I don’t know, maybe there’s a part of me that wants to hang out with Chloe for purely selfish reasons. Maybe spending time with someone who only seems to do what makes her happy will rub off on me.
“And of course,” her voice pulls me from my thoughts, “the usuals should all be here tonight so it will be fun.”
We round the entrance to the park, and the first thing I see is the slide. Though it has a fresh coat of paint, it’s still the same metal beast that once served as our castle or pirate ship or home base depending on the game we’d been playing. My chest tightens with fondness as the memories come flooding back in technicolor.
“The usuals?” I ask, ducking to pluck a dandelion from the grass. I press my lips together and blow my wish into the atmosphere.
“Aaron—”
“Your kinda boyfriend?” I supply, chucking the stem on the ground.
“Yup, and his best friends Reese—”
“The one you think should be my kinda boyfriend?”
“Yup.” She grins. “And Devin, your neighbor.”
I swallow back my excitement. I’d hoped I’d see Devin tonight, but since Chloe hadn’t really mentioned him I figured maybe this wasn’t his scene.
“How has he been?” I’d overheard Momma on the phone with Ms. Maisie shortly after his daddy passed away. I’d asked to talk to him, but he wouldn’t come to the phone. I wrote a letter, but he never replied so I just assumed he didn’t want to talk about it. We lost touch after that. I looked him up on Instagram back when I decided to spend the summer in Newton, but was too much of a chicken shit to message him.
“Umm,” she pauses, pressing her fingers to her lips as if trying to find the right words. “He’s basically a hot ass mess. Full-on Stephan off the rails, Ripper vibes.”
“Am I supposed to know what that means?” I arch a brow at her.
She sighs as if she’s in physical pain. “Vampire Diaries? Stephan and Damon Salvatore? Do I have to teach you everything?”
“Hey.” I slap her on the arm. “I know stuff, just not useless stuff.”
“Oh, who cares if you can spout off random facts about old painter dudes who died before our grandparents were born? Big deal.”
“Being able to spout off random pop culture references would be better?” I shoot back.
“It is if you want to get laid,” she says, slapping me on the ass.
“Are those really my options? Dying a virgin, or having sex with boys who’d rather talk about TV shows and movies, than renaissance era artists?”
“Girl, we’re in Georgia, the east side of Newton specifically. The guys here care about basketball and four-wheeling. Plus, we’re only eighteen. It sounds like you’re looking for a forty-year-old, single dad of two.”
I jut out my chin. “What if I am?”
She giggles at my defiance, poking her index finger into the cleft in my chin. “Then we came to the wrong party.”
The grass crunches under our feet as we enter a clearing just off the trail. There are people…everywhere. Some draped over the hoods of cars, some hanging off beds of trucks, while others sit crisscross in the grass. Music plays low from a few of the cars—all different but somehow not chaotic.
“The cops don’t bust you guys?” I ask in amazement. All the times I’d come to The Grove as a child, I’d never imagined this is what was going on behind the trees.
“Nah,” Chloe says, waving to a few girls sitting on top of a paisley blanket. “Partying here is like a Newton rite of passage. Our parents did it, and so did their parents, and well, you get the idea. They typically leave us alone so long as we don’t leave our trash, and no one complains about the noise.”
I nod as we make our way through the crowd, towards a beat-up GMC pickup truck. It seems to be the center of the party. Bodies are congregated around it like it’s the sun and they’re caught in its orbit.
“You want a drink?” she asks, pointing to the keg.
My heart thuds in my chest and a thin layer of sweat coats my brow. I’d like to blame the humidity in Georgia, but it’d be a lie. I tell myself I don’t care what people think of me—hell, I put on my art hoe shirt just to drive the point home, but now that we’re here, I’m realizing I care more than I want to admit. What if they think I’m weird? What if Chloe realizes I’m socially awkward and decides I’m not worth the energy? Then where will I be? A better question, without her, where would my muse be?
“I don’t really drink,” I pause, glancing around the crowd once more, “but something tells me I might need one.”
“At least one.” She hooks her arm through mine. “But we’ll skip the keg. I’m sure the boys have something better.” At that, she drags me through the crowd to the back of the truck. Three guys sit there, holding court like they’re some sort of royalty.
I can’t really see any of their faces through the group of girls vying for their attention. One even growls, “Watch it,” at my back as Chloe brushes past her.
“Sorry,” I mutter, stumbling behind my friend.
“When did you sneak in?” A tall blond boy with a tattoo wrapped around his arm jumps from the truck bed and saunters over to us.
“That’s Aaron,” Chloe whispers. He stops in front of her, his hands find her hips and he pulls her the rest of the way. His lips press against hers, and my stomach flutters at their PDA. I feel like I’m intruding on their moment, so I stare at the black scuff on the toe of my chucks.
Chloe giggles, the sound feminine and flirty. A sound I’ve never made in my life. Do I even know how to flirt? God, what am I even doing here?
“And that’s Reese,” Chloe says, dislodging her tongue from Aaron’s mouth and jutting her chin back to the truck. My head snaps up and I’m caught in the green-eyed gaze of a boy who is totally out of my league. Reese is, for lack of a better word, hot. He’s got the whole bad boy thing down to a tee. A silver chain hangs from his neck, and black ink swirls up his right arm. His hair is shaved close to his head, and although he isn’t quite as tall as Aaron, his presence is twice as big. “I told him about you,” Chloe adds with a smirk.
I take an involuntary step back. “You did what?” I panic. I’ve never been set up before, and especially not with a boy like Reese. What do I say to him? Hi, nice to meet you, oh my shirt, no I’m not really a ho, I just like art and plants—actually I’m a virgin. Would you like to take my virginity in an effort to coax my muse out of hiding so I can paint again, so I don’t get kicked out of my dream school? No? Okay, nice to meet you.
The voice in my head screams, run, but I keep my feet rooted to the ground. I’m doing this.
He stops in front of me. “Hi.”
“Hi,” I squeak back.
His mouth tips up in a half grin. “I’m Reese.”
I nod like an idiot. “Chloe told me.”
He chuckles, his thumb traces his bottom lip. “And you are?”
“Oh, I—I’m?”
“Roni?” a deep voice calls from somewhere behind Reese. It’s dark and gravely, and sends a chill down my spine. “Veronica Abernathy?”