I pulled up to the port, parked the Porsche, and found the guys hanging out by the boat where I was met with two surprises. First, that the boat was no ordinary boat, it was more like a modest yacht. It had the top deck, the inside living quarters, and all the other amenities. The second surprise was the yacht was actually named "The Boat". It was written in giant blue bubble letters across the side. Real original I thought to myself with a chuckle. You give a bunch of high schoolers a boat - what would you expect them to name it.
Jason, Tyler, and Nico were there along with Charles and Hamilton whom I was introduced to. Shocker Hamilton was the one who owned the yacht, with a name like that I shouldn't have been surprised.
"Haha is this like your beater yacht," I asked him jokingly.
"Yeah, it is actually. Our nice one is on the west coast," He responded nonchalantly.
"Holy shit, are you shitting me?" I asked
"I'm just yanking your chain, man haha, my parents are rich, but they're not that rich" He responded light-heartedly.
We climbed aboard The Boat and Hamilton sat behind the wheel like it was a throne. Wow, that must have been some kind of feelings. He threw on a captain's hat that he claimed to have gotten on clearance at the local marina store, we all got a kick out of that. "Look at me, I am the captain now" we kept repeating mimicking the 2013 Captain Phillips movie. We set sail in good spirits.
We talked for a little bit, shooting the shit. The guys wanted to know what was going on between Lola and I. I told them off and shot back with a couple questions of my own about certain individuals who I had seen around from the high school. In under thirty minutes, I had a pretty good understanding of the social ladder in place at their high school. Fortunately, between my in with Madeline and Nico, I had found myself atop that ladder.
High school was really pretty simple. You had your popular group of kids who drank and partied, they were mainly the star athletes, rich kids, and pretty girls. Then there were a few cliches that were pretty popular but maybe a little nerdier or partied a little less. Then there were the music kids, chorus, band, orchestra, and what have you. The drama, debate, art, theatre kids had their own circle. Then there were the smaller cliques of soccer kids and cross country kids. Then, of course, there were the super-smart kids and then the outcasts. Like always there was some crossover and some expectations but the general outline seemed to stay consistent with what I had known back home.
The guys got me caught up on all the high school drama, who was cheating on who. Who had a thing for who and who didn't associate with who. Eventually, the conversation steered to fishing, and when they learned that I have never been deep sea fishing they stopped the boat and demanded that I catch something before we go any further.
They sent me out to the deck with a giant pole and told me to catch something. I was no fisherman but I had a general understanding of the sport. Cast, reel, and hope for a bite. I went through the motions and came up empty-handed my first couple tries. Finally, I got a bite and played the reeling game, giving a little line and then taking double what I let out. After a couple of minutes of fighting, I had finally brought the fish up. It was a baby swordfish. I was pretty impressed but the guys found it comical that I had struggled so much with a baby fish.
I refused to take it off the hook which prompted some laughter among the crew. They eventually cut me some slack and threw the catch back. After some debate, we determined that a baby fish was still a fish and we set course again. Hamilton claimed that he knew a cool cove that was only about an hour's drive. Just before we got there the guys started acting weird.
"What's up guys, you're being weird," I asked.
"It's just that if you're gonna be hanging with us there's something we gotta give you," Jason said, his voice sending my heart a million different directions. Suddenly I was thinking this could be some extreme cult where I had to commit a crime to join or something. They let me suffer for a few seconds thinking of all the terrible possibilities before finally screaming in unison.
"WE GOT YOU A FAKE ID!"
"Huh" I responded, quietly relieved that I wouldn't have to kill anyone or steal anything.
"Well, we figured that since last night was your first night drinking we would hook you up with a fake ID for any future party needs. We took a picture from your Instagram and Charles knows someone who was able to hook us up." Hamilton explained.
"I dunno what to say guys this is awesome. Wait you didn't give me some dumb name like McLovin did you" I said referring to one of the greatest Jonah Hill movies of all time, Superbad.
"No, your name is Samuel Perkins and you're from Idaho," Nico said as he handed me the card.
"We're here guys" Hamilton announced before I could thank them for a second time.
We had come upon a quiet little island where we dropped an anchor and prepared for an unforgettable afternoon. Hamilton opened the fridge and pulled out a tray of jello shots along with a couple of bottles of hard liquor and some Gatorade to chase.
"Ever had a jello shot before" Hamilton questioned as he tossed one my way
"Now I have," I said as I knocked one back not sure whether I should chew it up or just swallow it.
The boys laughed and each took one of their own. I wondered if this is how all of their weekends went. Knocking back jello shots on a yacht in the middle of the Ocean. This was something that I had only seen in the movies. It felt like Wolf of Wall Street: high school edition. In honor of this crazy lifestyle, we played some Jordan Belfort and took another round of jello shots. We ventured out of the living quarters and got situated on the roof of the boat.
"Watch this" Nico yelled, seconds before backflipping off of the boat into the ocean below.Whoooooo we all yelled at the top of our lungs. Nico emerged from the water and screamed.
"SATURDAYS ARE FOR THE BOYS!" he shouted drunkenly as he half splashed, half swam back to the boat.
That prompted another round of jello shots. As we drank some more I loosened up and before long it felt as if I had known these guys forever. We started talking about our favorite professional sports teams, video games, girls, college, cars, food, you name it. Despite the luxurious setting, it was almost like being back home.
As we got to know each other better we became more competitive. Eventually, we decided to have a competition for the coolest jump off of The Boat. Hamilton started with a gainer and landed it perfectly. Jason followed with a cannonball, no points for originality. Charles was up next and did a double backflip, sticking it pretty nicely. Nico was up for the second time and somehow managed to do a triple front flip. Tyler was second to last and jumped off spreading his limbs and then tucking them into a nice dive.
I walked up to the side of the boat mulling over my options. I was definitely not capable of anything cooler than a single front flip or backflip. I couldn't dive and a cannonball had already been used. I was between a belly flop and pencil dive. A pencil dive seemed like it would kill the mood so I opted for a belly flop. Before launching myself overboard I took one more shot hoping the alcohol would numb the oncoming pain. I stood facing the boys and backflipped off, however, halfway through my backflip I stopped rotation and spread all my limbs - a belly flop with a little bit of flair - style points as we liked to call them.
As the water rushed toward my body I prepared myself for impact. What I learned seconds later is there is no real way to prepare for the pain of jumping from such heights into the water stomach first. It felt like someone had five stared the entire front side of my body. My arms and legs were weak and my stomach was turning over with pain. My neck had even gotten a little kink in it from the impact, nothing major but sleep might come a little difficult tonight I thought. As I emerged from the water I could hear the boys laughing and screaming, that was a good sign I thought.
"WHAT WERE YOU THINKING," they asked as I made my way up to the top deck.
"Can I get some hard liquor?" I asked, frantically searching for something to take my mind of the pain that ran through my entire body. "Somebody please tell me you got that on tape?"
"It's all right here," Tyler said pointing at his phone. "We could send this to Barstool Sports or Worldstar man," he said, playing it back a second time.
They showed me the video and seeing it from their point of view I wondered how I hadn't broken something or even died. It was even funnier in slow motion, they saved the video and sent it to me but not before posting it to Twitter. All I could think was "I really hope that it doesn't go viral. I don't need all my friends at home knowing what I'm up to. I took a swig of my Gatorade and vodka mix and we began thinking of the next challenge.