Pressure (Equinox Lake Tahoe #1)

Chapter 1

CASH

With each footstep, the feeling of dread set in.

Dread was a new feeling for me and one that I didn’t care for.

The cinder block that sat in my stomach lodged deeper, confirming it was here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future.

In the distance, the law building on the UCLA campus loomed large.

Nausea accompanied me and my best friend, Braxton, as we headed into the building to find out what grade I’d earned in my Constitutional Law class.

“Maybe it won’t be that bad,” Braxton said as he jostled my shoulder while I reached for the door.

I’d fucked up badly, and I knew it. The worst part about it wasn’t that I knew my family would be not only disappointed and livid, but seeing that I’d failed at something was going to gut me.

While I was an undergrad, I did well in my classes and found them somewhat entertaining.

But I loved my art classes and took one each semester, against my parents’ wishes.

I took the art classes for “no credit” so they wouldn’t land on my transcripts.

After having just completed my first year of law school, I felt completely out of place and my final grades were going to reflect it.

I hated law school with a passion, and often found myself wondering how I was going to be able to stomach being an attorney.

All semester, I’d barely kept my head above water, despite lying to my folks about how great I’d been doing.

I kept most conversations in text form so they couldn’t hear the unhappiness in my voice over the phone.

I didn’t want my parents to catch on to how much the life they’d set up for me actually repulsed and depressed me.

Jameson Law of Indianapolis was where I was supposed to start and end my career as a corporate attorney.

My grandfather started the firm, and my father and uncle were senior partners.

The bulk of the practicing attorneys were my three siblings and five cousins.

I was the baby of the family and was expected to be the ninth attorney.

Only thing was that I wasn’t a sheep, like my siblings and cousins were.

I was definitely the black sheep of the family, but I was not one who was just going to follow that status quo because that’s what I was expected to do.

My true love is art and all types of art. I love sketching, drawing, and painting and I like to think that I’m pretty good at it. Unfortunately, my folks didn’t share my interest in art, nor did they encourage it. In fact, they did damn near anything and everything to discourage it.

My parents’ expectations were suffocating, though I had managed to get my way in some matters.

Yale and Harvard were the schools where my entire family had earned their law degrees from, and I was expected to follow family tradition.

I like to say it was my badass skill of persuasion to get my parents to see value in me attending UCLA for my law degree.

But honestly, I didn’t have the grades my siblings and cousins had to get into Yale or Harvard.

I was already a major disappointment for not getting accepted at Yale or Harvard, but I didn’t want to go to either of those schools anyway.

Once my parents, uncle, and grandfather came to terms with the fact they wouldn’t be able to proudly boast the education of Yale and Harvard for all the attorneys at Jameson Law, they calmed down some and were just happy I was accepted into a law program.

They’d made some snide comments at family gatherings about the type of education I was getting, and that they were concerned about the environment of Los Angeles and the impact it had on me.

This, of course, was after I told them that I thought I wanted to focus on social law instead of corporate law.

That news was met with a combination of blank stares and horrified expressions.

Naturally, they thought my interest in social law was a product of L.A.

My parents expressed concern often about “the kind of stuff I’m picking up” and would ask me if my morals were still “in line” with the beliefs and core values of Jameson Law.

I always rolled my eyes as I lied to them.

I could think and make decisions on my own and didn’t need them fed to me.

The only thing that kept me sane was my sketchbook and the parties that started on Thursday nights and continued solid through the weekend.

There were always parties going on in L.A.

, even if it wasn’t on campus. Aside from the parties to blow off steam, I really appreciated the openness of the student population at UCLA and the overall vibe of the people in Los Angeles.

Sometimes I ditched classes and would sit on a bench on campus and sketch.

I could spend the entire day outside sketching people talking while they had coffee, or skateboarding to their next class.

Sketching relaxed me the most and took my mind off the impending doom of my future at Jameson Law.

Braxton and I reached the wall where the grades were posted.

I don’t know what I was expecting, a miracle maybe, but nothing prepared me to actually see a D next to my name.

A fucking D. I got a D on the final exam for Constitutional Law and an overall C+ for the course.

Fuck me. Without feeling fully in control of my body, I closed my eyes, leaned against the wall beside the posting, and put my hands on my head.

My folks would freak the fuck out when they found out my final grade.

My skimming by was coming to a head, and I was drowning. Or maybe I’d completely drowned.

“Cash, man, don’t take it so hard.”

I opened my eyes and took a deep breath.

“My folks are going to shit. I got a fucking C in the class.”

“Plus. It’s a C plus.”

I flipped Braxton off, and he gripped my biceps and lightly shook me while grinning.

“Look, we’re leaving for Tahoe in the morning.

No fucking books or studying for the entire summer, man!

Nothing but partying, sleeping in, spending the day by the lake, watching movies, and all the pussy or dick or whatever your heart desires,” Braxton offered.

“When we come back at the end of August, things will have calmed down, and you’ll be invigorated to start school. ”

“I doubt it, man. I need to think, though, because I’ll need a plan in case I don’t come back to school.”

Braxton looked at me as if the words that fell out of my mouth weren’t in English.

“Things will be different, Cash. You’re burnt out.”

Whatever. I wasn’t going to argue about that now.

Even though my parents were going to murder me, I still smiled ear to ear.

This was the first summer that I was taking off since high school.

Braxton went to Lake Tahoe each summer with some of our friends and always invited me.

I usually declined and took law seminars, but I was so burnt out on school and law shit.

This year I accepted his invitation and was going with him and his on-again/off-again boyfriend.

Though, I accepted when they were in their “off again” phase, so hopefully being around them in the same cabin wouldn’t be annoying.

“Are you sure you guys don’t mind me tagging along?” I asked as we left the law building.

“I’m positive. There’s lots of room and tons of stuff to do in Tahoe.”

“Cashman Jameson the fifth!” my mom yelled into the phone when I told her my grades were straight Cs across the board.

“What?” I asked, as if I had no idea why she was angry. “Cs are average! I’m doing average!” I yelled back, pleading my case.

“All this time you’ve been lying to your father and me about how well you’re doing!”

My heart pounded erratically, and I could feel each thump in my ears. As I paced around the dorm room I shared with Braxton, I could feel myself rapidly reaching the boiling point. I was at risk of exploding at any moment and saying things that I wouldn’t be able to take back.

“Cashman!” Mom yelled again. “You’ve been telling us that you’ve been doing great and your classes were going well, and your grades were good.”

“I never said my grades were good!”

“It was certainly implied each time we asked how school was going.”

They never asked how I was doing; it was always about school and how school was going for me. I walked toward the window and looked outside at the perfectly blue sky and tried to calm down.

“Cashman Montgomery Jameson, what do you have to say for yourself? You know your grandfather will hear about this. You better not be enrolled in any useless art courses; you know how your father and grandfather feel about anything to do with art.”

That put me over the edge. I’d had fucking enough of this shit.

“I don’t care!” I pinched the bridge of my nose while tightly closing my eyes. In my mind, I could picture the ice-cold blue eyes of my grandfather sternly stabbing me. No words would need to be spoken because his look would say it all.

“Cashman!”

“Mentally, I’m doing great, minus all the stress you and dad and everyone else in this family put on me! My grades are average, but I hate law school!” I blurted out. Saying it out loud to my mom seemed to take a weight off my shoulders.

“Perhaps those are average grades for students out at that artsy party school, but it’s not average for this family, nor is it expected of you. Your grandfather is paying for you to earn your degree in law and join the family firm.”

“It’s not a party school, Mom, and I hate studying law. I’m sorry to burst your bubble.”

“I can’t believe for a second you don’t like law school. Something else is going on, isn’t it?”

“No, Mom.”

“You grew up wanting to work where your grandfather and dad work.”

“Not really. I wanted to draw all of the time.”

“Cashman, you used to love going to the office with your father.”

“Yeah, because kids like hanging out with their dads and following them around. I wanted to make pictures for Grandpa to put on his office wall. But when I got a taste of the reality of what they did with all these stupid summer seminars and classes, it lost its luster. Now that I see what it is, I’m not into it. ”

My mom totally didn’t listen to me and went off on another tangent. “Is it drugs? Oh my God, are you doing illegal drugs?”

“What? No!”

“Are you messing around with women?”

“Mom—”

“Are you messing around with men?”

“Mom!”

“Are you going to disappoint this family further by not giving your father and me another grandchild?”

I exhaled loudly, making sure my mom could hear my irritation.

And really, I had no one to blame but myself.

First, it was my fault I got shitty grades, and second, I was annoyed at myself for having decided to call home rather than text.

I knew they’d be pissed, but this was crazy.

It was also my fault for allowing them to steer me into law and try to douse my love for art.

“Anyhow, I just wanted to call and tell you before the school mailed the grade report home. Since I won’t be there this summer—”

“Cashman, you absolutely need to come home this summer. Your grades are horrific, and you have no business going to Lake Tahoe for the summer.”

“Mom, I’m leaving for Tahoe in the morning,” I said firmly.

“Do you think there are some tutors in Los Angeles that we could arrange for you for the summer?”

“Mom! You’re not listening to me! I hate law school, and there’s no way in hell I’m wasting another summer studying to become something I don’t want to be.”

“Your father and grandfather were very kind and gracious to allow you to go to California and study nonsense social matters rather than corporate law. And this is how you repay them?”

“I’m getting off the phone, Mom. I need to finish packing for my vacation. I’ll have my cell phone with me. Love you, bye.”

With a shaking hand, I quickly hung up before she had a chance to say anything else. Mindlessly, I spent the next twenty minutes cleaning up my desk before turning my attention to finishing packing.

I’d just zipped my duffel closed when the door opened and Braxton walked in carrying a white plastic bag.

From the bag he pulled out two boxes of condoms and grinned.

He tossed me a box, and I smiled. I was determined to enjoy myself this summer and spend some time thinking about what I wanted to do in life, because it sure as fuck wasn’t law.