For One Last Night

12:00 AM

Josie held up her silver can, smiling.

"Excuse me!" She called out. "I'd like to propose a toast."

"What are we toasting to?" Oliver asked her.

"Our last night!" She reminded him, rolling her eyes.

Gus shook his head, confused. "What are you talking about? Summer doesn't actually end until like two weeks from now."

"Also, isn't tomorrow night technically our last night? Isn't that what the whole dinner is about?" Ziggy asked, sounding confused.

"It's Paloma's last night, so our summer ends tonight." Josie tipped her can in Paloma's direction before continuing. "The dinner is one of those family things that ends at like ten which means that tonight is our last night together, like just for us." She sounded more happy than sad. I didn't know how she could be so okay. Maybe, she was faking it. Maybe, like me, she'd spent the last few months trying to sound more happy than sad whenever she talked about leaving.

"Shit," Gus said quietly.

"Yeah, damn." Ziggy nodded.

"How is the summer already over?" I asked, trying to catch Paloma's eyes. "It feels like it was just the last day of school."

"Really? I feel like it was forever ago," Paloma said dismissively and I looked away. It was so hard to know if this was just as hard for everyone else. Maybe I was the only one who wasn't ready to let go.

"Let's not get distracted, ladies. My toast?" Josie looked at everyone's drinks pointedly.

"Right, right." I said, picking up my drink without really looking at her. God forbid we got off topic for a minute when Josie was talking.

Everyone else followed, holding their drinks in the air.

Paloma looked up. "Shouldn't it be my toast since it's my last night and all?"

"You can add on."

Paloma rolled her eyes. "Alright, Jo, go ahead."

"Thank you, Paloma." Josie cleared her throat. "Alright guys, I'm not going to do that thing where you say something is going to be amazing, and then by doing that, it makes it awful–"

"Like how George did for Prom, you mean?" Gus interrupted, looking at me. He didn't say it mean, though. More like a joke that were both in on.

"Everyone says Prom is going to be the best night of their lives, Gus!" I said, shooting him a glare and his eyes widened. He mimed zipping his mouth close before winding his arm up a couple of times and tossing the imaginary key across the yard and I smiled because I couldn't help it.

Paloma nodded. "Yeah, which is probably why it sucks so much. How could anything live up to those expectations?"

"It wasn't that bad," Oliver said affectionately and Josie smiled at him. I wondered how many things she remembered entirely differently than the rest of us because of Oliver.

"Says you. While you and Josie were upstairs planning your future kids' names, we were being kicked out of the ballroom because that psycho junior slapped that girl, Marina, for dancing with her boyfriend!" Paloma exclaimed, shaking her head.

"Yeah, and you got to miss Ben Sanders's throwing up the entire six courses he ordered at Olive Garden." I shuddered, remembering what a nightmare Prom had been. All I remembered from Prom was the three times I slow-danced with Gus and drunkenly stumbling through the hallways with Paloma, laughing as we tried to find the ice machine.