Initiation

The sun was warm on my skin, for the moment at least. Its reliliablity was shoddy today; the clouds seemed to be competing for priority in the sky and winning, for the most part. Samantha and I had been camped out by the pool for the majority of the afternoon, basking in the feeble rays and flipping through magazines we had biked over to the village to purchase that morning. Sunscreen was an afterthought, in Indiana it was more likely that you'd sweat it all off before actually getting burned. Today was no exception, turning the glossy pages of Teen People was getting increasingly frustrating as my fingers began to get slimy and stick to the pages. Not feeling compelled to master the art of applying fake eyeslashes for That Parfect Date! at the moment, I let the magazine fall to rest on my equally slimy stomach and turned my gaze towards Samantha. 1

Her light Indian brown skin hardly needed tanning, though she protested to the contrary, and looked, if not sunkissed, gently toasted year round. Compared to the pale skin I still felt the need to roast, I was envious. The envy didn't stop at her skin. It continued to her long, wavy brown hair, her wide green eyes, and full lips. And it didn't look past her trim figure that maintained itself no matter how much ice cream we consumed at sleepovers.2

"Want some fruit snacks?" she offered, drowsily lifting up an arm, clutching the aforementioned snack in her hand.3

"Sure," lifting up my own hands to show her my sweaty, sunscreened palms, I continued, "if you can open them for me." She did, and took a bag for herself as well. "Mm, tropical mix, my favorite" she murmured contentedly.4

"So what time are the rest of T.O.A.S.T coming over tonight?" I asked.5

"Around 7, I think. Although you know Tegan and Abigail are probably going to be late." They would be, I acceded, we knew them well. T.O.A.S.T is a group we were initiating tonight. It's inspired by The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, books of which were all avid fans. Not wanting to copy entirely, we named our group T.O.A.S.T, a clever acronym comprised of our names, Tegan, Olivia, Abigail, and Samantha, plus a random "t" tacked on the end to make it a word. We had gone shopping for pants the past week, and tonight we would officiate the whole business by creating our constitution of sorts, and organizing the sacred pant rotation. 6

By five the clouds had completely won out over the sun, and so, admitting at last that any more tanning was futile, we packed up and went back to Samantha's house. We walked into the kitchen after she let us in through the garage, and the cool air that embraced us was more than welcome.7

"Hi girls! Home so soon?" said her mom loudly, overexuberant as always, in a way that almost seemed fake. Especially when compared with Samantha's stories of harsh mood swings and silent treatments. "How was the pool?"8

"Fine, sort of cloudy though." I responded.9

"We didn't get very tan." added Samantha.10

"Oh, that's too bad. You'll have to go back tomorrow, I guess!" Her mom always seemed eager to extend Samantha's social engagements. It wasn't a problem, since we never minded, but it was there nonetheless.11

"Yeah, I suppose so. We're going to go downstairs now, ok mom?" Samantha's basement was our usual hangout. If we weren't outside, we were downstairs watching movies or just talking.12

"Wanna try something? I read in my magazine at the pool that cracking an egg in your hair makes in shinier." Samantha said as we walked down the stairs.13

"Really?" I replied, eager for anything that would ad shine to my dull, coarse hair.14

"Yeah!" And with that, we raced back up to the kitchen to nab the eggs before dashing up to her bathroom and shutting the door behind us. 15

"You first" she said, pushing the carton towards me. I rapped myself on the top of the head and the egg exploded beneath my hand. Trying to salvage the shell from getting tangled into my hair, I let the yoke run down the strands. Having, to quote my hair dresser, "the thickest hair I've ever seen," I needed two more eggs before I had covered my hair sufficiently. Laughing, we wrapped our hair up in saran wrap as the magazine instructed and went to sit outside in the gentle warmth from the setting sun while we waited for the yokes to soak in. The light angled provacatively across her lawn, seemingly begging for us to take advantage of it with our camera. We draped outselves across the grass, the swingset, and even the fence, making goofy faces and giggling madly the whole time, taking hundereds of photos.16

By the time we began to feel the chill that blows in after the sun goes down, we remembered our egg yoke wraps and impending guest arrivals. After washing out the eggs (much easier said than done) we wound up back in the basement, aimlessly flipping through channels before Abigail and Tegan showed up.17

Several hours, 4 bowls of ice cream, and 2 movies later found us sprawled amidst an array of futons, blankets, pillows, and warm bodies. Our heads were positioned close together for easy whispering and to allow multiple conversations to take place at once. We're a blur of nearly incomprehensible amusing anecdotes, wishful thinking, and midnight musings passwed and traded amongst each other.18

In the comfortable darkness of Sam's basement, it's easy to pretend you're a fairytale heroine, that the irrational can become the rational, that the impossible will soon occur. Being safe from the scrutiny from each other's eyes, or the discomfiting the sight of a shocked countenance (all meant with the best of intentions, of course) the darkness lulls you into sedation. More effectively than the most inebriating drink, you feel the most irresistable and leisurely drive to say anything, reaping no consequences.19

As the conversation reaches one of it's brief lulls, we wait in content silence, for someone to rejuvenate it, as they always do.