The Cure for Sleeping

Chapter Thirteen

We finished the bottle last night. We drank an entire litre of dirt-cheap vodka between the four of us, and now the aftermath is thumping around my head like a peg-legged pirate doing an Irish jig.

My eyes open to the garish brightness of midday sun. It feels like the sunbeams are stabbing me in the retinas. I groan, throwing an arm over my bleary eyes and mentally curse the light of day. As I move, I notice a weight holding pressing my shirt to my sticky skin. I glance down.

There's an arm thrown across my chest. The palm is facing up, the fingertips stained with grey pencil and twitching as he dreams. Noah is curved towards me, asleep his glasses askew. One of his legs is overlapping mine, soft points of contact at our ankles. His sandy hair is curling lightly, soft against his cheeks, strands highlighted in fine gold strands by the light. A constellation of freckles smatters his cheeks and nose, she same light brown as his hair. Dark brows arch over his eyes and the shadows underneath are faded, his lashes as dark as paint. His eyelids move with dreams, and I'm holding my breath, waiting for them to open and show the brown and green hidden underneath.

Rolling to the side, I let the arm flop against the wood. I think I'm still drunk.

I feel like I'm looking around the church through a layer of cling wrap. The world is blurry and tilting, and my skin feels too tight on my face. I bat at it with my fingers. A shadow fell across my face, blotting out the horrible sun. A silver communion bowl is shoved into my hands.

"If you're going to throw up, do it in there. Or, better yet, do it where I can't hear you." Hazel says, closing my fingers around the filigree. I squint at her, hair lit from behind like a halo.

She meets my eyes, smiles like the devil, and steps to the side. The sun hits my face and I feel my eyes shrivel.

"You are a cruel, cruel girl." I cringe, pulling my blanket over my head. I might need to use the bowl after all.

"And you look like you've returned from the dead." Hazel tugs my blanket away, trailing it behind her like the body of her last victim. A string of curse words that would make the try to exorcise her and a trill of laughter from Hazel accompanies Thea's return to the waking world.

Josh rolls to his feet with his hand over his eyes and hurried towards the bathroom. I hand him the communion ball as he passes, and he takes it with a grunt of acknowledgement. A few moments later, the shower curtain swings shut and I hear retching noises.

Hazel is grinning like a queen surveying the destruction she's caused.

Noah sits up without a sound, fist pressed tight against his mouth. He blinks, trying to wipe the fog from his eyes. Without a thought, I lean over and push his glasses back up his nose. He closes his eyes, raises a hand faintly in acceptance. He turns his head to the side, notices the flattened blanket, still warm, right next to him. He blinks at it. Then at me.

I stand and stumble away, clutching at a little statue of the Virgin Mary to keep myself upright. Wondering if that counted as blasphemy, I pat her little sculpted shoulder in thanks.

I decide that a little exercise might sober me up. So, I let go of the wall and only trip a little bit as I do a lap around the pews. And another. And another. By my sixth lap, I'm feeling slightly more alive and Josh has emerged from behind the shower curtain. The ends of his hair are dark with water and his face is dripping. He leans a broad shoulder against the doorway, grinning.

"Morning, all."

Noah picks his head up off his knees, staring at him with the bleary eyes of a cursed man. "I feel as if we have made a terrible mistake."