A letter from May 22nd, 2020

Dear FutureMe, I am feeling nostalgic and would like to pass that on to you. Here's a memory you should hold on to: It's not one specific time, its the feeling of senior year in high school when Papa started dating and would leave us alone every other weekend. We would have parties all the time. Honestly, what did he expect us to do? I have yet to replicate the feeling of that year. Of everyone in our basement getting **** faced. Just downing liquor left and right, not caring cause none of us really had jobs yet and school was too easy at that point. We just all loved each other. It was the triplets, Corey, Jim, Jack, Jac, and sometimes Cera. I remember the very first time I went down there to hang out with the boys while they were drinking Jac made me a Captain Morgan and coke, which was mostly Captain Morgan. I drank so much of it and woke up the next morning in my own bed with puke in my hair. Apparently I was talking nonsense to Corey, puked, passed out, and then went up stairs. They made me clean up my own puke the next morning. Sam and Jac played liquor pong. Corey tried to cut up limes to make some sort of mixed drink, cut his finger, spilled candle wax all over the air hockey table. The boys would have pull up competitions. One night Jim ran and jumped on the couch and broke the back of it. One night Jim turned to Sam and asked if she wanted to make a bad decision, and they did more than that! (I am jealous that Sam got to have her first time with such an amazing guy. And I am so glad that they are still friends to this day). One night Katie and Jack had *** in Papas bed, didn't tell anyone, left behind a rumpled bed and a condom in the trash. And we all got in so much trouble with Papa the next day. We would go through handles of Captain Morgan and Fire Ball. Why did we have such terrible taste? One night Jac was puking and Jack was in there taking care of him. Jack had his hat on and was rubbing Jacs back. Corey and I were laying on the floor outside of the bathroom and he told me about this girl Anna who he felt was the love of his life. They met at summer camp and one of them was always dating someone else. One time my childhood crush Levi joined us. He was only in the friend group for a short time because everyone thought he was kind of a jerk. He and I got drunk, went up to Sams room, he stuck his hands down my pants, Sam walked in, we couldn't find another place to go, he wanted to hook up outside by the fire pit, I said no, I slept on the couch, and we never talked about it again. I am so glad nothing happened because he was a jerk and honestly wouldn't have been very good. I would say it was a little nice to know though that my childhood crush was wanting to hook up with me, but I know now that boys are stupid and will hook up with anything with a pulse. On a similar note. One night Jack and I were drinking and I sucked his **** in Papas bed. It was so bad, I was so drunk, and I had never even really kissed anyone at that point. It was so so awkward and we never really talked about it after. It is now a joke brought up from time to time about how bad I was and how Jacks **** was my first kiss. Looking back now, almost three years later, I am so glad nothing happened. He and I never would have been good together and, if I'm being honesty, I am out of his league at this point. Overall message of the last two paragraphs: I am so glad I didn't lose my virginity to anyone in high school because it would have so not been worth it. While those were two long paragraphs they were mean bumps in the road during an amazing year and summer. The joy of senior year and summer 2018 came from being with our people, it wasn't about anyone hooking up, that stuff just happened. Most nights we would play this game where the first boy to take their shirt off was the winner. It would usually end up with Jim running downstairs without a shirt on, causing all the other boys to rip their shirts off too. I don't know how we came up with that, but it was funny. We would start these parties at around 8pm and would just do shots and pass out by 11 or 12. It's funny because now when we have people over we drink beer and play games and talk, we don't get that ****** up anymore. The next morning after those weekends during senior year I would make everyone breakfast and coffee. We would then all clean up the house together. We took out trash bags and picked everything up, cleaned up puke, and then took the trash to the dump. We would often go to IHOP after too. I miss that. I've been to a few other parties now that I'm in college and I miss cleaning up with everyone after. I miss seeing that human side of people. The two best parties were: after prom at mama's house where Sarah and Jack hooked up, Lani and Jac got way too high, Jim got lost in the woods, and Dante won homecoming king and passed out with the crown in one hand and a bottle of fire ball in the other. Graduation at Jacks house was also an amazing one because it was so spontaneous, we all just wanted to hang out and say goodbye. I'm thinking of that senior year because last night Sam and I went over to Jims for a bonfire and Corey and Jack were there. We talked about how none of us had really ever felt the magic like that again. We created something so special when we all hung out. We all loved each other and there was no judgment, we all just wanted to have a good time. We are still friends now obviously, but there was something magical back then when we just didn't care about anything, when we didn't know what a hangover felt like. I think that was the first time in all of our lives that we really felt like we had found Our People. I hope by the time you get this letter that you have found some new people, or better yet, I hope that you are still friends with Jim and Corey, and I hope that Jack is doing all right.