17. Jared
Jared
The party’s in full swing. “Bartender Song” by Rehab is being blasted out of someone’s parked truck, while people roam back and forth from the barn to the bonfire.
Joey’s idea of setting up beer pong in the barn has been a huge hit.
Greg and Steffan are currently playing against two other guys.
Earlier, I saw Beth for a quick second, before she went straight for my brother and his new friends—each of them carrying overly filled water balloons.
There was another girl with her, but I didn’t get that good of a look at her.
Kailey still hasn’t arrived yet. I’ve been busying myself by walking around the party and saying hi, and making light conversations with the people who showed up.
“Where are Kailey and Brittney?” Greg’s voice catches me off guard. I didn’t even hear him come up beside me.
“They should be here by now.” I shuffle my feet uncomfortably and pull my cell phone out of my back pocket. No new messages or calls.
Greg looks over my shoulder. “Well, the service out here is shitty; maybe they had a late start. Those girls can never be on time for anything,” he states while scanning the crowd near the bonfire.
“Are you looking for someone?”
“Yeah, a girl from out of town. We’ve been texting a lot, so I invited her. Hoping she actually shows up. I might shoot my shot with her.” He smiles around his beer bottle and makes eye contact with me.
“Oh, that’s cool. I’m supposed to meet Sarah tonight. She’s the one friend of Kailey’s I haven’t met.”
I take a drink of my water while watching the dirt road for any movement in the distance.
“Why aren’t you drinking?” Steffan asks, using his beer bottle to point towards my water.
I give him a cheeky smile. “I wanted to wait for Kailey before diving in.”
“You guys make me sick with how cute y’all are.” Greg bends over at the knees, acting like he is about to throw up.
“Oh now, don’t be jealous, Greg. Mystery girl might be the one to make you as happy as I am. Sometimes I can’t even believe it.” Smiling at both of them, I know I meant every word in regards to Kailey.
I’m not sure how much time has passed. Songs have carried on to the next; laughter and shit-talking consumes the people next to us. I finally hear a vehicle in the distance. “Holy shit, finally.” I lightly shove Greg’s shoulder and point to the road.
Brittney and Kailey’s laughter carry through the air as the Bronco continues down the drive. The sound of rocks crunching under its tires fills the air.
Greg, Steffan, and I jog to where Brittney has parked. We overhear the tail end of their conversation.
“That was fucking insane.” Kailey is wiping tears from her eyes, laughing.
“You can say that again.” Brittney slams her door.
“What took you girls so long to get here?” Greg asks while putting his arm around each of their shoulders.
Brittney points to the spare tire that replaced the back driver side tire.“You won’t believe this, but we actually got a flat tire on the way here.”
“And… well… it took us a while to remember how to change it.” Kailey bends over, hands resting on her knees, her laughter starting back up.
The movement causes her hair to shift from her right shoulder to the left one.
That’s when I see something on her neck; it looks like clear tape.
My feet move fast, closing the distance between us.
I grab the left side of her neck. She leans into my hand, exposing the right side of her neck, allowing me to take a good look.
It’s her birthday present from Beth—a beautiful sunflower is hiding behind her right ear, and the vine drifts down her neck.
“Do you realize there’s no traffic to your house, Jared? Like none, zero! We were left to think back on what our dads taught us when we first started driving. Which has been years.”
“You could’ve called any of us,” I whisper into Kailey’s ear, then peck her on the cheek and kiss down to where her new tattoo is. The salty taste of her sweat is left on my lips.
“Yep, we tried that.” Kailey grabs her cell phone from the back pocket of her jeans and shakes it back and forth. “No service on the way out here.”
“But now we know how to change out a tire, so there’s that.” Brittney’s sarcasm makes me laugh.
Her hands go to her hips. “We need a real drink, stat, boys!”
“Have you seen Beth and Sarah?” Kailey eagerly starts looking around the crowd.
Holding her hand, I bring it to my lips and place two quick kisses on the inside of her wrist. “I saw your sister earlier with another girl, but they headed straight for Joey, and I haven’t had a chance to make my way back to them.
” I grab her hand and pull her flush against my chest. “Very sexy birthday gift, Dimples.” My fingers faintly touch her neck, landing on a thin clear sheet covering the vibrant sunflower.
“Thank you, babe,” Kailey whispers against my lips before licking them.
I smack her ass playfully, and my front teeth dig into my bottom lip.
Sheesh, every touch from this woman makes my dick hard.
Her palm rests on my cheek. “Oh wait, before I forget—” She reaches into her back pocket and hands me a small white envelope.
In it, I find the picture that Brittney took of us on my bike.
Grinning like a fool, I tell her that I’d been meaning to ask for a copy of it.
“Now you can always have a piece of me, even when I’m not with you.
” I hug her body tightly, lifting her up off the ground, and Kailey’s legs wrap around my hips.
“Okay. Okay, we better get to the party.” She laughs while kissing me one last time.
Party first, devour every inch of her body later… Got it.
Greg, Steffan, Brittney, Kailey, and I make our way to the barn.
Walking inside, I don’t spot Joey or Beth right away.
All of a sudden, an eerie feeling trickles over my skin.
Something feels off; we should’ve already seen them outside or inside the barn.
Where the hell are they? At this point, I’m getting pissed off.
Did Joey sneak off and take his friends out backroading with the girls?
Kailey and Brittney spot a cooler containing their favorite drinks, and they each open a can, clinking them together—a cheers before shotgunning them.
“Well, alright then, ladies.” Greg laughs, bending down to grab two more. “Maybe you two try drinking these a little slower.” The girls laugh while accepting their drinks with a nod.
A scream pierces through the calm air. Simultaneously, we all look around to see where it came from.Through the barn doors, alongside the back of my property, I see a shadowy figure running toward us. Besides the moving figure, I can’t see anything else in the pitch black night out there.
“Sarah?” Kailey’s voice is laced with panic, and she starts running for the figure. How in the hell could she possibly know who’s running at us? The music stops behind us as we try to catch up with Kailey.
The figure falls to her knees, still screaming incoherently. “What happened? Where is Beth?” Kailey screams at the girl who’s sobbing uncontrollably.
“You have to calm down and tell us what’s going on, Sarah,” Greg says in a calm voice as he places his hands on her shoulders, trying to take control of the situation.
“We… we… were all out there swimming… Jo–Joey gave Beth something before we went into the water… Everyone was laughing, stripping down to their underwear.” She curls her legs into her body, rocking back and forth.
“What do you mean? Where the fuck is she?” Kailey cries, hands grasping Sarah; she shakes her shoulders back and forth, roughly.
I look in the direction where she ran from.
It’s near where our pond is. I see that there are several figures in the shadows, scattering, taking off.
I start running toward the pond. Judging by the way this girl is acting, it can only mean one thing.
By the time I make it to the pond, Beth is lying on the ground in her bra and underwear.
Her lips are blue, and her face is pale.
I check for a pulse and feel nothing. Everything that happens next goes in slow motion.
My friends show up next to me. Greg is holding Kailey back as she’s crying and screaming, bucking her body against his.
Panicking, I start to shake Beth—nothing happens.
I vaguely remember a safety class from high school, and am reminded how important it is to start CPR.
Immediately, I feel the crunch of her ribs under my palms with each compression.
I hear someone screaming to call 911. Steffan runs back to grab his truck and drives it back to where we are.
Knowing it’ll take an ambulance way too long to get here, I yell for Greg to help me load Beth into the truck.
Greg and I are running together, sharing the weight of Beth’s unconscious body.
When we reach his parked truck, I slowly lay her down and into the bed.
My hand reaches for her; I can feel a faint pulse in her carotid. Stay with us, please.