Lost Stars

vi. flare star

Elle found it hard to focus on only one thing as it pained her eyes for all of those neon colors flashing all at once. There were unfamiliar faces cooped up at a corner doing who-knows-what with each other, the host of the party included as he was busy with a random girl he probably found around.

"Are you sure this is safe?" Elle yelled over to Melissa but was instantly shocked when she saw her pick up a guy when she turned her head to the side. She watched as the only person she knew in the party made it very clear that she had better people to be with as she lead him to the dance floor. Elle sighed, but she somehow knew that something like this was bound to happen to a girl with her disgraceful kind of luck.

Elle scanned the room for an adequate space to hide by. The bar was definitely not an option, since that was where the beginnings of bad decisions took place. The sofas at the center of the room were the epitome of teen libido as various couples were expressing their sexuality, straight or otherwise, all over and in every position, decent or not. Elle simply cringed and pulled her attention away from the living porn site, and she finally decided to stay by the punch bowl, since it was surrounded by chips as well as not that much people as it was positioned by the wall.

Elle scanned the choices presented over the table and decided to just go for some punch to quench her throat and calm her nerves as she reached over for an unused glass before pouring the beverage in it with the spoon thing that often came with a punch bowl. She soon headed over to the emptiest sofa that was relatively near the table, and all she had to do was shove her way through couples who chose vile ways to accept their affection.

She was living up to her name as the ghost, since all she did was look at everyone throw away their lives with alcohol and lost virginities. But then she thought about how better being invisible and neglected was rather than popular and infamous. She shook the cherry red liquid around in the glass a few times before taking a swig of it.

"Hey," She leaned forward to prevent the drink from spilling all over her as she felt the sofa unexpectedly bounce as a new body joined her on this sofa. It was Lucas with his shirt buttons undone as it exposed his chest, as well as ruffled hair that was clearly the result of what could have been multiple pairs of hands running through them.

"Hi." She said loudly as an aftermath of her absolute shock that someone was actually acknowledging her. She noticed that Lucas was absolutely wasted by the way that he swayed side to side laughing at humorous things that weren't there.

"Isn't this a great party. I, for one, think that I have outdone myself and blew any other parties out of the water because this night is so amazing. I mean do you know how fucking expensive that DJ was. I paid him a lot just to get him to squeeze some time from his hectic schedule." Lucas' words went out in a slur that was very much a series of mumbles for Elle as she struggled to make sense of what he was saying.

She was also doing this thing she does that she kept drinking her punch absentmindedly as a form of showing how stressed and anxious she was. She never even noticed that she was already drinking her way through the entire glass, as well as the odd taste when she took the last sip. Suddenly, she felt herself spinning as her body was overcome with dizziness.

"Does the punch taste funny to you?" She managed to steady herself to yell at Lucas through the deafening music. The dizziness got worse and worse, and Elle couldn't focus on anything anymore. Though the music was something that could not go unnoticed, Elle's hearing was a bit dodgy as it keep switching back and forth from the ear-splitting music to a maniacal screeching caused by her head, and sometimes it even touched deafness.

"Oh, the punch? That's what the hardcore guys spill their pills in, didn't you see the cases and containers on the floor?" Lucas smiled due to his intoxicated state. But now that he mentioned it, she really didn't notice that the table was indeed surrounded by plastic containers that were empty of their usual prescribed medicine.

"Do you wanna dance?" Lucas yelled through the deafening tracks as he stood in front of her and extended his hand.

Elle felt like she was plunged into a hazy euphoric paradise. Suddenly, she couldn't feel herself anymore present in the room. Her thoughts were suddenly too silent for her to hear. She was suddenly questioning her inhibitions as she felt herself fall in a wormhole of elation. Her brain felt numb as her body was abandoned by reason and proper judgement, being left to survive on its own. Her body was immediately swaying like jelly as she took his hand and was immediately pulled off of the chair and into the dance floor.

Being pulled towards the dance floor, she couldn't focus on one thing at a time as the neon colors blinded her eyes. Her head was thrown back as a result of the numbness that took over her completely as her shoes kept hitting the floor. Her head was blasting as the sound of the music battered it. The only thing keeping her up was Lucas' arm that was bringing her to the center before they stopped. Elle threw both arms around his neck and they started jumping rapidly up and down to the beat of the song. She could hear her breath quickening just like the beating of her heart, but the effect of the pills was telling her that she was enjoying it.

Elle threw her head back and embraced the feeling of apathy. This was what everyone wanted her to be. They wanted her to go to parties and get drunk and lose herself in the music in a crowd that was just as reckless as they wished she was. They wanted her to live a life that was constantly on the edge as she attended all the parties that were available and just live a life a regular girl wants.

But she suddenly had a realization, a realization that what they wanted her to be was different from what she was now and what she wanted to be. The memory of the girl who rather not fit in a destructive society came back to the girl who was jumping up and down without a care in the world and whispered in her ear that this wasn't what she was supposed to be.

"Stop." Elle told Lucas as she retracted her arms and rubbed them down her face. Lucas was baffled at why she suddenly decided to discontinue what he thought of was fun as he realized that she was coming back to her senses. Elle finally could hear herself think as she tried to ignore the effects of the punch as she started timidly walking away from him as she wrapped her arms around herself as a form of comfort from the things that she could have done, had she not stopped herself. But then, a hand reached out and forcefully pulled her back.

"Oh, come on. We were having so much fun." Lucas tried to persuade her to stay as he snaked his arms around her waist and pulled her towards his steady body, but Elle still resisted. She slammed her hands over his chest and tried to shove him away from her, but his grip on her body was just too tight to escape from. She tried again with more desperation as panic soon overwhelmed her and filled her with more and more desperation.

Lucas, as intoxicated as he was, leaned forward and started planting sloppy kisses down her neck as another form of persuasion, but Elle was finally back to her old self again and tried harder and harder to pull away from him. "Stop!" She shrieked out in terror with eyes tightly shut as she tried to pull away from him, like he was fire. And suddenly, it did.

Elle finally had the courage to open her eyes and saw that Lucas was on the floor clutching his face. She asked herself if it was her who delivered a hard punch at him in her horror, but she soon realized that it wasn't her action as she finally saw that Jack surprisingly was beside her, his fist clenched and his face seething as his chest rose up and down with his speedy breaths.

Thoughts filled her head such as how he was never seen in a party, just like her. How she didn't remember seeing him when she was walking around. How he was so furious at the damage Lucas could have done. How she was so curious as to why he came to her rescue.

And after that, she remembered nothing but her body falling.