Gang Gang

by G.C. Collins

If I use text predictions to say “I love you,” back, will she be able to tell the difference? She said it first but, damn – It’s always been dark as shit when we fuck. I don't even know what it looks like.

The squad dunks on me for texting during dinner so I beat their ass on the court. Grid goes down hard, ankles fully broken, and we lightly curbstomp him until he gets mad and puts Prince in a chokehold. But Prince has his weed pen at the ready and sticks it into Grid's mouth while losing oxygen. Grid takes a big hit, relaxes his grip, and peace is restored in the wolf pack.

The ice cream machine on deck 16 is finally fixed so we get double servings. Aiden breaks free of his crazy mom to hang out with us for the first time that day. He swears he got some dome last night and of course we clown on his virgin ass. 

“I swear! To God!” He starts but we don't listen to him anymore because Serina and her posse are coming our way. They look us up and down like we’re merchandise at a Wuhan wet market.

All smiles but the squad is bricked up just smelling their sunblock so I gotta be the gentleman. “You coming up to Cloud later?” 

“Maybe, if we don't have anything else going on…” Their swimsuits are peeking from underneath their shorts. I look in short bursts.

“We got everything you need. Anything you want. We got the hookup, too.” Aiden is basically begging for a crumb of pussy. I roll my eyes and give them that stoic shit. I am Buddha, without desire. But if they want to hang, will even the Buddha say no?

The girls leave us in limbo with a “maaaybe.” Grid is steaming again but he’s already stoned so we let him hog the communal Blue Razz Ice.

We pray that Benjamin is tending at Lime and Coconut tonight, which isn’t far from the Cloud. He is! (On the first night, Prince referred to him as “Been jammin’” cause of the Jamaican flag pinned to his chest and we laughed since Prince is ethnically ambiguous so he could get away with it.) Back to the Cloud. Corner seats are allocated meritocratically and before anyone could take a sip of their well-earned Cuba Libres, Aiden is passing out molly like Tic-Tacs.

“For real?”

“We’re dancing with God tonight, bitches. And hopefully bitches too.”

“Aiden, you’re gonna be the first one of us to die, you know that?”

“Twice as bright, half as long, sucka. I’m taking one of you with me.”

The come-up is rough under the bright lights. We are drinking heavily and generating nimbuses like fog machines. Meanwhile, the evil-eye is being cast at our direction from older couples, drunks, cigar-puffers. Prince wards them off with some indigenous magic of his own before leaning on me, saying that he picked it up from a youtube video of peyote farmers.

Somehow being eighteen stories above the ocean doesn’t generate a much-needed breeze and I am melting down. “Guys, GUYS.” I think I’m screaming but I’m just whispering aggressively. “Where. Are. The. Girls.” Blank looks and dead eyes. Oh no. The crossfader is slammed to the side of God’s DJ controller called ‘fate’ and we are not going to last.

Grid is already asleep, somehow, and ungentlemanly plans are being made to soil his big, dumb face. In the midst of conspiracy, the squad presses closer and closer, elbows touching knees, shoulders rubbing, hands pawing as the drug works its terrifying magic. 

“I’m going back inside. I need some fresh air.” Only Prince looks up at me but he doesn’t even crack a smile.

At the elevators, I am scared by the prospect of plummeting thirteen floors to the main promenade and instead take the stairs. My feet grow wings. I am drenched in sweat. The promenade is close by and I hear the sound of a million people talking in the quietest voices over music piped in from the ocean. I lose myself in the line for Giovanni’s. I am spat out the other side with a slice of pepperoni, a slice of cheese, and a slice of Hawaiian. I turn around. Beautiful Serina is sitting with her sirens and an empty seat next to them. It bends light around it like the edge of a black hole. Their voices are chimes and there is nothing binding me to the mast.

G.C. Collins is a writer living high in the mountains of the US. One day they will finally come down, move to the coast, and fulfill their destiny as a senior surfer/writer.