maybe we won't grow old

March 18th, 2015

It was Delilah’s 13th birthday. The Cul De Six had spent most of the day at the party that Delilah’s sister, Jules, and her new boyfriend, Augustine Reid, had thrown for her. It was definitely still a kids party. The backyards of the Reids and the Lockwood’s were covered in bounce houses and other inflatable attractions. They’d brought in a cotton candy maker and made dozens of funnel cakes. For the most part, it was just a reminder that all of them were teenagers now.

Tieghlur was the oldest. He’d be turning 14 in a month. Monroe was next in May. Skye was the third and Lachlan was fourth, both in August. Kirsten was next at the end of October, though she had always acted like a little adult, leaving Delilah to be the last one to reach the new age. It seemed right, though, for Delilah to be the youngest of them.

As the night wound down and the guests left the cul de sac, the group of six was hanging out in the Reid’s pool. Skye and Lachlan were racing back and forth, basically alternating victories, forcing one of them to call a rematch every time. Tieghlur and Monroe were sitting on the end of the edge of the pool, Monroe having been cornered into an infamous Tieghlur rant on something absolutely ridiculous. Kirsten and Delilah were floating on inflated recliners, trying to avoid being splashed by Skye and Lachlan. Kirsten still had sunglasses on despite the fact that the sun had completely gone down. Most of the Reid’s backyard was covered by a large hanging tree.

Lachlan had just lost a race to Skye, the second in a row, and was insisting that it wasn’t fair because Delilah had been in his way when his dad, Sam Reid, came out back. He was wearing a suit. Lachlan would never understand how he could be in a t-shirt all day and would change into a suit at night. He was also holding the keys to his Buick.

“Hey, bud, I’m heading out for the night. Augustine should be home at some point. If you guys get hungry, order something and put it on the AMEX.” He waved with his keys in hand and turned to walk around the front of the house. Lachlan had learned how to “put it on the AMEX” by the time that he understood what money really was. Sam had been spending more and more time away from Lachlan, and with Augustine becoming centurion with Juliana, he was spending less time at the house, too. A lot of nights, it was just Lachlan in the big house.

Once Sam was gone, Lachlan ran inside to grab the phone and called to order pizza for the group. He rattled off the AMEX number from memory to the girl on the phone and she told him it’d be there in about 20 minutes.

By the time the pizza arrived, they had all gotten out of the pool and were drying off. Lachlan grabbed the pizza and brought it back to the group.

“My dad hates when I do this, but he’s not here, so. Follow me.” Lachlan said. He pushed the door open to his clubhouse. This place had been his for about 2 and half years now and he was starting to basically live there. He was actually trying to convince his dad that he could put a bed up in the loft and it would fit super easily. Right now, though, there was just a futon up there that he’d occasionally sleep on when his dad wasn’t home.

Lachlan hurried up the spiral stairs, taking them two at a time. The group followed tentatively. Tieghlur called up after him.

“Dude, where are we going?”

Lachlan passed the pizzas back to Kirsten behind him and stepped onto the futon. He unhatched the window and pushed it open to the small balcony outside the window. Lachlan stepped out onto it and took the pizzas back. He balanced them on the slanted roof and pushed himself up onto the roof. Monroe followed behind him as Lachlan balanced on the slanted part of the roof to get to the flat portion above the living room area of the clubhouse. He set the pizzas down as Monroe helped the other 4 get up onto the slanted roof. Lachlan helped them get down to the flat part of the roof. He watched as Tieghlur, the last one out the window, almost fell of the roof before Monroe caught him.

Once they had all made it to the flat part of the roof, they sat around the pizza. There was a light breeze but it was a pretty warm night for March. On the roof, they were above the tree and could see all the stars in the sky. After they ate, they pushed the box aside and Delilah was the first to lay down, looking up at the stars above. Slowly, they all joined in. It was silent for a couple minutes as they laid with their heads in the center, just thinking about the heavens. Skye was the one who broke the silence.

“Do you ever think about how our destiny is just as crafted as the stars?”

No one replied for a minute. Staring at the stars really put things into perspective.

“I guess I don’t like to think about that. I don’t like to think about what our futures could hold.” Lachlan replied, quietly. To anyone who didn’t know them, they could just be 6 regular kids with 6 regular futures ahead of them, but they knew that they were demigods. They knew that the future of demigods was often pretty bleak. It was scary to think, but there was a fair chance one of them wouldn’t live to 18. It could be any of them.

“We’re teenagers now. Who knows what the future holds, but at least we’ll do it together.” Delilah said. Lachlan looked over to see the sweet smile on her face. Delilah was always the optimist of them. As he turned his head back, though, he caught sight of Skye and Kirsten making eye contact, leaving Lachlan to think that Delilah’s future might not be the one that they had in mind.

He chose to ignore that, though. For that moment they were just 6 kids, no teenagers, under the stars. It felt like they could stay there forever, just 13 years old, ignoring what hid in all of their shadows.

---