Every Summer Has A Story

Ch. 21 - The Lake Boys

Eve and Zeke made their way beyond the bonfire toward the stairs leading up to an impressive beach house. Eve marveled at the sheer size of the home and shook her head.

"I'm going to stay down here," Auden announced, slowing her pace, "Greyson is wanting to make s'mores first and I'm starving."

Eve grinned,

"That's the cutest shit I've ever heard."

She could almost see Auden's face heating up despite the cloak of night.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Auden sang, "have fun, Evie!"

Eve tossed her best friend a wave and turned her attention back to Zeke,

"Where to, travel guide?"

He pointed toward the looming mountain of stairs built into the side of the dune,

"We're going up, girl."

Eve inwardly groaned at the idea of exercise. Her feet ached from the exertion of week one at summer camp. She spent all day running around camp tending to various needs, ailments, and bellyaches. She swallowed her complaints and gave Zeke a positive smile, though.

"Lead the way," she offered, knowing good and well she would set an embarrassing snail's pace.

Zeke shrugged in his good-natured way and began his ascent, pausing only to take Eve's hand back into his own. 

"Why is this not weird?" she questioned herself with slight alarm.

She studied Zeke's back as he lead her onward, enjoying the feeling of his smooth skin against her own, and tried to force the concerns into the back of her mind. 

"We're halfway there," Zeke encouraged, breaking into her thoughts.

"Camp is weird," Eve blurted, "it's just so weird."

Zeke laughed heartily and continued pulling her along.

"Oh for sure, girl. Camp is the strangest yet most incredible experience I've ever had."

"I'm not usually a people person," the tequila admitted for her, "and now I touch people all of the time and it's not weird."

Eve could hear the din of voices and an increase in musical volume the closer they got, and she tried to mentally prepared herself for an onslaught of strangers. Well, mostly strangers. The rest of the camp staff had gone up ahead of them.

"Who wants to be normal, though?" Zeke challenged as they reached the summit,

He stepped up onto the sandy dune and pulled Eve up to join him, smiling down at her brightly.

"Let's see if we can hunt down those Lake boys," he said, "they like to get weird, too."

Eve turned her gaze back toward the house and realized the floor to ceiling doors lining the bottom floor of the large beach house were open to the night air with people spilling out onto the patio and sand. There were maybe 30 attendees present, nothing too crazy, but Eve still felt her grip on Zeke's comforting hand tighten at the sight of so many unfamiliar faces. She scanned the crowd and quickly spotted Thea and Ellison off to the side discreetly taking shots from a douchy looking guy in a bro tank and board shorts. She resisted a grin. Ellison was a chip off the old block. She continued looking through the crowd and, of course, locked gazes with Maverick's thunderous eyes. He and Zayne had already gotten cups from the keg and taken a seat in two of the available beach chairs near the patio. Maverick was visibly on edge while Zayne simply looked confused when his eyes landed on her hand entwined with Zeke's.

"I bet the guys are inside," Zeke suggested, making a move toward the patio.

"Okay," Eve managed to choke out, trying to break eye contact with Maverick.