JESSIE
Jorgen is sprawled across the bench when I get there, my hands tucked into my jacket pockets, mid November wind starting to bite through the city.
"Hey," he looks up at me.
"Hi."
He shifts, jacket making a little noise of denim on denim as he sits, yawning, "you look like you've had a rough day."
I scan him, taking in details, standing a little away from him, wary of his presence, "you do too."
He shrugs, running a hand over his hair, "rough year, more like."
"Yeah," I mumble. "Same here."
"Well," he stands. "Wanna get high?"
I stare for a second, then think about it, looking at him, looking around me and the dull gray of the city. I think about the week and think about the way my shoulders are aching from all the stress I've been keeping. I think about all that I've heard about doing this. I think about the way that people say it changes how you think for a little bit. I think and I think and I think he knows that I need a little time. I think he understands my silence. And I breathe in, preparing to speak, "yeah. I do."
He stands up, checking the bench behind him to make sure he didn't drop anything, "do you have anywhere we can go?"
I swallow, "I do."
"Lead the way."
We end up back on the bus, headed toward my house, him standing above me, making quiet conversation with me while my mind races, watching his body as it sways a little with the motion, watching the other people not paying attention to us, almost missing the girl that pointed out our dynamic two weeks ago.
"So," he follows me down the path to my house. "Am I allowed to ask why your parents are routinely out of the house on Fridays? It seems a little careless to leave a high schooler an open house on a Friday."
I swallow, "I'd rather not answer."
"Alright," he says it and for once in my life I don't feel the urge to fill the silence and tell him. It's foreign.
He flops down on the back porch, leaning against the railing, looking up at me, "joining me?"
"Now?"
"I assume so, I mean," he shrugs. "This was the intention, yes?"
"Do you..." I blink, trying to force my brain to make any noise instead of the gray sort of haze it gets stuck in when he's near me. "Want to take your coat off or eat or, or are you okay... or."
"Eh," he waffles with it. "We can eat later. Weed always makes you hungry."
"Why?" I put my school bag inside and sit next to him, two feet away, my hands folded in my lap.
"I should probably explain all this to you," he knocks his head back against one of the slats of the railing, eyes closed. "I was thinking about doing it but then I thought better of it but I still googled it on the way over to make sure my understanding of the science is right."
I stay quiet.
"Before we get started, then," he fishes something out of his pocket with his eyes closed. An altoid tin. "Your brain produces natural cannabinoids, they act as neurotransmitters. That means that they attach to different receptors on the brain and allow for messages to be sent between neurons. THC, the active component of marijuana, is incredibly similar in structure to one of those cannabinoids, which means that the brain picks it up and attaches it to those receptors and it processes the functions itself," his eyes blink open, looking at me, soft and rich brown. "Now, that wouldn't be, like, a massive deal, if the cannabinoids weren't critical in the nervous system. But they are, in some areas, so the alteration of that can cause some stuff to happen. So, being high means that your reaction time and coordination are a little wonky, your active and inactive memory are also a little weird, but the important part," he's smiling. "Is the transmitters that deal with emotion hormones. Dopamine and friends. The THC attaches to transmitters that handle the brain's reward system, mainly run by dopamine, and it produces a higher amount of dopamine in you than normal. Dopamine causes a bunch of shit but mostly it's just the reward chemical. Satisfaction, pleasure, enjoyment. All of that also takes a bunch of stress off of you and then you get the relaxing effect of all of it. People relate the dopamine release to that of sex but I'm not sure about that comparison quite yet."
He raises his eyebrows at me, for some reason.
"Why did you go tense there at the end? When I mentioned that it relates to sex?"
I shake my head, "not important."
"Evan hasn't done anything to you, right?"
I shake my head again, "nope."
"Alright," he taps his head back again. "Whatever you say."
I watch him intently as he switches his focus from talking to working with whatever is in the altoid tin. I assume that would be the weed. I mean, I hope it is. I keep my eyes on it, nervous. Halfway hoping he doesn't actually give me the chance to, as Emma keeps saying, take a hit, and just smokes the whole thing himself. Or maybe I am hoping he does teach me how to do this. Or maybe I hope I get the results just from staring at it, the ones that Ben and Lily and most of my friends talk about. Or maybe...
Maybe I'm not sure as he puts it to his lips, eyes darting over to me as I watch the tricky way he pulls on it, focused on his mouth, his lips, then leaning back, stunned when he pulls away and a little opaque white bubble of smoke appears at the very front of his mouth before getting sucked back and blown out his nose.
Then he's smiling, white teeth behind puffy lips and the extra smoke slipping out the corners of his mouth.
"It's not a science experiment," he picks my hand up out of my lap, his long fingers wrapping around mine, a sparkle of heat up my arm from where his hand warms mine. "No need to take notes on what I'm doing."
I think he's just holding my hand for a second before he lifts my fingers, placing the little roll of paper between my forefinger and my thumb just like he had it.
"Now, carefully," he moves his hands away from mine. "Pull in, like you're sucking on a straw, but hold it in your mouth for just a second, close your lips and then breathe in through your nose over the smoke in your mouth, make sure to dilute it. If you don't it'll burn your throat."
I stare at him for a second and his smile gets a little bigger, a small laugh in his chest when he realizes I look terrified.
"It'll be fine," he encourages. "And if it isn't, you can hand it back to me and I won't make you do anything else."
I stare at the roll of paper in my hand and then do as I'm told, bringing it up to my mouth.
Immediately, I gag on the smoke and push it back into his hand, coughing the smoke back out again, startled and a little grossed out by the taste.
"Oh, Jessie," he rubs my back as I cough. "Happens to the best of us."
I can't stop coughing and it isn't until he presses his water bottle into my hands that I can manage to get my breath back. I cradle the bottle with both my hands, eyes watering, looking at my knees, processing what just happened.
Next to me, he takes another drag, a sort of ease to it as he does it, I watch, trying to figure out what he's doing that I didn't.
"Want to try again?" He asks, gesturing at my little disaster, water cradled in my hands, tears in my eyes, hunched forward away from the rail that he's slouched back against like it's the most comfortable thing ever.
Now that he's given me the chance and he's put up the challenge, I sort of feel like I have to be successful at it.
I nod.
He passes it back to me and I try again, burning my throat but trying to get past it, only making it to the part where he told me to fill my mouth before I have to stop, choking on the smoke and handing it back to him.
"Okay, so maybe smoking is not for you," he's rubbing my back again as I cough my lungs out. "Maybe next week I can bring an edible or something? That could work for you."
I shake my head and his expression goes confused.
"I'll figure it out," I choke out.
"Really?" He doesn't seem convinced, bringing the roll back up to his mouth. I watch again, closer now, like I'm trying to unlock a secret. He pulls in, cheeks puffing out when he pulls it away, then he breathes in through his nose just like he told me, and just like that, it all comes rushing back out, aimed carefully away from my face.
"If," I watch his mouth make the word. "If you can't get it this time, I have another idea. It's stupid but I'm getting closer to high, so."
It's not too much of a shock when I can't get it the third time, throat aching and another round of coughing enough to rival the first two.
He rubs my back and lets me drink his water.
"You just have to be alright with this idea," he starts. "And it sounds daunting but I swear it's basically nothing. It eliminates the need for you to do the nose thing because I'll dilute it myself."
"Are you going to just," I'm a little grossed out by the concept my brain came up with. "Blow it into my face...or."
"No, worse, better, I don't know," he shrugs. "I'm going to basically just kiss you and make you breathe it in off me."
"Oh," I back up a little. "That's a little gross."
"I know," he shrugs. "But it could work."
It could work. And a kiss is basically nothing. I never feel anything kissing Evan so what's Jorgen? He doesn't have to know and I know that I don't feel anything for Jorgen so really it seems like a good idea. As long as I don't feel anything for Jorgen and we're doing this for this reason, it can't be that bad. Plus, Evan can't know that I was even here, he'd lose his mind.
It's not like it even matters. Evan isn't going to lose me as his future wife if I kiss Jorgen just once. I won't end up at a different school if I kiss Jorgen just once. Nothing will happen if I kiss Jorgen.
"Okay, sure."
"You know," he sighs. "You're really freaking me out by being this urgent to get high, but," there's a bit of a mental discussion that I watch go through his head. "I suppose I can only make sure you're doing it safely." He sets the joint in his lips and pulls again, this time his free hand is snaking around the back of my neck, anticipation thrumming in my stomach, knowing that his mouth is going to be wet and slick and a little gross and that his hand is gonna grip my neck weird the second he kisses me and that I'm going to be left with a little slobber on my chin and a lot of saliva in my mouth but I'm determined. I came here with a reason.
His eyes flick to mine and I lean forward, tipping my head.
It's not that bad. I'm not doing anything bad.
His nose brushes mine.
It's fine. This is fine.
And then his mouth. And then his mouth and the smoke pouring into mine and the gentle brush of his thumb across the back of my neck that makes me gasp, breathing in, all the smoke warm not hot, smooth, not grating on my throat.
"Breathe," he mutters, lips brushing mine as he says it. I'm barely even focused on the smoke, not even thinking about how I'm probably breathing it back out into his face. I'm sitting in utter shock, a buzz in my lips and a sort of thundering of something in the rest of me, a little slack-jawed and very dazed. My chin is dry, he didn't stick his tongue into my throat, and when my eyes blink open I can see the twitch in his mouth that's telling me he's a little close to laughing.
"Better?" He asks.
I nod, snapping back to reality, taking a deep breath and shocking myself with the cloud of smoke that comes out my mouth when I release it.
He's pressed thigh to thigh, shoulder to shoulder with me now, warm on the cold afternoon, solid and stable and very much there.
"Tell me if you want another," he says before taking another drag himself, somehow avoiding searing his throat or doing anything like that.
I watch, trying to tell him that I do, but I suppose he's a guy that likes things verbalized, especially because I think he knows that the look I'm giving him is a yes.
"Um," I blink once, trying to force myself through saying this. "Can I have another?"
The twitch in his lips tells me it's a yes, "thought you wouldn't have the guts to ask."
That ticks me off, "of course I do, I-"
He sets his lips on mine, shutting me up, tapping his tongue against the seam and then pressing the smoke into my mouth again. He smiles into it, cradling my neck, leaning me a little backward. It feels different. Different from any kiss I've ever had. Different than anything Evan has ever done.
Maybe it's because it's someone different and everyone kisses differently, maybe it's because he isn't using his tongue or he isn't drooling or-
"Still breathing?" His words are a little slower than they were when we started. "I'd give you a third but I'm afraid we're out," he shows me and then flicks it to where he can crush the ember with his boot. "And I would light another but I'm high enough and you probably don't need much. I'll probably end up reconsidering that, but this is a good start."
"You're high?" It's probably a dumb question to ask.
He tips his chin down, looking at me, a twitch in his lips, "Jessie."
"Yeah?"
His fingers pick up my chin, inspecting my face, "I think I like you high."
"I don't... feel-"
"Yeah you do," he snorts. "C'mon, show me the kitchen."
***
song: A Kiss - THE DRIVER ERA
***
the song's energy doesn't quite fit but i love this song so.
this one was fun to write. it's a little off balance but it was fun.
what? rabid posting on midnight on friday/saturday? is that a first for this book? probably.
anyway enjoy it. we speed up from here.
-rabid
do tell me what ya'll are thinking about this so far, though, I'm terrified this thing is flopping lol