Chapter 4

Even though the looming presence of graduation and separation is coming down heavily on all of us, we all know that all the things we do, be it random or not, are all because of the simple fact that we want to spend time with each other as much as possible before everything changes forever.

I take a look around now and realise that, although I am alone here, there are people out there who care for me and value our friendship as well. There are people out there who I have yet to meet and who I have yet to build a friendship with.

Take Jez, for example. I chuckled to myself at that point as I put one foot in front of each other, each little step consuming a second, and each second being a very important part of my life.

Jez was, in the literal sense, a troubled person. I do not even know why I would consider her as a person but, then again, who was I to judge? We each knew our share of personal secrets, and kept them for the sake of secrecy. As much as I hated to admit it, we were alike in a variety of ways. As a summary of all the things that would take too long to mention, I would very much say that we think alike. There was some sense of understanding between the two of us that neither Eris nor Megan could understand. They were just mortals while we….well, I wasn’t quite sure of her age, but from the looks of it, I could say that she has lived far longer than I ever had.

I could hear someone approaching me. The footsteps of the person came closer to me, making identical sounds of her feet sinking only slightly onto the wet, dewy ground that has been made so by the circumstances that is. I reached my car and, irritated by the squish, squish sound of her feet, whirled around.

The girl looked shockingly pretty. Although she didn’t look like Eris or Megan or Jez or any other pretty girl I knew, she had a unique beauty of her own. She looked slightly like that girl from the party---the brunette that Jez referred to as her cousin---but not so much. Her straight brown hair fell past her shoulders, but didn’t go past her waist, merely ending above it. It had a spiky look, and it didn’t go over her eyes or whatever. It was kept from covering her face, almost framing it. Her high cheekbones made me a little envious. Her jet black eyes were like two pairs of dark, endless tunnels. She had fair skin as well.

Oh, and did I mention that she wore the school uniform?

And that she looked like one of my immortal friends back in Shadowfield?

She smiled her dazzling smile at me, and I knew that she was someone I have known after all.

“Lina?” I asked, squinting, as if I couldn’t see her clearly enough. She made her way towards me, her every step leaking with the confidence that I used to be jealous of.

“In the flesh, hun,” she said. “I just know that you’d give me a hug sooner or later so…”

I hugged her. For the first time in years, I did. The last time I hugged her was before I lived again. That was ages ago. I absolutely missed her mean, sarcasm, diss-y comments that always seemed to call to me. It was like she was my evil side, and I couldn’t be complete without her.

“Okay, don’t overdo it,” she warned, a slight laugh in her tone. I pulled away. “Well, I’m kind-of stranded here and I don’t want to wait for the bus. D’you mind giving me a ride?”

I nodded, happily letting her in. It was not out of the ordinary, though: she would do anything to get out of using the comforts of public transportation.

She closed the door, and looked intently at me. She grabbed my arm.

“Listen,” she said, her tone strict. Huh. I figured as much: I shouldn’t be too happy about her being here. There just had to be a catch, right? Well, this was it. I just knew that it concerned work, one way or another. “The higher-ups back at home say that you’re taking too long. Ol’ Big Daddy of yours was way too worried. I mean, really worried. They stormed into my house and said that I had to do this big job and protect your or help you and whatnot. So here’s the deal: once you get the mission done, I go.”

“Yeah, sure,” I said, trying to get away from her grip. It wasn’t too much, so why was she acting so…strangely? As if I was going to die? “Hey, what’s the big deal?”

“Leah, there’s too much at risk here. I don’t know why you accepted this mission, but I don’t want to ask, because I know that that’s just you. Underground Intel says that these people are not to be taken lightly, and we know that Intel from there is very reliable when it comes to unknown info. Whatever you’re trying to do, just please make it sane and rational, okay? For my sake, just please. I hate seeing you die again and again. Don’t be so flippant about this.”

“Lin, please just tell me what this is all about,” I said, shrugging my arm to be released from her grip. I knew her better than this. She wouldn’t get all worked-up over my safety, because she knows that I can take care of myself. “I swear, I’ve never seen you this tense since the 1786 incident.”

“This is not a joke, Leah. I need you to take this warning seriously,” she said, her tone strict. I revved up my car. Gee, I gotta buy Lin a car. I don’t want her nagging around like this. I don’t mean to say that I didn’t want her here; it’s just that I needed my space, and my car was one of the places where I got that personal space. She frowned at my reaction, and then sighed. “Well, since you won’t listen, I’d have to stay with you then. Since I don’t have much in my apartment, drop me off and I’ll pick up my stuff.”

I gaped at her. My foot lingered over the gas pedal.

“Are. You. Serious?!” I asked, aghast. It wasn’t enough to ride with me to school, after all. She just had to stay in my house, didn’t she? My ‘rents will get a kick out of this. “And you have an apartment all on your own?! What have you been doing?! God, Lina---,”

“Whoa, calm down,” she said as she felt the sudden burst of speed as I accidentally stepped on the gas pedal. I sighed; I should probably accept this since she was my official guard now. Sigh. Sometimes Bill could be so strict and worrisome.

I let out a calming breath before driving to the directions that Lina gave me. An awkward and heavy silence encompassed us. She spoke to me once or twice to give directions, and told me to stop in front of this shabby building that looked as if I was way older than me. The white walls were peeling away to reveal the grey stone underneath. She wordlessly got out of the car, and it didn’t seem too long before she got back in with a huge duffel bag. She threw it at the back seat like this car was hers, and then motioned for me to drive.

I mean, really. The least she could do was say thank you. I, after all, drove all the way from Dandenong to Thomastown. Well, it wasn’t too bad since my car was fast but hey, I drove. Besides, I had to drive from Thomastown back to my place in Narre Warren North. That took about more than four hours, and it was tiresome, considering all those stoplights and pedestrian crossings. It was just too long that I didn’t have ample time to do my homework and research on those three cases again.

I sighed as she immediately rushed to my fridge, ignoring every other maid who politely greeted her. Well, either that or they get pointed death glares. She rummaged my fridge for food as I told my butler to put her things in the spare room (which, unbelievably due to my loaded ‘rents, was a bed in the middle of some kind of glass-lake thing that showed water but wasn’t quite the substance itself). I sauntered over to the kitchen, and then found her emptying what seemed like half of what’s left of my Koko Krunch. And probably most of my milk.

“What the hell are you doing?” I demanded, looking for mac ‘n’ cheese.

“This is my dinner, biatch,” she snapped at me. I prepared my food. Right now, I didn’t feel like asking my maids to do all the hard work.

“Cereal is hardly even what you call dinner,” I pointed out as I waited for my macaroni.

“Cereal is the staple food for us 21^st-century students. What century do you live in, the 17^th?” she said as she flopped down on the couch, balancing the cereal bowl on her crossed legs. I sat down on the floor, and then grabbed the remote from her hands, still careful so that the cereal won’t fall on my head. I turn on the plasma TV and immediately switched it to something that would actually give us something to talk about. Sadly, due to the unbelievable circumstances of the place I lived in, there was nothing good except for the evening news.

Might as well give it a try then.

“...Sydney, so far, has a wonderful weather for fishing…” the reporter droned on. Well, duh. There was nothing else going on in the world.

Suddenly, Lina smacked the back of my head with her hand. “Change the channel.”

I thought I heard a vein pop in my neck due to so much annoyance. “What the f^ck was that for?”

“I said change the channel, dumbass,” she snapped. “Put a damned movie on or something. Call friends. Anything to keep me amused and prevents me to die of boredom.”

“Eff you,” I said, annoyed, as I fished my phone out of my pocket. I dialled Eris’ number. “I swear, you make me go through all this trouble---,”

“Yes?” Eris answered.

“God, Eris what happened to your voice?” I said, shocked at how sick she sounded. “You sound as if a whole freakin’ truck has been stuffed up your nose.”

“I feel worse when you put it like that,” she replied. I laughed. “No, seriously. I am sick, and it’s for real, this time.”

“You mean, full-on?” I asked, aghast. Eris never got sick, as far as I remembered. “As in, sick-as?”

“Yeah,” she answered, her tone glum and somehow laced with melancholy. “I never got this sick since I was five,”

“Oh,” I said, kind-of disappointed that I was apparently stuck with Lina. “Any news from Megan?”

“Apparently, she has a fever, and I have a damned cold. Yes, I know it’s unbelievable, but yes, it’s true. Now can you let me get off the effin’ phone so I can sleep my ass off? My head’s killin’ me.”

“Yeah, sure,” I answered, my heart sinking to the bottom of the earth. Lina was a very, very scary person at night. I walked out and returned seconds later with a bowl of wonderful, cheesy macaroni in my hands. I smiled. Food seemed to make everything better.

I found Lina skimming through the rows and rows of DVDs and Blu-Rays on the humongous rack that towered over her. She had finally let go of her cereal and picked a random disk from one of the bottom rows: the bottom part was my part. Well, at least that was good. I couldn’t bear to watch an old movie with her.

“Here,” she said, throwing the disk over her shoulder. Well, I had to catch it, didn’t I?

Of course, doing so would endanger the position of the mac ‘n’ cheese in my hands. Actually, I almost dropped my food to the ground. Lina walked past me as if she didn’t see the treacherous position I was in and grabbed her cereal from the coffee table. My heart thumped in shock; if my parents saw the smallest stain on the Persian carpet, I’m dead.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” she said pointedly as I glared at her, straightening up from my position. I scoffed. “Put the movie on, for God’s sakes! Do you know how much trouble I had to go through just to pick one?”

I sighed, knowing that there was no point in arguing. I did as she said.

Oh, this was going to be absolutely wonderful.

***************************************************

Greek mythology made me curious.

After researching so much on Jez, Ryan and Dylan, I came into the conclusion that there would be no point in researching without actual interaction. Now I knew what made this mission so dangerous. After seeing Jez and Ryan, I seriously doubt that Dylan was any different. There was nothing to differ him from them: he was part of their family. Who knew if it ran in their genes?

I realised tonight, though, that the only things I could research on were their names. Their god and goddess names intrigued me so much that it led me spiralling into Greek-mythology-ness. I was an addict: everything from where they were born, to their symbols…and other things that concerned them. I slowly came into the conclusion that it was the only thing I could research on without actual interaction…and I actually was contented with this, but only for a little while.

I, of course, already knew that they were vampires. It doesn’t take a dumb-ass to come into that thought once he/she saw what I saw before. It didn’t come to so much as a slight shock, since I, too, knew that I was a vampire, one way or another. I took the life out of humans and devoured it. Ryan’s family might not be the same species, but we were vampires all the same. There was almost nothing that differed our “condition” from the other. I sucked souls through blood, and they drank the blood that contained each little piece of the soul of the human.

You may wonder why I drink the blood instead of the soul itself. Well, I couldn’t do exactly that. Doing so would jeopardise my power and make me weaker, not stronger. Drinking the very essence of the soul itself was enough to kill a Drinker, because the soul was such a strong force. Since blood contains the products of the heart which carries the soul itself, we drink it. We drink each little fragment of the soul that pours out from the continuously beating heart. There was nothing else to do but devour the blood that was the product of the soul itself. In doing so, the soul cannot make more of its essence, therefore being consumed with the last drop of blood.

As the blood courses through the veins, we feel it there, underneath the skin. Merely sensing the presence of a soul is a job for a lowly novice. Tasting the soul itself just by feeling the pulse, though, can only be done by experienced Drinkers, like I am.

This was how I tasted the darkness of Jez and Ryan’s souls. What made me curious the most, though, was how innocent and pure Dylan’s soul was. How did he do it---still be pure and innocent---in the midst of such dark and evil souls? It was perplexing…mind-boggling, really. I didn’t want to confront them about it, but I didn’t want to fail this mission, either. Even if it would be just a mere blotch of black in my clean record, I didn’t want that blotch to be there. I wanted to keep things the way they are. After all, after cleaning my record after the Paris incident, I couldn’t afford any more mistakes.

I heard someone shout loudly from the room across mine. I was startled, my eyes peeling away from the profiles before me. I heard rushing footsteps, and the door opened widely. Light streamed in and, since my room was always kept dark after 8:30, I was temporarily blinded.

“Leah!” Lina said, her face white. Her eyes were closed, as I expected. I sighed. She always did this, storming into my room in the middle of the night, looking for a “bedroom buddy”. This was what I meant by scary: she changes from mature, sarcastic bitch to a little, scared kid at night. It was creepy, seeing her like this. Ever since I met her and offered to live at my place a few lifetimes ago, she always comes barging into my room in the middle of the night, offering to keep me company, which means that she was scared. I sighed again as I led her in and took out the extra mattress. It was just one night, anyway. All she had to do was get used to the place. This would continue for one week. God. One week of room-barging, window-wrecking screams. I almost paled at the thought.

“I’m sorry for barging in like that,” she apologised, clutching a pillow close to her chest, and using her other hand to drag her blanket behind her. Her eyes were wide with fear, and she was cold sweating. Tomorrow, I knew that she would force herself to forget about this. “Would you like me to keep you company?”

I shrugged. “Sure. Go ahead and make yourself comfortable.”

“Thanks,” she said as I heard her tuck in. I closed the lights and went back to my research. The light of the computer screen illuminated the rest of the dark room. “For everything.”

As I turned, I saw her eyes close. Well, that was good. She won’t be disturbing me for the rest of the night. I turned back to my computer, the mouse just sitting there idly, waiting for the next click. Each little blip of that line on the screen was mocking me, tempting me to research all I could.

Without being able to resist, I typed in the words Apollo and Artemis once more, my thirst for knowledge never stopping, never quenched.

***************************************

I woke up with something heavy on my back. My head hurt. The last thing I remember was resting my head on the desk and resting my eyes for a bit…

Oh yeah. I must have slept on the desk. I didn’t want to open my eyes yet. It was a Saturday, after all, so I had every right to rest after a long week of work and school. I kept on sleeping.

The heavy weight on my back was quite annoying, though. It was already annoying enough that I had to have my neck craned forward and my back hunched over. I didn’t need this extra weight. What was it? I groaned and touched it: soft, silky, bulky. I huffed in frustration. I just had to sleep on my bed, didn’t I? Well, okay then.

I willed myself off of my ass and dragged the blanket. I hung it over me. My head hurt so much. It was a good thing that the light from the only window was not directed at my bed. That was a relief. Guessing it was about 5 in the afternoon, I was in an irritated mood; I woke up too early. At times like these, I would wake up at 6 PM, eat a three-course dinner, watch TV, then go back to sleep. If anyone tried to ruin my moment at the brink of sleep---

Of course someone just had to call. I grunted as I reached underneath my pillow. It wasn’t there. I tried to find the vibrating thing, and found that it was stuffed in my pyjama pocket after all. A grunted a hello, I think.

“Well, someone’s crabby today,” the girl grunted over the phone. I heard an engine rumbling in the background. It annoyed me. “Whatcha doin’ now?”

“Earlier? I was doing okay. Now? Not so much,” I said, my tone cruel. “Who the hell are you again?”

“God, I can’t believe you don’t know who I am,” she said, her tone light and amused, slightly tinged with cruelty. “You know, the bitch that you love so much?”

Now that my head was slightly clear, I finally recognised the voice: Jez.

“Oh. You. What do you want?” I snapped, trying to make my eyes open. They were way too heavy. “You know that you’ve interrupted my precious moments of sleep, don’t you?”

“Of course I do,” she answered, her tone mocking me in every single way possible.

“Why are you calling?”

“Everyone’s waiting for you here,” she explained, the sound of the rumbling engine growling louder than ever. I could hear the faint sound of rushing wind. “We all got tired. Sadly, they picked me to pick you up. From the sound of your voice, you’re still in bed, correct?”

“I hate you,” I said. “What do ‘they’ want from me anyway?”

“You bitch,” she chuckled over the phone. “It’s Dylan’s birthday. Your friend is here waiting for you, dumb ass.”

I weighed the pros and cons of going. Pros: great party, great guys, good friends. Cons: Jez. She was my problem. I know I should be polite and go, but STILL. It was Jez we were talking about here. That was a very colossal problem. If she was coming, I bet there’d be trouble.

“I’m sorry,” I said, regretting it the second it came out of my mouth. I wasn’t really intending to say sorry for being a dumb ass. The following words kept streaming out of my mouth without my consent: “I’ll go.”

She laughed. “That’s great. I’ll be at your place in 10. You better be ready by then. Dylan’s been waiting for you…and trust me; you wouldn’t like it when he’s impatient.”

“How’s the party?” I asked, suddenly curious, my sleepiness wearing away. It was like coffee on a Monday morning. It was great, knowing that I was invited to parties like these. What intrigued me most, though, was the fact that they were having their so-called party in plain daylight. Weren’t they vampires or whatever? At least, that’s what I thought, based on my “observations”.

“Oh, you know, local underground club scene,” she replied. “Listen, I gotta go. I’ll be there in exactly nine minutes and forty-three seconds. If you’re not ready, I’ll have to kill you.”

I was already on my feet. No matter how much I wanted to believe that she was bluffing, I didn’t want to take that risk, after reassuring my worrisome friend/guardian that I would stay safe and clear of these vampires that we feared so much. “Yeah, yeah, sure.”

“Wonderful,” she grumbled sarcastically. “And I was really looking forward on killing you.”

Then, the line was cut. In other words, she hung up on me. Someone actually hung up on me. No one ever had the guts to do that. Geez, she was really pushing her luck.

********************************************

“Took you long enough,” I said, slightly huffing as I opened the door and stepped out. She, as usual, was riding her Ducati. Well, it looked new. Then again, who knew how many times she cleaned her bike, or how many bikes she had? She laughed at how exasperated I looked when she handed me my helmet. I noticed her earpiece: that’s probably how she managed to call me and talk to me while riding her bike. But that didn’t explain how she managed to sound so relaxed while driving this…this thing that she fondly calls her “baby”. Besides, she wore this cute outfit that consisted of a pair of white silk gloves, a bomber jacket (that was held together at the front by a chain), a black blouse, and a pair of torn jeans that looked WAY cooler than mine. How she even managed to ride a bike with high-heeled boots, I had no idea.

“You look horrible,” she said as she kicked her bike alive. I hung on to her waist for dear life. Who knew how many chances I had on falling?! I had heels on, for God’s sake! I mean, what the hell?! Even with comfy torn skinny jeans and a cute blouse, I really wasn’t sure if I would survive this. “Don’t worry, I’ll fix that once we get into the house. Dylan kept on nagging on when you would come.”

She put her helmet on. “Oh, and since you’re a guest and not food, you can be sure that you and your friend can live through today.”

Before I could say another word in protest, her motor seemed to take off at a dizzying speed. It was as if my soul was left behind. I felt as if my stomach flattened to my spine. My heart raced and thumped against my ribs, and my head spun. I hoped that my tinted helmet would dim everything else, but that was only slightly. My hope got flushed down the toilet, so to say. Damn. Every time we stopped, she would drift to one side, and it made me clutch her waist so hard that I almost squished the organs, since every time she would drift, I would feel as if I was about to get flung off.

By the time she parked her bike inside their colossal garage and I took off my helmet, my hair was air-dried, my face was most likely pale, and each breath came in short pants. She led me out of the garage and into their house. It smelled faintly of lavender and rose, with a slight tinge of alcohol. It was a little too nauseating, and I tried my best to ignore it even if I wanted to get out of this house, I couldn’t, due to my state. I honestly thought Jez wanted to kill me right there on the road. I swear I could hear her laugh wildly every time I had her waist in a vice grip.

She led me past two hallways, each adorned with a beautiful Persian carpet and, as much as I wanted to deny it, their carpets were way better than ours. The way to her room got darker and darker, and the smell of lavender got stronger. Soon, the lights were so dim that I can just barely see her dragging me forward. It was a ghostly light, really, and it made everything look…superficial, to say the least. It all looked all so unreal.

When we got into her room, though, I was to smell heavy rose instead of the strong lavender that I had expected. I was expecting a clean and tidy bedroom, not a bedroom whose floor was littered with clothes (and underwear, if I may add). There were lights, but she didn’t bother to turn them on. All the shades were closed, and I could clearly see her water bed.

“Stay here and don’t touch any of my stuff,” she said as she closed the door behind me, and then she walked off into her humungous closet. When I say into, I mean that literally. It wasn’t just a simple closet; it was a walk-in closet. I’ve never wanted to have one before but, after seeing how cool it looked in an unrealistically huge bedroom that looked almost like mine, I definitely wanted one. I heard clothes rustle around and, after a few minutes or so, I saw her come out with a pair of boots and an unbelievably short silk skirt that seemed to shine under the candlelight. She had a huge belt on her shoulder, too, so that probably was meant for me as well.

“Put these on,” she ordered as she threw me the stuff. I grabbed the skirt and the belt, but the leather hide boots fell to the floor with a seemingly loud clatter. She just grunted as she fished out eyeliner and lip gloss from her little bedside drawer. She rushed over to me just as I put the boots on. She looked at me up and down, and I hated how she looked at me like I was rubbish. Instead, though, she smiled. “That could work. Now hurry and dress up. I’ll do your hair and make-up later, so that would give us---,”

Then, her phone rang.

She cursed under her breath and answered it. She, of course, had her earpiece on, so it was kind-of funny when she paced back and forth as if she was talking to someone invisible.

“…are you really that deaf?!” she screamed, flopping down onto her water bed, the water letting out a splash-like sound. “I said give us 10. If you don’t want to wait, then I’ll just take her home.”

“Whoa, easy there, sis,” I heard Ryan say as I put on the belt. “Our brother’s birthday is supposed to be fun. Don’t let Dylan’s impatience ruin our day.”

She scoffed as she nodded at me approvingly, before reaching for the lip gloss and tossing it at me.

“Ry, my bro, my twin…” she said as she put on my eyeliner for me while I did my lip gloss. It was great, doing this, even if I hated her so much. It was unbelievably fun. She combed the tangled parts off of my hair and blow-dried it properly so that it was back to its natural state: going from slightly wavy to strongly wavy at the end. “Tell Dylan to shut up and wait, will you? If I get one more call from him, I’ll seriously give Leah a ride back to her house and he won’t get to see how wonderful she looks. With help from me, of course. She wouldn’t look so pretty without my oh-so-helpful…help.”

She smiled at me and opened the door, motioning for me to get out. She shut the door behind me. I went ahead into the garage, not even daring to venture to other places in the house.

Only then had I noticed that there were not two, but ten luxury cars and five bikes parked. She opened the garage door by a remote, and I really couldn’t believe that I hadn’t noticed this in the midst of my fear.

There was a Cadillac, two Ferraris, one Hummer, one Lamborghini, three Bugatti Veyrons, one Aston-Martin Vanquish, and a GMC. There were two Ducatis and three Harley-Davidsons. Each was a colourful mix (not). Most were black, red or silver. There were one or two whites, but hell, it was like emo world. A damn, rich-as emo world.

She cut the call and unlocked the white-and-black Veyron. I just barely managed to gape as she pushed me inside the car. It smelled so much like a dude, as if a dude usually rode in this cool-assed car, but it was obvious that it was Jez’s: there were lots of black. And probably a tinge of red. Unlike her room, it was unusually clean.

She drove off, stopped in front of the gate, and then closed it. WITH A FREAKIN’ REMOTE. The remote seemed to do everything. Damn it. The house looked only slightly smaller than mine, but the garage explained why there was so much space downstairs than there was upstairs. Still, the first floor was so big anyway, so what the heck.

The mind-numbing speed didn’t help with the gaping at how incredibly rich they were.

Mind. Blown.

Soon, by the end of exactly 8 minutes (I tried counting the minutes just to help kick-start my brain, so I wouldn’t be like a freakin’ zombie by the time I got in the place), we were in front of this worn-looking building. No, it wasn’t worn. It was old. And it was far from being a building, too; it looked as if it would qualify to go in the ancient riches of the world. The roof---if that was what you called it---was starting to fall apart. Unbelievably huge cracks were on the walls, and the dusty-looking frosted glass door was guarded by a bulky bouncer. She opened the door and I followed after her.

The guard nodded, smiled at us, and then opened the doors. They weren’t dusty, after all: it was just an effect.

A staircase greeted us, going straight down. It was illuminated by the lights that adorned the wall of the staircase; I couldn’t see anything other than that. I guess that was the desired effect. Did I mention that the staircase was metal? By the time we got to the bottom, there was another guy.

And, as it seems, being with Jez meant that I almost always met gorgeous dudes.

The guy was leaning on the wall of the staircase was hot. He had dreadlocks, yes, but he was cute. Not just that. He wasn’t cute. He can’t even be considered cute; he’s way beyond cute. He surpassed that. His blue eyes were honest, but his smile was a little too cruel for my taste. Still…

He opened the door for us, in all his six-pack, tuxedo-covered glory.

Music seemed to blast right at me, but it wasn’t quite as loud as the one from my party.

No, it was way, way louder than that. I couldn’t even hear my own thumping heart.

“Your friend left a few minutes ago,” the dude whispered to me before shutting the door behind me. I didn’t even hear it shut.

My friend…which one?

Jez simply grabbed my wrist and pulled me to the bar, past multiple hoards of gorgeous teens that were gyrating with the beat of the music. It did look almost like a local underground club scene: a black DJ with dreadlocks putting on the tunes way up there, semi-circle couch-like seats around the glass tables, a small stage, and a tiled dance floor. The bar took up most of the side, and there was a dark feel to it. The ever-present disco ball was there, of course, making lights dance.

What I wondered most about was that the dance floor was absolutely clear of dancers.

“Martini, bartender,” Jez said, then took a glance at me. “Make that two.”

“Sure, hun,” the dude said. He looked so burly that I could imagine him picking me up with one hand and using me as a barbell. He was huge. “Special martini, on the house,”

“Thanks, Stark,” she said, handing me one of the drinks. I didn’t want any; it was way too early in the afternoon. Then again, I’d rather have it that way, since arriving too late inside my house would likely cause trouble. She shrugged and drank the two, one after another.

“Let’s go,” she murmured, pulling me by the wrist again, this time towards the dance floor. She stopped, then I realised that she was beside her brother while I, on the other hand, was beside Dylan.

“You’re here!” he shouted over the music with a dazzling smile. He gave Ryan a geeky thumbs-up who, in turn, snapped his fingers to the DJ. “We’re going to show you how we celebrate our birthdays, so seat tight, hun. You might get blown away.”

Jez laughed at this.

“Alright, dudes and dudettes!” the DJ shouted over the music. “The birthday boy wants to compete with y’all singers out there, so we’ll be picking random peeps to sing, a’ight? A’ight, let’s get it on! First off is the brother! Give it up for Ryan, y’all!”

I didn’t even notice him leave until he was on stage. It was like I’ve never seen the instruments there before. It was like a whole damn band was playing. It was complete, along with the grand piano.

“Okay, I’d like to call on my half-brother and my best buddy, Steven,” he said into the microphone as he motioned for Dylan and another dude. Dylan left my side as if reluctantly and took his place as a guitarist. His guitar was red, while his brother took his place on the other side of the stage with a black electric guitar. The dude, Steven, took his place with the drums. Wonderful. Was this an emo fest? It was as if the closest colour to yellow or orange was red, and the brightest was white. Gee, emo much?

The dude on the drums didn’t look too bad himself.

The lights dimmed, as if on a real concert.

They started playing, and I my attention was focused at no other than the two brothers. And probably also the fact that they were smouldering hot while they performed “JESUS OF SUBURBIA” by Green Day.

I didn’t even care how disturbing their song was, or that it sounded so much like the real thing. What mattered most to me was that they looked gorgeous and hot while doing it, when being so skilful as well.

What can I say? I was attracted to them.

Wait, it was more than attraction. I absolutely loved them. Ryan? Not so much, since I barely knew him, although I could say that he was, indeed, hot. Dylan? Now, that was a work of art. He was like the god of hot-ness. Yes, I admit that I was attracted to him, no matter how pompous and air-headed he was.

I almost fainted when their song finished. They could pass as an actual band. They could do that by themselves? It was amazing. It was the best party I’ve ever been to…so far.

“So how do you like that?” Jez asked, a contented smile playing at the edges of her lips. I couldn’t even put it to words. Words were not enough to describe it. Then, the spot light shone on her, and everyone clapped.

She held the mic stand in her hands as the others retained their places except for….

WHOA. Sick. As!

My mind was totally blown when I saw Ryan sitting like a pro on the seat right in front of the brilliant white grand piano.

The lights dimmed and they started performing “INNOCENCE” by Avril Lavigne. I wouldn’t be shocked if I found out one day that the artist was one of Jez’s favourites, since she sang it so well.

This was the second best party I’ve ever been to. I mean, duh! It’s like I went to a rock star-studded concert that any other emo, Goth or punk would die to go to.