Back by popular demand
"Man like Juice yu'knar."
I laughed and gave him a hug.
"Long time no-see PJ" PJ was one of Bandz's friends from way back. "This is Avela. Avela this is PJ."
She waved at him and nodded in acknowledgement giving me a look men give to men to let them know that their chick is a dime-piece. She was dime-piece but she wasn't mine -- YET.
We walked into Bandz's open plan living space/kitchen and there loads of familiar faces. One of them being my brother. I grinned at him and he looked at Avela and winked at me. I shook my head and walked over to him holding her hands in the process. I was aware she was around strangers and didn't want her to feel awkward or left out.
"Hi Landon." She waved.
He got up and gave her a hug.
"Wassup Vellas you good?" He asked.
At this point in time, everyone had a nickname for her and I lowkey found that hilarious.
"Ready to have fun." She said excitedly looking at me.
I shook my head.
*
We sat down and I introduced her to Bandz and the everyone that was there that I knew. Bandz had left to go pick up his wife and some of her friends from the train station. We all got comfortable and started drinking. I mostly watched the game and Avela. She was so engrossed in the game of cards it made me laugh. I heard a bunch of voices and assumed Bandz was back. In walked Bandz with a bunch of pretty girls and his wife. She waved and I chuckled looking at Avela. I was interested to see how they would interact with each other. Once again, everyone introduced themselves he really got the night started. In the end it ended up being an even number of male to females so we decided to go up against each other.
It started off with a University Challenge type vibe where each group had to pick two representatives for the challange. Phye and another girl called Jourdane went up for the ladies and PJ and Nero (another old face) went up for the guys. After five minutes I was embarrassed at how badly we were loosing. The girls were killing it. Especially Phye. It was almost as though her brain was plugged into the Google mainframe.
"What is the sixth commandment?"
"Thou shall not kill". They both shouted. I shook my head in disappointment.
"1-0 to the girls. Guys I'm disappointed. What a mess." Bandz said genuinely disappointed. I was too. Growing up with a twin meant I was super competitive. I knew Landon was going through it too. We had to redeem ourselves. The challenges had been written inside a bowl and the guys had picked out the first challenge so it was the time for ladies to do. Phye rummaged through the bowl for so long Landon started shouting abuse at her. She laughed and finally took out one. She burst out laughing. Sunny took the paper from her and burst out laughing too.
"What does it say?" Real asked.
"It says, strip tease."
I immediately turned to Landon and the grin on his face made me laugh out loud. He was ready for Sunny to be up on him.
"Who put this in there?" A girl called Princess asked chuckling.
The silence that radiated from Nero let me know that he was the culprit. I was happy to keep his secret.
