“If I was holding—and I’m not saying I am—why would I sell to someone I don’t know?” Drew says. “In case you aren’t aware, Hannah New Girl From LA, buying or selling drugs here will get you expelled. They have a zero-tolerance policy at Saint Francis. And I’m on scholarship.”
“I know the drill.” What a little prick. Fucking standing there, toying with me. Even drug dealers are patriarchal assholes. It’s always dudes that are holding, and they often get more than just money in exchange for their wares. Is that what he wants? “Look, I’ll go ask someone else. Whatever.”
I turn to go—one step, two—
“Wait.”
I smile and turn around. “Yes?”
“What do you want?”
“Percs. Vicodin.”
Oxy. Oh boy, do I want Oxy. But I don’t deserve to feel that good. Although—
“I ran out of Vicodin. I have Percs. And, before you ask, I don’t sell cotton to people I don’t know. That shit’s intense.”
“Okay, whatever. I’ll take what you have. How much?” I see Mae come out the front door, talking to some girl. Shit.
“Five for five milligrams, ten for ten. I recommend the ten—it’s a great high. Five will get you there, though. Just not as quickly.”
“I don’t need to be schooled on what will get me high. Look, I have to go.” I start backing away. “Can I get it from you tomorrow?”
“I might not have any tomorrow. But, whatever, it’s your deal.”
“I don’t want my sister to see,” I say, nodding toward Mae. “She’s … not like … us.”
His eyebrow raises just a tad. “Us?”
Losers.
“She’s a good girl.”
His mouth turns up a little. “Well, I’m certainly not one of those.” His eyes flick up to mine, and I force myself to hold his gaze. “Tomorrow at lunch,” he finally says. “Under the bleachers near the baseball diamond.”
Diamond. Perfect.
I suddenly feel a rush of gratitude for this asshole. “All right. Thanks.”
When I get to Mae, she’s looking over my shoulder, craning her neck to get a better look at Drew.
“Who was that?” she asks.
“Dude from my math class. I forgot to write down the homework.”
“He looks like the guy from that vampire show you like—the one with the brothers. The bad brother.” She bumps her hip against mine. “Ohhhh, I’m telling Micah.”
We’re trying to do this, to be like we used to. But it feels like we’re reading lines in a play. Even though I apologized for being a mess the other night, breaking that bottle in the kitchen, I’m still so mad at her for taking my pills.
I smile. “Shut up.”
I can always not meet Drew tomorrow, just forget I ever had that conversation by the flagpole. Make another quit attempt. Come clean to Aunt Nora and Uncle Tony and Nate. I know telling would be the first step in really trying to get sober.
But then I remember my parents are dead and my boyfriend is on the other side of the country and also that I’m a fucking loser piece-of-shit junkie.
“What’s wrong?” Mae asks.
Everything. Obviously.
“Nothing,” I say. “Why?”
She shrugs. “Besides the obvious? I know you don’t like it here. School. Boston.”
“I’m cool, Mae. Just … don’t breathe down my neck so much, okay? I’m a big girl. I can take care of myself.”
“I know,” she says, her voice quiet.
Fuck. Nothing comes out right anymore.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I just … you know. It’s hard.”
She takes a breath.
The kind before you jump into the deep end of the pool.
“Nora thinks we should talk to someone. A therapist.”
“Oh God,” I say. “That’s a quick way to make us feel shittier. The last thing I want to do is talk about it. Any of it.”
“It could help, Nah,” she says in a small voice. “With … everything. You know. The pills—”
“Is this voluntary?” I ask.
“Not so much. No. I suppose you could go on a hunger strike or something, but she says we need to talk to someone. Who it is—that’s our choice.”
* * *
When we get home, my fears are confirmed.
“So I have a list of the therapists in our area,” Nora says.
“I’ll look at it later,” I say. “I’m really tired.”
The next day, I make up an excuse to be late for lunch with Mae and her new friends, all confirmed nerds, and hurry over to the bleachers by the baseball field.
Drew is already there. He’s wearing a black hoodie with a puffy vest, ripped jeans, a beanie. Total drug dealer chic.
“I kinda thought you might not show,” he says, keeping his hands in his pockets.
“Well, I’m here.”
“How’d you know I’d be able to hook you up?”
“You just look…”
“Shady?”
Most of the guys here go for the I’m-applying-to-Harvard look: docksiders even though it’s too cold to go boating, khakis, polos.
“Pretty much, yeah.” I hand him a hundred bucks. “I’ll take ten tens.”
Money was never a problem for me, for anyone in my family. My lifelong savings did get low in the worst months, but then my parents died and everyone felt bad and Aunt Nora put a lot of money in both my and Mae’s accounts. Supposedly to get Boston wardrobes, since we’re basically in Siberia and you can’t wear jean shorts and flip-flops in places with negative degrees. When you’re a privileged junkie, it means you don’t have to stoop so low as to steal from the people you love or do all the things girls can do to get their fix. I’m the luckiest unlucky girl I know.
His eyebrows go up a little. “I’ve got fives if you—”
“Ten is good.”
“Ten it is.” He pockets the money, then takes out a bottle.
“Hold out your hand,” he says.
I do and he pours ten blue little circles on my palm, then one more.
“A little something extra for my new customer,” he says.
“Thanks.”
“So, you’re from LA?” he says, following me as I start for the caf.
“What do you care?”
He shrugs. “Just making conversation.”
“I give you five stars for customer service, okay? You can go … wherever you go at lunch.”
“I was just wondering what a nice girl like you is doing buying opiates.”
“First, I’m not a nice girl. Second, it’s none of your business.”
“Fair enough.”
We walk in silence for a while, and I can’t stand it.
“My parents died in that tsunami in Malaysia. Both of them.”
I see the weight of my truth settle on him. But instead of getting awkward, he looks at me—really looks at me.
“That is one of the most fucked-up things the universe could do to someone,” he says.
The absolute most right thing to say. I’d give him six stars for that.