The Cole Brothers

The morning of

POV Travis

    I don't really know if you're supposed to bring beer or liquor into a waterpark, but that's just what we've always done. The cooler bag that we take has a collapsible bottom and that's where we put the beer and we usually just fill empty water bottles up with whatever alcohol we have on hand. Is it our fault that nobody's checked it before? Maybe, but I couldn't care less; I need to be in some form of an incoherent state to deal with the waterpark. It's not the worst ever, like we'll be meeting our friends there and stuff, so that'll be fun. I like to ride the rides, too. I guess it's just dealing with all of the other people there, the little kids, and plus the older that I've gotten the less patience I have to wait in those long ass. I think it shouldn't be too bad though. I sit up in my bed and click my phone to see what time it is. The sudden bright light hurts my tired eyes and I have to squint to look at the phone. 6:37 a.m. We're not supposed to leave until like 10, but my body is used to waking up for work. I know that I'm not gonna be able to go back to sleep, so I unlock my phone and start scrolling through my email, seeing if there's anything important that I missed the last few days. I took off today specifically for our water park trip, so I decide that I don't need to focus on anything work-related today and swipe out of my email. I click through my other apps and see if there's anything else worth paying attention to. 

    Around 7ish, I eventually force myself to get out of bed and slide my phone into the pocket of my pajama pants, go brush my teeth, and do other morning routine stuff. When I pass back through the hallway, on the way to the kitchen, I bang on everyone's door just to be annoying; they need to get up soon anyway. In the kitchen, I pull out eggs, bacon, and toast. When I start to cook the eggs, I hear a set of footsteps coming down the stairs. I nonchalantly look over my shoulder and see Alex appear at the landing. 

    "Morning." I say while turning my attention back to the eggs that I'm frying. He looks rough; he has no shirt on, just boxers. His hair is sticking up every which way and the bags under his eyes look like he stayed up most of the night playing on his Xbox. 

    "Ugh. Morning." He sits at one of the barstools at the island and lays his head down in his arms. "Do you have to make so much noise in the morning?" He says, but it sounds muffled because his head is still in his arms. 

    "Yeah, bud, we're heading out to the waterpark today and if I don't wake y'all up, then who will?" God knows that they could sleep past 1 in the afternoon if they weren't bothered. "You know the place opens at 11 and it's over a hour away. We needa get there to get a good set up." I flip my eggs in the skillet. He stays silent. "Are the other two dipshits up yet?" 

    "I don't think so. Brad wasn't up when I left the room and Dylan's light was still off in his room." He yawns and then graduates from having his head buried in his arms to resting his head on his hand and staring off into space still trying to wake up completely. 

    "Okay, well I need you to go get them up if they're not already. We needa start moving, it's already-" I pause to take my phone out of my pocket and check the time."-8:30 and I already know that y'all's slow asses are gonna be dragging me behind." I finish with the eggs and move onto cooking the bacon. 

    "Why can't you?" He says in a monotone voice. I know that he doesn't wanna wake them up, or more specifically wake Brad up, but I couldn't care less right now. I don't have time for their arguing and bullshit. I have a fuck ton of stuff to do before we can leave and I need everyone's help.  I smack him in the back of the head when I pass him to get the salt and pepper.

    "Why can't I? Hmm, I wonder, probably because I gotta finish breakfast, pack up our drinks, pack our lunch shit, make sure everybody has what they need, and in the midst of all that still find everything that I gotta fucking pack, too. So, just cut the crybaby shit and do what I ask." I don't even have time to look in his direction while I'm lecturing him, I just keep cooking.