She wastes more alcohol than she lands in her cup. Before I can stop her, she has pressed a shot into my hand. The liquid is already sweating through the flimsy paper cup, like the kind you see in dentists’ offices.
“How about you, Brent? A drink, for old times’ sake?” Annie seems to find this idea hilarious, and says, “Old friends, old memories, old. We’re old, now.”
Before she can drink, Misha materializes, neatly snatching the cup from Annie’s hand.
“You need to slow down,” she says lightly. For a second, Annie looks like she might argue.
But in the end, she only shrugs and turns back to me. “She always could tell me what to do,” she says. “Both of them.” I assume she means Kaycee, too. Then she wheels off abruptly into the crowd.
“Three times in one week! How did I get so lucky?” Misha manages to level off directly between sincere and sarcastic. She touches her cup to mine. “Cheers. Go on. You deserve it.”
Deserve—maybe. I need it, for sure. I almost never take shots and am thankful, at least, that Annie poured out whiskey and not rum. Still, it’s cheap liquor, and it burns going down.
Brent must notice my grimace, because he laughs.
“Let me make you a real drink. No—don’t tell me.” He pretends to size me up. “Now let me see. Vodka cran? No. Too sweet. Definitely not gin. Too suburban.”
“You think you can guess?”
“I don’t think. I know.” He holds my gaze for just a beat longer than necessary before turning to Misha. “You want something? Gin and tonic?”
Her smile tightens. “Gin and soda,” she corrects him.
“Coming up. Don’t go head to head with this one,” he says, turning back to me and jerking his head in Misha’s direction. “She’ll drink you under the table. Or under the reservoir, as the case may be.”
He says it lightly, but for some reason, Misha flinches. Once, I told my mother I wanted to be a mermaid, and she told me that real mermaids were the drowned souls of broken-hearted women; I don’t know why I remember that now. I blink as if it will help clear out the memory.
Brent turns and shoves his way toward the makeshift bar: a litter of alcohol bottles and mixers spread out on a blanket. Already, I can feel the whiskey doing its work, spreading warmth to my chest, softening the glow of the fire. Misha tonight looks more like the Misha I remember, in jeans and a Barrens Tigers T-shirt.
“Brent was so worried you wouldn’t come,” she says brightly, without preamble. “I told him you wouldn’t miss the chance to relive the glory days. Isn’t that what going home is all about?”
I can feel her watching me for a reaction—but what kind of reaction, I’m not sure. It occurs to me that Misha never had a boyfriend in high school. She had plenty of boys—but no boyfriend. I wonder if she was jealous of what Kaycee had. Another question I’ll never ask her.
“Maybe for some. In my glory days, I would never have been invited. And they weren’t so glorious. But I’m sure you remember.”
It’s a cheap shot, but hey, at least now we’re even.
But when Misha says, “I deserve that,” it makes me wish I hadn’t said anything.
As I scan the crowd, it occurs to me that I don’t see Cora Allen. She used to stick to Misha like a shadow. “Do you ever see Cora anymore?” I ask, partly to change the topic.
Misha tries to arrange her face into a look of concern. But somehow it doesn’t quite land. “She doesn’t come around,” she says shortly. Then: “She got all messed up, honestly. Drugs.”
Before I can ask her anything else, Brent returns, balancing three cups. He passes one to Misha and presents mine with a flourish. “Cheers.”
I take an experimental sniff. “Vodka soda?”
“Did I guess right?”
“Trick question.” I can’t help but smile. He looks so damn pleased with himself. “I drink it all.”
“Even better. That way, I’m always right.” He touches his cup to mine and holds my eyes while we drink. By the time I think to include Misha, she has vanished.
Things are blurring, and my body feels warm and loose, as if the coil that keeps it responding to my brain has slowly begun to unwind.
“Whoa, there. Easy,” Brent says, and catches me when I stumble on a log half-buried in the grass.
“I’m not drunk,” I say.
“I’m not judging,” he replies, and pulls me closer. I feel his belt against my stomach. I pull away because the world is turning now.
“Do you remember Dave Condor?” I ask, before I can think better of it.
“Sure,” Brent says, but looks away. “He’s still around. Works at the liquor store. Once a burnout, always a burnout.” He tugs on the collar of his shirt. “Why?”
“Just curious,” I downplay. “I ran into him, that’s all.”
“Keep your distance.” Brent’s voice sounds as if it’s coming from far away. “He’s not the guy you want to keep running into.”
“What happened with him in high school?” I ask. “Why did you and your friends jump him?”
His blue eyes lock with mine again, hard to read in the darkness. “You remember Becky Sarinelli?” he asks. “That’s why.”
Of all the things he could have said, this might be the least expected of all. “Condor was the one who passed around her photos?”
Brent shakes his head. “He was the one who took them.”
—
Time shreds into ribbons. Hours fracture into quick-cut images:
I’m sitting on the ground with Brent’s arms around me in front of the fire, laughing without knowing why.
“You’re going hard tonight.” Brent’s voice meanders through my fog. “I like it.”
“I like it,” I repeat, and laugh. I’m fucked up. Too far gone to hide it. I lean against Brent’s chest. He’s so solid and warm. He is comfortable. Brent tilts my chin back toward his to ask me something; and then we are leaning into each other. Kissing. But I’m too drunk to know whether I like it or not.
I pull away. Brent’s eyes hold a look I can’t read.
“Isn’t this funny?” I ask. “We’re kissing. I thought we kissed in high school, and this whole time I haven’t been sure, and we’re kissing now, and I don’t even know whether I made it up.”
“I wanted to. I wanted so badly to kiss you in high school,” Brent whispers. Does this mean he did or he didn’t?
My mind slides to Dave Condor, his mouth hot on my skin…
Dark. Light. Dark. Light.
Becky Sarinelli’s thighs, blazing in the glare of the flash.
The laughter of the crowd in the stands. Her photo fluttering up toward me.
Then:
The faces around the fire are no longer familiar: they are huge, bloated like balloons. Brent’s voice is somewhere in the background, talking incessantly. He won’t be quiet.
I’m sleeping. This is a dream. I lie down, but the ground won’t stop moving. It feels as if I’m on a boat. I try to open my eyes.
“You’re okay,” says Brent’s voice. “You’re okay.” His voice is a separate thing. Listening to it makes me feel tired. And sleepy.