It was near the end of the summer, and I was hanging out with my friends. They were teasing me about never having time for them since I met my new girlfriend. Ramon was especially rough with the teasing, saying she must have me whipped.
"You must still be jealous because she rejected you so spectacularly," Jacob teased. When Ramon couldn't come up with a counter remark, we laughed, knowing that Jacob must have been right. "Anyway, I'm having a pool party this weekend. Do you think you can come? And the answer better be yes, because your girlfriend can come too."
"I just have to let her know about it, but we should be able to go," I said.
They all groaned at me. Jacob pointed out how that should mean that I wouldn't be making it. I texted Amanda and asked if she wanted to go to the pool party with me that weekend. She replied quickly, saying yes, that it sounded fun.
I showed Jacob that message. "See there. We are going." He just smiled in response. "You just tricked me, didn't you?" I asked.
"Yep," Jacob said.
"Jerk," I said.
A couple of days later, it was finally time for the pool party. Amanda wore a modest black bikini, looking incredible despite not showing much skin.
"What?" She said when she caught me staring at her for at least the third time.
"You are just so beautiful. I can't help but look," I said honestly.
"You're just saying that," Amanda said bashfully, and besides, you have seen me in a bikini a lot by now, not to mention fully nude."
"I'm not just saying it. You really are beautiful," Amanda blushed again. I loved how when I complimented her. She never knew how to take it. I was the same way, but that didn't stop me from taking advantage of showering Amanda with compliments to make her speechless.
"Shut up," she said without conviction, resting her head on my arm as we drove.
"Make me," I said.
"Maybe later, when you are not driving," Amanda said seductively. It was my turn to get quiet as I thought about what she had in mind.
We got to Jacob's house, a modest-sized one in the middle of the college town. It was his childhood home, but his parents had moved out of it when they saved up to retire to a second, bigger home. Jacob had free reign of the house as long as he didn't break anything, or at least as long as he didn't break anything to the point beyond repair.
Jacob had kept the party pretty small. There were only about fifteen people. Jacob, his girlfriend, Ramon, and a couple of other party-goers were over by the grill where Jacob was cooking up some burgers and hotdogs.
I could tell as we walked towards them that Amanda was feeling nervous. "Relax, you are going to do great. Remember how they were acting when you met them?"
"Yeah," Amanda said.
"So there isn't much you have to do to impress them."
"That's harsh," she said.
"That's my friends," I said with a shrug.
"If for some reason you want to leave, or I do, maybe we should come up with a signal," I suggested.
"What? Why would we do that?" Amanda asked.
"I know what it is like being out with people and suddenly hitting your interaction limit and how hard it is to leave without drawing attention to yourself. This way, if one of us ever feels like they want to go, we could do the signal so we could leave together."
Amanda thought about it for a moment. "That sounds like an excellent idea," she said.
"Thanks, I thought about it all on my own; I didn't read about the idea online or anything like that," I said, confessing where I got it from.
"What could the sign be?" She asked.
"How about scratching your ear?"
"Are you serious? Even just thinking about scratching my ear will make it itch," Amanda said.
