Summer in Crestwood
Crestwood is a sleepy little town in the pacific northwest, nestled amongst the trees, it is like a little island in a sea of green. The High School is the main source of employment for most of the residents, the rest were working at, or managing the local businesses. Church is always on Sunday, the produce is always organic, and the coffee is always flowing. There wasn’t much that changed there and the townsfolk liked it that way. Every now and then a new person would move in and be greeted with open arms, those ‘just swinging through’ were mistrusted- greeted with standoffishness; and very few people ever left. Though it seems like a haven for unextraordinary lives and comfortable predictability- it has a sinister side to it that few are aware of. The very essence of Crestwood is an aura of dark energy.
Summer was beginning to peak, school had been out for weeks and the youth were restless. In a tiny mountain town there was little they could do in the way of entertainment. It seemed as though all the anticipation for the break would always lead to restless disappointment and they would spend the last few weeks of summer anxiously waiting to go back to school. Most ideas were burnt through quickly and typically were the same things every year.
The group of five friends were stuck in this very predicament; being incoming seniors their anticipation for the year was strong, but not as strong as the desire to make the most of their last summer together. Soon they would be going their separate ways, off to prestigious universities or run down Community Colleges. Either way they knew that things would be different next summer. Which is why they set out to make this one the best ever.
Jack was the undeclared leader of them, always the one with the plan and always first out of the gate. He fancied himself a ‘bad boy’ or at least attempted to cultivate the appearance; he was rarely ever seen without a leather jacket. In truth he was a heartbroken romantic. Standing at 5’11” he was also the tallest of them. His skin was pale and his hair was a contrasting black, typically messy, always out of control though he spent much time in the mirror to achieve this look. A narcissist and a loud personality, he couldn’t help but exhibit the charisma to get others to follow. He had a brief affair with one in the group, Prudence- it ended when he realized she was just too square for him; or at least that’s what he told people.
Jack’s best friend and total confidant was Lee. Almost an exact opposite, Lee stood at 5’5” with sandy blond hair and dorky glasses that would slide off his face at the worst times. The group would tease him as he blindly went chasing after them. He lacked confidence, though being friends with Jack had the benefit of fitting in with the ‘cool’ crowd and experiencing a world that normally would’ve been shut off to him due to High School politics. They had grown up next to each other for years, eventually he moved to another part of town but that didn’t let their friendship waver. He had strong feelings for Prudence but neither the confidence nor the permission to pursue it. Jack had a strict ‘no dating bro’s exes’ policy and though Jack didn’t know of Lee’s feelings, he would often remind him of that code. Inherently making her off limits. He put up with this even though he wished it could be different. He didn’t mind being friends though, it was just such a treat to be around her, he would take whatever he could get.
The other boy in the group was Ben, who was a nice balance between the two. Shy like Lee, but adventurous like Jack. He was even the middle height at 5’8” and would always appear between them in photos. He was laid back and loved reading; he dreamed of someday writing his own books, or maybe working in a bookstore, or a publishing company; though he had no idea how to begin any of those dreams. He had barely scraped his way through the last three years of high school and wasn’t particularly looking forward to the next one. Colleges scared him, paperwork made him anxious, and he usually didn’t like his teachers. This wasn’t to say he wasn’t smart, he was actually quite brilliant; most of it coming from self-directed study. The problem was that he didn’t care for the class-directed study, so often it went by the wayside in favor of his reading. He was the only one of the three was currently in a relationship and as luck would have it, she was best friends with Prudence. In small towns, relationships become incestious in the aspect that friends were constantly changing partners between themselves until everyone in the group has dated everyone in the group. It bothered Jack to have Prudence around, but he couldn’t tell his friend that his girlfriend couldn’t hang around- and he certainly wasn’t going to tell Rosie that her bestie couldn’t hang with them either. Instead Jack suffered quietly with the attitude that nothing was ever wrong.
Rosie was also shy and quiet, more like Lee than Ben; she was short, standing at 5’3” and sported glasses with big black frames (though she didn’t have the problem of losing them like he had). She was a natural redhead with long flowing hair that Ben loved to play with. She too was quite smart, but she loved school. She wanted to be an Architect and was pursuing that passion with every fiber of her being. She was often bummed when Ben would complain about school, but she passed it off as his personality. As an adoring girlfriend she would often try to inspire him towards academia, though rarely got frustrated at his lackadaisical attitude. Also like Lee, she wasn’t naturally part of the popular crowd; she merely fit into it by means of her best friend Prudence. She looked up to her courageousness and carefree attitude; often following along to things she wasn’t sure about, but not wanting to be left behind.
Prudence was fearless, she was outspoken, she would’ve been the leader of the group if Jack wasn’t so thick-headed. Standing at 5’7” with strikingly black hair in a short pixie cut, and an athletic build- she was the image of perfection in that town. She too didn’t care for school, nor for the small township in where she lived; her eyes had stars in them. She loved drama class and when her senior year was over planned to leave Crestwood in the dust for the glitz and glamour of Hollywood. She felt most at home in the limelight and often fought Jack for the attention of any crowd they may be in. She had some feelings for Lee, he was always sweet to her and unlike any boy she had met before; though he never seemed interested in her so she just left it at friendship. She had a brief relationship with Jack though it ended when she learned what he was really like, she was disgusted by the philandering mess of a man he would no doubt become. This was the truth, regardless of the stories she had heard from others around campus.
The group had been friends all through high school, even before the dating had begun. Others had joined in but usually ended up leaving, or being less-than-desirable friends. The five of them had always been the core, and though they’d soon be going their separate ways, they knew that they would remain friends long into adulthood and even old age. They too were struck with the same exasperated boredom that fell on every other youth in that town. Having exhausted most of their fun ideas already and determined to make this the summer to remember, they met one morning at the Four and Twenty Blackbirds coffee shop in the heart of Crestwood.
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