I thought of all the people I’d passed on the way to the kitchen and how a lot of them wore dull expressions. One group sat in front of a laptop in the living room and watched YouTube videos. Did they have to come to someone else’s house to do that? What was the point?
Even those who seemed happy were being stupid. Brandon would have never sat down beside me, told me I had beautiful eyes, and broken out into song if he hadn’t been plastered.
I don’t know what I had expected to find at one of these parties. It’s not like I had expected everyone to be playing charades, but I’d figured something entertaining must happen. Until that moment, I hadn’t realized the alcohol was the entertainment. Apparently the idea was to slosh your brain until it had fun by itself—and then, lo and behold, staring at the underside of a table became a thing of joy.
The song ended and Brandon finished his serenade. He turned back to me. “I ought to start my own band. It would be great. I could play the guitar, get paid lots of money, and women would throw themselves at me.” He took a sip of his beer. “Have you ever thought about being a groupie?”
“Not really.” I glanced at the clock on the wall. Elise’s three minutes were up. I motioned for her to come over.
She got up and pulled Chad along after her. Instead of looking at me, she leaned close to Brandon, and stage whispered, “How’s it going?”
“I don’t know,” Brandon said. “Your friend isn’t very talkative.”
I stood up. “That’s because Elise and I have to leave now.”
Elise ignored me. “Cassidy is kind of repressed. She needs to learn to enjoy life.”
I sent her more psychic kill vibes.
“You know what happens to repressed people,” she added as though she were a doctor delivering a diagnosis. “One day they snap, shave their heads, and start soliciting money from strangers in airports. You don’t want that to be your fate. You need somebody to sweep you off your feet.” To Brandon she said, “Be the broom. Be the sweeper. Be the . . .” she hiccupped, “you know, that plastic thing you sweep junk into.”
“The dust pan?” I provided.
She fluttered a hand in Brandon’s direction. “Yeah. That. Be that.”
“Elise,” I started, but I didn’t finish. While my back was to Brandon, he picked me up, literally sweeping me off my feet. He twirled me around—something intoxicated people really shouldn’t do. He stumbled once, and I suddenly had visions of cracking my head open and being rushed to the emergency room. Thankfully, after one twirl he set me up right again, still keeping his arm around my waist. I wasn’t sure whether he was trying to be romantic or just using me to steady himself.
“Wow,” he said looking at his feet. “The tile on the floor is moving. Have you ever noticed that?”
I turned to find Elise. She and Chad had headed out of the kitchen, holding hands.
I stepped away from Brandon, disconnecting his hand from my waist. “Elise, where are you going?”
“I’ll be back in a minute.”
I knew she wouldn’t be back in a minute. It was all in her diabolic plan. She was leaving me with Brandon, and an assortment of other wasted idiots, to fend for myself.
“So,” Brandon said, trailing after me, “Do you want me to sweep you off your feet again?”
I held up a hand to ward him off. “No, my feet are fine on the ground.”
“We can go out back and watch the stars.”
“It’s ten below outside.”
“My car has a heater and a sunroof.”
“I’ll take a rain check, Mr. Dust Pan. I’ve really got to go.”
I made a trip once around the downstairs searching Elise, then went upstairs to look for her there. As I walked by one of the bedrooms, I heard Chad’s voice from behind the door.
“C’mon, Elise. You’ll like it. I promise.”
All sorts of compromising situations came to mind. I put my hand on the doorknob but didn’t turn it. I didn’t want to embarrass Elise. Then again, I didn’t want to leave her in the room with Chad, either. It was wrong. In her state of mind she’d be easy to take advantage of.
My hand didn’t move.
What if she wanted to be taken advantage of? It was her choice, not mine. She constantly told me to let her live her own life. What if she hated me for walking in on her now?
But it didn’t matter. I knew I would hate myself even more if I walked away from the door.
I knocked to give them a moments warning, then turned the knob. The door was locked.
“Who’s there?” Chad called.
“Elise, it’s time to go home.”
“You’re supposed to be off having fun,” she told me. “Go Carpe your diem.”
Chad laughed then said, “Don’t worry about Elise. I’ll take her home.”
I rattled the doorknob again. “No. Open the door.”
I heard them talk quietly, then Chad came to the door. He hadn’t meant to open it all the way, but I pushed my way inside. Elise was leaning up against the bed. I started towards her, then stopped abruptly. A couple of oddly rolled cigarettes sat in an ashtray on the dresser.
I stared at them. “Is that marijuana?”
“No,” Chad said.
Elise held up her hands to stop my words. “I wasn’t going to smoke any.”
I turned to Chad. “You were giving her drugs?”
“It’s just a few joints,” he said, as though it were all a joke. “If you want the hard stuff, you gotta go downstairs to the den.”
I thought of every statistic and news story my parents had made me read about the dangers of mixing alcohol with other drugs. “That’s dangerous and illegal.”
“Calm down,” Chad said, putting himself between me and the dresser. “It’s no big deal. A little pot takes the edge off your stomachache so you don’t throw up.”
He was an expert on this? How often did he do drugs? “And then you can drink yourself into a coma instead?”
He picked up a joint and took a drag. “See? No coma. Just fun.” He tilted his head back and blew out a puff of smoke. “You wanna try some?”
I folded my arms and stared at him. I felt nothing but contempt for him in that moment. “I’m sure Elise told you that I’ve had a crush on you since the eighth grade. But now that I know what you’re like, I think you’re a complete jerk.”
He took another drag. “You had a crush on me?”
Elise shook her head. “I never told him, Cassidy.”
Chad smiled and blew out more smoke. “Since the eighth grade, huh?”
I stepped away from the smoke. The last thing I needed was to come home smelling like pot. “Didn’t you hear anything else I said? I think you’re a jerk.”
He took a step closer to me, still smiling. “Your eyes sparkle when you’re angry. Did you know that?”
Elise walked over to us, her eyes tight with anger. She put her hands on her hips. “I can’t believe this. Are you hitting on my friend while I’m standing right here?”
“I’m just teasing her,” Chad said. “Chill the hormones.”
I took hold of Elise’s arm. “We’re going home right now.”
Elise didn’t answer. We heard a noise downstairs, like something crashing. Chad held up his hand. “Shh.”
We all listened in silence. The music had stopped. We heard raised voices, but not what they said. Footsteps muffled everything.
“I’ll see what’s happening.” Chad put down his joint in an ash tray and strode to the door. “I’ll be right back.”
As soon as he was gone, I snuffed out both joints, smashing them hard. “This isn’t living life to the fullest, Elise. It’s living life to the stupidest.”