Spill The Tea

The next morning when I arrive at the school, I find Callie already by her locker to one of her classmates. She greets me with a kiss on the cheek and waves her classmate goodbye, we still had about 7 minutes until the first period so it gave us time to chat a bit.

"I have some news!" I say as soon as the other girl left "but we'll have to wait for Ethan."

"Thankfully he's here." she says looking behind me.

I turn around and I see him waving at us when he spots us.

"Listen to me!" he says when he reaches us "we should have our get-together tonight. There were be no alcohol since it's a school night," he says looking at me "but we'll be spilling lots of tea."

"Fine with me as long as we'll be able to get to school tomorrow." I say shrugging.

"Okay but Nikki has some news for us." says Callie.

Ethan looks at me urging me to talk "spill it!" he says.

"First of all Joe is here and she's pregnant!" I say clapping my head excitedly.

"Those two are going to have the cutest baby, I can already picture the dark green eyes and the curly hair." comments Ethan.

"Is she staying for long? We should drop by and congratulate her." Callie says looking at Ethan.

"It is still unknown but they won't be gone for at least another month. For my second best news, Carl came by yesterday and he got me a beast of a motorcycle." I say now squealing excitedly.

"Oh my God! You should definitely bring it tonight and take us on a ride!"

"I'll pass," says Callie "I love you but motorcycles scare the shit out of me."

"I'd really like to take you on a ride tonight Ethan but my mom wouldn't let me drive it at night, at least not now." I wink at him "but you should come by and I'll take you on the ride of your life."

We're out of time so we head to our classes, Ethan and I had the first period together so it gave us time to chat a bit more.

When I got home, the first thing I did was to head to my room and change into something more fit for the ride, I put on a pair of black jeans, my favorite Dr. Martens boots and a violet hoodie.

I go down and take out my keys, "Who's ready for the ride!"

Joelle jumps up from her place "Let's go!"

"I'm coming with you, I'll take my car and we can have a nice siblings' evening." says Carl.

"Are you two seriously encouraging this nonsense! She's only 17!" growls my mom.

"Leave them be, at least now we can have the evening for ourselves." says my dad pulling her closer.

We leave them while my mom is still complaining but only to him.

"We can drop by a grocery store to get some snacks and then we can go to the lake." suggests Carl.

"I'm okay with anything as long as I get to ride this beast." I say patting the leather seat then handing the spare helmet to Joe.

We were on our way to the lake, Joelle was clinging to me with one hand and filming us with the other while Carl was riding next to us music blasting from his car. The best thing about our relationship is that we can be sitting around a table having a deep and mature conversation or we can be acting childishly like now as if we were all teenagers. Our age difference never made a problem for us to communicate.

We arrive at the lake, take a seat and spread all that we bought from the store. It was too chilly for a swim so we just sit there talking about everything and nothing in particular.

"Last night we were talking with Martin and we decided that we will not be taking off again, at least not until I deliver the baby. We will probably look for a nice house here and spend the whole period here, I want to be close to my family during this time." announces Joelle.

"That'll be amazing! That way we can spend more time together and you can come by more often" I say looking at Carl "you don't have to be in Detroit 24/7 and I'm sure dad won't mind, it's been so long since we spent some quality time together."

"I'll try my best, I can't promise you anything but I'll be just as happy that Joe will have you with her."

We leave at around 7 p.m, it was already getting dark and I had to go to Ethan's. I asked Carl to drop me off after dropping Joelle and telling my parents that I won't be home for the night, I made sure to get us pizza on the way and candies.

Ethan was preparing a fondue for us and Callie was going through a list of movies for us to watch after we spill the tea.

"So why are you late?" Asks Ethan "We agreed to meet at 7 and it's now 7:30."

"Carl came up with a surprising plan for the afternoon so I was held up with my siblings and I brought pizza and candies if that counts." I say showing off what I was holding.

"You always know the way to my heart."

We set up the food and get comfy around it and Callie chose three movies for us to watch afterward, a horror one first then a comedy to wash out the terror and finally a romantic comedy to end the night with something cheesy.

"Okay so we'll go around each of us will tell us what happened during his summer vacations, I need some juicy details because those texts weren't enough." says Ethan sitting in a more comfortable position that allows him to focus with both of us.

"I'll start!" says Callie excitedly "so as you both know, I went on a camping trip this summer. I was truly against it at first, it was only me and Larissa, I love my sister but we don't have the same relationship you do have with Joelle," she pauses looking at me and I nod understandingly "any way she was only bringing me along so that our parents would let her go and that bitch truly ditched me as soon as we reached the meeting place for her friends." Ethan laughs at that point, Larissa was nice but she wouldn't even give you a second look when she's with her friends. "The first night, after setting our tents and the fire camp, each group gathered together and thanks to my lovely sister I found myself alone, Ryan was then sitting by himself playing some chords with his guitar, he had a friendly air about him so I sat beside and somehow we ended up talking all night.." Callie keeps telling us how sweet Ryan was and how in that month-long trip she found herself falling for him unconditionally while showing us occasionally pictures of them both together, they were truly suited for each other and I can only hope the best for her. We agreed that when he comes on Friday, we would all go out in the evening to get to know him.

"Nikki, your turn!" announces Ethan.

"Why don't you start? and besides, you already know the whole story." I complain not wanting to talk about a meaningless summer love after hearing about Callie and Ryan's relationship.

"We'll leave the best for the last and I want to look you in the eyes when you're telling me about your steamy summer."

"Fine," I breathe out "so we went to Australia for our summer vacation obviously, and since Joe spent a couple of weeks in Sydney, she told me that I should definitely try surfing. We were going to spend a whole month there so I decided I'd take her advice and take a few classes and that's how I met Ashton, he was my instructor. He's only 18 but since I'm totally ignorant when it comes to surfing and he's been surfing since he can remember, as he said, it was a perfect fit for me to learn the basics. I already sent you pictures of him but I still can't get over his hazel eyes, especially the combination they make with his tanned skin. As soon as I lied eyes on him, I decided that I should get me this Australian snack."

"You're incurable!" laughed Callie.

"He was a snack," I show them the few pictures of him that I still have on my phone "see? Anyway, thankfully he wasn't taken and I still can't understand why! he was such a sweet guy and for a moment I wished that we wouldn't leave so that I can still be him." I keep talking about the time we passed together during those six weeks because thankfully our vacation was extended which allowed me to spend more time with him. "He promised we'd keep in touch but it's really hard with the time difference and the distance, I can't even know when it'll be possible to see him again and with school starting, it's even harder. So that's the end of our little story."

Callie hugged tightly "You'll find the one, you just wait." She smiled at me.

"Any guy will be thrilled to have you as his girlfriend, we can take James as an example." jokes Ethan and we all burst into laughter.

"Now as I said the best for the last. I didn't go on any vacation this summer so I went to each and every single party there was in town and to my surprise, Skylar was always there so I took my chance with him and approached him by the second party." Ethan keeps telling us about his encounters with Skylar and how they've gone on several dates but there was still nothing serious, he's been crushing on him even before I met him but Skylar only came out by the end of last year so he never had the courage to approach him before. They're now assigned on a project together and he said that he's going to take this chance to ask him out and make it official.

We spent the rest of the night discussing some gossip and giving our predictions for this year then we watched the movies that Callie chose for us and ended up sleeping after 3 a.m hopefully we'll still be able to make it to school tomorrow.

It's actually in moments like these that I truly thank my mom for finally letting me join a public school so that I could experience a normal teenagerhood.