The Throw-Aways

Tuesday evening was bittersweet. I had my bags packed and with me as we stood outside The Three Meatballs. Everyone was there to see me go-but it wasn’t forever. I would be back soon enough. Dante, Nico, Skars, Kylar, Jake, Dad, and Arestino had all come to wish me luck.

That morning, my group of friends and I had all met inside The Three Meatballs with lunch on the house as I told them. They all erupted into tears of happiness, screams, and gasps. We were all hugging and crying out of joy, and everything in between.

Now we stood here. We exchanged our final goodbyes. I had all their phone numbers and knew I had to text so often that I would run out of the texts I could send. And I was on unlimited texting!

“Are you ready?” Austin patted my shoulder. I told him to hold on a moment and went to hug my dad quickly.

“You’ll be home to check on me and Jake, right?” He sniffed. I nodded.

“You’ll have to come out to a concert sometime!” I replied happily. Jack bumped my leg and sneezed, trying to say goodbye.

“Bye, Jake! I’ll miss you, bud!” I rubbed his head and kissed his little snout. He whined as I left him to go to Kylar.

“I told you that you’d make it! You just didn’t believe me!” She punched my shoulder as I wrapped my arms around her in a hug.

I put a mental bet that five minutes on the road, I would get a message from Kk, saying that she already missed me.

“Okay, I’ll believe you next time.” I teased. She laughed, but I could tell she was sad.

“This is why we’re married. You need me!” She laughed, but I could see she was sad.

“WHAT?!” Alan yelped. I turned around, hands in the night air in surrender.

“No, not really!” I laughed. It was a joke we had together for a couple years. One day she made the offhand comment that we fought like we were married, but had each other’s backs. From then on, we agreed that we were “married”.

“Woah, hold on….” Tino shook his head, clearly confused. I laughed.

“But what if I want Kylar?” Alan whined to me. I stuck my tongue out. I couldn’t believe I would be stuck with these adorkable guys! I think Kylar was going into MAJOR fangirl mode behind me.

“Too bad! She’s mine!” I teased him. He grinned and waved to the group. I followed the band onto the bus, waving farewell to the rest of my friends and family.

I was off to new adventures.

As the bus pulled out of the town, I glanced out the window. Jay was standing on a street corner, glowering the entire time. She had found out earlier that day when my dad had run to tell Arestino. Her father had been in the bar when my dad proclaimed the news and it had gotten to the teen after an hour or so.

“Okay, so this is your bunk.” Austin pointed out. The rest of the boys went to go lounge around the bus. My suitcase and bag was already on the sheet that was neatly pulled up around the mattress.

“So, are you ready to have some fun?” Tino came up behind me. I turned around to face him. It felt like I had known these guys for years, they were so friendly!

“Of course!” I laughed. I hadn’t felt this confident, this sure with myself in a while! It was like there was some spell over the bus.

“The first stop is in to the Great Sand Dunes! We’ll go sledding on the hot sand and hopefully not burn our skin raw!” Phil read off a check list. Austin took my wrist and pulled me to the front lounge past the small kitchen. I sat down with the others as Phil started to read out stops.

First it was to go sledding on the Great Sand Dunes, then we would travel to Lake Powell in Utah to go water skiing and tubing. After the gigantic canyons filled with water, we would all head off to Grand Canyon for yet more adventures on riding a donkey through a long trail, and then we went off to Omaha, Nebraska for the bars. Then it would head off to California so that I could get to know the area a little more. Aaron said I would be given a lesson in surfing, go to the Wild Animal Park, and visit other attractions in the area.

It would all be jam packed into three weeks’ worth of time. Phil explained that along the way, we could just stop and rest and take plenty of detours.

“Oh, I’ve never really had a vacation before. That sounds awesome!” I eyed the sheet of paper. Well, it was more like five sheet of paper with plenty of notes and scribbles on the side.

“What?! No way!” Austin gasped. The others looked just as shocked. I explained that the only vacation I’d ever really had was up to a ski area for a few days. It was never like we had enough money around the house to spend on lavish trips.

“That’s sad.” Aaron muttered. I laughed.

“So more about when we get back to California. The studios have a keyboard that you can use for now until we can get you a better keyboard. It’s not bad, it’s just old. Do you have a laptop?” Alan asked me. I nodded.

“I have a fairly nice one.” I added, thinking to my laptop. All I did was write the occasional fanfiction story and check my email.

I guess I was living it up now!

“Okay, so we might have to have a second laptop hooked up at times so we can get more use out of the keyboard. We’ll go over that stuff more when we get back to the studios.” Austin laughed. I nodded, still smiling. Our group seemed happy and relaxed on the rocking bus.

“So who’s up for extreme monopoly?” Phil slyly suggested. Aaron rolled his eyes.

“She just got on the bus and you’re already making her strip?” He sighed. I snapped back to attention as Phil reached under a counter and got a monopoly set.

“Woah.” I said plainly and held up my hands. I mean, they seemed like good guys and all, but what the….?!

“No, no. We’ll do teams.” Phil stated firmly and started to set up.

“So, uh, what is extreme monopoly?” I asked quietly. Austin nudged my shoulder and smiled to me. I was taken by the breathtaking grin.

“It’s like normal monopoly, but if you land on someone’s house, you have don’t pay in money, but you have to shed some piece of clothes. Usually you start small like your shoes, socks, bracelet, or hat. If you land on one of the hotels, then you take off your shirt, and the price keeps getting higher.” Austin laughed. Everyone adjusted seats so someone had a partner. Phil and Tino paired, Alan and Aaron were together, and Austin and I were sitting next to each other.

“I wish Kylar was here.” Alan muttered. I snapped up.

“Oh, so you miss her?” I asked slyly. Alan blushed as I stared at him.

“OOOHHHH!” Tino and Phil catcalled. Her stuck his tongue out.

“What? She seems like a good person to play extreme monopoly with! Besides, I bet she doesn’t spend all our money!” Alan tormented Aaron who continued to bicker back and forth.

My phone buzzed in my pocket. It was Kk. She had barely lasted four minutes before texting me. Like I thought, it was saying that she missed me already. I took a quick picture of Alan and sent it.

To Kylar: He said he missed you and wanted to play monopoly with you sometime XD

All I received was a bunch of letters strung together in all caps. Austin rolled the dice and we began. I was the person in charge of money on our turn, and he was the payer.

Yes, extreme monopoly was very interesting.

Notes

References, references everywhere!

If you've read Dear Austin.... (My first story!) Then you will get the monopoly reference XD

Love you all, and I'M GOING TO WARPED TOMORROW!!!

So I won't be updating during the day :p

Stay beautiful!