Page 27 of Behind the Lights

Brett, Uncle John, and my dad had moved up standing behind Diamond. His dad eyed each of them in turn. “If you don’t come home now, son, you’ll no longer have a place to lay your head with a forgiving family. Choosing these sinners over us will sever all ties you have with your real family.”

Diamond was shaking, my dad placed his hand on his shoulder in a show of solidarity. “We’re his family now.” He addressed Diamond’s father. I’d never been prouder of my dad than I was right then. Never, would I doubt him or his loyalty again.

Diamond’s mother and brother were now crying, but his father didn’t care. He grabbed his mom by the arm dragging her behind him as he stormed off, disappearing from our line of sight. The crowd started clapping, when I turned to look at Diamond, he had his head buried in my dad’s shoulder with Brett and Uncle John surrounding them. I couldn’t imagine how he felt right then.Was he sad? Was he relieved?

“Come on guys, let’s go to dinner before you have to get ready for the party.” Mary guided us out of the dense crowd that had gathered around to watch Diamond’s personal life unfold and headed toward the parking lot.

When the four of us approached the van, I tossed my arm loosely over his shoulder. “Dude, you okay?”

He ran his hands through his short hair, releasing a breath in the form of a heavy sigh. “Yeah, I will be. I just wish I could get my little brother out of their controlling clutches.”

“Your mom didn’t look very happy either,” Stoli said, slapping his hand on Diamond’s back letting him know he was there for him too.

“Yeah, but she never stuck up for us either.” He shook his head. “She’s always been afraid of him and did everything she could to keep from arguing. In my eyes, she’s no better than he is.”

Stoli and I exchanged glances before crawling in behind Diamond and Mickey. Mickey had already claimed the driver’s seat. “Where to, guys?” Mickey asked, holding his hand out for the keys with a shit eating grin plastered across his face. He rarely got to drive so this was a win in his book.

Stoli laughed, and handed them over. “Red Lobster by Alderwood mall they said.” We tossed our caps and gowns in the back as he drove us to the restaurant to meet our families for the celebratory dinner.

Two hours later, we were loading up the van and heading to the party. June in Washington was the perfect time for an outdoor fest of any kind. There were easily a hundred graduates already there and the party hadn’t even kicked off yet. We got busy setting up our gear on the makeshift stage they’d placed for us to use in the backyard.

“Whoa,” I uttered, taking in our surroundings, “this is intense.”

“You can say that again, whose house is this anyways?” Stoli asked.

“Rob Steiner, he’s in our class,” Lucas answered, walking up to us. “His dad works with my dad.” He kissed me as I was bent over to pull my mic stand out of the back of the van. It was nothing to write home about considering I picked it up at a second-hand store, but it was my first and it was paid for.

“Hey babe.” I curled my arm around his waist, drawing him in for a deeper kiss.

“Awesome,” Stoli muttered, walking away.

“Your hair is getting so long,” Lucas said, twirling my curls around his fingers.

“Yeah, I vowed never to cut it again.” I kissed the tip of his nose. “I didn’t see you outside after graduation, where’d you go?”

“My dad whisked me off to dinner with some business associates. So much for celebrating my day. All they did was talk contracts and what not,” he huffed. “Um, I may have added to the headcount tonight,” he said while chewing on his cuticles and staring at me.

“What do you mean?” Mickey asked, sneaking up behind us.

“Well, I um, tweeted and posted the party on Facebook. When I checked it a few minutes ago, it had more than two dozen retweets and a hundred and twenty-seven likes.” His eyes widened, as he finished telling us the news.

“Oh shit. Ah, are Rob’s parents going to be okay with that?” One thing I didn’t want to deal with was the cops showing up to break up a paying gig. We needed the money and jail was not an option for us.

“His parents are out of town, but they let the neighbors know what was going on. Here,” he said handing me an envelope, “They left a check for you guys. I had them write it out to you because I didn’t want it to be blank.”

“Thanks.” I slid it in my back pocket and we got back to unloading and setting everything up.

We’d decided on a playset that consisted of more recent releases since the crowd was predominately our age. Although, I did note quite a few college-aged heads there as well. Lucas hunted Rob down and brought him over to introduce us before we started playing. Seemed Stoli and Mickey had him in a couple of their classes. Diamond and I didn’t know him, but he seemed alright. Before long, people were passing us plastic cups of beer and the party kicked into high gear.

“How’s everyone doing tonight?” I hollered into the microphone, drawing everyone’s attention. They yelled back in response, mixedhellyeah’sand various hooting with their blue and red plastic cups held high in the air.

“Right on. Now that high school is behind us, it’s time to send those years out in style.” I held my hand up with the cup in it in a salute and then took a drink. I saw someone pass Stoli a bottle of his namesake and knew it was game on.

“Ha-ha, I see the story of how Stoli became Stoli made its way around. But enough of that. We are Social Sinners and we’re here to get this fucking party rocking. How about we start it off with a little Alice Cooper,School’s Out For…” I paused, waiting for the crowd to catch on.

Everyone yelled, “SUMMER!” and we jumped into playing the song.

We planned a nine-song playset, taking a break after every third. When we were done, we had decent buzzes going and decided to pack our shit up in the van before we drank any more. Seemed Rob’s folks had the yard wired with speakers, so he had a playset already rolling off an iPod docking station when we came back in.

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