Tainted Entropies

RECKLESSNESS.2

CONTENT WARNING: SUBSTANCE

[Saturday. April 2. 20:26]

The rave was held at San Pablo, two hours away from Solomon. Despite the distance, the three of them still decided to come. After all, it was a pop-up, and it was the first music fest this summer vacation, too, so they really had to go.

It was already deep into the night when they reached the once empty plot of land that was now occupied by an impressive stage. It was fully-equipped with different kinds of light and fog machines, and even had a huge LED screen behind the DJ that displayed trippy-like backdrops as EDM roared through the night-sky.

It was capable of waking even those that were long dead in a five-mile radius. Good thing that the venue was actually quite far from the city proper, thus allowing them to blast music without having to receive an awful lot of noise complaints.

The car finally slowed down to a halt in an empty spot beside an assortment of different vehicles. It looked as though their owners were itching to join the fest just by looking at how their prized cars were carelessly parked on the wide field.

Kael sighed and glanced at his phone to see if Aliana had already replied to his previous message. However, just as he was about to type a message, a loud shout came from behind the barricades where most of the people were at.

Thinking that the shout sounded like his name, he squinted his eyes before the three of them walked towards the entrance themselves.

Ah, the person who shouted his name turned out to be none other than Ali. She wore a thin crop top and a revealing tennis skirt, but what caught Kael’s attention was her neon-coloured bracelets that seemed to emit a glowing light through the pulsating darkness of the night.

“Can I have one of those?” he blurted out just as he approached her. Realising what he had just said, Kael pursed his lips before letting out a chuckle. “I mean, why did I not hear about this music fest? I was literally dawdling at a random parking lot when I found out. If you hadn’t told me, I would’ve been already sleeping my ass off right now.”

Ali took off one of her bracelets—the white one that glowed a pretty silver—and handed it to Kael before waving at Arthur and Joaquin that stood behind him. “Yeah, understandable. I only found out about it a few hours ago, too. It seemed like the DJ just impulsively decided to host a small-scale music fest.” She looked around and waved at someone from the crowd. “Look, there’s Akemi!” She pointed at the man who was holding three solo cups in his hands.

Kael could only steal a quick glance at where Ali had pointed before Joaquin suddenly tapped his shoulder.

“I saw some of my friends so I’ll be joining them first. I’ll come find you after, or you can just call me when it’s time to go home.” He nodded and smiled at Kael before running to a group of people that seemed older than Joaquin by a few years.

Kael’s eyes lingered at the one with a snake tattooed on his forearm before his attention was then stolen by the person who shoved a red solo cup on his hand. Startled, his eyes shot at Akemi, who was now coaxing Arthur to drink from the cup he just gave him.

“Man, just one sip! It’s not spiked, if that’s what you’re worried about. I swear, it isn’t!” His actions were snappy as he raised his right hand that was holding his own drink, to show that he was honest. With just a glance, anyone could tell that Akemi was either already drunk, or was higher than the moon above their heads.

Kael figured it was the latter.

After all, Akemi was such a huge fan of taking candies, in contrast to his big sister, Lynde, who was more fond of trying to destroy her liver while performing at a gig with Arcane and the rest of their band.

When Akemi finally convinced Arthur to drink the shot, he turned to Kael and hooked his arm around his shoulders. “I haven’t seen you in a while! Where the hell were you when I threw a party for my cat’s birthday?! Come, drink, drink!”

Kael snorted as he shook his head from pure amusement. “Been hanging around Arthur more often these days since his place is near and I felt like lazing around.” He took a sip from his drink before deciding to hop into Akemi’s topic. “Your cat’s birthday was last week, right? My bad. I was attending a seminar at the church, so I was unable to attend.”

Akemi rolled his eyes before taking out his phone and showing photos of his Siamese cat wearing a party hat while sitting idly on a mat.

He was so absorbed in his cat’s photo that Kael felt even more amused about the situation. Exchanging knowing glances with Aliana and Arthur, he shook his head before patting their s**t-faced friend’s head.

After a few moments, it seemed to Akemi that Ali was more interested in his cat’s birthday party than Kael was. Thus, he turned around and started chatting with her about their pets.

Arthur and Kael was left alone while sipping on their drinks.

“He’s so talkative, right?” Kael started. “I met him last year at an org. meeting. He’s fun, don’t you think?” He glanced at his friend, waiting for a response.

A few seconds later, Arthur nodded slowly. “The man alone, can combat you and Joaquin’s loudness combined.”

Kael chuckled. “Agreed. He’s really loud,” he said as he looked around, finally taking in the surroundings.

Despite being at the outskirts of the crowd, the music still shook Kael to the core, and the lights doused him of different hues that it almost seemed like his black shirt morphed into a colourful rainbow.

It was really a lively crowd, now that Kael finally looked around. The people seemed as if they were one organism, collectively jumping on time with the beat, cheering and hooting every now and then whenever the DJ tried edging them with the beat drop.

His face lit up when he remembered what he was supposed to ask Akemi. Turning to his friend that was just finishing up his conversation about preferred veterinary clinics around Solomon, he asked: “By the way, dude, who’s the DJ?” He looked up at the stage, but it was too far away, and too high up that he didn’t catch a good glimpse of the person standing behind the DJ table.

It was as if he remembered something, too, that Akemi’s face lit up. “Right, right! I was going to introduce you to the DJ and her boyfriend! I almost forgot.” He grabbed Kael’s wrist before dragging him deep into the crowd of people before he could even protest.

Looking back at Arthur, he sighed. It seemed that the moment they left the guy alone on his spot, a woman took her chance into striking a conversation. Well good luck to her, Kael thought to himself, after all Arthur isn’t in the mood to—

Oh, s**t.

How could he forget that Arthur was currently in bad terms with Inka?

He hissed before shaking his head from the thoughts that entered his mind. He could only hope that Arthur wouldn’t dare do it again.

The last time he attempted to do so, he was caught by Inka. It wasn’t impossible tonight, too, since Inka might also be there with her friends.

And it wasn’t as if Kael could stop him from doing such things. It wasn’t because he didn’t want to, but because he was unable to.

Letting the matter go and hoping for the best, Kael downed his drink before looking around the crowd of people that smelled that of beer and cigarette smoke combined. Akemi, who was resting his arms around Kael’s waist jumped along with the crowd, resulting to Kael being dragged with each jump. Eventually, though, he joined in the fun and even started greeting the familiar faces that they passed by as they approached the stage.

They were about to go up the steep flight of stairs leading up to where the DJ was when they were stopped by two burly men wearing black tracksuits which made Kael feel uneasy. Wearing Adidas tracksuits in summer? Totally unheard of.

“Relax, relax, Niccolo asked specifically for this guy, so can we pass through?” Akemi cheerily said, with his eyes half-lidded from the pleasures of his high.

Kael could only sigh in exasperation before they were allowed to actually pass through. “Who’s Niccolo?” he asked his almost-incapacitated friend.

“Hm!” He raised his brows and shut his eye before walking up the stairs. “He’s . . . he’s the one who contacted me about this pop-up fest—”

“Contacted you, why?” Kael’s brows furrowed.

“Uhm, because this is my property?” He stomped on the scaffolding that was the stairs for a few times before calming down. “Anyway, the man told me he wanted to meet a certain Mikaela Angeles, so I was like . . . sure! I most certainly know the dude.” Despite having one of his eyes closed from battling his own body from shutting down completely, he was still able to guide the both of them towards the men who were standing at the edge of the stage.

“And I wasn’t even informed about this event.” Kael chuckled before sweeping a glance on the table was set up on the side, where the drinks and snacks were. There were two men standing idly near the table, looking as if they were too absorbed with their conversation to even notice Kael and Akemi’s arrival.

“About that—” Akemi chuckled, “—yeah, I totally forgot to tell you. My bad. I was drunk the whole day, even I almost forgot about this event!”

With the sudden rise in his tone, he finally caught the attention of the other two. Kael tried to smile, however his embarrassment for Akemi made it look more like a grimace.

“Akemi, why are you so drunk? It’s still early in the night!” The man, who was a few inches taller than Kael, said. His hair was a gross shade of blond that it made him look like a French fry in Kael’s mind.

Akemi waved his hand before gesturing at Kael. “Niccolo, this is Mikaela Angeles. It’s pronounced as ‘Mi-ka-ye-la’, not ‘Mi-ka-e-la’, by the way,” he slurred, making it obvious that he really was wasted. “And Mikaela, this is Niccolo Sparaci. He’s from Florence, Italy.”

Kael could feel his ears glow red from embarrassment. Who the hell introduces their friend like that! “Nice to meet you. You can call me Kael.” He chuckled under his breath as he shook hands with the French fry-looking man who was, apparently, someone from Florence, and not France.

“Nice to meet you, too, Kael.” He smiled before offering them a drink and also introducing the other person that Niccolo was talking to a few seconds ago.

Kael stared at the man who was just introduced—he looked oddly familiar, and it made Kael feel uneasy. He was pretty sure that he already knows this Matthew person.

Matthew seemed to have noticed Kael’s burning stare, and chuckled in amusement. “Let me guess. You don’t remember me?” He sipped from his drink and nodded in amusement. “ObliCon.”

“ObliC—oh!” Kael repeated, and with each syllable that escaped his mouth, he realised something. “We attended the same class!” He nodded enthusiastically, still absorbing the revelation. “Yeah, I do know you.”

After a few exchanges between the four of them, Kael finally brought up his question, turning his attention to Niccolo. “I heard you wanted to meet me?”

Niccolo’s brows shot up before he nodded. “Oh, yeah. I’ve seen your works across **, and it just so happened that me and my girlfriend were planning on going around Asia this year to host a few music festivals before I enter art school.”

Kael’s jaw dropped. “Art school?”

“Yeah, I plan on attending Accademia di Belle Arti—Ryse! Drink up, you must be thirsty from all the standing!” His attention was stolen by the person who stood behind Kael. “Please wait,” he said before jogging towards the person, holding a bottle of cold water.

Kael watched as the two of them talked about something, nodding occasionally, before they both turned to Kael’s direction.

Ryse waved at him, and beckoned him to come and follow her to the edge of the stage, where the DJ setup was. She was wearing a black tank top that had allowed a lot of webbing straps to wrap around her torso in a manner that made it look like she was wearing a parachute, and a black leather skirt that almost revealed her behind. Her strides were sharp, making her knee-high boots create a resounding clack on the wooden floor with each step.

Curious, Kael followed immediately, leaving Akemi with Matthew, who were both strolling aimlessly around the confined spaces of the stage while chatting. He was about to introduce himself to her when she managed to beat him to it.

With a huge smile, she offered her hand. “Ryse Alexeyev. Nice to meet you.”

“Mikaela Angeles. It’s nice to meet you too—”

“Kael!” shouted someone in an alarmed voice, which made Kael instinctively look for the source of it.

Finding that it was Joaquin who was standing below the stage, trying to get Kael’s attention, he raised his brows before squatting down the edge in order to be able to hear his voice clearly.

The moment he heard what he had said, his heart sank.

“Arthur!”

One word, and Kael already knew what had occurred. He had hoped that Arthur wouldn’t do it, but in the end, he still did.