KING OF THE POOL PARTY

SATURDAY, 13 FEBRUARY, AFTER PARTY

By the time Sandy (or was it Cindy?) arrived, my parents housewarming party was winding down. Ki and some of the guys had the sliding doors shut again, and there were men gathered around the outdoor heaters discussing the best way to take it down.

There were no sign of children - so they were either spirited away by the pied piper when no one was looking, or they were tucked in bed at their respective homes (which was the more reasonable assumption, yes, but rather unexciting conclusion to the evening.)

Us youths have gotten changed and were gathering around the pool. Hank and Flynn had announced they were youths and would join us. We groaned and moaned about their delusions, but let them because as far as adults went, Hank and Flynn were okay.

Apparently, no one felt that Ki was chaperone material, even though Ki was already a proper adult age. Ki just didn't give the parents the impression of an adult who would stop us from getting into serious trouble. When I thought of all my experiences with Ki, I had to admit, the parents were uncannily spot on.

When I grew up and had my own pups, the only beta I had who should be allowed to babysit was probably Harvey. Ki would use my pup the way some guys use their pet dogs to flirt with the ladies. Ben might just kill my pup to save it the trouble of getting killed on its own.

I joined my friends who were gathered around Dean.

"Oh, hi Sam." Dean shuffled a little awkwardly, he put his hand on his date's back, "This is Cindy. She's from Jude's Pack and is studying at New Leaf too."

I gave her a wide smile, "Hi Cindy. Nice to meet you."

Cindy returned a very small smile and then turned away. I couldn't tell if she were reluctant or just really shy to make friends. Maybe I should back off and give her a bit of space, so I left the small group and went to hang out with Jessica and Lola.

"Hi, have you girls met Cindy?" I asked when I joined them.

"I've seen her around in school." Jessica shrugged, unimpressed.

Lola pressed her lips in a tight line for a moment as she watched Dean introducing Cindy to the other teens.

Cindy looked really shy about meeting everyone, she clung on Dean's arm. She was pretty with very straight brown hair that passed her shoulders.

"Actually, Cindy's from Jude's gang." Jessica divulged at last, "And you know, girls from Jude's gang can be a bit...you know."

Lola nodded her understanding.

"No, I don't know. What?" I asked. Mostly it's because I was with Jessica and Lola. Jessica already knows I'm dumb like a rock, and Lola wasn't the judgey type so I didn't think twice about blurting out my ignorance. What was girls from Jude's gang like?

"Well, they're kind of havoc, you know?" Jessica said.

Kind of what? I blinked, "What's havoc? Like bada**?"

"Kind of but in the spending too many nights at clubs and drinking one too many too often, and hanging out with the wrong guys kind of havoc." Lola tried to clarify.

"She used to always wear halters under her clothes in school." Jessica told us in hushed whispers, "And then she would take off the top layers after school to meet her friends. I've seen her riding on the back of a motorbike on my way home from school before."

Oh! Just like the rebel teen who joined a biker gang in the video that Mrs Hen showed us. I nodded my understanding.

"Why is Dean going out with her?" Lola sighed.

"He doesn't know." Jessica said, "She acts all demure in front of him. But she actually has a loud mouth and Shannon says she swears like an old warrior."

That made me laugh. I shook my head, "That has to be an exaggeration!"

"I don't know, Sam." Lola didn't seem so sure, "Marissa used to date one of the bikers in Jude's pack so she had met Cindy before. She told me the Cindy Dean was dating was very different from how she remembered her."

"People change." I shrugged.

"A leopard doesn't change its spots." Jessica said in a warning tone.

I frowned a little. And the three of us watched Dean laugh with the guys. Cindy stood next to him looking around. She didn't look interested. She didn't even look comfortable.

Shannon, Ben, and Jonah were leaning against the stairs on the other side of the pool, arms crossed and from the smirks on their faces, I knew they weren't saying anything polite.

Drew laughed awkwardly, and then backed off from Dean's group. He got himself a drink and then stopped while passing Shannon and the guys at the stairs to laugh at something they said. Then he joined them.

The Morning Light teens were here too. I caught a glimpse of Harvey talking with Kevy and the hyenas. Every now and then their masculine laughter would ring out, heralding Ethan's hyena laughter.

And then the rest of us would laugh too, because Ethan's laughter was infectious. And because Marlow got so irritated by having Ethan cackling loudly next to him, he picked Ethan up.

Ethan failed and screamed and begged, and then splash! Ethan was the first in the weather.

Even though it was a pool party, no one else was in the pool - yet. It always took just one person to jump in first - or get thrown in.

After that, Ethan got out of the water and took off the t-shirt he still had on to wring dry, "Okay, no more Mr Nice Guy. Marlow, you're going down!"

The two guys scuffled and Ethan turned out to be pretty quick on his feet. Marlow was still way sturdier though, but Ethan managed to get his revenge by ramming himself at full speed into his buffer friend. Both of them went straight into the water in one big splash.

Naturally everyone yelled, those that got wet by the splash and those that didn't.

And then it was free for all. We grabbed colorful floaties that had been thoughtfully left about and everyone took turns to try out the small pool.

Even Hank and Flynn decided to leave their mates with their sodas, and get into the water. They made a game of snatching our floaties and it soon became a game of floatie snatching. Last one on the float was King of the pool.

Even the cute girls weren't spared. Carlie screamed the loudest, but she wasn't the only girl screaming. It was chaos like end of the world in the pool.

"Okay stop!" Flynn yelled when there were only 2 people left on the floaties.

Hank blew on his whistle - seriously? He brought that here?

"Everyone not on a float, get out of the water." Flynn instructed, "It's the final faceoff."

We hooted and got out, and then we hooted and clapped again when we realised who were the last two left floating - Dean and Carlie.

"Whoot! Go Carlie!" Delilah shouted, "Girl power!"

"Don't lose to a girl, Dean!" The guys yelled.

Hank gave his whistle a quick beep to signal the start of the face off.

Carlie was immediately on it, she paddled desperately to get her float close enough to Dean's. Dean had looked somewhat confused at all the shouting. Everyone was shouting at him to "get her" or "paddle" or "get away" or "wait!"

Too many cooks spoil the stew... Or in this case, too many coaches...

Dean looked around and then up in panic at Carlie's approach. He tried to paddle away, but he couldn't turn his floatie away. He tried to take her head on, but at the last moment she screamed... it was a scream so loud I felt the water trapped in my ears pop and flow out my ear holes. At least I hope it was pool water, and not blood.

That girl could scream.

She screamed so loud, I could have sworn Dean literally faded and became as transparent as a ghost.

And then Carlie pulled hard at the corner of Dean's floatie. By the time, Dean realized what was happening, his butt was hovering above the water.

"Whoaaaa...." The rest of the guys yelled in unison.

And the splash! Dean went under.

"Whoaaa!!!!" The girls screamed.

"I'm the King of the Pool!" Carlie screeched. We all had to back off due to the sheer pitch of her voice.

That girl could scream.

"'Whoot! Girl power!" Delilah shouted from the sidelines. Angela and Darlyn helped Carlie out of the pool.

And then the guys all jumped in and went for Dean.

It was like a piranha attack. And then a piece of wet fabric was shot out of the pool. The girls screamed and the guys swam ashore yelling, "Dean's the King of the Pool!"

The hyenas went off, their laughter like sirens.

"Don't look Sam." Lola warned me.

"OMG, They took Dean's shorts." Jessica gasped, "Don't look! Don't look!"

For some reason, girls needed to open their mouths to scream when they shut their eyes not to look. It was terribly funny - urm... which was what the guys were all thinking, not me. I urm... hahaha. Come on, it was funny.

Hank's whistle joined the fray. And then Flynn walked over to the wet shorts on the side way - everyone had kept a distance from it like it was radiating cooties or something. Cooties didn't affect adults though, so Flynn could pick it up and toss it back into the pool where Dean's red face was floating in the middle of.

Oh... I guess it wasn't that funny for Dean.

"Okay, show's over. Guys get dressed - you're doing trash duty around the Alpha's house. If you leave a single scrap of plastic anywhere, you'll be down on snow duty all of next week." Flynn decided.

"Awww..." The guys groaned, but they made their way out.

"Girls, you're cleaning up all of the indoors." Flynn decided.

"Well, it was good while it lasted." Lizzy shrugged.

"Why do we have to clean up?" Angela whined, "This was supposed to be a party."

"It's a housewarming, not a house trashing." Flynn informed us.

I guess that made sense. Ki magically produced trash bags. Delilah and Marissa dived into the pool to pick up the random items that had sunk into it. You'd be surprised what you'd find at the bottom of the pool after a party. I was. There was a few coins, a hair tie, a stone, more than a few pieces of wood chips (like why?), a bracelet, a used plaster, the back of a earring, and a soggy chicken wing.

All the girls with piercings checked the back of their ears. But in the end, the back of the earring was Marlow's. No one claimed the bracelet. Flynn insisted the coins were his, but no one believed him. We thought he was just messing around with us at first, but later we found out they were really his when Macy said, "I told you to empty your pockets just now."

We threw the rest away. The bracelet would be deposited at our Pack House's lost and found section.

It wasn't terribly hard work, the adults cleaned up most of the party. Only the pool room was a mess, but with so many of us, it was done pretty quickly. The guys came back with a nearly empty trash bag. They had to search all the way to the shrubs by the woods to find it. The adults had cleaned up outside before leaving too - far be it for them to have the Alpha house surrounded by litter in light of the morning!

I realized our pack was pretty considerate as far as house parties went.

Once we were done, Flynn and Hank took their mates and car pools were arranged to send everyone home - all the way to Morning Light. Along with Harvey's truck, and Lola's mum's red station wagon, they were just able to fit everyone who was going in that direction.

Mum and Dad came back downstairs to see our guests off. There was a flurry of good nights and thank yous and then it was quiet. Just the usual gang left.