The wind blew briskly through his hair. Standing at the edge of the cliff, Kyle looked back at his compatriots. Behind him, they looked on curiously, watching their friend’s actions. He took a couple steps back, still looking at his people. With a wink and a smirk, he turned back to the cliff and took off. “Woooo,” he shouted as he threw himself over the edge, plummeting down. Down.
The splash was enormous. All of the other swimmers, already in the sea, laughed as they were rocked by the waves. His friends followed suit. All but Eric, who was a giant pussy. First Marcie plummeted the several stories off the cliff, then Will, and finally Helen. Each one making roughly equally large waves as they impacted the water. Kyle and the rest of his friends who’d had the cojones to do the leap gradually met up out in the open water. Helen was laughing as she arrived. Kyle smiled at her. “Told y’all it’d be fun,” he said, chuckling himself as well.
“I gotta admit,” Will replied, “That was a lot more enjoyable than I thought it would be. I always figured jumping off a cliff would, I don’t know, feel kinda melancholy.”
“That’s cause you’re one of them sad poets,” Marcie told her old friend, “No sense of fun.”
Will shook his head at Marcie. “I know what’s fun. I’m sorry if I see leaping from vast heights to be more often sad than entertaining.”
“Eric’s expression when I hopped over was certainly entertaining. You guys shoulda seen it,” Helen added.
“That boy’s got the biggest crush on you, Hel,” Marcie said, shaking her head, “You know that, right.”
“Don’t remind me,” Helen replied, “Think he’s gonna jump?”
Kyle shook his head. “Nah,” he stated, “He’ll be coming ‘round beachside, in, sum’ like, ten, fifteen.”
“Come on,” Will said, “I want to show you guys something.” He started to swim out into the water, towards three rocks that jutted out of the sea, small mountains juxtaposed against the vast plain of water stretched out before them. Will led the other out to them, and pulled himself on top of the shortest of the three. As he started to talk, the others joined him on the rock. “These used to be called the teeth of the sea. Out from here for almost a mile, these rocks jut out, just under the surface of the waves. It’s said thousands of ships, way back when, got destroyed when they veered too close.”
“Wait,” Kyle said, “Getting past your general morosity and morbidity, are you saying there might could be some valuable shit down there?”
“I think he is,” Marcie added.
Helen agreed as well. “That’s what it sounded like to me, too.”
Will shook his head at his friends. “You three are hopeless,” he said, “No sense of connectedness. Can’t see the beauty in front of you.”
“Hey,” Kyle objected, “I can too see beauty in front of me.” He looked down at his reflection in the water and pointed. “Look, it’s right there.”
“See,” Helen said, “He well coulda used it to complement any of us. But instead he chooses to make an ass outta his self.”
“Well, remember Hel, Kyle doesn’t know how not to make an ass out of himself,” Marcie reminded Helen.
For that, Kyle shoved Marcie. She lost her perch on the slippery rock and, as though in slow motion, she slid off of it and splashed into the water. Everyone but Marcie chuckled at that. “Jerk,” Marcie stated before grabbing Kyle by the leg and pulling hard. Following his friend unwillingly, Kyle slid right into the water, too. Much faster than Marcie had. The pair still on the rock laughed, though they also had the presence of mind to move as far as they could from the edge.
“You two are no fun,” Kyle informed the pair on the rock.
Helen nodded. “Fair enough,” she said. She hopped from the short rock, to the next, then the third, clambering up to top of the tallest. “You ready for this?”
“Nope,” Will said.
“For what?” Kyle asked.
Marcie just laughed. She knew what was coming. Helen stood up atop the tallest tooth, bowed to her friends, then belly flopped right next to them. The wave from the splash smacked against Will. He lost his grip and, much like Marcie had earlier, he began to slip away. “Ow,” Helen said, rubbing her chest.
“Oh god, oh no,” Will said, desperately trying to find perch on the mossy rock. He didn’t and crashed back first into the water.
Kyle and Marcie laughed. “Worth it,” Helen said, with a pained chuckle of her own.
Will sighed. “I’m feeling kind of thirsty. Want to head back to the beach?”
“They still giving out drinks for free?” Kyle asked.
Will shrugged. “How would I know?”
“Maybe he thinks you’re psychic,” Marcie offered her old friend.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Kyle replied, “If he knew what people around him were thinking, he could definitely write better poetry.”
“Hey,” Will feigned offense, then after the briefest of pauses, clarified his offendedness, “Psychicness is totally a sliding scale. Some psychics just get something akin to a gut feeling about the emotions around them or the like.”
Helen shook her head. “You know psychics ain’t real, right Will?”
Will rolled his eyes. “No shit,” he said with a sigh, “So drinks? Or am I to drink alone?”
“I mean, knowing you, most definitely eventually,” Marcie answered, “But for now, I’m with you.”
“Maybe Eric’ll meet us there,” Kyle added, “Add some brains to all y’all’s combo.”
“Ain’t you a part of, ‘all y’all’?” Helen asked, using air quotes around the final pair of words, mimicking Kyle’s voice as best she could.
“Hell no,” Kyle insisted, “I’m my own man.”
“You heard it here first,” Marcie said, “If the drinks aren’t free, Kyle has to pay for them.”
“How’d you hear that?” Kyle asked.
Will nodded. “I heard that, too. Hel?”
Helen, chuckling, agreed enthusiastically. “Yep. Almost verbatim.”
Shaking his head, Kyle groaned. “Y’all’re the worst, you know that?”
“Probably,” Will said. At the same time, Helen agreed, “Yeah.” Marcie, on the other hand, simultaneously asked the pertinent question, “But which of us is actually the worst?”
Kyle groaned as he led the group back to shore. Helen looked over at Marcie, “I think that means you.”
Marcie sighed, then chuckled. “Alright, drink time,” she said, as they arrived at the beach. Kyle walked up to the shoreside bar to grab them something fruity and alcoholic. Helen led the others to a table. Sitting down around it, the group was joined by a much less dripping wet Eric. “How was the dive?” Marcie asked the guy as he walked up.
Eric held up his hands. “Sorry if some of us value our lives. Even if only a bit.”
Helen mocked offense. “Hey,” she objected, “We value our lives. That’s why we cram as much living as we can into them.”
Will looked at Helen and joked, “Speak for yourself.”
“About which part?” Marcie asked her old friend.
Will shrugged. “Oh, I was not actually listening to Hel. I was simply reminding her to stop speaking for the group.”
Marcie nodded, then furrowed her brow. “Maybe she wasn’t,” she offered, “Maybe it was the royal we.”
“Good point,” Will replied, ignoring Helen’s exhausted-with-their-shit expression, “She is about narcissistic enough.”
“Mmhm,” Marcie added, “And she definitely likes talking about herself.”
“True, true,” Will agreed as Kyle approached with several Tiki drinks.
Putting them down, Kyle asked, “So, what’re we talkin’bout?”
Will explained to Kyle, “We were debating whether or not Hel was using the royal we.”
Kyle looked at Helen, who was clearly very much not involved in this conversation, then said, “Seems right about something she’d’ve done.”
Will sighed. “In that case, Helen, I am quite sorry for being snippy.”
Helen sighed. “You’re never forgiven, Will, dear,” she half-jokingly replied, before taking a drink.
While everyone started drinking, Kyle looked over at Eric. “Why are you so dry?” he asked. Eric, drinking his own drink, gave Kyle a look that said you know exactly why. Kyle shook his head at his friend. “Are you saying, we came all the way out here, with this beautiful sea in front of us, and you ain’t finna hop into the water?”
“I was,” Eric said, “But when I made it to the beach, you four were already, well, here.”
“We could’ve used you out there,” Marcie said, “Will bored us with some morbid history facts. Some slightly less boring science facts to irritate him would’ve been nice.”
Eric looked curiously at Will. “About what?” he asked the poet.
Will gestured towards the jutting rocks, out a ways in the water. “Just about the history of the teeth. And it was, like, a couple sentences at most.”
Eric nodded. “Sorry,” he said, “I don’t know much about oceanography. Couldn’t have helped much.”
“So, what next?” Helen asked. Having been downing her drink while everyone else was enjoying thiers, she’d finished first.
Kyle shrugged, then looked over at some of the groups of ladies lying on the beach watching the other beachgoers. “I don’t know about y’all,” he said, very skeevily, “But I’ve got an idea of what to do.”
“Not sure you’ll have time,” Will said as he, too, finished his drink, “After all, you need to go get us another round.”
“That was the agreement,” Helen stated.
Kyle shook his head. “I didn’t agree to anything like that.”
“Not what we heard,” Marcie countered.
“Come on, Eric,” Kyle turned to the only one of his friends who hadn’t piled on earlier, “You’re with me, right?”
Eric shook his head. “Nope, I heard you agree to those terms. It was while you were in the water.”
“You were on the other side of the fucking mountain, you ain’t hear shit,” Kyle complained. Eric shrugged and looked at his drink, also nearing empty. With a groan, Kyle begrudgingly left to get another round.
Helen chuckled. “So, ignoring Kyle’s crass suggestion, what should we do?”
Marcie held up a finger. “Woah woah woah, I like annoying Kyle as much as the next guy, but let’s not be so hasty.”
Will nodded in agreement with his old friend. “I have to agree with Marcie, there are a lot of hot people around the beach.” Helen looked at Will, judgingly. He raised his hands, “Hey, I’m just saying. Plenty of lads and ladies about for everyone. Certainly one or two would be interested in each of us. None of us are unattractive.”
“Understatement of the century,” Helen countered, “In Marcie and my cases, anyway. Can’t say the same for the rest of you.”
“Told you she had the ego to use the royal we,” Marcie said, though clearly she was happy to have been included in the understatement.
“I didn’t disagree,” Will replied.
Helen shook her head at the pair. “Why am I friends with you guys?”
Will smiled. “Because I’m the greatest wingman ever.”
“And we’re kind of a packaged deal, where friendship’s concerned,” Marcie added.
Helen chuckled. “You can both go screw yourselves,” she responded jokingly.
Kyle returned at that statement with the next round. He announced his presence by saying, “Why do that when there are so many other people around who could screw them?”
Marcie nodded. “He makes a point,” she said, then added quickly, “He makes it in the crudest and probably worst possible way, but it’s a point nonetheless.”
Helen sighed, giving up. She looked at Eric, who’d been oddly silent. He was lost in thought, figuring out what he wanted to do next. Kyle wrapped his arm around his old friend Eric. “Come now,” Kyle stated, “Let’s go meet some lovely ladies.”
Eric chuckled, shaking his head. Helen looked at Marcie and Will. With a sigh, she said, “Fine, I’ll help you two find some strapping young men, too. Whatever.”
“Knew it,” Will said, “You love this.”
“Shut up,” Helen spat back, but she was grinning.
“She loves us,” Marcie adds, mockingly.
Shaking her head as the five of them walked back towards the beach, Helen joked, “You know, I can rescind my offer anytime.” Together, they all laughed at Helen’s statement.
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