watched the cone of light shining in the hallway sweeping through the room where I hid, catching my breath as it passed by my hiding spot. As the light swept through the room, I couldn’t help but to notice another hidden amongst the shadows, trying to creep silently to gain a better vantage of our hunter. I swore silently in my head as I helplessly watched the fool, sure that they would give the us away. It had felt like minutes had passed, when I felt my lungs burning, I remembered that I had forgotten to breathe. Desperate for air I released the stale air in my lungs in an audible gasp. Immediately I covered my mouth with my hands in an attempt to silence myself again. Fortunately our pursuer had already moved on and didn’t hear my gasping for air, unfortunately though the shadow that was creeping around the room heard me and stood up directly into a bookcase, resulting in a perceivable thunk. Unable to control myself, probably due to the lack of oxygen to my brain, I burst into laughter before smothering it again, when suddenly our hunter quickly came around the corner again shining the light directly into my eyes.
“Aha! I found you!” He announced before switching on the lights and noticing the source thunk that he had heard in the other room. The sudden burst of light rendered me temporarily blind, so I stood there blinking quickly to help my eyes adapt to the sudden change of light. When my eyes adjusted, I looked up to see my two friends sitting in the middle of a pile of books. The grin fading from my lips as I went over and checked out any damage that may have been caused by the sudden collision with the bookshelf. I was unsurprised to see the fair Grace, whose name could only be described as unfortunate, was the cause of the commotion. Parting her light brown curls I searched for any signs of blood or any other obvious injuries, satisfied that she appeared fine I offered her my hand to help her up. She continued to be in a bit of a daze, so while she sat composing herself, I took the opportunity to assess the damages to the bookshelf which appeared to sustain a fair bit more damage than Grace herself. Thanking the fact that Grace is more durable than she appears, I started humming lightly while picking up the books and piling them onto the desk that I was previously hiding under.
Dusting off my hands, satisfied with the haphazard book pile that I created, I turn to my friends declaring “Well, it’s time to find Mary.” Hunter, our less fair friend who shared his name with his temporary occupation, looked up and nodded in response as he gave his hand to Grace, who accepted it as she stood up a bit shakily. The two of them stood staring into each other’s eyes when I let out a “ahem,” and they quickly turned away from each other, faces flushed. I pretended to not notice their red cheeks, prompting to instead pick up the flashlight and exit the room, giving a cheeky wink and stupid grin before turning the light off. A few seconds later, slightly disappointed but not surprised, I noticed two sets of steps following behind me.
10 minutes of fruitless searching later, I eventually got bored and started calling out for our last friend to reveal herself. A bright and chipper hello could be heard from Mary who had seemed to just appear behind us even if it would be hard to miss the tall muscular girl in broad daylight.
I shook my head and stared at her as I asked “Were you hiding in the rafters again? You still remember what happened last time don’t you?”
She laughed and shook her head “Yeah I remember, but I also see that you broke that shelf in the study.”
I sighed as I remembered the time she had cracked one of the wooden beams in the foyer that had luckily been only cosmetic “That’s not the same and you know it, besides where were you hiding all this time?”
She laughed again and stated, “I was right behind Hunter this entire time.” This didn’t surprise Hunter as he shook his head and let out a chuckle and I let out a snort as well, while Grace continued to look amazed and confused at our apparent apathy to this feat. Knowing that Mary was a trained and accomplished Dancer/Gymnast/Martial Artist/Probably Trained Assassin had the two of us completely unphased by this revelation. Starving from hiding and searching, I headed into the kitchen, picked up a paper plate and a couple slices of pizza, and sat at the counter spinning lightly on one of the barstools. The two girls joined me at the counter with slices of pizza while Hunter went to the fridge to get some sort of creation that he had made earlier mostly out of chickpeas and tofu.
I pointed at his creation with a slice of pizza and proposed “You know I can’t understand how you can eat that stuff when this tastes so good.”
He ignored the pizza and decided to answer the question in a rehearsed manner “It’s a lifestyle choice and I’m sure you don’t understand, you would eat anything as long as someone told you that it was edible.”
“You’re wrong” I started, taking note of his upraised eyebrow, “they would have to tell me it tastes good too.” I finished my sentence and slice of pizza and dramatically turned away from him, crossed my arms and went “humph.” Hunter followed my cue and turned away in a similarly dramatic matter, causing Grace to panic a little as she repeatedly opened and closed her mouth and waved her hands in front of her. Mary however seemed to have caught on to us and started laughing at the three of us as I went over to hug Grace and said “You’re so cute you know that right” giving her a little kiss on the head and quickly added “He knows it too” pointing backwards at Hunter before he turned away again, this time to hide his red cheeks. I laughed it off as I went to the fridge to take a beer that Hunter’s dad had stored in the fridge.
“Hey!” Hunter said, in an attempt to interrupt me in my quest for a bottle opener “You know that’s my dad’s and that you’re not 21 yet, right?”If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“Relax Hunter, it’s alright. Besides I’ve had a few brews with your old man before.” I said casually, before finally finding the drawer that had a bottle opener in it. “And besides” I said motioning with the bottle opener, “I turn 21 in a few weeks and there aren’t any cops here, right? Sooo …” I continued, popping open the bottle “I think it’s fine” and took a sip of the beer. “Eugh too bad it’s lite beer” I finished, as I looked in the fridge for a soda.
“I still don’t think you should drink it” Hunter said quietly underneath his breath.
“Blah blah blah, I can’t hear you. Now would either of you like to join me in my trip to inebriation?” I proposed while popping open a can of diet soda, once again disappointed that Hunter’s mom had convinced his dad to take better care of himself. Seeing no takers, I shrugged and took another slice of pizza and sat down downing beer, pizza, and soda equally.
“I still don’t see how you’re not 1000 pounds yet” Hunter stated, ignoring my glare “You eat more than Mary and all you do is laze around all day.”
I scoffed at him and stated, “Thou should never query a lady about thine weight tis rude” and started chomping on the fourth piece of pizza that I had gotten today. “And besides, my ladylike figure is from hard work and dedication.”
“You mean all the dudes that you have been doing?” Hunter retorted, as he stood up and nearly knocked the pizza box over as he slammed his hands on the counter.
I scoffed at him for a second time and shook my head indignantly, replying with another over the top response, “Tis most rude to intrude on the going ons of a woman and I for one am not one to kiss and tell” pausing before continuing “except if they are quite cute.” Thoroughly satisfied with my defense, I proceeded with my counterattack “What about you Sir Rivera, I’ve seen how you and Miss Thomas have been acting around each other lately.”
Blushing heavily for at least the third time tonight Hunter stammered out “It’s not like that… not like I don’t like Grace like that” the last few words barely a whisper. “Why are you bringing her into this? She doesn’t deserve this Hope.”
Making a sound that I had previously thought only dinosaurs could make, I went over to Hunter, shoved my beer bottle in his face, and cautioned “Take that back Rivera.” My face glowing a similar shade of red, mostly due to alcohol and some due to rage “You know I don’t use that name anymore.”
Our glaring contest was interrupted by Mary who had gotten up, picked up and opened two beers and sat back to enjoy our show “Now stop it you two, you’re scaring Grace again.”
Noticing that she was right as usual I stopped, gave a “Sorry mom,” and went over to squeeze Grace “sorry Grace” I said and booped her nose, “and I’m sorry to you too Hunter.” I finally finished processing the information that Mary had taken two bottles I stared at her and waved at the bottles. “So are you drinking two at a time? Even I don’t do that unless we’re looking for a good time.”
She shook her head and said, “No I got one for Grace, she wanted to try it and asked me to get one before you two started arguing.”
“What?” I said caught off guard, never having expected Grace to be the type of person to drink. “Well why didn’t you say something when I offered you some earlier?” as I got up close to her face and took in every detail in her soft brown eyes noticing that they had a bit of green in them, reminding me of my own bright green eyes. Resisting the urge to give her another kiss, I backed up and slapped Hunter on the back to rouse him from his stupor.
I heard a small “I’m sorry” and I put my hands next to my ear to feign ignorance to his statement. “I’m Sorry” his face got redder than it had any time before tonight “I’m sorry that I called you that, I know how you feel about that name, Alex. So, you know I’m sorry…”
“Don’t worry, just never call me that ever again” I said and gave him the biggest fake smile I could possibly muster while also attempting to put some killing intent behind it.
“Ooooh scary” Mary mused “Why do you never join the plays? You seem to be quite the actor, if I do say so myself.”
“I’m a more of a behind the scenes type of gal you know” I replied, “and besides the people are much more entertaining and less fake.”
Mary nodded at this fact “Yeah any of the actors I talk to either don’t seem to like me or they want to get in my pants or both” shuddered she continued “and it’s the latter that scares me the most.”
“Me too” I agreed “but if any of them tried to make a move on you it would be game over for them” I smiled a little at the thought and remembered the first and incidentally last person to smack Mary’s ass. Not like I hadn’t thought of doing the same once or twice or basically every time I see her, but hearing his wrist crack was enough to deter anyone from ever thinking of doing it ever again. Mesmerized by the thought of Mary’s butt I was brought back to reality by Grace’s giggles as she swayed slightly in her chair, obviously a bit of a lightweight. Unable to resist Grace’s infectious giggles, perhaps due to my own slight intoxication, I joined in with a slightly heartier laugh, only stopping to breathe and not fall over. Slightly confused about the sudden weakness in my body dismissing any odd feelings I felt, I got another slice of pizza and plopped onto the couch searching for the remote. I heard groan behind me and ignored it, as I had found the ever elusive tv remote “Who wants to watch a movie???”
“Ooooh what are we watching?” Grace asked expectantly.
I shrugged, knowing full well that they couldn’t see me and replied, “I don’t know, let’s figure it out.” A few minutes of intense debate later and a vehement refusal from Grace to watch any horror movies, even with my offer to hold her, we decided to watch the latest superhero movie. Mary hadn’t watched a lot of the other superhero movies, so we had to explain a lot of the plot details to her. Watching the movie ended up taking almost twice as long as it should have. Hunter and Grace seemed to really like it even though Mary and I thought that it had too many characters to keep track of. After another hour or so and a few more beers, everyone was sleeping in the living room Grace and Hunter sharing a chair, Mary sprawled over the entire couch, and I occupied the last chair. Feeling the warmness of the alcohol, I started to drift to sleep and as soon as I had closed my eyes, a blinding light jolted me immediately awake.