“So?” I turn for their inspection.
“You look amazing,” Kai says.
“Seriously.” Poppy takes me by the shoulders and guides me to the mirror. She bunches my hair up on top of my head, lets it fall down, then repeats the process. “I can’t decide.”
“Up,” Kai says.
I feel like a paper doll being dressed up by two gleeful children, but I can’t deny that I actually look pretty cool. It’s not something I would have come up with on my own. Poppy piles my copper hair on top of my head while Kai offers critical analysis.
“Can I wear sneakers?” I ask as Poppy holds up a pair of thin hoop earrings.
Neither of them answer, which is a response in itself.
Twenty minutes later, after I talk them down from a pair of gorgeous—but impossible to walk in—Louboutins, opting instead for ankle booties with a stacked platform heel, we head out through the kitchen.
“Going out?” Felix asks, coming around the corner.
Poppy and I both jump, earning a laugh from Kai. “You scared me!”
“I’m not the one creeping through the house like a burglar,” Felix says dryly. He busies himself with a notepad. “Will you be home late?”
“Um…” I’m not sure how to answer that. It’s not like my dad will notice or care that I’m gone. We only went through the back so we could take the Mercedes without him noticing—something he will care about. “Don’t know.”
Felix glances up from his notes and studies the three of us for a moment. Then he sighs. “I’ll make cookies.”
The party is off campus, which is a nice change because I’d gladly never set foot in another fraternity. The house sits a few blocks from the quad in a neighborhood of homes mostly occupied by groups of upperclassmen looking to get away from campus restrictions. It’s your typical fixer-upper converted into a rental unit. A hundred years ago, it was probably a stately home for a professor and his family. Now it’s mostly barren, which leaves plenty of room for students to cram into it. Tye dye tapestries hang on the walls, and the furniture looks like it was bought secondhand decades ago. But there’s a keg in the living room and the night is fairly warm for November, so the party has spilled outside into the back yard.
“Want a beer?” Poppy asks as we weave our way inside.
I shake my head and hold up the keys. “I’m driving.”
“We can walk to campus,” she calls over the crowd. “You can crash in my room or…”
“Or what?”
“I’m sure Sterling would let you sleep at his place,” she says meaningfully.
I’ve been waiting for this. I’d been purposefully vague about what went down with Sterling and me the night of my party, saying we had a fight. Poppy hadn’t pushed me for answers, and part of me was beginning to hope she might let it go, especially once I agreed to return to the land of the living. No such luck.
“Sterling Ford’s bed is the last place you’ll find me,” I yell back, adding, “Ever!”
“Got it,” a harsh voice growls behind me. Poppy’s eyes widen in response. She looks to Kai, and then they both look at me, mouths open.
This can’t be happening. Again. What is it they say about repeating past mistakes? I guess where Sterling is concerned, I’ll never learn.
“I’ll find you in a minute,” I promise my friends. Gathering up my shredded dignity, I put on my gameface, and turn to glare at him. My knees weaken immediately, my body betraying me, but I lock them and do my best to avoid his piercing blue eyes. “You might as well know, since you couldn’t be bothered to end things face to face.”
“I think I did.” He smirks, lifting a bottle to his lips and taking a swig.
“Wait! Are you drinking again?”
“Never stopped,” he says sloppily. “Turns out that booze is nearly as easy to score on this campus as ass, if you know the right people. Guess I was wasting my time before.”
I recoil like he stabbed me in the stomach.
“You’re a dick,” I hiss at him.
He leans closer, and I smell stale beer and the sharp tang of old liquor on his breath. Up close I realize he hasn’t shaved for a few days and his shirt is a wrinkled mess. “There you go thinking about my dick again. I know I told you no before, but if you ask nicely, I might just give you a free pass tonight, Lucky.”
“Don’t call me that.” The nickname that was once endearing now feels like a ploy at best—a slap in the face at worst. “And find someone else that will put up with your shit.”
“I always do,” he slurs. “Every single night.”
I storm away, pushing through the crowd. I need to put as much distance between us as possible before the tears come. There is no way I’m crying over him in front of him. He doesn’t deserve it. I hear Poppy call to me, but I keep going until I reach the back door. Outside, I suck in a long, steadying breath.
“Adair!”
I look up to see Cyrus standing with some guys. He says something to them and heads toward me.
“Hey,” I say weakly.
“You okay?” He puts a hand on my shoulder, his eyes squinting with concern.
“Fine. I just ran into your roommate.”
Cyrus frowns, glancing behind me. “He’s a bit of a mess.”
“He’s a dick,” I say. “I can’t believe you put up with it.”
“I stopped sleeping in the room,” Cyrus says.
“How could you sleep with a carousel of girls coming and going?” I tighten my jaw like I can bar the raw ache from working its way to the surface. Why did I let my friends talk me into coming here tonight?
“Girls?” he repeats, shaking his head. “More like a perpetual happy hour without the happy part. I only stop by to make sure he hasn’t died of alcohol poisoning.”
“He said…” I blink a couple of times trying to process this new information. “He’s just sitting there, drinking?”
“Like a fish,” Cyrus confirms. “You were probably smart to drop him when you did. At this rate, he won’t make it past his first semester. He’s got to be failing all his classes. I feel bad for him, though. I thought maybe going out would help him get it out of his system. I didn’t know you would be here.”
Suddenly, I’m on information overload. It’s not like it’s my fault that Sterling is pouring his life away one drink at a time, but I can’t deny that this all started the night of my birthday. And worse than all of that is the tiny, wicked glimmer of satisfaction I feel learning that he’s a mess without me. I’m sure it makes me a terrible person, but still not as bad as he is.
“Come meet the guys,” Cyrus says.
I’m grateful for the distraction. I need to take a break from all of this, get it off my mind, and just relax. For the last two weeks, I’ve been zoning out and rewatching old television shows—the kind of stories where the guy and the girl always make up in the end. Maybe it’s past time to admit that’s just a fantasy. Reality is much uglier, and there’s no script heading things toward a happy ending.
Cyrus introduces me to the guys, who turn out to belong mostly to Beta Psi, the fraternity he pledged earlier this fall. They all say hello and return to their discussions about the football team’s chances in their upcoming game.