The walk into town was exhausting.
Not because it was a long trek, but because I'm so clearly unfit compared to Grayson and my brother, who were both urging me to walk at a faster pace.
"A sloth could walk faster than you." Mitchell says.
"Or a snail." Grayson added with a slightly amused chuckle.
"Shut up!" I snapped at them.
Can't a guy walk at his own damn pace? God.
There's also the fact that I was fresh out of crutches.
A warm and sweet aroma wafted from the nearby bakery. Freshly baked bread, vanilla cupcakes and cinnamon doughnuts. Some might say that's what heaven would smell like. For me, my personal heaven would smell like crispy bacon on a rainy day, paired with the smell of burning wood and pages of a brand new book.
I manage to catch up in time to follow them into the bakery. Divine.
"Hi, welcome to Lucky's Patisserie, what can I get for you?" The lady behind the counter asked, a bright customer-service smile plastered on her face.
"We'll take a bit of everything." Says Mitchell.
"Everything?" The lady wondered.
"Yep. Say, five of each?"
How can he afford this? Did he find the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow or something? I know he has a job, but there's no way he can afford to possibly buy out a bakery.
"This may take awhile, feel free to have a seat." The lady gestures to the tables and chairs behind us.
After five or ten minutes, the lady calls us to the counter before handing each of us two paper bags filled with treats.
The next few hours were spent eating sweets and playing board games in the living room of the lake house. Afterwards, everyone decided that they wanted to go swimming, which is why they we're currently sloshing around in the lake while I lay on the floating dock with my eyes closed as the sun battered down against my skin.
"Dallas! Get your ass in the water!" Mitchell ordered, splashing water in my direction.
"Buzz off!" I groaned, rolling over so that I'm lying flat on my stomach.
I don't know why, but I've always been insecure about my body. I was weak and scrawny, and, no matter how much I ate, I still could not gain weight. My ribs practically stick out.
"Yeah! Get in here!" Mom urged.
"No thanks." I force myself to sit upright and I drag my feet over the edge of the dock and dip them into the water.
Beside me, my phone dings with a notification.
Unknown number:
Hey, it's Hannah. I'm sorry for being a shitty friend.
Can we hang out?
I want to talk to you about what happened.
She must have a new phone? Or a second phone?
I rolled my eyes before replying.
Me:
I can't.
Hannah:
Oh. Why not?
Me:
I'm not home.
Hannah:
When will you be back?
Me:
Idk.
Hannah:
Can you text me when u get back?
I stare down at the text. I was still angry towards Hannah. Towards all of my friends, actually. Except for Lucy. Honestly, I don't think anything they can say will help. I start typing in a response when two hands shove my from behind, pushing me forward into the water. I thrash around and bring myself to the surface, whipping around and looking back up to the dock to see Grayson laughing. I was choking on lake water due to unexpectedly being pushed in.
"What the hell!?" I coughed.
I was struck with a sense of Deja Vu from the last time I was thrown unwillingly into water.
"He's finally in!" Dad says.
Mitchell and my mother were too busy laughing.
"You're so dumb!" I snapped, kicking myself up from the water to climb onto the dock.
I come to the realisation that my phone is no longer attached to my hand. "Fuck!"
"Language." Dad warned.
"You made me drop my phone!" I shouted in a panic.
Not to sound like a total nomophobe, but I can't live without my phone!
My entire life is in that thing!
Fuck!
"Shit, sorry... uh.." Grayson cuts himself off and gently slips off the dock and into the water.
He'd better be fishing for my phone, or I'm going to drown him.
"What's happening?" Mom wondered. It sounded like she was still high.
"Dallas lost his phone in the water." Mitchell explained to her.
"I didn't lose it! It fell out of my hands when I was pushed by-"
Grayson emerges from the water holding my phone in his hand.
Thank fuck!
He climbs onto the platform, water dripping off of his body as he held my soaked phone to me. I snatch it from him and then shove him off of the dock before storming up to the house.
Hopefully there's rice in the house.
It's totally fine.
I'm sure plenty of people have dropped their phones in a lake and it ended up being perfectly fine.
It can still be salvaged...
Later that day
It could not be salvaged.
"Cause of death.... Drowning." Says Grayson from the other side of the countertop as he shoved a flaming hot Cheeto into his mouth.
I hope he chokes on it!
"That's going to be your cause of death if you don't shut up." I say angrily, throwing him a glare before walking away.
I walk into the living room and slump down on the sofa to watch tv. Mom and dad had gone to bed early, meanwhile, Mitchell was seated at the other end of the sofa eating some leftover treats that we had gotten from the bakery earlier on.
I'm still angry. Scratch that, I'm not angry, I'm enraged, but maybe this is fate's way of telling me to enjoy the rest of the week without the constant need to always be on my mobile device.
What am I, Amish? I thought to myself.
Grayson takes a seat between Mitchell and I. "Dallas, I'm really sor-"
"Shut up and watch the movie." I cut him off, crossing my arms.
"But the movie hasn't even started ye-"
"What did I just say?" I shake my head at him.
He slumped further into the sofa, reaching his hand for another Cheeto from the packet.
"Cheeto me." Mitchell says, holding his hand out.
Grayson hands him the packet. It crinkles loudly as Mitchell takes it and digs in for a handful of Cheeto's.
At the sound of a phone dinging, I reach for my pocket before realising Grayson murdered my main source of entertainment.
I turn to see Mitchell reaching for his phone. "Uh, why is your weird friend texting me?" He asks.
"Which one?" I wonder.
"Lucy."
"What did she say?"
"She says you haven't been answering her texts and she wants to make sure you're okay." Mitchell reads the text.
I leant over Grayson to take Mitchell's phone from him.
"Hey!" He says with Cheetos in his mouth.
"Shut up and eat your Cheetos." I tell him, settling back in my spot before reading Lucy's text for myself.
Me on Mitchell's Phone:
Hey, it's Dal.
I'm okay. Grayson the dumb idiot broke my phone 😭
"Rude." Grayson says, reading the text I had sent to Lucy.
I mocked him as Lucy's text came through.
Lucy:
Thank god.
That you're okay, not that Grayson broke your phone.
You should definitely break his.
Me on Mitchell's Phone:
I'm fighting the urge to break his face.
"Rude." He repeated, this time more urgently.
I shove him with my left shoulder. "Don't read my texts." I say.
Lucy:
Hahaha! I'll help.
I'll let you go, I'm sure Michelle will want his phone back.
Me on Mitchell's Phone:
Yeah. He's probably scared I might accidentally click onto safari and see a hundred tabs open with cougar porn.
Grayson stifled a laugh.
Lucy:
Dallas! Omg! 🤣😭
Mitchell snatched his phone back.
"Hey!" I groaned.
"Text your friends on your own phone... oh wait."
I glare daggers at him. "Dipshit."
Grayson laughed from beside me.
Psychopath.
I slump into my place on the sofa, crossing my arms again as I turned my gaze to the tv screen.
"Cougar porn? Really?" Mitchell scoffed.
He continued reading our texts and scoffed again. "How dare she call me Michelle."
He angrily typed something to Lucy.
"Mitchell, don't be an ass to my friend." I tell him.
"I'm not. I'm just kindly informing her that she spelt my name wrong." The way he worded 'kindly' made me think that he was definitely not informing her in a kind manner.