The next morning, Cassandra was the first one up stiff and tired. The cut on her head had begun to throb. She got up and dragged herself into the kitchen for some aspirin.
"What shall we do today?" said Isabella entering the kitchen being the only other one awake. Cassandra only shrugged.
"Hey, I've got an idea!" said Isabella.
"Please, not so loud."
"Sorry. How about we invite Linden and Trevor over, and we'll go out to eat. On the guys, of course. You haven't really met Trevor. Heck, neither have I!"
"Yeah, okay. Whatever. Sounds fine. I'm going back to sleep," and she walked back down on to one of the couches next to Nick, and was sound asleep in a matter of seconds.
Nicole, Coreene, Devon, and Jonathan, thinking themselves to be the smart ones for taking the unoccupied beds instead of the couch, were the next ones up and went downstairs and joined Isabella in the kitchen.
"Hey, I'm gonna invite Linden and Trevor tonight and we'll go out to eat. You guys agree with that?" said Isabella. The four of them agreed. "I'll have Cassandra call Linden right now." She went over to where Cassandra was asleep and shook her.
"Huh? Yeah, what?"
"Will you call Linden now?" Isabella asked her.
"Um, yeah. Okay." Cassandra stood up groggily and dragged herself over to the kitchen, and picked up the phone.
"Hello?"
"Hey Linden, it's me Cassandra."
"Oh hey. What's up?"
"Oh nothin. Is Trevor still over your house?"
"Uh huh! Why?"
"Well, would both of you like to come stay over our house tonight and go out to dinner?"
"Hold on a sec, let me ask him." Cassandra could hear her yell to Trevor. When she came back she said, "Yeah sure! What time should we be over tonight?"
"Well, how about you come over kinda early. How about four o'clock?"
"All right. Can I have directions to your house?"
When Cassandra got off the phone with Linden, she went back into the living room, sat down next to Nick and fell asleep again.
"Okay," said Isabella, "I guess we'll ask her when she wakes up, again!"
When everyone had gotten up at about one o'clock, they all decided to go swimming and have lunch. It took Mercedes and Cassandra five minutes to make sandwiches for everyone. Mercedes took one plate and headed outside. Cassandra grabbed another plate and headed for the door, when Nick stopped her.
"Yeah?" she asked him.
"I have something for you," said Nick smiling. She smiled and said,
"What is it?" He pulled out a box from behind his back and opened it. Cassandra gasped and almost dropped the plate of sandwiches. "What's it for?"
"It's for you. From boyfriend to girlfriend." She put the plate down on the counter and took the box from him. She touched over it lightly. He took the box back from her and took the ring out. He took her hand and put the ring on her left ring finger. She looked at the ring. She touched the simple gold band, and small, oval opal.
"It's so beautiful!" she said with a tear in her eye. She put her hand on his face, and kissed him lightly. She grabbed the plate of sandwiches and walked outside.
"You guys have the biggest smirks on your faces. What just happened?" said Nicole. Cassandra held up her left hand, screamed, and started jumping up and down.
"Oh my God!" said Nicole. Coreene, Emalia, Isabella and Mercedes came over and started jumping up and joined Nicole and Cassandra in jumping up and down.
"It's beautiful! Where did you get it?" said Emalia.
"Der! From Nick!" squealed Cassandra. Nicole hit Jonathan in the arm.
"What was that for?" he said to Nicole.
"Did you see that ring? It's beautiful!" said Nicole.
"So?" he said. Nicole sighed loudly and jumped into the pool.
"I take it that you guys are going to start another volleyball game?" said Emalia.
"You better believe it!" said A.J.
"This time we're going to be the undisputed rulers of the pool volleyball!" said Kevin.
"I don't think so!" said Brian. "You're on!" Howie, Devon, and Kevin jumped in the pool on the shallow end.
"Hey! Why do you guys get the shallow end?" said Nick.
"Because you guys are the so called, undisputed rulers!" said Devon.
"Oh," said Nick. He looked at Cassandra for some conformation, and she pushed him towards the pool. Nick, Brian, Jonathan, and A.J. assembled in the deep end while the girls put up the net.
"There you guys. Have fun!" said Mercedes and the girls all sat down on the grass to watch. "So what time is Linden coming?"
"Um, about four o'clock," said Cassandra.
"Cool, it's about one now. What are we going to do about dinner?" asked Nicole.
"Actually, we're going to go out to dinner and have Linden and her boyfriend Trevor stay over," said Mercedes.
"Yeah I remember them. They seem pretty cool," said Nicole.
"They are pretty cool," said Mercedes.
"You know what I meant," said Nicole. Mercedes only gave her a look and Nicole gave her one back.
"Okay guys. Come on, no fighting!" said Cassandra still gazing at the ring on her finger.
"Okay, fine. I'm going to go decide what I want to wear for tonight," she said getting up and sticking her tongue out at Nicole. "Come with me Cassie."
"Okie dokie," Cassandra said standing up and following Mercedes into the house still looking at her ring.
When the doorbell rang three hours later, Mercedes and Cassandra came down dressed. Cassandra was the one to open the door.
"Hey Linden, Trevor! Come on in," said Cassandra.
"Hi!" said Linden walking into the house with Trevor.
"Did you find this place all right?" said Mercedes.
"Yeah, we left early and had no trouble."
"Hi Trevor. It's nice to meet you," said Cassandra.
"Nice to meet you too," said Trevor shaking her hand.
"Cassandra, everyone it still in the pool!" said Mercedes. Cassandra sighed and said,
"Excuse me for a second." She walked out of the door and over to the pool.
"Hey guys! Linden and Trevor are here!"
"You're kidding me!" said Isabella from the pool.
"No, I'm not. It's four o'clock."
"Oh, then I guess that we should get out and get dressed?" said A.J.
"Yes you should," said Cassandra. They all dragged themselves out of the pool. The guys went running through the fence to their house, and the girls grabbed their towels and ran into the house and up the stairs to get dressed. Cassandra joined Mercedes in the living room
"So Trevor, how did you and Linden meet?" said Cassandra.
"Well, we went to the same high school and we liked each other, but we never went out. I called her about four months ago to see if she wanted to get together some day. And well, one thing led to another, and we've been going out ever since."
"Aw that's romantic," said Cassandra. Linden smiled and grabbed Trevor's hand. Isabella and Nicole were the first ones down, and anxious to go. Nicole yelled upstairs.
"Come on guys! Hurry up!" Coreene and Emalia came running down the stairs.
"Okay! We're ready!" said Emalia. They were all dressed nicely.
"That's nice, now let's go and get the guys," said Nicole.
"The guys?" asked Trevor.
"Yeah, the guys next door that you probably met at the beach house," said Nicole.
"Oh yeah. I don't think that I met all of them though," said Trevor.
"Well you can now," said Cassandra. "Let's go."
They all walked out of the house and knocked on the guys door. Brian quickly opened the door.
"Hi, hello, how are you? That's nice, hold on a second I'm not done getting dressed yet," said Brian quickly and ran back upstairs.
"Okay then," said Mercedes. "Ooh, it looks like they have all of their furniture. It just doesn't look like they have arranged it yet."
"Where are we going to go?" asked Coreene.
"Uh oh. We never actually decided on that," said Cassandra. They guys all came downstairs in a pack. All of them were dressed nicely also.
"We don't exactly know where were are going to go tonight," said Emalia.
"We've already taken care of that," said Kevin.
"We're going to The French King," said Brian.
"Oh! I've always wanted to go there!" said Mercedes.
"Yeah, you can only get in if your dressed up," said Coreene.
"Oh cool!" said Linden. "I guess that I'm glad I made Trevor dress up!" They all laughed, and got in their cars.
When they got home, they all went into the girls house, except for Brian and Mercedes who decided to watch a movie together at his house. At the girls house they decided to go for a swim and play volleyball, again.
Mercedes and Brian walked into his house and decided on watching The Relic. Mercedes pulled the afghan sitting above them, down over both of them. They both huddled together, even though it wasn't even that cold out. As they were watching the movie, Mercedes gasped and jumped into Brian's arms. There heads were so close that their eyes locked on each other. They were totally oblivious to the movie, as they looked so deep into each other's eyes, they felt like they couldn't pull apart. She took her fingertip and drew a line from the center of his forehead, down his nose and across his lips and down his neck. He laughed and withdrew his head as it tickled his neck.
She put her hand on his heart to feel it beat. She could feel it beat down her arm and into her own heart. There was a flame in him, greater that any flame within her. It blew steadily upon her, warming her whole person, and lifting her to an intensity of feeling and living which she could not have known without him. She opened her mouth to say something, but he place two fingers on her lips. He stroked her face ever so gently, brushing her hair out of her face, and running his fingers through her hair. He pulled down her tank top strap on her left shoulder, and leaned down to kiss her shoulder.
He kissed every inch of her shoulder until her reached her neck. Mercedes moaned as he softly nibbled on her neck. He pulled away as Mercedes grabbed both sides of Brian's shirt and pulled it over his head and dropped it on the ground. She leaned in and took the edge of his ear gently in between her teeth. As she nibbled his ear, he continued to kiss her neck. When they both leaned too far to the edge of the couch and almost fell off, Mercedes accidently bit a little too hard on Brian's ear. He grabbed his ear and they both laughed.
When they looked back into each other's eyes, their laughter died, and turned back into the raging passion which they shared uniquely between each other. He took his arms and wrapped them around her waist and pulled her closer to him. Their lips stopped an inch from each other, prolonging the moment. Their breaths came more rapid as the gap between them decreased. It decreased until their lips couldn't avoid meeting any longer.
Back at the girls house, Emalia was wandering around the pool while everyone was getting dressed inside. She gazed down into the pool at her own reflection, then looked up as she contiued to walk closer to the edge of the pool.
There lips fit together better then they ever had. When they pulled away, they went right back in and let their tongues find each other, and gradually getting more and more intense by the second. Brian took his arms off of her waist and put them on her shoulders. He slowly moved his hands over to the top of her shirt and unbuttoned two of the top buttons. They pulled away, and Mercedes rested her hands on Brian's chest. He unbuttoned the bottom two buttons on her shirt, making her wait. She like his games, but she didn't want to wait. He then slowly unbuttoned the fifth and then the sixth button of her shirt. He took his fingers and hooked them on the straps of her tank top and slowly drew them down her shoulders, until it fell on the floor on top of his shirt. She leaned in to him and kissed him hard again. Just like Cassandra said, you have to taste his soul, his emotion, and she could taste and feel more than that.
Emalia kept walking closer to the pool, just thinking. She wasn't paying attention when her ankle gave under and she fell, hitting her head on the side of the pool and sinking slowly in the pool. Inside, Kevin heard the splash and went outside to see what the noise was.
"Oh my God!" he screamed, and jumped into the pool.
"What was that?" said Cassandra from inside.
"I think that sounded like Kevin!" said Nicole.
"Let's go!" said Coreene. When Nicole and Cassandra ran outside, they saw Kevin carrying Emalia out of the pool.
"Oh my God! What happened?" asked Cassandra.
"I don't know! I think she fell in and hit her head," said Kevin.
Brian's hands caressed down Mercedes' arms and across her stomach, and then up through her chest, and back to her neck. They continued to kiss as every emotion that they had ever felt for each other rekindled. He drew his fingers up along her back and to her bra. He looked at her to see if it was okay. She shook her head yes, and he went to undo it. Just then, Isabella burst through the door.
"Hey guys! Oops," said Isabella.
"Damn!" thought Mercedes. She acted like she actually cared. "What happened?"
"I think Emalia fell into the pool. She's unconcious!"
"Oh great!" said Mercedes. She threw her shirt on and the three of them headed back to her house. Cassandra had gotten a towel and had Kevin lay Emalia down on it in the backyard. She appeared to be unconcious but when she started to cough up water, Kevin propped her head up.
"Emalia! Are you all right?" said Kevin. She sat up and then stood up. Cassandra went over to her.
"You scared us to death!" Emalia gave them all a weird look.
"Who?" said Emalia.
"You Emalia," said Cassandra.
"Who's Emalia?" They all thought that she was just joking. She thought to herself. "These people insist that I am Emalia. I don't know who that is, but I guess that if I go along with it, I can escape later."
"Come on Em. Stop kidding around!" said Nicole.
"Ha ha! Got you guys! I had you going so bad!" They all let out a sigh of relief. Just then, Emalia saw a blond girl enter the backyard with another girl and a guy with his shirt off. Mercedes went up and hugged Emalia.
"Thank God you're okay!"
"I really need to get outta here!" Emalia thought to herself. She put on a fake smile and said, "Yeah I'm okay." They all walked inside and Mercedes took Emalia up to the kitchen.
"Let's get some ice on that bump." Everyone else went down and sat in the living room. "I hope you know that you interrupted Brian and I!"
"Oh great. These people are horny too!" she thought. Mercedes told Emalia that she'd be right back. Emalia saw her chance. She put down the ice pack and tiptoed towards the front door. She closed it softly and ran. Looking back to see if anyone had seen her, she ran right into Nathan.
"Watch it bitch!" he said.
"Oh I'm sorry. Do I know you?" said Emalia.
"Don't play stupid with me slut!"
"You're not very nice!" Nathan knew that she couldn't act like that towards him. He thought to himself.
"She's either taking acting classes, or she's gone completely out of her mind!" He decided to see how much he could get away with. He put his hands on her shoulders.
"I'm sorry, baby. Let's go."
"But I don't even know you!"
"How could you not remember me? I'm your boyfriend!"
"You are?"
"Yeah! And you don't remember you best friends Richard, Burke, Eric, and Bobby?" She shook her head. "Well that let's go. They'll be happy to see you!" She was a little bit timid, but he convinced her it was alright.