It was a Friday night in early May. Greg, a soon to be graduating high school senior, was sitting at a nicely furnished patio table outside in the backyard of his best friend, Lester Rockford. Lester's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Rockford, had just finished cleaning up from the small celebratory backyard barbecue thrown in honor of Lester's older sister, Sarah, having wrapped up her first year at college and officially arriving home for the summer. From Lester's perspective, the barbecue was completely boring and uneventful, so he was thankful that his parent's had permitted him to invite Greg.
With graduation just a week away, Greg and Lester were coasting along. They had both been accepted into their dream schools. Lester was going to go to a local university known for its prestigious computer science program. Meanwhile, Greg was planning on attending an out of state college with a rigorous engineering program; it also happened to be the same school that Lester's sister, Sarah, attended. Sarah wasn't in the engineering program, but Greg still wanted to hear all about her first year.
Greg hadn't seen Sarah since Winter break, and had only heard updates through Lester anytime anything eventful happened. For example, Sarah had been dating a boy she met in the dorms (Greg had even met him, albeit very briefly, when Sarah was home for the holidays in December), but about two months ago they broke up. From what Lester had told Greg, it sounded like Sarah's boyfriend was the one who ended it, but Sarah wasn't too upset about it ending. She didn't let it affect her grades at all; she finished the semester with straight A's. This was something Lester and Sarah's parents brought up constantly during dinner, to which Sarah, in modest protest, would respond, "Well, one was an A-."
The barbecue, while nice, was indeed pretty uneventful. Since the weather was pleasant the five of them had eaten in Mr. and Mrs. Rockford's backyard. The Rockford's had a beautiful home with an expansive backyard. There was a patio attached to the back of the house that overlooked a pool. On the left side of the pool was a well manicured lawn, while on the right side there was a lush flower garden. Opposite the patio was an ample sized pool house, which wasn't just home to the pool equipment, but it had also functioned as an entertainment/game room for the Rockfords. It featured a ping pong table, a mini fridge, a big flat screen TV mounted on the wall, a large sectional couch that faced the tv, and even a poker table.
Lester, Greg, and some of their other buddies had had a lot of really fun times in the pool house over the years. When they were younger, they used to spend all night in the pool house chugging sodas and playing video games. Then once they hit high school, they still spent all night playing video games, but they'd also get drunk off of the few beers that were not-so-slyly lifted from Mr. Rockford's stash in the garage. Mr. and Mrs. Rockford had caught on pretty quickly. However, instead of punishing Lester, they just told him, "We're ok with it if you and your friends want to have a few beers sometimes, but nobody drinks and drives. We'd rather your friends crash here instead of crashing into a tree while drunk driving home. They are welcome to stay in the pool house so long as you clean up after them!" While their descriptions could be a little on the dramatic side, they were definitely some of the cooler parents among those of Lester and Greg's friends.
After cleaning up from dinner, Mr. Rockford opened a bottle of nice red wine and insisted everyone have a glass to celebrate, in his words, "his talented, smart, and beautiful daughter having finished her first year of college." Greg had refused wine at dinner, but Mr. Rockford was adamant, telling Greg, "Didn't you turn 18 a few months ago? So have a glass of wine to celebrate my daughter." So Greg lamented and allowed himself a small pour. Sarah took a glass from her father, but Greg could see on her face that she felt awkward celebrating something that didn't seem like a major milestone to her.
Lester on the other hand poured himself quite a large glass of wine. He was more than willing to take advantage of his parents' encouragement to celebrate Sarah's accomplishments. He had also imbibed a couple of glasses during the backyard dinner. Lester animatedly raised his glass and through a subtle slur said, "Here, here! To my big sis."
The family and Greg all clinked their glasses and said, "Cheers!" After the quasi-toast, Mr. and Mrs. Rockford dismissed themselves, but not before adamantly reminding Greg that since he drank (albeit one small glass of wine) he would have to spend the night there. They told Greg he was obviously more than welcome to stay in the pool house, as he had many nights in the past.
Once Mr. and Mrs. Rockford had gone into the main house, Greg turned to the brother and sister and asked, "Well, since I'm staying the night, what do you guys want to do?"
"Well, we could watch a movie in the pool house," Lester replied. "And finish this bottle of wine," he said while hoisting the slightly-more-than-half-full bottle in his hand.
Sarah looked at the two friends and asked, "You really don't mind if I join both of you? Pretty much all of my friends are at schools that run on the quarter system instead of semesters, so they won't be home until next month."
"Not at all!" / "I guess," Greg and Lester simultaneously responded respectively.
It was settled, and the three of them took the short walk around the pool and entered the pool house through big sliding glass doors. The layout of the pool house hadn't changed much over the years. The ping pong table is basically right in the entrance, and was in full view of the whole backyard, courtesy of the big sliding glass doors. However, the couch and TV were off to the side, so as to prevent glare from the sun on the TV screen, and as such had offered some more privacy. The poker table was between the couch and ping pong table and it was set up in such a way that it offered even more privacy.
Lester, still holding the wine bottle in one of his hands, plopped down on one side of the couch. Although he was well on his way to being drunk, he smartly kept his thumb covering the opening of the bottle and managed to not spill a drop. As he sat he asked out to Greg, "Hey, man, can you grab a couple glasses from the cabinet over there?" He indicated the cabinets by the mini fridge.
Greg obliged, but only grabbed two glasses and brought them back over to the couch. "I'm fine. I don't really want any, so these are for you two."
Sarah didn't say anything but Lester remarked, "Nice, more for me!" before grabbing the glasses and giving himself an ample pour while only doling out a small thimble's worth for Sarah. She didn't seem to mind and took the glass. Greg spotted that Sarah didn't take a sip and just set the glass onto a coaster on the coffee table.
Sarah was seated between Lester and Greg on the couch. "So, what do you boys want to watch?"
"I don't care! It's your guys' house so you two pick," said Greg.
"I know!" Of course, Lester had an idea. "Superbad just got added to Netflix, what about that? Have either of you seen it?"
Greg and Sarah both shook their heads. Sarah also said, "I'm down to watch it. I've heard it's funny!"
It was settled. They started to watch the movie at around 9:30 pm. It was dark outside and cozy inside. Greg, Sarah, and Lester, in that order, were seated on the couch evenly spaced. The pool house was still warm from the earlier daylight so no one needed any of the blankets that were folded up and stacked adjacent to the couch.
None of them had bothered changing their clothes before starting the movie so they all sat there wearing what they had on for the barbecue. Greg was in a pair of khaki colored shorts, a pretty basic black polo shirt, and some sneakers. Lester had on loose baggy jeans, a floral Hawaiian shirt, and skate shoes. Sarah was wearing a cute peach colored blouse that was tucked into a loose flowing skirt that came all the way down to her ankles.
