"Stop, that tickles..." I laughed as she trailed her hand up my thigh, letting her fingertips dance along the areas where my jeans were ripped.
It was Saturday night. Hut Rock had officially been open for an entire week. My roommate, Ashton, worked there as the drums teacher and I came in a bit later to work as the guitar teacher since Luke was the manager and the voice teacher. I didn't mind - it meant more income, hanging out with friends all day, and occasionally slapping Michaela's ass when she visited during her off periods. She also played a part in Hut Rock by painting the guitars that hung from the ceiling on display. But whenever she came to paint or hang out, I was usually working; so she spent most of her time with Luke. I didn't want to replay Riley's words in my head every time I saw them together, but I just couldn't help myself.
My mind was brought back to the present and all of the feelings running through my nervous system. Michaela's hand on my knee, the smell of smoke in the streets, the wind on my face, The 1975 blasting through the speakers of the tiny car.
"Michaela," Luke chimed from the back seat. Luke sat crammed next to Tori, who was next to Calum. When I looked at them, their shoulders were touching and they all looked extremely uncomfortable. "Why the hell do you have a Mini Cooper when you have so many friends?"
Michaela laughed and turned down the music before weaving in and out of traffic, "I didn't know I would have friends, Luke."
I felt an angry pang of jealousy as Michaela and Luke conversed so freely. There was no ugly tension between them like there still was whenever we talked. I sighed and slumped a bit in my seat. Luke wasn't a bad guy, so I wasn't going to make him the bad guy.
"Can you at least tell your boyfriend to lean his seat up? I'm suffocating..." Luke kicked at the back of my chair impatiently.
"Not my fault all of my friends are giants," Michaela groaned, accelerating a bit to catch the green light.
"Are we almost there?" Calum whined, also getting impatient in the backseat.
"Yeah, it should be on the right..." Tori responded. She'd heard from a friend of a friend about this hot new club in town called "Chaud-Nouveau".
"Mike," Michaela said sweetly, "you're on the right, look for the club and I'll look for a place to park..."
"Are you kidding?" Luke began. "It's Friday night, this is the hottest new club in town, this is the busiest part of town...and you expect to find a fucking - "
"Found one!" Michaela signaled furiously for a left turn and parallel parked so swiftly, she earned a round of applause from a few drunken bystanders. "That wasn't too bad, was it, Luke?"
"It's easy to park when you're driving a box..." Luke groaned, popping his back and neck after stepping on to the sidewalk.
"Oh, shut up and be glad Jennifer rode with Ashton..." Michaela replied, locking the car and grabbing my arm, wrapping it around her waist.
She pulled me past the sweaty, tipsy bodies that roamed along the sidewalk; most of them smelling like vodka and/or piss.
I thought back to earlier this week when I first called Ashton.
"Where the fuck have you been all day?" I remember Ashton yelling through the speaker when I stepped out of Hut Rock to ask him to come and work there.
"Sorry, my phone has been off since last night and -" I tried to explain.
"What are excuses?" He said, cutting me off.
