Regarding Jay

11: neurotransmitters

He raises his eyebrows at me, for some reason.

"Why did you go tense there at the end? When I mentioned that it relates to sex?"

I shake my head, "not important."

"Evan hasn't done anything to you, right?"

I shake my head again, "nope."

"Alright," he taps his head back again. "Whatever you say."

I watch him intently as he switches his focus from talking to working with whatever is in the altoid tin. I assume that would be the weed. I mean, I hope it is. I keep my eyes on it, nervous. Halfway hoping he doesn't actually give me the chance to, as Emma keeps saying, take a hit, and just smokes the whole thing himself. Or maybe I am hoping he does teach me how to do this. Or maybe I hope I get the results just from staring at it, the ones that Ben and Lily and most of my friends talk about. Or maybe...

Maybe I'm not sure as he puts it to his lips, eyes darting over to me as I watch the tricky way he pulls on it, focused on his mouth, his lips, then leaning back, stunned when he pulls away and a little opaque white bubble of smoke appears at the very front of his mouth before getting sucked back and blown out his nose.

Then he's smiling, white teeth behind puffy lips and the extra smoke slipping out the corners of his mouth.

"It's not a science experiment," he picks my hand up out of my lap, his long fingers wrapping around mine, a sparkle of heat up my arm from where his hand warms mine. "No need to take notes on what I'm doing."

I think he's just holding my hand for a second before he lifts my fingers, placing the little roll of paper between my forefinger and my thumb just like he had it.

"Now, carefully," he moves his hands away from mine. "Pull in, like you're sucking on a straw, but hold it in your mouth for just a second, close your lips and then breathe in through your nose over the smoke in your mouth, make sure to dilute it. If you don't it'll burn your throat."

I stare at him for a second and his smile gets a little bigger, a small laugh in his chest when he realizes I look terrified.

"It'll be fine," he encourages. "And if it isn't, you can hand it back to me and I won't make you do anything else."

I stare at the roll of paper in my hand and then do as I'm told, bringing it up to my mouth.

Immediately, I gag on the smoke and push it back into his hand, coughing the smoke back out again, startled and a little grossed out by the taste.

"Oh, Jessie," he rubs my back as I cough. "Happens to the best of us."

I can't stop coughing and it isn't until he presses his water bottle into my hands that I can manage to get my breath back. I cradle the bottle with both my hands, eyes watering, looking at my knees, processing what just happened.

Next to me, he takes another drag, a sort of ease to it as he does it, I watch, trying to figure out what he's doing that I didn't.

"Want to try again?" He asks, gesturing at my little disaster, water cradled in my hands, tears in my eyes, hunched forward away from the rail that he's slouched back against like it's the most comfortable thing ever.

Now that he's given me the chance and he's put up the challenge, I sort of feel like I have to be successful at it.

I nod.

He passes it back to me and I try again, burning my throat but trying to get past it, only making it to the part where he told me to fill my mouth before I have to stop, choking on the smoke and handing it back to him.