These would be the good ol' days

It was roughly T-Minus five minutes until Skye would be here and she'd get the best surprise. Well it'd be a surprise if everyone had made sure to keep their mouths shut and no one leaked the information to Skye. It was hard work to plan a surprise party, because so many people knew and you had to make sure that no one would be there to open their mouth whether that be on accident or on purpose, but Delilah was confident about the work that Oliver and her had put into this.

Looking around you could see the sand they had dumped onto part of Lachlan's back yard and they had the volley ball net set up with some of those beach volleyballs laid out for people to use. There was a table set up for some beer pong as well, and then there were the little inflatable palm trees blown up and placed near the pool. Another table was there which had a variety of alcohol on it and even the little umbrellas you could put in your drinks, which Delilah had in one of her own drinks at the moment.

Delilah herself had a blue hawaiian which was to match the theme of the party. She had her bathing suit on but over top of it she had the grass skirt wrapped around her waist and had some of those leis around her neck and her wrists. To top it off she also had a flower clipped into her hair. While she had her phone out to make sure her text to Skye had sent, 'Hey Skye, when you're done your duties stop by Lachlan's I have a birthday present for you.', she turned to her camera and she handed it to Lachlan, "Hey Lanny, I need you to get a picture of Oliver and I for the 'gram."

Lachlan knew that this party needed to be perfect. With whatever was going on between him and Skye, he couldn't be the one that ruined this party. He had had a hard enough time not telling her that this was coming. Lachlan was pretty good at keeping his own secrets. If anything, that was his speciality. When it came to other secrets, like surprise parties, he was shit at it. It took everything he had not to just blurt out when him and Skye were together. It was even harder when a delivery came of a couple things Delilah and Oliver had had to order online. He didn't think he was going to get out of that one.

Lachlan had been put on drink duty by Delilah. He was rushing around making sure that everything was out and that there plenty of mixers and cups. Lachlan tapped the keg and made sure everything was ready. He ran inside to grab some ice, unlocking his door. He adjuster the leis around his neck. He was wearing a pair of brightly colored swim trunks and had the leis laying over his bare chest. There was no way he was letting these drunk idiots into his home or his clubhouse. He grabbed the ice and relocked the door. As he set the ice down, Delilah called him over. He took her phone from her.

"Yeah of course I can." He put the phone up and looked through it.

---

Oliver was stressed. He loved party planning but the day of was always stressful. He was a perfectionist and needed everything to be just right if he was going to put his name on a party. Luckily, he trusted Delilah fully and everything had turned out so well. He was speeding around the backyard, sidestepping tables and avoiding falling in the pool. He was wearing a pair dark swim trunks with the grass skirt and coconut bra that him and Delilah had picked out a few days earlier.

People seemed to be having fun already. He checked his watch. Skye had gotten off duties a few minutes before, and should be here in precisely 4 minutes. That was key to surprise parties, timing. They needed to be ready for Skye because it'd be so awkward if she just walked up without them being ready.

Oliver felt himself get pulled in to Delilah. He smiled down at her as she passed her phone over to Lachlan for a photo of them. Oliver slipped his right arm around Delilah's waist and pulled her in close. He threw up a piece sign with the other hand and smiled wide as Lachlan took the photo. Once he put the phone down, Oliver said,

"C'mon y'all. We have to be ready for Skye."

Delilah posed with Oliver next to her for the photo that Lachlan took for her. She would definitely send it to Oliver, but it'd probably go up on her instagram account, it had been a little while since she updated it and she figured her followers would like to see something after the drought it had been. Plus everyone had been responding well to seeing Oliver on her instagram page and they wanted to see more of him. Delilah couldn't argue with that, she loved spending time with Oliver and having him on her insta account was no hard feat at all.

She took her phone back and then began to shush everyone knowing that Skye could probably be coming around the corner any minute. She wasn't going to try and get anyone to hide for it because that was almost too cliche and lets be real, Skye probably knew something was up despite Delilah's strong will to have it be the biggest surprise of all time. She had a small bag that'd have Skye's swimsuit in it and she held a plastic pineapple cup that had a drink in it ready for Skye to have the moment she got back. Skye deserved it after they basically made her work a centurion shift on her birthday.

"Yeah! Just come in through the side!" Delilah would call and once Skye came into view everyone would raise their hands up and yell 'Surprise' to her. Delilah walked up to Skye can handed her the bag and the cup. "A swimsuit for you to change into, your gran gave it to me, and one of your favourite drinks, if it's not your favourite drink you can blame Lachlan, because we asked him." Delilah said with the biggest grin on her face.

As Lachlan handed Delilah's phone back to her and Oliver pulled them towards where Skye would be entering the backyard, Lachlan couldn't help but wonder what was happening between Oliver and Delilah. Oliver was his best friend, but Delilah was like his sister. Was anyone good enough for Delilah? Then he looked at the goofy smile on Oliver's face as he practically jumped out of his skin with excitement. Yeah, he could be.

Lachlan had been to very few surprise parties in his life, and most were when he was pretty young. He wasn't really sure what to expect of one as someones 18th birthday. He was sure that Skye knew that at least something was up. He'd been dancing around the topic of her birthday for the last couple of weeks, and he guessed that Delilah and Oliver had been doing the same thing. When he saw the look on Skye's face, it confirmed she was ready for something, but it still had a certain amount of excitement on happiness on it. Lachlan, in that moment, understood surprise parties.

Delilah threw Lachlan under the bus about the drink a little bit, but he was laughing. "Hey, it's rum and coke. If that isn't actually what you like, you've lied to me and then it's your fault." Lachlan said, and then added, "And if you wanna change in the clubhouse you can. Just lock it back up." He said, handing her his key.

---

Oliver knew it was ridiculous how excited he was for this party. Like a true Hufflepuff, though, he just loved being around his friends and doing things for them. For a bit, he had been friends with Lachlan, Delilah, and Skye separately from each other, but it was nice that now he was getting to be friends with them all together, even if he'd never share in their childhood, he can pretend like he had always been there.

When Skye turned the corner around the house, there was a chance that Oliver screamed surprise louder than anyone else.  He knew that she wasn't 100% surprised by any means, but he hoped that at least what was actually happening here would be a surprise to her. He felt goofy standing here in this ridiculous outfit, but goofy was good, especially when it was with three of his favorite people in the world.

"Of course, Lachlan's specialty hasn't always been listening to people when they talk, but it's hard to mess up when the answer is rum and coke." In Oliver's hand was a frozen strawberry daiquiri in a plastic coconut, with a thick straw and a little umbrella.

Seeing the look on Skye's face was priceless. She was obviously not as surprised as she could have been, but there was a a piece of happiness riddled on her face and that was good enough, it meant that Delilah and Oliver had done their job well enough to achieve happiness and that's all anyone ever really deserved on their birthday. When Skye went to go get dressed she turned to one of the Apollo kids, Julian, Julian was really good at putting party mixes together and he had been at a lot of the field of Mars parties, usually the first DJ of the night that had the good stuff playing.

It wasn't too long before Tieghlur had walked up to the trio that were left standing there. He had his butt inflatable under his arm and his swim trunks on. "Hey bros." He said giving out a small wave to Lachlan and Oliver, and looked to Delilah, "Hey Delilah, rocking that grass skirt might I say. I hope the birthday girl's got less on." He said with his usually laugh as he took his last drag of his joint.

"Anyone wanna head into the pool with my floaty?" He asked after while putting his joint out.

"No thanks Tieghlur." Delilah said and watched as he had gone to put his floaty in the pool.

Delilah turned to go get her drink which was a pina colada, she enjoyed the drink a lot, any frozen drink was good in her book, if anything she was a little jealous of the Daiquiri that Oliver had, she'd have to get herself one of those. As she turned back to face Lachlan and Oliver, she seen her dog bounding into the back yard letting out a bark while wagging his tail. "Bear!" Delilah exclaimed.

Lachlan's eyes trailed after Skye as he walked towards his clubhouse before realizing that he was being obvious. He acted like he was looking over the whole party to make it less obvious and then said.

"I think this all turned out really well. Good job, guys." He meant it, too, not just as a distraction from watching Skye all the way to his place. If there was anyone that he knew who could genuinely go into the party planning business it was Delilah and Oliver. That or he could see them being one of those couples who fixed houses together on HGTV. Did he just think of them as a couple? Gross.

"I'm going to go and float in the pool and drink until tomorrow. If any of you mess with me, I swear to gods." He backed away from the pair and then turned towards the pool. He watched as Tieghlur struggled with a ridiculous floaty, and once he grabbed his floating, inflatable recliner with a cup holder, and put it in the pool as far as he can from Tieghlur. He started floating in the water and watched the door of the clubhouse until Skye emerged.

---

Oliver was so excited that Skye really seemed to like it all. "I was so worried that you'd figured it all out. It was my biggest fear when Delilah and I were planning all this." Oliver said. Even though it was only a few days earlier, Oliver really enjoyed thinking back to their San Francisco day.

"Honestly, I don't even know how much sand it is. We just found a company you can order it from and they come back and pick it up and stuff."

Oliver wasn't fooled by Lachlan's searching the backyard trick, but luckily it didn't seem like Delilah was paying too much attention. He didn't like being in on this thing that Delilah wasn't, but he also knew it wasn't any of his business. Anyway, if he hadn't put the pieces together he knew he'd be on the outside, too. Maybe that'd be better than watching what he felt like was a ticking time bomb up close.

When Lachlan walked away from them, Oliver turned back to Delilah. "When Skye gets back we are totally going to mess with him, right?" He asked, raising a dark eyebrow. It felt nice standing here with Delilah. All the planning and timing was done and they could just enjoy the party.

"We really are a good team, huh?"

She listened to Oliver explain how they did a few different things to Lachlan and she just smiled. Delilah loved planning parties, but planning them with Oliver took the weight off her shoulders about it and she could just have fun with the ideas and shopping. Besides having a companion to join her on the shopping trips made the day more exciting. At this point all Delilah could truly think about was the day the two of them spent in San Francisco. It was a bright sunny day where they spent part of it in the depths of Party City trying on grass skirts and then sort of having a water fight on the beach in the bay area.

She was reeled back in when he mentioned messing with Lachlan and a grin slipped onto her face as she pet Bear. "Absolutely, we'll have to think of some ideas, but I'm sure with three of our brains we can come up with something." She loved the idea of messing with Lachlan, it felt like she could finally get back at Lachlan for all the times he had tugged on her pigtails when they were like five years old. Tipping him over in his chair was just mediocre, they needed something better to mess with him with.

"We really are a good team, huh?"

The words flooded into her ears as she heard it. Initially she just had the goofy smile on her face still there and she replied, "Absolutely! We crushed it." As she said the words she offered her fist out for a fist bump. Was that a normal thing to do? She could feel her brain wanting to analyze everything again, but she just started to drink her pina colada to push down the overactive part of her brain.

In a hushed voice she looked over to Skye, "We're going to mess with Lachlan, got any ideas?" She asked.

Lachlan always liked the clamor of parties, and outside in the sun like this he found it even calming. After balancing himself on the raft, he put his drink in the cup holder and closed his eyes. He pushed his brown-lensed glasses down over his eyes and put his arms behind his head. He could hear the people around them chatting and laughing and singing along to the music that Julian was playing.

---

Oliver watched as Lachlan let himself a drift in the pool. He was trying to think of the best way to mess with him. Oliver and Lachlan were constantly engaged in a goof war. It didn't deserve to be called a prank war, but they were just always trying to mess with each other. Lachlan had gotten him pretty good recently. It was his turn.

Oliver returned Delilah's fist bump to her. What did that mean? Wasn't fist bumps kind of a step back for them? He knew he was overthinking it all. She probably just gave him a fist bump without thinking anything of it. Maybe she did mean something by it, though. Just maybe. Oliver took a large sip of his daiquiri, knowing that if he got a little tipsy he'd stop overthinking everything with Delilah and just have some actual fun.

Oliver's heart practically broke with cuteness when Skye came back and put a lei on Bear. He gave Bear a good pet as Delilah caught Skye on up on their need to mess with Lachlan somehow. He was giving a Bear a good rub when he looked up at Skye and said,

"Yeah, Skye. Any ideas?"

Making pranks and goofing around wasn't something that Delilah was that good at. She could have fun and do silly things like the day her and Oliver had the mud/water fight in San Fran, but that was fairly harmless and nothing to the extent of the pranks she had seen her sister pull from time to time or even the ones that Lachlan would pull. So in this moment she was really banking on Skye to come up with something, but if it weren't Lachlan coming up with an idea, it would definitely be Skye.

Delilah looked down to see Bear enjoying himself at the party. He wasn't used to loud noises and lots of people, but regardless he did quite well despite it. He was sitting down as his tail swept across the ground with the multiple people petting him. He didn't try to take the lei off as it didn't seem to grow bothersome. Lilah couldn't help but notice how cute Bear was, so she pulled her phone out and she took some pictures of him, Bear was always welcomed on the 'gram.

Her ears perked up as Skye mentioned she had a plan. Honestly it almost looked like Lachlan could have passed out in the chair at this point, but it was hard to tell with his sunglasses on. She had her phone taking a video as the water pushed Lachlan farther and farther up. Sadly she couldn't put stuff like this in her vlog or videos like these on her instagram. It was a shame, but her instagram would look fine without it.

Lachlan wasn't planning on falling asleep when he laid down in this recliner. He spent a few minutes relaxing and finishing the rest of the margarita in his cup. When he was no longer reaching to get his cup, though, he felt the small waves other people were creating rocking him closer to sleep. For a minute, he thought that this must be what it's like to be in Margaritaville. Jimmy Buffett was the last thing in Lachlan's head as he dozed off to sleep.

He woke up not too much later to Skye calling his name. He hadn't been expecting to fall asleep, so he sat up quickly, forgetting he was in the pool. Well, forgetting he had been in the pool apparently. As he jostled awake he quickly became aware that he had been lifted up in the air. He was aware of that because his shifting had taken him off the pillar of water and he was crashing back into the pool. When he surfaced, he had two words to say,

"Skye Maddox!"

---

As Oliver watched Skye lift Lachlan up above the water, he knew that nothing he would have come up with would be better than what she had done. He took a sip from his drink, and then crossed his arms, watching as Lachlan lifted several feet above the water. He knew how heavy of a sleepler Lachlan was, so he was surprised how quickly he woke up. Of course, it was to Skye's voice.

Oliver started laughing loudly, doubling over as he watched Lachlan crash into the water. He knew that Lachlan would absolutely hate that. He could get his own hair wet, but it was not okay when someone else did it. His best friend really was an egotistical dude-bro, wasn't he? Oliver leaned over to Skye.

"You know he's going to kill you for this, right?" He said between laughs.

Delilah couldn't help but record this. It was everything that they all needed except for maybe Lachlan. Perhaps they could ahve been a little nicer to him, but what was the fun in that? Besides, they all needed to get abck at him for something, so it was better than letting him go without anything. Besides the laughter erupting from the three of them on the outside of the pool was a thing to hear. If Dr.Burke could hear them now maybe she'd realize they could have fun and they weren't always riddled with problems.

To clarify, Delilah didn't hate Dr.Burke or anything and she knew that she was being a little harsh on her at times, but that had more to say about Delilah than it did about anyone else.

When she could see Skye lean in she heard her asking for the video after, "Of course, I was going to make a group chat alter to send it to you all." She said still laughing a little bit. The whole joke just reminded Delilah of when she had been scrolling through Oliver's instagram feed. A lot of it was good stuff, Oliver was skilled with a camera that was for sure, but some of the stuff on there seemed to be the little goofy things that they pulled on each other. At the thought, she could feel the same nervous feelings pull up again and she decided she'd have to drink more if she wanted to leave her anxieties behind, so that's what she did, she drank more of her pina colada as she filmed and zoomed in on the pool hoping to get Lachlan's face in view.

Lachlan shook out his hair like a wet dog. When his vision cleared from the water, he was looking eye to eye with a panting Bear, who he had definitely just splashed in the face with water. Lachlan gave him a quick pet as he looked around the party. He locked eyes with Skye as she gave him a little shrug and an oops. No way was she getting off that easily. He put his hands on the edge of the pool and cleared onto the ledge in one movement. When he looked at Skye, he was smiling, but it was a little crazy, in a fun away. He looked a bit like a jungle cat ready to pounce.

Lachlan took off towards Skye at full speed. He clocked Delilah's phone up recording him and that and the looks on Oliver and Delilah's face, he knew that they were in on it. He pointed into the camera and said, "I'll deal with you two in a minute." He turned to Skye, and bent down, wrapping his arms loosely around her legs, letting her fall over his back as he stood up. He fireman carried her over to the pool and once finding an open spot in the deep end, he threw her in.

---

Oliver stood up and let out a deep slow whistle when Skye said that she'd like to see Lachlan try. He guessed that Skye had never seen crazed Lachlan, After their little goof war, he definitely had. And as Lachlan pushed himself out of the pool, Oliver knew there was no stopping the revenge train. When he came over and called out Oliver and Delilah, he knew that there was no way they could protect themselves, so Oliver had an idea. He watched as Skye was picked up and thrown into the pool. As Lachlan watched her, he turned to Delilah.

"Maybe if we just get in the pool for ourselves he won't come for us, too." Oliver set down his drink on the table and took off running, canon balling into the pool.

Delilah bit down on her lip trying to stop the laughter from coming out of her mouth as Lachlan resurfaced and brought himself up onto the ground. Instantly she watched him go for Skye, so she panned her camera over slowly to Lachlan and Skye after he had declared that he'd be back to get him and Oliver. Delilah wasn't too concerned with his threats, so she got the video of Skye being tossed into the pool before she'd pan over to Oliver mentioning a strategy for Lachlan to not get back at them.

With that she stopped the recording and put her phone in her bag and set it off to the side under a table so it wouldn't get put into the water. She knew Oliver had a point, and despite her wanting to stand her ground against Lachlan, she knew the better choice would be to go into the pool. For the moment she took the grass skirt off so it wouldn't get wet and she ran up to the pool and jumped into behind Oliver.

As she resurfaced she looked around trying to find Oliver, "Good idea. But if he comes for me, you gotta help me to even the playing field. You seen my poor attempt to get you in the water in San Francisco." Delilah said laughing as she looked around trying to find Skye. She found Skye down below and looked over to Oliver with an upset face. "Lachlan! What did you do?! Skye's not coming back up! You need to help her!" Delilah said almost yelling at him, but she knew Skye was fine.

Lachlan skidded to a stop on the wet concrete to stop himself from flying into the pool with Skye as he threw her weight off his shoulder. He laughed loudly, a huge smile spread across his face. The whole party was watching them now. Lachlan had to think that this was what their lives would be like if they were normal. This could be them every weekend if their friend group hadn't fallen apart and if they weren't teenage legionnaire.

Lachlan watched the water for Skye to resurface, a witty razz at the ready. Slowly, he started to realize it was taking too long for Skye to surface. She was probably just holding her breath to make him feel bad. Then, it started to be too long for that. The smile on Lachlan's face fell and a lot of people around him were muttering. Delilah's voice pierced through them,

Lachlan! What did you do?! Skye's not coming back up! You need to help her!

Lachlan panicked and dove into the water, reaching to pull Skye up out of the water with him.

---

Oliver was resurfacing just as Delilah entered the water. When she surfaced, he was smiling and laughing. It was always so easy to goof around with Delilah. She brought up them in the water at San Francisco, when Delilah had tried as hard as she could to get Oliver down in the water and failed miserably until Oliver just gave up and let her win.

"That really was pathetic wasn't it." Oliver laughed. "I promise to take care of Lachlan for you if it comes to that." Oliver followed Delilah's eyes to Lachlan as she shouted at him. He could tell, with how prepared she was to say it and the look in her eyes, that she knew something that he didn't, and maybe she thought that Lachlan didn't too. Whatever it was, he knew that Lachlan was going to hate it. Oliver smiled mischievously.

It took everything for Delilah to not burst out laughing as Lachlan's face shifted and he would begin to dive in to get Skye. She knew she had helped Skye in her classic trick. It had been pulled on Delilah once when they were kids and Delilah got so worried that she had to run up to Nancy and tell her with tears in her eyes. That's when Nancy would just calmly go up to the pool and tell Skye to resurface. Ever since then Delilah hasn't forgotten because having that trick pulled on you is the worst, but hey, Lachlan sort of deserved it?

When she heard Oliver call what she did pathetic she couldn't help but laugh about it. "It was a moment of weakness. You weren't budging so I had to try and be persuasive. I could always tried pulling some serious Cupid persuasive powers on you if I really wanted to." Delilah said as she would wag her eyebrows a bit. She could feel herself slowly growing out of the sheltered shell that she had always been kept in. Looking back at it she didn't realize how much of a prison it felt like. Now she could just focus on being more of herself without any worries.

"A true gentleman, thank you. Lachlan's not the kindest to me. It's kind of like that sibling thing where you can pick on them, but other people can't." As she said the words she could hear Skye resurface and she was laughing. Poor Lachlan, but that's when Delilah couldn't help but burst out laughing along with Skye. She returned the high five to her.

"Anytime, those who listen to Jonas brothers together are bros for life."

Lachlan resurfaces and starts to pull Skye towards the edge until he starts to feel resistance. He turns back and sees Skye smiling and laughing and suddenly it all hits him. Skye has her stupid water powers that allowed her to breathe underwater. He had been counter-goofed. Skye called a thanks to Delilah and he realized how stupid he looked now. Delilah knew what was going on, but Lachlan hadn't been able to figure it out.

Lachlan started aggressively splashing water at Skye. "I hate you so much I don't think you understand." Lachlan was laughing though. He saw how this was funny, even if it did mean that he had to be the butt of the joke. Lachlan had several things that he wanted to say to Skye, but most of them he couldn't in present company, so he withheld them. He pointed a finger at Skye and one at Delilah.

"You two are the worst." He said, laughing.

---

Oliver wanted to say something about Delilah not needing to use any Cupid abilities on him, but he knew that this wasn't the time. He'd been doing a lot of thinking over the last few days and had actually taken the time to process all the things he was feeling on Sunday. He'd started to make some plans to act on them, but right here and now wasn't the time. Anyway, Lachlan was yelling at Skye and that was pulling most of the attention now.

"You got womped Lachlan." Oliver called to his best friend. When Delilah said something about people jamming to the Jonas Brothers making them bros for life, he looked down at her. What did that mean for them?

Lilah's sides hurt from laughing so hard at Lachlan's face and his declarations of her and Skye being mean. It was only fair, he had gone and thrown Skye into the pool, but she supposed it was provoked. Those two were constantly trying to one up the other, especially when they were kids. Skye was the bossy little girl next door and Lachlan was the laid back shit disturber who always had the last word. In case it wasn't obvious, that didn't go over well with a bossy child. "C'mon Lanny, you know we're really cool people."

Then Delilah's eyes looked over to Skye, "It was no big deal. Oliver and I just spent some time together planning it." She said flashing a smile. She loved planning parties, everyone would just get together to celebrate someone or something, and if you decorated something well enough and got the right items for it, you could make a killer party. When she heard the mention of sand she came up to the edge of the pool and propped her elbow up on the edge and put her finger up, "Actually as Oliver mentioned earlier it's all set up on a tarp and they'll come collect all the sand again." At that point she let herself slip back to being fully in the pool. Delilah loved water, it was a time where she got to feel weightless so she put her sunglasses on her face and looked over to Lachlan.

"Hey, Lanny, can you pass me another pina colada?" She asked because she really didn't want to get out of the pool and at this point she was laying on her back and floating in the water.