House Party (4 page)

“Thanks for coming and—”

The doorbell rang again, cutting me off.

“You better get that,” Mike said.

They went upstairs, and I went to grab the door. Two guys and a girl walked in. I didn't know the guys but I knew the girl—Ashley from my law class.

“Hey, Casey,” Ashley said. “These are my friends, Brian and Ryan. They're such good friends they even rhyme.”

They nodded at me, and I nodded back.

“There's punch upstairs,” I said, “but be careful. It's spiked with alcohol.”

“I'm going to stick with wine,” Ashley said. She pulled a bottle out from under her jacket.

“Fancy-looking bottle,” Brian said. “But look, it's got a cork. Why didn't you get something with a screw cap?”

“My father doesn't buy wine with screw caps,” she said. “He only buys the good stuff.”

“Your father bought that for you?” I gasped.

They laughed and I realized that was a pretty dumb question.

“This isn't like a bush party,” Ashley said. “I'm sure that Casey has a corkscrew.”

“Of course. Up in the kitchen. The drawer just to the right of the fridge.”

Brian and Ryan headed up the stairs. Ashley started after them, stopped and turned around.

“Thanks for hosting the party,” Ashley said.

“Thanks for coming…it didn't take much effort.”

“It's just that it's pretty brave of you to do, that's all.”

“Brave? What do you mean?” I asked.

“Ashley!” Ryan bellowed from the kitchen. “You're slowing down our drinking time! Come on!”

“I'm coming!” she yelled back. “Talk to you later.”

I guess she must have meant it was brave because my parents would kill me if they found out. They actually wouldn't kill me. I'd be grounded, but if that happened it happened. Sometimes you had to be prepared to pay the price to get what you wanted.

There was a pounding on the door. Startled, I almost screamed. I recovered
and scrambled over to the door. It was four—no, five people. Three girls and two guys. I recognized them from around school, but they were a couple of grades ahead of me.

“Is this the party place?” one of the guys asked.

“Yes, I'm Casey and this is the place where—”

“Yahoooo!” one of the guys screamed. They burst through the door and brushed past me. There were no introductions. They just moved upstairs. I guess there'd be time to get to know who they were later. I was sure Jen would introduce me.

I did a quick count—four, then three and now five, plus Jen and me. That was fourteen. No matter what happened now, even if nobody else came, we had ourselves a real party. No one could accuse us of having a party and nobody showing up.

The music surged even louder as somebody cranked the stereo up another notch. I didn't know our sound system could go that loud.

I'd stopped trying to count. There had to be at least twenty-five people here. It was amazing to have all the people we invited come on such short notice. I knew Jen had to be thrilled. She certainly looked happy. She was practically beaming. She was
buzzing around, talking to people, dancing, laughing and having a great time.

The song ended and Jen gave the boy she was dancing with a hug. Then she came into the kitchen.

“Great party!” she said.

“Not bad,” I admitted.

Jen dipped a cup into the punch bowl. She downed the whole cup in one gulp and then refilled it again.

“You should go slow on that stuff,” I warned her.

“I'm burning at least as much calories as this on the dance floor.”

“It's not the calories I'm worried about. Remember the alcohol?”

“Come on, Casey, you know how little there is in here. I could drink the whole punch bowl and still drive a car.”

“You're only fifteen. You don't have a license.”

“But if I
did
, this stuff wouldn't affect me. I'm hot and it's good.”

“It's not bad,” I agreed. I'd had two cups myself.

“Just be careful. You wouldn't want to get drunk,” she chided me.

“Funny.”

I dipped my cup into the punch bowl. Jen wasn't the only one who was hot and thirsty. It was amazing how all the bodies in the house heated the place up. That and the dancing I'd been doing.

Actually, it was looking like Jen and I were the only ones who were drinking the punch. The bowl was still almost full.

There was a tap on my shoulder and I turned around. It was Mike.

“Do you want to dance?” he asked.

“To this?” I asked. The music was a pounding rap song.

He looked hurt. I wasn't turning him down. It was the song.

“We could try to dance,” I said quickly.

He smiled, took me by the hand and led me toward the dance floor—the dining room. There were two other couples on the floor. They looked really awkward trying to dance to rap. At least we wouldn't be the only ones who looked stupid.

We walked into the center of the floor and started dancing. It
was
really awkward.

The music suddenly stopped and another song came on—a slow dance song.

“Is that better?” Mike asked.

“Much better.”

He slipped his arms around me and we began dancing. Instantly other couples reacted to the song and rushed into the dining room. We were pushed into the center by the crush of people on all sides and we continued to shuffle to the music.

“Quite a crowd!” Mike said into my ear.

“It is.”

“You throw a great party!”

“Thanks.”

It
was
a great party. Everywhere there were people dancing, and laughing and talking and drinking. There was a whole lot of drinking going on, but nobody seemed to be drunk…just happy.

Jen suddenly popped her head into the dining room and motioned for me.

“Can you excuse me,” I said to Mike. “Always things to do when you're the host.”

“Thanks for the dance.”

“Maybe we could dance later on,” I suggested.

“For sure.”

I squeezed my way through the couples and off the dance floor.

Jen looked worried. “What's happened?” I asked.

“Where can I get a pail and a mop?” she said.

“What happened?” I asked anxiously.

“Nothing serious. A bottle of wine got knocked over.”

“I'll get the bucket…where did it get spilled?”

“Downstairs in the rec room.”

“On the carpet?”

“Yeah, but it's not bad and it sort of blends in with the brown of the carpet.”

I grabbed a roll of paper towels off the kitchen counter and handed it to Jen. “You start blotting it up, and I'll get the bucket and water.”

Jen rushed off and I went to the laundry room and grabbed a pail. I squeezed in some soap and filled it up with water. I grabbed a couple of rags that were hanging behind the door.

The pail was heavy, and it bumped against my leg as I moved along the hall and down the stairs, sloshing water onto the floor. Water wasn't bad. Wine was.

Jen was on her knees, blotting up the wine. She was right. It had blended in, and I could hardly see where it had been spilled. I took a rag and soaked the spot with water.

“I told you it wasn't that bad,” Jen said.

“Nothing serious,” I agreed.

“If this is the worst thing that happens, it'll be one successful party.”

“It
is
working well,” I said. “There are a lot of people, though.”

“Yeah, isn't it great?” Jen shouted.

“I guess so.”

Jen started giggling. Her eyes looked all glazed.

“Jen, have you been drinking?”

She giggled even more. “Nothing except the punch, like we agreed. I'm just happy that it's all working out so well. Isn't it a great party?” she yelled.

“Just as great as when you said it a minute ago.”

“Oh, yeah, that's right,” she said and giggled some more.

“How many people do you think there are?” I asked.

Jen shook her head. “I don't know…a lot… but most of them are people you invited.”

“Me? I hardly invited anybody.”

“That doesn't make sense. I didn't invite most of them…I don't even
know
most of them,” she said, sounding defensive.

“You don't?”

“I thought some of them had to be your friends. That you'd invited them.”

“I hardly know anybody here. But if you didn't invite them, and I didn't invite them, how did they know about the party tonight?”

“I guess they just sort of heard through
the grapevine…you know, on msn or text messaging or something like that,” Jen said. “But they all seem like pretty good people.”

“I guess so. It seems to be going pretty well.”

A big cheer filled the air.

“Let's go and see what's happening,” I said to Jen.

We rushed upstairs. There was a crowd of people standing around watching four guys chugging bottles of beer. They were racing to see who could finish their bottle first.

People continued to cheer as the drinkers got closer and closer to the bottom. Two of the guys finished, and then they turned their bottles upside down to show they were empty. The crowd cheered even louder. The bottles weren't completely empty though, and some beer, mostly foam, dripped out and onto the carpet.

I ran over with my pail and rags. Before I could even get there, the crowd surged forward, slapping the two guys on the back
and grinding the foam into the carpet. There was no point in even trying to clean it up now.

“Just go with the flow,” Jen said. “I saw a carpet cleaner in the storage locker downstairs. Do you know how to use it?”

“Of course I do.”

“Good. After it's all over we can just clean the whole carpet. All the carpets.”

That made perfect sense. I was sure there'd be little stains all over, not to mention mud and dirt that had been tracked in…it wasn't like people had been leaving their shoes at the door.

“The only bad thing about cleaning the carpets is that the place might be too clean,” Jen said.

“How can being too clean be a problem?”

“If it's too clean, your parents will get suspicious—unless you normally clean the carpets when they're not looking.”

“No, but I guess we'll have to take that chance,” I said.

“Speaking of chances. Why don't you
go and find that cute guy you were dancing with. Just enjoy yourself!”

“I'll try.” It would be a whole lot easier if it wasn't my house, or if my house wasn't filled with so many people. People I didn't know. People that Jen didn't know.

Just then the doorbell rang. I ran down to answer it. It was a pizza delivery guy holding a stack of boxes. I opened the door and he stepped in.

“Sorry it took so long,” he said.

“So long? But…but I didn't order any pizza,” I stammered.

“Is this Forty Calico?”

“Yes.”

“I've got ten pizzas. That'll be one hundred and twenty-seven bucks.” He tried to hand them to me. I backed away.

“I didn't order them, and I don't have that sort of money!”

“Somebody ordered them and somebody better pay!”

“But…but…”

“Hey, pizza!” a guy yelled. A bunch of people rushed toward the delivery guy.

“Nobody gets pizza until I get paid!” he yelled. He was big, and he didn't look like he could be pushed around.

“How much?” a boy in a baseball cap asked. I think his name was John.

“A hundred and twenty-seven dollars.”

“Hold on.” John took off his baseball cap and started moving through the crowd. Some of the people dropped change into the hat, but others put in bills. He went through the living room, into the dining room and disappeared into the kitchen.

“Sorry,” I said to the pizza guy. “It won't be long.”

“I can wait. Quite the party.”

“Thanks.”

“Biggest one I've been to tonight.”

I wasn't sure if that was something I was particularly happy about.

John returned. He started counting out the money. It looked like a lot, but was it enough?

“One hundred and nineteen dollars,” he said proudly.

“That leaves you eight dollars short,” the delivery guy said.

“Hold on. I'll get the rest,” said John.

“Don't bother,” I said. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the twenty my mother had given Jen. She had told us it was for pizza. I handed it to the delivery guy.

“And keep the change.”

I dipped my cup into the punch bowl and filled it up. I took a sip. It tasted a little bitter. Maybe the juice was starting to turn. It didn't matter. I was thirsty. I chugged back the whole glass.

There were people everywhere, in every room. There were even some out front on the grass and in the backyard.

“Hey, nobody is allowed up there!” I yelled at a girl and guy on the stairs. They
couldn't hear me over the music and kept going. I ran over to the bottom of the stairs and yelled at them again.

They stopped and looked at me.

“There's nothing up there but bedrooms,” I said.

“That's what we're looking for,” the girl said. The boy laughed. They started back up the stairs.

“No!” I yelled. “You can't go up there!”

“You can't tell us what to do,” the girl said.

“It's my party and my house,” I said, trying to sound firm.

“Well, unless you're my mother, you can't tell me and my boyfriend what to do, so just butt out!”

They turned and walked up the stairs. I stood there, stunned. This wasn't right. They couldn't use my parents' room. They couldn't use my room.

I started up after them. Somebody grabbed my arm. It was a guy I didn't know.