Disarm / Rafe Cameron

13. Pearl

"Easy girl, easy." Matty laughed, patting her back and taking the joint from her fingers. She kept coughing and her throat burned. "What, is that your first time?" AJ laughed, leaning back on his hands. Layne shook her head while still coughing a bit. "No, that's not my first time." she mocked, feeling slightly shy. She had smoked enough weed to fill up an entire dispensary, but she hadn't spoke a joint in a long time. Pretty much ever since she got home from college.

"I just don't do it a lot. More of a casual smoker I guess." she laughed, picking up some sand and letting it fall from her hand. Matty stared at her and passed the joint back to AJ. "You do any other shit?" he asked, leaning a bit closer to her. Layne bit her lip and shook her head, not looking at him, but tried not to reveal her smile. "You liar, yes you have." he laughed, poking her shoulder. Layne looked at him and laughed out loud. "Maybe."

"No way, what?" AJ asked, taking multiple hits and flicking some of the ash off in sand.

"Dude, her boyfriend is a kook. They've got like the good, good shit." Matty teased, moving to lay down and rest on his forearm. Layne looked down at him, and then back up at AJ, and then continued to toy with the sand. "I've done coke a few times." A few times was right, and she hated every second. It was mainly Rafe forcing her to do it and then she'd be up for days straight with her pupils so dilated you couldn't even see the normal color of her eyes.

"Shit, I thought you were gonna say you did fentanyl or some shit." AJ coughed a bit, passing the joint back to her. Layne took another hit and scrunched up her face, letting the smoke fill up her lungs and rest in her mouth before she blew it back out. She thought about the time she did do fentanyl and it brought a bad taste to her mouth. "I did do it. Once."

AJ's eyes went wide and Matty looked at her like she was some sort of goddess. "Holy shit, what? No fucking way." She suddenly felt very sad. That night Rafe had dumped her at Marian's house and left her to be someone else's problem. She should've broken up with him then. It would've saved her a lot of peace.

"Yeah...it was a fucked up situation." She breathed out, feeling Barry's hands on her, the way he touched her, the way Rafe sat there like a statue and let him stick the drop of fentanyl on her tongue. The way she felt afterwards, like she was in heaven, flying through the clouds until she fell asleep for almost an entire day.

"What happened?" Matty asked, and he was looking at her, genuinely curious. She hadn't spoken this much in a long time. "I just...it was Rafe's dealer, that guy Barry. He took me there to get coke and when I went in Barry just sorta...made me do it to get more money out of him, I guess. Rafe then dumped me at my friends house cause he was scared I was gonna die or something." There was a still silence for a moment before Matty blew out a cloud of smoke. "That's fucked up. No wonder you broke up with him."

Layne stared ahead, at nothing in particular, and nodded her head. "Yeah." she said simply. If only you knew, she wanted to say, but her throat closed up. Don't cry, don't cry. Her eyes burned a bit and she sniffed, clearing her throat. "Let's stop talking about him." she added, as AJ smoked the last of the joint.

"You wanna come back to our place?" Matty inquired, and Layne laughed slightly. "What, you want me to come tuck you in?" she looked down at him, and he smirked, shaking his head. "No, we can just keep talking."

Layne rolled her eyes. "Keep talking? Is that what you do with all the other girls, just talk?" she joked, although she was partly serious. She wasn't interested in any sadomasochistic three way they had in mind. Matty shook his head, tracing shapes on the towel. "Nah, you're not like other girls."