Even Death Won't Do Us Part

Chapter 22

--23rd of August--

1 year, 2 months, 6 days earlier

"Say cheese," Peter said.

          "Not so fast, pretty boy," said Auburn. She leaped up and made a grab for his phone. Peter held it behind his back. The two of them tussled, and Lilly watched them from the comfort of the couch, her entire body filled with warmth.

          "What are you smiling about, smiler?" Peter said.

          Lilly touched her mouth which was all curled up on the sides, and realized he must be talking to her. She hadn't even known she was smiling! She guessed it must be because of how well all of this was going, because of how happy that made her. (Also, possibly a tiny little bit because of alcohol.)

          They'd made the plan weeks ago once they found out Peter's parents would be out of town. It was supposed to be four of them : Lilly and Peter, who Auburn had never really hung out with before, and Auburn with her new boyfriend, who Lilly had never even met. His name was Todd and he was the drummer in a band that Auburn liked. Auburn had met him after one of his shows. The first thing he ever said to her was,"If there are an infinite number of parallel universes, then in at least one of them, we'd already be dating."

          "I was into it," Auburn had told Lilly. "Obviously, I mean, that's a hot line right there. Turns out he stole it from a smarter friend tho." But Auburn said he was so sexy it didn't even matter. That's just how Auburn's like. Then, she said, "Being interesting is not what he's here for."

          Lilly had seen many pictures of him, including a closed-up picture of a jug that was shaped like Hitler's face, because Auburn would do things like that, show you  a bunch of normal pictures and then a picture of a dinosaur with a dog's head thrown in like it was nothing. "And  there's Todd's dog, and there's his roommate whose beard has fleas, I think, and there's Todd's oddly-shaped earlobe." She was so good at being completely deadpan about it, as though she didn't even know that what she was doing was out of the ordinary at all. So yeah, Lilly had hoped she would forget about seeing a closed-up image of Todd's earlobe when she meets him, cause . . . y'know, it'd be pretty odd if she kept staring at his earlobe wouldn't it? 

          But then, well, it turned out she would never meet him, because an hour and a half ago instead of arriving with Todd, Auburn showed up with a half-filled jug of cheap vodka , a jar of cherries, and a story about how she'd dumped that snoozy loser on the car ride over(but only after they arrived, because she wouldn't have had any transport.) "Boohoo, but oh well, more vodka for us," Auburn had said with a wink, and then toasted the air and took a long chug right there on the front steps.

          But as Lilly had watched Auburn, standing alone, pouring vodka into herself, Lilly had gotten a feeling of deep dread down in her gut. The feeling that something bad was going to happen that night.

          Lately, when it was her and Lilly alone together, and Auburn was drinking--which she was doing awful lot of--Auburn got dark. They'd always looked at the world as us-against-them, but while it used to be in a because no-one-quite-else-gets-it sort of way, now it was because everyone-else-and-the-rest-of-the-world-is-crap. Alcohol was the fuel that powered the Auburn rocket down down down to the pitch blackness. Lilly didn't want to see everything like that, but Auburn's feelings wrapped around her and slid under her skin until they were indistinguishable from her own.

          When they originally planned the night, Lilly had hoped, assumed even, that with Todd there, Auburn would be her sparkling, fun, charismatic self. Being around guys she was attracted to usually kept her on her best behaviour. But without him, who knew what would happen? What would it be like, just the three of them?