We didn't talk about much on the way there, I think Jimmy was a little afraid as to what topics he could bring up. Obviously the elephant in the room was why there had even come to my apartment in the first place, and the secondary elephant was the events that took place after. To top it all off, he may or may not have seen the eviction notice on my door. We skated round a couple of conversation starters, until we landed on the topic of Slab City. It was only a couple of days away, and we were only now starting to work out the details of what we were actually going to do there. Jimmy was talking about camping, and Jake was pretty adamant that if we were sleeping in 'fabric walls', we were going to get stabbed. I found the whole conversation rather hilarious, the gist I basically got from it was that Jake - "The Viking", was scared. I didn't blame him though, we didn't know much about this place, apart from the fact that it was known as the city with no laws. I wasn't too bothered personally, I felt safe with Jimmy, and he proved that I could by coming to my aid tonight.

"So what are the chances we're even going to be allowed to camp?" I asked, Jimmy thought for a moment, the silence consuming us indicated that Jimmy hadn't even thought of that as a possibility. "Erm." He coughed, the cogs in his brain working overtime, "It's not as if we wouldn't be allowed to camp." He said, rubbing the back of his neck, "But if people didn't want us to, there's plenty of things they could do to stop us." He told me, chuckling slightly. "Fuck sake." I laughed, "I shouldn't be excited, but I am." I said, smiling up at Jimmy who was still focused on the road. "That's because you're going to be stuck with me." He told me, looking at me just long enough to do an overly enthusiastic wink. I straightened myself up in my seat, and caught Jake's eye in the rear view mirror. He shot me a smile, before going back to texting on his phone.

We pulled up on Jimmy's driveway, and I took note of all of the cars parked around his house, I smiled to myself, excited to be going to my first party since the very beginning of college. I enjoyed parties, and I can imagine I would enjoy this one even more seeing as I actually knew everyone that was going to be there. I could see multicolored lights moving around the front of the house, being cast by a little black box in the middle of the lawn. I remembered when Jimmy bought that little contraption, it must have been a couple of weeks ago in Walmart. He had told me that it was for a video at the time, but now I realize that he had been planning this party for a little while. I got out of the car, and made my way over to Jimmy. He placed his arm around my waist, pulling me towards him for a second, before opening the door and letting Jake and I inside.

The first thing I noticed was the banner. "Congratulations" it said, hanging across the balcony at the top of the stairs. The second thing I noticed were the people still moving around and helping put up decorations, and put the buffet together on the table in the hallway. I say people, I meant Chris, Chandler, and the other boys. It was Garrett who noticed me first. "Oh, hey Y/N" he said, looking back and forth between Jimmy and I, almost as if he was confused. "Are we running late?" He asked, his attention fully focused on Jimmy. I saw him shake his head out of the corner of his eye. "No." He told him, "Surprisingly." Garrett smiled at him, a toothy grin smeared across his face. "Well, there's a first time for everything." He laughed. "What are you doing here so early then?" He asked. I felt myself freeze ever so slightly, silently hoping that Jimmy wouldn't mention anything to him about what had happened. Jimmy chuckled, "You know I'm shit at keeping secrets." He told him, and I breathed a sigh of relief. "God damn it, barely anyone is even here yet." Garrett said. All of a sudden, Chris piped up from the kitchen. "Go wait upstairs!" I laughed, until I looked at him and he had a moderately stern look on his face. "Yes Mom." Jimmy shouted back at him. I looked up at Jimmy, and he gestured towards the staircase.

I felt butterflies in my stomach. I had been in Jimmy's house many a time, but I had never seen his room. "Ignore Chris." Jimmy told me as we walked up the stairs. "He's moody because I wouldn't let him eat any of the snacks." I smiled, knowing that Jimmy as well as the rest of our friends were all notorious for being 'hangry'. "We'll just chill out in my room for another couple of hours." He said, taking my hand as we neared the top step, and lead me towards his bedroom. Each step sent a wave of emotion through me, I couldn't quite tell if it was excitement, or just pure, intense nervousness. A shiver went down my spine as Jimmy opened the door. He turned the light on, and stepped to the side as I entered.