August 21st, 2012

The music was blasting through the speakers. Everyone was coming in like always and we were enjoying ourselves. This was it, the best party of the Summer.

I was standing near the entrance when Carlos greeted Andrew and Cody walking into Jana Kramer’s house. “Eyy, what’s up dawg,” Carlos said with a fist bump to both. I chose to ignore Cody and he ignored me.

One of the yearbook geeks were recording the whole thing with a camera. Andrew grabbed the camera and turned towards him, “Yo it’s gonna get crazy tonight.”

I remember watching the video posted on a private group on Facebook where I don’t think it ever left. I could talk about everything that happened with me but this video has much more that I couldn’t remember; things I wasn’t even there for.

Now Carlos threw the biggest part of the summer, but Jana had the best. There weren’t as many people, but there were still close to a hundred. Still, it was as close as everyone's dream since Project X aired and everyone tried to throw one.

The video started with Andrew saying what he wanted to say. There were a bunch of cuts of everyone greeting the camera, specifically all of the girls. The video was edited to show everyone and everything cool.

The first scene is of me, of course. I was dancing to the music with a red cup on my hand. I was dressed up perfectly and kept all appearances. I looked at the camera and smirked. Even though all the makeup, I had bags under my eyes. Still, I was pretty, pretty enough to get approached. Connor came up. I remember he asked if he could get me anything. I shook my head and danced with him until his mind wandered off to go find Jana.

The camera moved into a bathroom where Sara and some other girl were doing lines. “Close the fucking door!” Sara said before the camera moved somewhere else.

The football jocks were openly snorting and after all got in a huddle and yelled, “One, two three, oh!” then all jumped up and down to the hype of the beat.

To outside, Emily was talking to some of the guys near Jana’s pool. The newspaper dork, who's named is Bo, asks Emily, “How’s the night treating you?”

“Just fine,” Emily replied with a smile. “Are you recording for the yearbook?”

Bo laughed nervously, “No, no, they would never accept this. This is just for a personal blog that’s going to the Facebook Group.”

“Cool! Make sure you tag me.”

In retrospect, wanting to be tagged in a video where everyone is underage and are binge drinking and doing narcotics is a bad idea. But we were kids, we got to be dumb.

Bo moved to the pool where the Asian clique was hanging out. Every other school has every other race in Asia, we have the Koreans. They live in their own world but nobody ever really bothers them. There are two Korean girls that everyone loves. They were standing at the edge of the pool talking to each other in bikinis. Seconds later, they’re both pushed into the pool by Andrew and Carlos. They both jump in right after and through the waves, Andrew pulled one of the girl’s bikini top. She didn’t care and yelled out for a drink. People cheered and started to jump into the pool.

As more people came outside, Bo went around saying hi to everyone and caught me walking with Jana Kramer to the pool. “Hey, ladies, where you going?”

I scoffed, “Can it, Videoboy.”

Jana giggled, “Don’t be a stalker, Bo.”

There are more shots of kids drinking, dancing, taking clothes off, kissing, and throwing up. Now junior puts on a show of lights with strings and people watch. Bo heads upstairs and opens bedrooms door to see who’s in there. They’re all empty except for one, Sara and Lucas. In the video, Sara is visibly sick with white powder in her nose.

I was the one who told her that she needs to power through it.

There’s a fight between Andrew and some kid from Issaquah. It’s over in under a minute with Andrew leaving unscathed. There are more shots of drugs, dancing, and smoke. There was a constant radio listening in into all police dispatchers to see if this party was getting too out of hand.

There are more shots of me and my girls. There is a Cody in the background, silently watching me. There is Chris staring at the stars, completely doped out of his mind. Bo asked him, “Are you okay?”

“Time and space are an illusion to keep us sane.”

“Uh, okay?”

Then there’s the part I regret the most:

Caroline, the girl we tortured into suicide, her sister came to Jana Kramer’s party. Amanda was the first to recognize her. She was an eighth grader who was becoming a freshman in a few days. I don’t know why she was in the party, but she was. Her name was Karen.

I let the girls bully her as I oversaw it. We cornered her, made fun of her dead sister and caused the guys to join in. This wasn’t completely on camera as it was focusing on Cody. But Cody was watching us as Bo was trying to ask him a question.

I think Cody wanted me to stop it, to prove that I was above it all after all. But I wasn’t and we caused Karen to run into the woods. Amanda chased and so did Megan because it was all a game to them. I was coked up and followed them. Jana locked my arms with her and shook her head because she always hated this sort of shit. I should have listened.

The woods are comprised of two lightness level. One is pretty dark, but you could always see what was in front of you at least a little bit. This is often due to the moon brightness or the town’s lights. Then there is complete darkness. Near Jana’s house, this is what it was so all we had for light was out phone’s flashlights.

We followed Karen’s cries the best we could and they went deeper and deeper into the forest. We were never far, but never quite caught up until she tripped on a wooden plank randomly in the ground. I shined my flashlight up and saw the treehouse; Emily’s and Cody’s treehouse.

Back in the video, I could see us leave and some murmurs and laughter and gossip of what was happening. Emily went up to Cody as Bo was still on him. “Aren’t you going to do something?”

“She won’t listen.”

“She’s our friend. Eli said so herself, she’s done being that bitch.”

“She just turned into a different one,” Cody shook her head.

“What are you guys talking about?” Bo asked.

“We should follow, cool shit is happening,” Andrew butted it. Cody laughed. This was proof enough for me that Cody really didn’t give a fuck that fucked Andrew. He said he had forgiven me but any real logical person would know that was unforgivable. He would be angry at me and even angrier at Andrew. But he never was. The way they still acted like friends, like it never happened, it disgusted me.

The video would go on and follow the rest of the party and I was in the woods torturing some girl I never knew for no reason.

The girl was crying. I felt it.

It’s something Chris liked to talk about; that we’re all connected into one grand consciousness so, in theory, we could all feel what each other felt if the conditions were met. I think I felt it there if it were true. Chris did say that people become consciously connected through great sadness and sorrow. It’s all a mind fuck really.

Then Karen said, “You’re all pathetic.”

“Your sister killed herself because she couldn’t handle some little roasting. She was weak, like you, hoe. You know freshmen aren't allowed here,” Amanda snickered, shining her flashlight right into Karen’s eyes.

I felt a towering presence that was more than just the treehouse. I shined my light up towards the tree but there was nothing. When it was back onto the girls, Rhea, the woman in white was standing right in front of the trunk. She was watching us.

“I didn’t do anything! Stop!”

“You need to learn your fucking place!”

Rhea kept staring at me. I knew she wasn’t actually there but I really wanted her to be so I was convinced I wasn’t crazy. I couldn’t move my eyes off her.

“Eli, you alright?” Megan asked.

“Uh, yeah. Look over there,” I pointed at Rhea.

“Hmm?” Megan looked but obviously didn’t see anything. “What’s a treehouse doing out here?”

Rhea shook her head at me. I didn’t know what she’s supposed to be. She could have been my guardian angel or my devil. She could have been God itself. I think she wanted me to stop what was going on, like Cody. In the end, I think that’s what they both wanted because they knew I was a better person than that.

To me, nothing changed. This woman was just another being trying to control me and tie me down with chains. I smirked at her and walked up to the girls where I grabbed a handful of dirt and threw it down Karen’s face. “You’re just trash!” I yelled. “Nothing but lonely trash!” I made sure I was looking at this judgmental angel when I said those words and the next. “You’ll always be shit!”

“Aren’t you talking to yourself?” Rhea said.

“Aren’t you talking to yourself?” Karen said.

I backed off. I looked at them both and in anger, kicked Karen. “Fucking bitch!”

I could feel the yeyo wearing off. It made me feel even more pissed because it was the last bit I had and nobody wants to sell me anything just because Cody told them not to. I kicked Karen again. Megan and Amanda continued to laugh. I grabbed Karen’s head and rubbed it all around the dirt. I could feel her pain but it only made me angrier.

Angry at Cody.

Angry at myself.

“Stop,” Rhea said weakly. I didn’t listen.

I was so fucking angry that I didn’t realize I wasn’t stopping. I kept hurting this innocent girl over nothing. I thought over the things I’ve always kept going in circles again. Cody, Andrew, Lyle, drugs, Emily. Love, loneliness, being lost, uncertainty.

What the fuck am I doing with my life?

When it’s all said and done, Megan and Amanda are silent. The only thing could be heard it the faint thunder in the distance, a small drizzle of rain slowly coming down upon us and a violently crying Karen curl up into the dirt.

At all, in once that drizzle became hard rain and everything vanished. All the sound, the light from the flashlights, my fake friends, Rhea; they all just vanished. And for a good minute, I thought I did too because I couldn’t see or hear anything, not even my hands in front of me. I couldn’t feel my own touch or smell the lingering scent of rain.

I thought I was dead.

The first thing I saw this woman talking to a child. This woman’s name was Grace she was telling this child that being a good person is just being kind to each other. There was nothing to else to it. I could tell that there was something in her words that really reach out the child. This kid looked troubled and told her that he’s tired of seeing everything. Grace said, “It’s okay to be scared, it’s how you chose to face your fears is what defines you.”

Those words really connected with him.

Then there was the child again, this time alone and was grabbing his head; like he was going mad and I can hear the voices he was hearing. It wasn’t anything I could understand. The woman Grace was nowhere to be found. Instead, her gravestone was right in front of me with a single blue daisy.

It read:

Grace Ciotta

Loving daughter and friend.

1998-2016

She made me watch these two futures and wanted me to pick? Both of them had terrible outcomes no matter how I looked at it.

“What do you want?”

“You don’t have to be sad anymore.”

“I’m not sad. I want to be free, I want to have fun. I don’t care. It doesn’t matter.”

“You keep saying that. You keep lying.”

“You keep bothering me!”

“I’m trying to keep you doing something you’ll regret.”

“Just who are you?”

The voice didn’t respond. This was the last time I ever saw her or heard her. I was done with that mystical or hallucinogenic bullshit.

Megan slapped me back to reality. “Are you okay?”

I looked around but there wasn’t much to see. The only light was coming from Amanda. Karen was still on the floor crying and there was nothing else but rain. “Yeah. C’mon, let's go.”

I only took one look back at Karen’s cries. They were slowly getting muffled by the rain and her body quickly disappeared.

Back in the video, people were enjoying the rain and hadn’t slowed down one bit. There was a full on pool party now and people were crowd surfing in it.

Bo made sure to get every girl who was kissing another girl and lingered on the shots. Andrew was mixing everyone’s drink and Bo asked him, “Is that a bottle of everclear?” Andrew grinned.

It seemed that nobody really cared about what was going on. Jana Kramer was now too busy being a host and Alyssa was too drunk to care anymore.

Then there was this shot of Cody hanging out by himself near the entrance to the woods. It’s hardly noticeable as it was about a second. I noticed Emily was walking up to him.

And that’s who we first ran into going back to the party. He was staring but we just ignored him as the crowd welcomed us back with open eyes. Cody’s eyes never left me. I could feel them burning my back with anger.

The video would continue on; people binge drinking, passing around beer bongs, flashing their tits, dancing, sweat, drugs. It was all too much. I got fucked up that night and couldn't remember much of what happened. But I did remember the anger in Cody’s eyes.

I think for a moment, I didn’t care.