The movie ended and Hazel told us good night and headed for the door.
“Wait, before you go, tell me about hot dude from the store!” Scarlett shouted across the room.
“Oh my God, crazy lady. That wasn’t hot dude from the store. I gave him my number, but I haven’t even heard from him. That was Pops letting me know he was home from Amor’s and that he was going to bed. You’re completely insane.” Hazel opened the front door and gave me one more wave. “Night, Winnie.” She looked over at Scarlett. “Night, asshole.”
When the door closed behind her, I picked up my phone and took a look.
Hazel: Nope. Just a few really busy days. Wanna play Hadrian’s Wall tonight?
I would have fist pumped and jumped around if Scarlett hadn’t been watching me like a hawk. Instead, I got up and went to my bedroom to throw on some joggers and to load up Hadrian’s Wall on my PC.
Hazel wasn’t talking to someone else. And she was still talking to Gray. I didn’t know what had made her shy away for a couple of days, but it didn’t matter now. She was back. I was still in the game. I was off the bench and ready to score.
Age 17
Holy shit. I looked over at Scarlett passed out on a couch in some random house out in the country and knew I was going to have to do something I really didn’t want to. And I was going to have to eat crow doing it.
“Scarlett.” I tapped the side of her face. Others might call it a slap, but I was calling it a tap. “Come on, wake the fuck up, woman.”
Her eyes fluttered open and her head rolled against the back of the couch she was sitting on. “I’m awake. I’m totalllllllly awake.” Her words were slurred and she could barely hold her head up, meaning almost not at all.
Fuck, I’d only left her alone for an hour. I’d gone to sit out by the fire with my shitty date for the night, Rob. I said shitty because now I couldn’t find his ass to help me get Scarlett home and he was the one who’d driven us out into the middle of nowhere bum fuck.
“It’s okay, baby,” I said, petting Scarlett’s head. “I’ll get us home. Even if it means kissing your brother’s ass.” I rolled my eyes. The things I did for my friends. I stepped outside to avoid the loud music and dialed up Ollie from my phone, still trying to understand how Scarlett had gotten so shit-faced so fast. I mean, I’d had four beers and was only tipsy, so I had no idea how many she’d had to be this drunk.
“You’ve got be joking. It’s fucking three a.m.” Oliver’s sleepy voice came over the phone.
“Good morning to you, too, Winnie.”
Scarlett gave a loud snore that made all the people partying in the room chuckle.
“What do you want, Hazel?”
Well, shit. It looked like Oliver was still mad that we hadn’t taken him out with us tonight. But I’d been going on a date. Sort of. And it felt weird to bring him along. Now I was going to pay for it.
“Well, see,” I started, scared to tell him that Rob had ditched us and that Scarlett was deliriously drunk.
“Spit it out.”
Oh, God, he was getting more irate by the minute. “Rob ditched us at the party and we need a ride home.” I spat it out so quickly, I was hoping he only understood half of it. The half where we needed a ride home to be specific. I’d wait to tell him about Scarlett until he got here. I wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, but I wasn’t the dullest either.
“I told you not to go out with that douche.” I could hear him moving around now, so I was guessing that meant he wasn’t going to leave our sorry asses out here in the middle of nowhere. “Where are you?”
Shit. “Oh…about that.” I looked around at all the drunk and stoned people in the room with us and decided they probably didn’t know where they were either. “I don’t know. Somewhere in the country.”
Oliver gave a low growl that probably meant he wanted to kill my ass. “I can’t believe you right now.” I knew he said that from between his clenched teeth. Because I’d heard him say that plenty of times before and I knew exactly what it looked like. After all, Winnie was the responsible one. “Share your location from your phone.”
And this was a perfect example of him being the responsible one. “Oh. Good idea. You’re so smart, Winnie.”
He didn’t respond. Which I thought was odd. Oliver loved it when he was right. “Hello?” Nothing. “Winnie?” Still nothing. I looked at the screen and realized he’d hung up. I shrugged and walked back in the house and sat next to Scarlett on the couch. I sent him my location from my phone. I knew Oliver would come and save us. He always did. You would have thought he was the older one.
“Scarlett!” I shouted over the loud music. She didn’t move. “Scarlett!” I yelled again closer to her ear.
This time her head rolled toward mine and her eyes opened. “Stop yelling at me, Hazel,” she slurred out.
I pressed my forehead to hers. “Winnie’s on his way.”
“Of course he is,” she mumbled back.
I nodded, neither of us surprised by our predicament or that Oliver was coming to save us. Again.
Since I was stuck there for at least twenty minutes more I decided to drink another beer while we waited for Ollie. And Scarlett decided to continue snoring.
I’d just finished up when I saw him come swaggering across the room to Scarlett and me. He didn’t look happy like he usually did. In fact, he looked downright livid.
So I gave him a big smile and tried to pretend to be completely sober. “Hey, Winnie.”
He stopped in front of the couch a foot from us and looked at me and then at Scarlett snoring away and then back at me. “You have got to be fucking kidding me. What’s wrong with her?”
I should mention that when Ollie smiled, it was breathtaking, but when he was scowling, it was panty melting. He had the kind of jaws you could cut granite on now. He had a thick head of brown hair and striking hazel eyes with the kind of lashes every girl wished for. He was big and strong and tall. It was such a shame that he was my best friend’s brother. Yes, my Winnie had grown up to be a knock-out. But I knew I wouldn’t be doing any knocking.
I continued to smile so I could somehow downplay this situation even though I knew he was going to want to murder me. Scarlett’s safety and well-being were always at the top of Oliver’s priorities and I’d failed her tonight.
“Well, see. She was talking to some hot guy and I decided to leave her to it and go out by the fire with Rob. I was only gone an hour and I came—”
“Enough.” He cut me off, leaned over, and hoisted Scarlett up by her underarms, then threw her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. He stomped to the front door and I followed, knowing now was the time to shut my drunk mouth.
“Hey, Olls,” Scarlett said loudly and drunkenly from upside down on Ollie’s back. She gave his ass a hard slap. I almost told Scarlett to shut her drunk mouth, too.
“I can’t believe how irresponsible y’all are.” He opened the door to his old hand-me-down Honda Civic and laid Scarlett on the back seat gently. She proceeded to curl into a ball and start snoring again. “This is why you shouldn’t have gone out without me tonight.”