Dibs! (Lesbian, GxG)

Chapter 21

     "Who are you?" she asks, suspicion coating her tone.

     "Um, I," I hesitate. "Is Logan here?"

     The girl doesn't start acting completely nice, but she steps aside and lets me inside. "He'd be in the living room," she informs me. 

     I nod. "Thanks," I say.

     There's a crowd of people large enough that I have to bump my shoulders with all of them when I walk my way through. I get turned around a couple times, one of them ending up in what I think is a laundry room. The living room, as it turns out, is seriously in the back of the house. I have to wonder what kind of people would arrange that. Well, besides Logan's parents.

     To my relief, Dominic is there with him, having a conversation. Logan sees me out of coincidence and smiles. "Hey, Callie!" he says, causing his friend to turn around. "I didn't expect to see you here." 

     I must have looked confused; Dominic explains, "Your friend told him parties aren't your thing."

     Ah. "Yeah, I needed to get out of the house," I say.

     "Well, since you're here . . ." He leans over and reaches for a white cooler on the ground a couple of feet away from him. He reveals quite a few cans buried everywhere in the ice, pulls one out, and hands it over. "Want one?" Logan asks, showing me the Bud Lite brand. 

     I shake my head. If he was trying to appear as a nice guy, this wasn't helping his case. He shrugs before opening it and chugging it down. "Man, this shit's good," he says after consuming probably half of it.

     "Where's May?" Dominic asks. "Isn't she with you?"

     I tell him about the braces, and he winces. "Yeah, had them for two years. They hurt like hell when I got them." 

     Logan offers Dominic a beer as well, but he refuses. At the same time, a girl passes by and grabs the beer out of Logan's hand. She gives him a wink before making a show of opening the can and taking a sip. From the look on Logan's face, I'm going to have to assume he wishes he's not with May. Or at least, that I'm not here witnessing this.

     The girl walks away afterward, passing a couple of people noticing me. They give me a smirk before returning to what they were doing. I let it go, not understanding the exchange. I awkwardly stand by Dominic and watch the scene of people dancing to the music coming from someone's boom box they have on their shoulder. Some time after that, another person glances in my way and laughs.

     I lean towards Dominic, so I can talk to him without shouting and feel a little less of running out of the party. "Is there something going on?" I ask. "There are people laughing at me." As if on cue, yet another person sneers at me.

     "Huh," is the only thing he can say. "I don't know. Maybe they think you're someone else?"

     "Like who?" I point out.

     We don't talk again, and gradually, more people are starting to glare at me, or whisper to their friends. By this time, my concern is high up to the point I ask Logan if he knows what's going on. "I don't know," he says. He turns to one of the people whispering and loudly asks, "What's up with you guys?"

     The guy doesn't understand until Logan points at me. The lightbulb goes on, and he tells Logan something that I can't hear. "Okay, thanks!" he says as the person continues their whispering, still looking in my direction.

     "So?" I say, extending the word. "What is it?"

     "All he said was you were letting yourself get a bad reputation," Logan replies as if he's giving a lecture about a boring subject.

     "What the hell does that mean?"

     The person stops his whispering long enough to tell me, "Is it true that you've been going to Jules' house and fucking her?"

     He could have punched me, and that wouldn't have been as bad as what he just said. "E-excuse me?" I ask, not believing this.

     "Dude, that's not a kind of thing Callie would do," Dominic starts.

     For some reason, the guy decides to make things worse by adding, "What about drugs? I heard you were trading sex for drugs." My jaw drops, and he continues with, "It's kind of pathetic, don't you think? There are better choices and even better drugs."

     My hand clenches automatically. "I swear to God--"

     "Like me!" He gestures towards his waist. "I bet I can make you--" He's stopped when I punch him, hard, on his stomach. He bends over, groaning, and several people around look.

     I don't know what's worse; that there have been disgusting rumors about me, that I punched someone for the first time, or the first thing that comes to mind is, 'Why didn't I aim lower?' Nonetheless, the whole thing causes me to start breathing heavily and my heart going faster than it was before. 

     My flight-or-fight response kicks in, and I quickly get away from Logan and Dominic, the witnesses, the guy. Thoughts are zooming in my head as I dodge people standing around, finding the front door and heading towards my car. Grabbing the keys I pocketed earlier, I get in and turn it on, pretending I'm escaping from the zombies my sister mentioned when I left the house.

     I shouldn't have lied to Mom about the pills, I think as I go past several stop signs. In books, there are people who say to the reader something close to, "Before I know it, I've driven myself to a convenient place, totally not remembering the route." In real life, those same people would have a problem with passing their driver's test.

     Still panicking, I get to what I think is a reasonable place to visit: the field. I doubt anyone's going to bother me at all when I'm here. I make sure the car's locked before I start to the tree. Not liking the idea of climbing, I instead sit at the base, trying to calm myself down with some breathing exercises.

     Over time, my breathing's gotten slower, but not that much. I contemplate about going back home, but I hear some footsteps behind me. I freeze in place, hoping whoever's there would miss me.

     The person sits down beside me, and I don't bother looking at her. Jules puts an arm around me and pulls me down, my head on her shoulder. She doesn't bother saying anything.

     That's an improvement there.