10:55. It was time to make my move.

I had never snuck out of the house before, and it felt ridiculous stooping to that level, being that I was already an adult, but I knew exactly what my dad would say if I asked him to go out so late. “My house, my rules. You can do what you want to do when you finish High School and move out on your own.”

Blah, blah, blah. I had spent too many years under my Dad’s iron fist, and it was time to have some fun.

I quietly opened the door to my room and poked an ear out into the hall, listening for any sounds that my dad was still awake.

Nothing.

Slowly, I returned my door to its closed position and creeped to my bedroom window, inching it up ever so gently. When it was high enough that there was room for me to slip outside, I pulled a leg through and prepared for my leap of faith. It was only a 1 story drop, but there was a bush directly below my window and I’d have to push myself out far enough to avoid landing in a painful mess of leaves and branches.

1, 2, 3…

I pushed out of my window as forcefully as I could and landed hard onto the grass below. It wasn’t a clean landing as my foot caught to bush a bit on the way down, but there was no damage, save for a little bit of scuffing and dirt on my palms.

I picked myself up and dusted the dirt off as I looked up at my open window. “Sorry Dad,” I whispered.

I knew that he was just protective because of what happened to my mom when I was in Middle School. Mom had suffered from back pain after years of sitting in a chair at a Customer Service job, and the family doctor had prescribed her some pretty strong pain medication. It seemed to help her at first, but soon she couldn’t function without the drugs, and then she started taking them even when she wasn’t in pain.

Dad had no idea she had grown so addicted that she was taking nearly a half a bottle of pills a day, and when he came home from work one day to see her overdosed, laying lifeless on the floor, it nearly killed him too. Up ‘til that point, Mom had always been drug and alcohol free, so Dad realized how quick a single vice could change everything in a person’s life. Ever since then, he did everything to shield me from the world and all its dangers.

“You’re all I have left, Layla,” is what he would always say, and that was enough for me to never give him a hard time about his strictness. But I was an adult now, and I needed to have a life of my own. I needed to be able to go out and explore the world.

I ran towards the street in front of my house and ducked behind a tall bush that hid me from view. It was another 10 minutes before I finally saw the headlights of Caleb’s car driving down the road, and as he approached, I almost panicked at how loud the exhaust on the car was, even when he was driving at a slow 5 miles per hour.

“Can you make this thing quieter?” I asked him as I ducked into the passenger seat of his car.

“I spent a lot of money to make this thing loud, and now you’re telling me to make it quiet?”

I clenched my teeth and slapped the dashboard. “Just go. Get away from the front of my house.”

“Why?” Caleb questioned as he pulled away slowly. “You said your parents were cool with you going out.”

I crossed my arms and stared forward, not saying a word.

“Ahhh.” Caleb nodded slowly. “So you lied.”

“Just a little white lie. And my Dad won’t find out anyway as long as you’re quiet when you bring me back.”

“I ought to take you back home right now. The last thing we need is some angry father calling the cops because his daughter is missing from her bedroom.”

“Relax. He won’t find out. And if you take me back home, you won’t get to see Amanda.”

Caleb hissed and shook his head. “Okay, but there better not be any—“

“Don’t worry,” I interrupted and pointed my finger towards a freeway entrance ramp. “Get on the 5. It’s the fastest way to her house.”

Caleb pulled onto the freeway, and 10 minutes later, we were at Amanda’s house. She confidently stepped outside of her front door and waved goodbye to her mom.

Lucky bitch, I thought. She had so much freedom.

I could see in Caleb’s eyes that he was happy with what she was wearing too. The tight strappy tank was even more revealing than the low-cut shirt she had worn to school earlier in the day, and her shorts were so short that they barely covered her ass.

I was wearing a different colored tee and let my hair fall past my shoulders, but otherwise I looked the same as I had during school.

“Hey, babe,” Amanda said as she slid into the back seat of the car. “Hey Caleb.”

“Hey,” we both said, and Caleb threw Amanda a sly grin.

I hadn’t told Amanda that Caleb was interested in her yet. I figured it would be better for Caleb to make a move on his own without me acting as any sort of interference to whatever he had planned. I just asked her to go to the races with us, and of course, she was down to go.

“Where is this place again?” Amanda asked.

“Rolling Bluff. Just another 10-minute drive,” Caleb replied. “When we get there, stay close to me, okay? Some of the people at The Bluff can be a little rough.”

Shortly after, we were driving up the side of a steep cliff. Rolling Bluff was like a large mountain that had its tip completely flattened on the top and was a mile or two in diameter. Roads wound up and down the mountain on every side, and none of them had barriers.

When we made it to the top, it was like a whole different world. There must have been 100 cars parked near one edge of the cliff, all of them coated with candy paint jobs, shiny rims and fittings, and on the other side was a whole mob of people gathered around two cars that were drag racing towards a flag that was placed several hundreds of feet away. A huge spotlight setup lit up the racing strip, and near the main lighting rig was a booth where a DJ was spinning music over the roar of the cars’ engines.

It looked like something out of a movie, and it made my jaw drop.

“Wow,” Amanda voiced, equally impressed.

Caleb parked his car with the others, and we all got outside. “Remember, just stay near me…”

He walked us up towards the crowd of people, and the place had pretty much all the makings of a large party. The music, the lights, energy of the mob. We passed a stand where a guy was selling drinks out of a large cooler, another area where someone was barbecuing chicken and burgers, and another area where a guy was taking bets on who would win the next race.

“This way.” Caleb waved a hand and we rounded the back, past the DJ stage and to an area that was a little more open.

That’s when I saw Mason. He was leaning with his back against the DJ stage and a couple of rough, dark skinned men were talking to him.

“Look man,” one of the men said. “I can beat The Beast. You’re just afraid you’ll lose your ride.”

“I’m not afraid I’ll lose my ride,” Mason countered. “I don’t want to take both of your cars. I’ve got no place to put them, and I just don’t want to race for pinks tonight. I’m racing for enjoyment only.”

“If you’re so confident you’d win, you’d do pinks,” the other guy barked.

“If you’re so confident, go speak to Ricardo and place all your money on yourselves. Then you can build your own Beast.”

One of the guys pressed his lips together and sucked air between his teeth as he frowned forcefully.

Mason noticed us approaching out of the corner of his eyes. “Hey,” he said and held up his hand to the men. “We can talk about this later.” He turned his attention over to us, brushing the men off as they walked away.

“Hey, bro,” Caleb said.

Mason glanced at Amanda, and then he looked at me. His brow creased and his eyes narrowed. “What’s this?” he asked.

“They wanted to come to the races.”

“And?” Mason asked. “You just bring two random High School chicks up to the Bluff just because they asked?”

Caleb’s eyes lowered. “They’re cool, man.”

Mason took a deep gulp of air and then huffed it all out. “Well, they better be since they’re here now.” He looked me again and scanned me up and down. “Nice to see you again,” he said.

“Yeah, nice to see you too.” I smiled.

“And this is Amanda,” Caleb said, holding his palm out to her.

“Hey,” Amanda said, a wide grin and a sparkle in her eye that I was all too familiar with. She was hoping to put Mason on one of her pending lists too. Not that I blame her. He looked even better that night than he did during the day, with his dark jeans hugging his ass and sleeveless black tee exposing his large, strong arms.

“Nice to meet you,” Mason said and extended his hand. He glanced at Amanda’s massive cleavage for a split second—and what man wouldn’t? —but his eyes didn’t stay there long. Maybe he wasn’t as smitten by her as most guys were or maybe he just wasn’t interested in High School girls. Probably the latter, I thought.

Mason pulled his hand away after a quick shake with Amanda. “You two be careful up here,” he turned towards Caleb. “And you, make sure that they don’t wind up in any trouble.”

Caleb smirked. “Don’t worry, Mason. There won’t be any problems.”

“Better not be,” Mason replied as he turned and started away.

Caleb looked towards Amanda. “You hungry? You guys want to get something?”

“Umm… Yeah, sure,” Amanda said.

“I wouldn’t mind one of those burgers,” I said.

“Hey!” Mason called out. He was standing several yards away but still in shouting distance. “Are you racing tonight?”

“Yeah! I want to!” Caleb yelled back.

“You better go check in with Mike and make sure he can fit you in!”

“Fuck,” Caleb cursed. “He’s right. I need to go check in. Will you guys be okay on your own for a little bit?”

“I guess so,” I muttered, unsure if I was telling the truth.

Caleb wiggled his hand in his pocket and produced $20 bill. “Go get yourself some food and stay near the drag strip. If you need anything, just ask around for Caleb or Mason. Everyone knows us.”

“Okay,” I said as I took the money from his hands.

“And I’ll see you soon,” Caleb said as he made eyes at Amanda and gently brushed his hands against her arm before walking away.

Amanda and I turned and started back towards the area with food and refreshments.

“Oh. My. God,” Amanda stressed.

“What is it? Finally realizing that Caleb likes you?”

“Caleb? No… Did you see his brother? Is he not the hottest guy you’ve ever seen in your life?”

I felt something that I can only describe as jealousy when she started talking about Mason. It wasn’t like Mason and I had anything going or that it was even a possibility considering our age difference, but something about another girl, especially my hot best friend, liking the guy finally made me realize that I was sort of crushing on him. It’s probably the same feeling that little girls get every time Justin Bieber gets a new girlfriend.

“Yeah, he’s pretty cute.”

“Cute?! He’s fucking gorgeous.”

“Caleb told me he’s like 22 or 23. He’s a bit out of our age range.”

“Even better,” Amanda said. “I like experienced guys. If he fucks as good as he looks…. Oh my god,” she squealed.

“Stoppppppppppp!” I said. Hearing my best friend talk about sex always sent me into shy mode. I wasn’t a virgin, but I was the next closest thing to one. I had only had sex with one guy, my ex-boyfriend, in junior year and each and every time was an awkward experience.

Samuel was his name, and we had dated since my freshmen year. It wasn’t until a couple years later that I finally decided to give him my V-card. He claimed that he had bedded tons of other girls before me, but I’m pretty sure he was lying. He looked at my body like it was some sort of science experiment, and he couldn’t even figure out the top from the bottom of a condom when he was trying to put one on. He also had an obsession with stopping every 30 seconds and asking “Are you okay?” as if he was hurting me. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was so small that I could barely feel anything, so he couldn’t possibly do any harm.

Needless to say, sex had just seemed like an awkward, annoying thing that I didn’t look forward to repeating.

Amanda and I bought ourselves a couple of Cokes from the refreshment guys. I got a burger, and she got herself a hot dog. We sat down on a low bench near the food stands as we ate. The seats weren’t high enough to see over the crowd of people, but we could see the cars that were drag racing go by at the end of the stretch where there were far less people standing.

“So…” Amanda started as she bit into her hot dog. “What’s the deal with you and Caleb?”

“There’s no deal, Amanda,” I replied as I took a bite of my juicy burger, wondering how clueless she could be.

“Come on,” she insisted. “He offers you a ride home today, and literally within hours he’s offering to bring us to a place like this? He’s definitely got a thing for you.”

I rolled my eyes and almost choked as I tried to hurry down my food. “You’re so stupid, Amanda. He told me he wants to ask you to prom.” I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I wasn’t going to go the whole rest of the night with her pushing me into a thing with Caleb that didn’t exist.

“What? Really?”

“Yes,” I said. “I wanted to come to the races and I told him that I’d get you to come if he brought us.”

“Oh…” Amanda said quietly as her eyebrows wrinkled together. “Sorry for thinking that—“

“No, it’s okay,” I interrupted. “You’re beautiful and you’re cool. Every guy likes you. You should know that by now.”

Amanda sighed. “You’re beautiful too, you know. Caleb is stupid if he doesn’t like you.”

“Oh stop,” I huffed. “Are you interested in him or not? Because he’s probably going to ask you out tonight.”

“Ehhh,” Amanda moaned. “I don’t know. Caleb is really hot, but…”

“But pending?”

“Yeah, pending.” Amanda took another bite of her hot dog.

“You’re a total slut, you know that?” I shoved her hard against the shoulder, causing her to almost lose her balance and drop the hot dog.

“Stop!” she coughed through a mouthful of food.

“Phew weee!” a guy suddenly whistled loudly.

We both looked up to see two men standing right in front of us, wide grins stretched across their faces. One of them was covered in tattoos and had a hat turned to the back. The other had a thick beard, a baseball cap and a checkered flannel shirt. I immediately assumed that these were the ‘rough kind of guys that Caleb had warned us about.

“Damn,” the guy in the flannel stressed. “The girls here are ripe for the pickin’ tonight!”