Alcohol

"I told you this game was off the chain" shouted Kris.

"Yeah, it's aight. What did you say it was called again?"

"Devil May Cry. The Sparda sword is phat!"

And as T.J. listened to thousandth time of Kris going over the
storyline of Devil May Cry, both of them heard a knock at the door. Kris with his knuckles white, and his hands literally glued to the controller, told T.J. to get it, without even taking his eyes from the screen.

"Hey this is my house, guests are supposed to get the door," stated T.J.

"And who made up that rule?"

"Me, just now."

"Well, I can't go right now, I'm fighting Mundus."

Reluctantly T.J. got the door. He had to do something because the
knocking had grown as if the person knew they were there.
When T.J. opened the door, he found a guy of about 16, brown blond hair
(kind of messed up), with skater clothes on, and adio sneakers.

"Yo, what's the deal cuz?" was the first words out of the guy's mouth.

"Nothing, just chillin'. Playing some video games." said T.J.

"Oh that's cool," the guy said," I want to invite you to the end of
school party at my house after the last day if school. It's gonna be
off the hizzy."

Taking a flyer from his back pocket, the guy practically forced it into T.J's hands.

"Here, it has the time and everything."

"Thanks," T.J. said not believing it.

"Be there!" the skater guy said.

When T.J. got upstairs, Kris asked him who was at the door.

"It was Erick inviting us to his end of school party on the last day of
school."

"I'm in," said Kris still fighting Mundus.

"Yeah I wanna go too, but Kris, you know how Erick and his boys like
to drink a lot. I ain't down with that."

"Well, what u gon' do?" asked Kris.

"I don't know."

As usual, the last days of school, to T.J., were boring. Even though he
was leaving the 8th grade, the teachers were still mean and didn't treat any student with respect. But it wasn't all that bad, since the teachers had cut the students a break and let them sit wherever they wanted. T.J, Kris, and their other two best friends Tim, and Keith, were hanging out in class as the movie Bring It On was playing.

"So what are you going to do," Tim asked,

"Well, I made up my mind. I'm going to the party," stated T.J.

"What if they're drinking?" asked Keith.

"Just don't do it. I won't do it. But all I know is, that mad chicks are
going to be there, and I want to meet some," said T.J.

"Then it's set," said Kris," we're going to the party."

That night T.J. was getting everything ready. He had his Phat Farm gear, his Timberland boots, with a silver chain with a big T on it. He looked in the mirror seeing his features, his black face, brown eyes, and black hair. He was looking good for sure.

When T.J. got to the party not a lot of people were there. There was
beer out already, which surprised him because Erick's parents were home.

"Maybe they don't care," thought T.J. Oh well, it wasn't TJ's problem
and he wasn't worried about it.

Erick's house was nice, the grass was one of the greenest on the block,
and his house was big. Supposedly, his dad was some executive in a high profile firm. No one T.J. knew had come yet, except for Erick's "drink buddies."

They were all getting wasted. T.J. felt sorry for them.

Keith was the first one to the party that T.J. knew. He was wearing Fubu shorts with a RocaWear T-shirt.

"Yo, what's happening?" Keith asked T.J.

"Not much, nobody's here yet. And by the way, don't drink the punch. I saw Erick and his friends putting something in it."

"What were they doing to it?" asked Keith.

"Spiking it. Probably with some drugs or some kind of liquor."

Keith and T.J. kept talking until Kris and Tim came together. Both of
them were wearing Guess shorts, but Tim had a Francois Girbraud shirt on, and Kris had a Sean John one on.

As Keith relayed the message of the punch spiking to the two of them,
Erick came over and asked them if they wanted some beers, or jelly
shots, or some tequilas. All of them said no, but Erick kept asking
them, and saying how good it tasted. T.J. started to wonder just what
tequila tasted like. But, he soon shook the idea out of his head and
told Erick NO again. Erick just stood there with some weird look of
"Why'd you come to my party then," in his eyes.

"Well damn, that's the end of my social status," said Kris.

"Oh well," said Tim, "if we're not going to be liked because of not drinking, then we're just not going to be liked."

T.J. and Keith both agreed to what Tim had said but Kris was a little
doubtful. But, they forgot those ideas when the party started to get
going. People had started to dance and all four of them joined in.
People were grinding on each other and busting on each other's dance
moves. All of they them were having fun.

The dancing started to break off when everybody heard Erick's friends
cheering him on to keep drinking tequilas. The people dancing went over and started to cheer too.

"Go, go, go, go, go, go," was all that you could hear from the crowd,
except for the hoorays after Erick finished another shot. Erick's shirt
was dripping from the alcohol as he kept chugging the shots. T.J. had
had enough, so he said goodbye to his friends and went home. Tim came with him.

"Erick is stupid, does he have a death wish or something?" asked Tim.

"I don't know. But, his friends aren't really friends. I could tell you
that," added T.J.

The Next morning T.J. went over to Tim's house to watch movies. After they were done watching the first one, and halfway through the second, Keith came over.

They could see that he was anxious to tell them something, what is was they didn't know.

"Yo guys, after you left you wouldn't believe what happened," said Keith.

"What happened?" prodded Tim.

"Erick, and another kid named Corey or something passed out. Erick
passed out from drinking all of those tequilas, but Corey passed out
because he drank the punch. Erick's parents had to call the ambulance to take both of them to the hospital." answered Keith.

"Glad I didn't drink it," said T.J.

"Yeah me too," agreed Tim.

As the three of them stuck around and kept watching another movie, Kris came over. Just like Keith's, his face was anxious, but it was a little more depressing.

"What's up?" asked T.J.

"I just heard that after Erick got to the hospital he died from alcohol
poisoning. And that kid Corey, he's in critical condition. Plus, Erick's
parents got locked up and fined a lot of money because they let their
son and other minors drink under age while they were home. And, what's worse is that Erick's dad was about to make partner with his big firm,
but since they heard about this, they fired him." told Kris.

"Damn, all of this came from just drinking?" asked T.J. disbelieving.

"Obviously." said Tim.

This short story was written by, Tamar. (aka njbawler).

All articles found on www.tscnow.com are © copyright 2002, of the TSC Group, and the author.