Lights on the Lake

Alana sat alone on her house's rooftop, staring at the lake that was in full view in front of her. The leftover wind from the storm was blowing through her long reddish brown hair and made her pull her sweater closer to her body. The storm had passed, but there were still some remaining dark clouds making their way smoothly over the water of the lake. She had a perfect view as she snapped multiple pictures on her camera, it’s strap lying comfortably around her neck. She almost forgot what it was like to just take a simple picture that didn’t involve screaming children and pageant mom’s fixing their three year old’s make up. Taking simple pictures of the simple old town she used to live in was nice, but no matter how nice she felt, Alana couldn’t help but feel like she wanted to just leap off of this rooftop and not care what happened afterwards.

It was only yesterday that she got dropped off by Leo in the rain to attempt to pack up the remaining remnants of her childhood home. She couldn't believe that her father just left her the house like that, basically dumping it into her lap. She called her work and told her annoying and very stingy boss, Karen- who always smelled strongly of bad breath from eating Frito's all the freaking time- that she would be missing even more work. Karen listened to Alana's explanation, then right after, told her she was fired and hung up the phone. Two seconds after that, Julie called Alana and told her that she’d try to convince Karen to stop being so unreasonable.

“I’ll just kick her ass and blackmail her or something, I can’t work here without you!” Julie said over the phone. But Alana insisted that Julie shouldn’t do either of those things unless she wanted to be jobless and then homeless like Alana was going to be when she goes back to New York.

Alana sighed, thinking about what she was going to have to face when she went back to the city, where time didn't move slowly and where people didn't build houses that looked like cabins that faced mountains and a large lake, but instead lived in cramped apartments facing alleyways., Alana also thought of what she’d have to face while staying here, and then reached over and grabbed a bottle of beer next to her and took a slug. So what if she was an underaged girl drinking by herself on the rooftop of her old house? So what if she took that beer from her now deceased father's old refrigerator? It wasn't a big deal. She didn't have to explain herself to... herself.

Alana leaned backward and groaned. Shouldn't she be at least somewhat happy? Trey called her. He told her he missed her. He had forgiven her. But still, her chest felt empty, like something was missing, and it was probably because of the fact that he was in a completely different country. He had forgiven her, which was great, but he still wasn't even close to where she was, and now all she wanted to do was isolate herself from the world and feel sorry for herself and the predicament she was now unfortunately in.

“Hello up there!” Came a strong voice below Alana. She immediately sat up and looked over the edge to see her old best friend Weezer standing there, his dirty blonde hair covering his forehead and in his hands a pile of flat boxes. Alana smiled and then saw Abigail and Mackenzie getting out of Weezer’s car with more boxes in their hands. They stopped next to Weezer and put their hands on their foreheads, looking up at Alana.

“Hi!” Alana exclaimed, sounding a little more excited than she should, so her voice sounded very high pitched and loud.

“What are you doing up there?” Mackenzie yelled back, her blonde hair covering her face from the wind.

“Come up!” Alana replied. The three looked at one another and shrugged, and dropped the boxes on the front porch to go to the back of the house where they knew a ladder was to get up to the roof. When they were all in high school, they’d climb the ladder and sit on the roof for hours, where they’d watch the sunset over the lake and talk about stupid things like how Abigail saw Kelly Paltron stuffing her bra in third period gym class, or how their parents were so lame for making them go to town functions.

"I feel like this roof is going to cave in," Weezer said hesitantly as he walked step by step toward Alana.

"It probably will under your weight, chubby," Mackenzie replied and pushed Weezer a little bit, probably to signal that she was kidding. Weezer stayed silent and they kept walking.

The three of them finally sat down next to Alana, and Mackenzie leaned over and rested her head on her old best friend's shoulder.

"Hey listen, remember Yohan Pyeon?" Mackenzie asked, her eyes staring forward at the lake.

"The Asian kid from in high school that convinced all of the teachers freshman year that he couldn't speak English?" Alana asked back. Mackenzie laughed and nodded.

"So amazing, when his parents found out and finally told the principal he was from Arizona, everyone was so pissed," Mackenzie stated. "Anyways, obviously you know that each year an alumni of Hamilton throws a scavenger hunt for all the graduates who are back in town for the summer, and he volunteered to do it. I made us a team!"

"Wait, what? No, Kenz, I've got so much packing to do," Alana rebutted. "I haven't even been able to get up the nerve to open the door to my own room yet, I slept in the living room last night."

"Which is more reason that you should get the hell out of memory lane cabin over here and come make new memories with your old friends!" Mackenzie encouraged as she laid herself backwards to stare up at the sky. "I mean, you're not leaving for a few days, and it was fate, or your father's twisted mind that made it that way, so why spend it slaving away packing up a house? We'll help you pack later tomorrow. But tonight, you are going on the Vedleu Hamilton High's scavenger hunt, where you will help us win $100 gift certificates to the new Red Lobster. Because I love Red Lobster."

A large, and very manipulative smile formed on Mackenzie's face and soon enough all three of Alana's old friends were smiling at her, anticipating her response, making sure that they wouldn't leave before she said yes. Alana couldn't help but feel a little at odds with this, mainly because she was usually the one who always tried to convince her friends to do stuff they didn't want to do, now it was the other way around.

"Fine, but if it's lame, I'm leaving,"

"Great!" Mackenzie exclaimed. "Let the games begin."



There were what seemed like a million cars parked outside of Yohan's large home located only a few miles away from Alana's. People her age were walking through the side gate and to the backyard and Alana recognized almost all of the faces, some more than others. She put her head down, trying to remain as unnoticeable as possible, but that didn't quite work when she entered the backyard and everyone's heads popped up and their eyes locked on the girl who skipped town. She raised her head up and almost immediately people began to whisper. She felt someone's hand grab her's and looked over to see Mackenzie smiling back at her.

"Apparently these people are figuratively still in high school," Mackenzie remarked and Alana tried her hardest to smile back at her, but it probably looked forced and uncomfortable. It was strange, because the old Alana would probably take all of this attention into stride, but the girl she was now wanted to just run away from all of these people.

"Lock your doors and hide your wallets, kids, Alana Bennett is back in town!" Alana heard someone yell from the small crowd. Almost everyone laughed and Alana felt her skin begin to prickle, her body signaling to her that she should probably get the hell out of here. A few people looked over in Alana's direction, wondering what her reaction would be, what she would say to that, because the Alana they knew always had something to say.

Alana tried to smile in a charming way, to make it seem like she didn't care that all of these people probably said the worst things she could imagine behind her back. People were still slightly staring at her and she tried to open her mouth to say something, anything at all, but nothing was coming out.

"All right, I'm here, let's get this shit started!" She heard someone yell from the side gate. Leo Cronin walked in, his Ray Ban sunglasses hiding his eyes and his hand grasping onto an obnoxiously long water bottle. A few people laughed when seeing him, but obviously they were laughs of appreciation, never was there more of a guy that everyone liked than Leo Cronin.

Some approached Leo and gave him a few high fives and a couple "How have you been"s before the crowd quieted down again and Yohan stepped in front of everyone. Yohan, who was freakishly tall and thin, looked over the small crowd of people who all used to go to Hamilton High.

"Hey everyone!" Yohan yelled, excitement clearly evident in his voice. "I'm so glad you guys came out. It's awesome to see some familiar faces home from college. Anyways, we all know the rules, I've written the master list and handed it to your team captain. You guys have until midnight to finish the list, take pictures of every single task you complete, and bring it back to me. If you fail, well then you fail, but don't worry because the party will go on here back at midnight to celebrate the winners and party with the losers!"

The crowd cheered and Yohan smiled brilliantly.

"Awesome, see you guys at midnight!"

Everyone dispersed into their groups and Alana immediately turned toward Mackenzie who grabbed them all by the hands and pulled them out toward her SUV. Alana, Mackenzie, Abigail and Weezer were all inside the car when the door opened and Leo made his way inside.

"Why am I not surprised," Alana muttered as Leo basically squished himself in next to her.

"You're not excited to see me?" Leo asked with a grin on his face. "Bummer!"

"Get along you two," Mackenzie said while pulling onto the main street of the town. "I have to say, Leo has made us champions every year past high school, and he better not disappoint this year."

"It hurts to see you doubt me, Mac," Leo replied. "You know scavenger hunting is one of my many talents."

Alana scoffed and kept her eyes forward. Leo's pompousness was almost too much for her to handle.

The first task on the list was: Convince Pete Wallace to take a shot with you at his bar.

"You're kidding right!?" Alana stated, the paper clutched in her hands. "Pete hates us, he would never do anything like that for us."

"Correction: Pete hates you," Leo replied and finally took off his sunglasses now that the sun was going down. "We had nothing to do with his dog Dudley's disappearance."

"Neither did I!" Alana defended and her group of friends all stopped and looked at her. "Well, whatever, it's not my fault that he trusted me to watch a dog while he grabbed his mail. That thing was evil anyways."

Weezer laughed and put a hand on Alana's shoulder.

"Just keep your head down, maybe he won't even recognize you. All of us have to be in the picture though," He replied. Alana sighed and crossed her arms in front of her chest. When was this supposed to start being fun? So far she's just gotten publicly humiliated in front of an abundant amount of people from her old high school and sat in a car next to a guy she couldn't decipher between hating and liking.

They pulled up in front of the bar and quickly got out of the car when they saw that a group was already leaving. A girl Alana remembered being in her freshman Algebra class with the biggest gap in between her two front teeth Alana had ever seen shook her head at them as they made their way to the front door.

"Don't even bother, he threatened to call the police," She said in a squeaky voice and the group downheartedly headed towards their car.

Leo didn't listen to her and walked straight into the bar as the group followed behind him hesitantly.

"Oh hell no, get outta here!" Old Pete said almost instantly at the sight of Leo as he gripped onto the bar's telephone, ready to dial the police any second.

"Chill, Pete, we're all of age!" Leo lied and sat down at the bar. "We're just here for a friendly drink."

"Leo Cronin, I know for a fact that miss Mackenzie and Abigail over there aren't of age," Pete replied, his white eyebrows hovering over his tiny blue eyes. Alana's back was faced toward all of them as she leaned against the counter picking at her nails, trying to her hardest to make sure that Pete didn't notice her. "Who's that over there, huh?" Pete growled.

"Just this girl that no one likes," Leo replied and Alana's jaw immediately dropped. Asshole. "Listen, Pete, let's just take a shot together and call it a day, yeah? We've all got places to be."

"Mr. Cronin, I've known you since you were a chubby, crying little baby, I will not take a shot with you," Pete snarled back.

"Refusing service... and money? That is so not like you!" Leo replied, trying to get Pete's gaze away from Alana, who was still afraid to turn around. Pete began to walk toward Alana, obviously interested in the the mystery girl who refused to turn around to face them. He took a few steps before Leo jumped in front of him. "Hey, Pete, what's this?" Leo asked holding onto a trophy that was placed on a shelf near them.

"Take your hands off of that!" Pete said angrily and grabbed the trophy back. Leo tried to block his view once more but knew he had failed when they al saw Pete's face flash from angry, to angrier when he finally realized who exactly girl was that was trying to hide from being seen. "Alana Bennett!" He almost screamed, a bulging vein suddenly popped up on his neck.

Alana turned around slowly as Pete now stood in front of her, breathing heavily. Alana looked at the vein and cringed, but then looked up at him and smiled.

"Hi, Pete!" She quipped and Pete almost growled at her.

"First you murder my dog, now you dare come here when I said to never come around these parts again!" Pete snapped.

"What are we, in an old Western movie?" Leo asked. "Look, let's just take a shot, Petey."

"No!" The old man yelled back, his arms flailing with anger. He turned around a little too fast to face Leo when all of a sudden, out of nowhere, he slipped over some leftover water or alcohol someone had spilt on the floor and lost his balance. It happened in just a mere second, he fell backward and hit his head on the counter before falling smack down to the ground with a loud thump. Abigail screamed and Mackenzie put her hands over her mouth.

"Oh my god, he's dead!" Abigail yelled.

Leo leaned down calmly and stared at Pete, who was completely knocked out, yet his large bowling ball stomach was still rising and falling. "He's not dead," Leo assured. "Everyone sit down next to him." Everyone stayed where they were. "Come on!" Leo demanded.

The group of them sat down as Leo stood up and grabbed two shot glasses and poured them with some random alcohol. He handed a small digital camera to Mackenzie and then placed the shot glass in Pete's hand. They all leaned in close as Leo chugged the alcohol back and Mackenzie snapped the picture.

"He'll hopefully wake up from his slumber with no recollection of us being here," Leo said to them as they stood up and stared at old Pete lying on the floor. "And Yohan never said that he had to be conscious for the task!"

Mackenzie laughed and Alana couldn't help but stifle a small smile. The group all looked at one another, all of them thinking the same thing, that this was something they would have done in high school, with no remorse or regards for the consequences. They'd be adventurous, and daring, and this was the first time Alana felt the way she used to when she was actually happy in this town. Too bad poor Pete had to be of help for that, Alana thought, as she stared down at the man who hated her more than anyone else in this town.

"Well, let's go!" Alana finally spoke and the group laughed, running out of the bar on the quest to finish the tasks, leaving Pete unconscious on the floor.