Queen of Nothing

14. Eighteen

I loosed a deep breath, remaining silent while he slid me paperwork, "In the meanwhile, stay in school. Worry about graduating, and I'll try and find out more." 

"Thank you," I said, in a daze. Stay in school, he had said. As if I'd go running across the country to find her sister, dropping everything I'd worked so hard for in the process. 

Fourteen year old Mahi would have done just that. 

I wish I didn't let her down so much. 

---

I'd spent the entire day planning for the party I'd planned for the evening, to commemorate turning 18. 

Bottles of alcohol were stacked against the kitchen counter. Cole had dropped by earlier to hand off the pong table, and solo cups, before sloping off in silence. I didn't need him to be sweet to me in private, but in that moment I ached to tell him what had happened, what I'd found out. 

Gia was in Louisiana. 

I wanted comfort, but couldn't bring myself to voicing those things. I wondered how he would have processed that information, especially when I'd bound his hands so tightly to our ugly little contract. I knew that he wanted little to do with me outside of school and I was, of course, to blame for this alienation. 

I needed him to survive this year. I had little left. 

Zara, of course, was nowhere to be found, even though I'd texted her hours before reminding her of when I'd needed her to come over. 

Knowing her, she was probably stoned somewhere in Newton Park, with Jack and his merry band of loser friends. 

Although, I couldn't worry about her whereabouts, when I'd still been waiting on Dean, who was in charge of music. He'd learned how to DJ over the summer, with his parents supporting the expensive hobby. 

And while I hated to admit it, Dean was good at what he did. Every seventeen year old boy swears they know how to put mixes together, but Dean really knew how to work a crowd with music. He was also horribly flakey and nowhere to be found at the moment.

"Can you call Dean?" I yelled over my shoulder, to Katie who was applying false lashes in the mirror. 

She met my gaze stonily, "No." 

"What do you mean, no?" 

"I mean, no I'm not calling him. Call him yourself," she hissed. 

"You really have to get over this little thing with him," I chided, "you can't avoid him forever."

"I can try," she retorted, before applying the other lash. 

"Fine," I groaned, before texting Dean. And as if on cue, he appeared in my doorway, while I shrieked in fear, "What the FUCK, Dean?" 

He gave me a shit eating grin, "Sorry, your front door was unlocked. You want me to go set up?" 

Katie stiffened up in his presence and Dean noticed, "Oh hey-" 

Instead of responding, she grabbed her makeup bag and pushed past him to the other room to get ready, clearly peeved. 

"What's her deal?" He asked. 

I rolled my eyes, "Are you really that stupid?"

"What?" he seemed really confused. 

"She likes you, you moron. But you spent all of homecoming basically trying to get with her best friend. Imagine how that makes a girl feel." 

"She doesn't like me," he retorted, "Katie would never have a crush on me." 

"And why is that?" I replied, "Because you have some stupid idea that you're too good for her or something?"