That she has hundreds of those pics scratches at me a little. It means I’ve been in a foul mood hundreds of times. I had to come back to Public because we couldn’t afford the Montessori school anymore, so maybe it means I get to reinvent myself a little. Maybe Abby is a little right in saying that we are all getting older—none of us are the same people we were two years ago. I’m not the same. At least, I don’t have to be.
“I’m sorry.” I half shout the words to my friend because the music is still making it hard to hear. I’m probably not going to be able to apologize to her more than this one time, so I have to make sure she hears it.
Her mouth curves slowly and she flits her thick black lashes at me before leaning forward enough to push gently at my shoulder.
“Aww, June. You’re getting all mushy.”
I squeeze my eyes shut in playful shame.
“Apology accepted. I’m not sure what you’re apologizing for, but I’ll save it up and cash it in when I feel like it,” she says.
“Okay.” I laugh, opening my eyes as my friend tips her head back and drinks the rest of her beer. When she’s done, she leans forward again, reaching for my can to test the weight. It’s still nearly half full, even with the portion I dumped, so I give it to her reluctantly.
Her eyes haze with suspicion.
“One of us is driving home. Let it be me, okay? I’m not a big beer girl anyhow.” I hold her stare as we each grasp the cup between us. She hasn’t fully committed yet so I don’t let go.
“Abby, I promise. I’m going to stay, and I’ll have fun, just not with the beer, okay?”
Her eyes squint a little more. She’s still not buying it.
“How about this? Whatever they’re doing in there, on the sofas”—some stupid game I would normally make fun of—“you take my beer and I’ll go play that game.” I regret my offer the second the cup leaves my grip. She gulps nearly half of it down before wiping her chin along her forearm and kicking her leg over the beam to stand on the deck.
Shit. We’re going to play a party game.
“Well, all right then,” she says, threading our fingers together and tugging me forward until I lose the balance battle and fall to my feet.
Not wanting to look as though I’m being dragged into this—even though I am—I loop my arm around my friend’s and smile at her. She isn’t convinced. She tosses her head back in laughter, but lets me save face while we make our way inside. At the huge sectional sofa , people are tossing dice on a giant trunk-style coffee table and picking small papers out of a bowl depending on the number they roll. Abby and I kneel on the floor behind a few of the others.
“I’m not next. You’re next!” One of the many faces I don’t know but recognize shoves playfully at another vaguely familiar girl. In their fit of nervous giggling, the one holding the dice glances in my direction.
“New girl! Your turn.” Bile shoots up my throat and burns.
“Oh, no.” I hold up a palm and shake my head as if refusing hors d’oeurves.
“She’s being shy. She’ll play. What’s the game?” Abby takes the dice and plops them in my palm, which she has to pry open after lifting my fist from the carpet.
I make wide eyes at her while I hold my breath, but she shakes me off.
“You promised,” she says, holding up the rest of her beer and tipping it back with an “ahh.”
I inhale deeply while the girl who volunteered me explains the rules. “You roll a number and pick out that many dares.”
“So, I could have to do twelve dares?” I ask this as though I’m really going to roll these dice.
“Oh, my God, no! You pick them and then the last person who went gets to pick which one you do. Like, Naomi made me walk to the kitchen and back in her bra!”
This game seems incredibly complex for what it really is: Truth or dare, sans the truth part. I’d like to make a motion that we add the truth part back in, but that’s because I’m painfully boring.
“So, who gets to pick my dare?” I’m still acting as if I’m really planning to play.
“I do.” I recognize the voice without turning around. Of all of the faces I don’t recognize here, that voice belongs to one I know I will. For as long as I have loved Lucas Fuller, Ava Pryor has hated me. I’d blame her for all the lame pranks I endured sophomore year, but overt bullying isn’t her style. She’s more of the “burn you with a glare” kinda girl, and that glare has this amazing power to make a person feel insignificant with a bat of her lashes. I glance over my shoulder and that stare is ready and waiting to zap my ego—what little there is of it—to shit.
“Lola went last,” the girl I’ve identified as Naomi says.
“That’s because I had to refill my beer. Scoot.” Ava flits her fingers and the girls slide apart to make space for her on the center of the couch. She steps between Abby and me on her way to sit down.
“I’m not doing this,” I mumble to my friend. She’s already taken the dice from me, though, and thrown them on the table.
“It’s time to stand up and show some balls.” I meet her eyes, trying to plead my way out of this, silently begging her to take my turn, but with the slight cock of her chin I can tell she’s going to make me walk through this fire.
“Four,” Ava says, a tinge of disappointment in her tone that I rolled such a low number.
“Okay, so I just . . .” I reach toward the bowl and Ava taps it toward me with the toe of her white canvas shoe.
I pull it toward me and search the contents, hoping to find clues in the poorly folded strips of paper, but it’s no use. It doesn’t matter how deep I dig into the plastic snack bowl. I pick out four from the top of the heap and toss them on the table as I sit back on my heels.
“Let’s see,” Ava says, leaning forward and rubbing her palms. I’m sweating watching her meticulously unfold the first paper and drag her gaze along the scribbled line. She’s twirling a lock of her white-blonde hair around her finger while her mouth moves slightly with the words. I stare intently at her face, trying to read her lips. She stops and flits her thick black fake lashes up to stare at me from underneath. Her mouth curves up on one side.
“This one.” She tosses it on the table, but before I can grab it, Abby does.
“You didn’t read them all yet,” my friend says, looking at the paper and chuckling lightly.
“Don’t need to. That one’s the winner.” Ava leans back on the oversized sofa cushion and folds her arms over her chest while crossing her legs.
“You afraid of the dark? Spiders?” Abby flicks the paper toward me with her index finger. I pick it up and read.
SPEND FIVE MINUTES IN THE GARAGE IN THE DARK
“Uh, not really . . . I guess.” I feel as if there’s probably a trick so I’m not going to boast confidently. There’s a catch. I know there is.
“Good, then the time should just fly right by,” Ava says, both sides of her mouth curved into an ominous grin. She glances down the darkened hallway behind me, toward what I assume is the garage door.
“Now?” That sounded stupid. Of course now.
“Uh huh,” she says, flitting her fingers at me with the same nonchalance she had when she forced the girls to give up their seats. Ava is a stereotype. That stereotype is bitch.