* * *
The rest of the week played itself out without incident. Tom and his crew, as Reed had started to think of them, continued to eat lunch with Reed every day. That made things a little crowded on Thursday when they were joined by Paige and Magda, but they managed to find room for everyone at the table. The only one missing was Amanda. She was a junior and had a different schedule so they never saw her at lunch.
When Friday afternoon rolled around, the big topic at school was the party that night. Robin Ersatz’s parents were letting her host a beach party to kick off prom week. The Ersatzes knew somebody on the town council and they had arranged to rent a section of the beach for a private party. The entire senior class was invited. Since Paige’s date had backed out on her, Reed volunteered to take her instead. Amanda was going with Manny of course, and Magda and Matt DeLuca were going as friends. Reed was constantly amazed at how many people Magda seemed to be friends with. There didn’t seem to be anyone in the entire high school that she didn’t know to some degree.
The only ones who weren’t going were Tom and his crew. Robin Ersatz was best friends with Erika Koko. In fact, as Tom described her, Robin was Erika’s stooge. Tom was well aware that Erika liked him and had been ignoring the fact that Tom was avoiding her. But as soon as she saw that he had started hanging out with Reed and Paige she had become totally obnoxious. The last thing Tom wanted was to be trapped with a vindictive Erika at a party being hosted by her best friend. Likewise, James, Danny, and Dimitri had opted not to go to Robin’s party either. At the moment their plans centered around Danny’s PlayStation.
That evening, Reed showed up at Paige’s house promptly at seven. Magda was there also and Reed gave them both a ride to the beach in his car. Matt had texted Magda earlier and told her that he was going to be late. He would meet them at the party.
By the time they got there they had to park on the far side of the lot. The beach owned by Mayfair Park was one of a strip of private beaches off Lido Boulevard on the south shore. The town beach boasted a series of covered enclosures like giant, cement umbrellas. Most people called them the Mushrooms. Robin’s parents had rented three mushrooms. The group could hear music blasting as soon as they got out of the car. The girls were excited and chatted constantly on the walk. When they stepped from the concrete sidewalk onto the wooden boardwalk that led to the trio of mushrooms, they could see a good-sized crowd milling around on the sand as well as under the giant mushrooms. It looked like it was turning out to be a pretty good party.
Magda and Paige waved and exchanged greetings with several people as they reached the entrance. A line of portable barricade fences had been set up surrounding the party area to help keep the party private and members of the prom committee were standing by the entrance checking tickets. Reed smiled and tried not to feel too uncomfortable. Then he reminded himself that he was arriving with two hot girls and he began to relax.
They were just stepping up to the entrance when Robin Ersatz appeared and stood in front of them.
“Hey, Robin,” Magda said. “Great party!”
Robin cut her a nasty look then turned her attention to Paige. She looked her up and down then folded her arms.
“You can’t come in,” Robin said.
Paige was speechless. Others at the party who were close enough to hear what was going on turned to watch.
Magda’s expression clouded over and she stepped up to Robin. “I thought the party was for the entire senior class.” It was not a question.
Robin glanced at her. “You can come in, Magda. You too, Reed. But she isn’t allowed in.”
“What’s going on?” a voice said behind them.
Reed glanced back and saw that Manny and Amanda had arrived right after them.
“Robin says that Paige can’t come in,” Reed explained.
“She should just go home,” Robin said. “Nobody wants her here.”
Manny felt his ears going red. He stepped up beside Paige, outraged on her behalf. “This is a public beach, Robin, you can’t order her off town property, I don’t care who your parents know.”
Robin gave him a nasty look then waved vaguely aside with one hand, “Fine. Then she can go sit over there for all I care. She just can’t come in here. My parents paid for the permit to use this space and I say she can’t come in.”
“Sure they did,” Manny said, “and they paid for it using the twenty dollars each of us paid to go to your party.” He held up his ticket and turned to the others. In moments they were all holding their tickets out to her. “Now let us in.”
Robin’s eyes roamed over all of them briefly then came to rest on Paige. She took Paige’s ticket and tore it in half. Then she reached into her pocket, pulled out a crumpled up bill, and threw it and the torn ticket on the ground at Paige’s feet.
“We don’t have your money and you don’t have a ticket. Now go away.”
Reed started to object but before he could say anything Paige grabbed him by the arm. “Let’s just go,” she said.
Reed looked at her and could see her eyes brimming with tears. He shot Robin a nasty look before he let Paige drag him away from the party.
Magda glared at Robin for a moment, too angry for words. Then she spun around and stormed away. Manny and Amanda had heard all they needed to know. They exchanged a silent look, turned and walked away as well.
“Hey, wait up, guys,” Manny called as he and Amanda hurried to catch up with them.
Paige was fighting to keep back her tears and continued to pull Reed along after her. The group walked all the way back to Reed’s car where Paige finally allowed herself to break down.
“That bitch,” Paige muttered as she wiped her eyes with the heels of her hands.
“What was all that about?” Manny asked.
Magda glanced in the direction of the party. “I’ll bet that was Erika’s doing. Robin doesn’t wipe her own ass unless Erika tells her to.”
“But why didn’t she want to let Paige in?” Reed asked.
Magda let out an exasperated breath. “Probably because of Tom,” she said. “Paige is competition. Did you see the way she stared at our lunch table yesterday? I hear she’s been going around school calling us the mini UN.”
Manny frowned. “Why? Because we’re all different ethnicities?” Manny was Puerto Rican and had occasionally been the target of racial prejudice. A couple of the girls at school had even stopped talking to Amanda when she and Manny started going out.
“But that’s stupid,” Reed said.
“You don’t have a girlfriend, do you,” Manny said.
Reed gave him a confused look.
Paige finished wiping her eyes and looked up. “You guys should go to the party. You paid for your tickets, too. I’ll just go home.”
“Stop it, Paige,” Magda said. “You know that’s not going to happen.”
“That’s right,” Manny said. “If you’re not going then the rest of us aren’t going either.”
“We’re your friends” Magda said. “And you don’t abandon your friends.”
“No matter what,” Amanda added.
They stood silently looking at each other for a few moments.
“So, what are we going to do?” Reed said.
“Tom, James, and Dimitri are over at Danny’s playing video games,” Manny said hopefully.
Amanda smiled as she took his hand and leaned her head on her boyfriend’s shoulder. Manny had his own game system and she had spent many an evening watching him shoot alien soldiers or battling dragons with an enchanted sword.
Reed started to make a face, then shot Paige a quick glance. He wasn’t a gamer but he didn’t want to shoot down an idea that she might be interested in.
“Hey, Paige,” Magda said, “isn’t Shay coming home this weekend? Maybe she’d like to hang out.” Paige’s older sister was home from college for the weekend. Shay wanted to be a marine biologist and was studying marine science at a prestigious university on the
island. Because so many of the students at her school were from the island, the campus was pretty dead most weekends and Shay came home just about every week.
Paige thought for a moment. “She said she was going to hang out with some of her friends.”
Reed grinned and rubbed his palms together. “Oooh! College girls!”
Paige slapped his shoulder.
“Well, we need to do something,” Reed said. “It’ll be getting dark soon.”
“Okay, I’ll give Shay a call and see what she’s doing,” Paige said.
As Paige reached out to her sister, Magda texted Matt to tell him about their change in plans. A few minutes later Paige announced that Shay was out on the Hill with her friends and they were welcome to join them. The Hill was what some of the kids in town called a small rise in the woods by the water tower. Mayfair Park owned several acres of woods on the south end of town adjoining the state park. Part of that land was controlled by the town water authority. Thrusting through the trees and visible from just about every area of town was the Mayfair Park water tower. The property around the tower was separated from the residential areas by a fence, but that was mainly for show. There were a number of ways to get around it and many of the teens liked to use the woods as their own, private park. Some kids even made a game out of climbing the water tower itself, even though you could get in trouble with the police if you got caught. The immense structure reached more than a dozen stories in the air and was one of the tallest things around for miles. It was so tall that it had flashing lights on top to warn away low-flying aircraft. There was also a narrow walkway running around the tank giving anyone who was up there a sweeping view across the entire area.
“I’ve never been to the Hill,” Manny said after Paige relayed the message.
“It’s really pretty,” Paige said. “And you’d be surprised how quiet it is. You only walk a little ways into the woods and you can’t even see the houses any more. It’s like you’re in a totally different place.”
“Sounds cool, but aren’t those woods town property?” Manny asked.
Reed laughed. “It’s not like there’s cops or something patrolling the woods. I go through there all the time. There isn’t even a fence on the park side. You can get there by just turning off the right horse trail.”
“Okay, but what about Johnny Lynch?” Manny said. “He got arrested last year for being in those woods.”
“Johnny Lynch is an idiot,” Reed said. “He was breaking windows in one of the water authority buildings. As long as we’re not doing anything stupid nobody’s going to catch us. I told you, I go through there all the time. Of course, if you’re scared…”
“Stop it, Reed,” Paige said. She turned to Manny. “Look, Shay and I go there a lot. The Hill isn’t near the water authority buildings. It’s just a quiet place to hang out. Really.”
Manny looked from Paige to Reed who was smiling at him. “Okay,” Manny said, finally.
Reed’s smile expanded into a wide grin. “Great!”
Paige could tell that her friend was a little too excited. He had something in mind. She was going to have to keep an eye on him. “What about Matt?” she asked Magda.
“He’s not answering his texts,” Magda said. “But I told him where we were going.”
Paige was quiet for a moment, then said as casually as she could, “How about Tom and the guys. Do you think we should invite them?”
“Already done,” Magda said. “They’re going to meet us at the Hill. James knows how to get there.”
“So, let’s go,” Reed said.