"If somebody hits you with an object, you should beat the hell out of them." ~Charles Barkley
➳♀♁➳
The thrum of people around us pushed against my brain. Bodies against bodies, noise on top of noise. Everyone was laughing, it seemed. Happy, drunken people conversing or flirting or arguing. The whole room was getting smaller and smaller, and my chest started to flutter with anxiety. The smell of sweat and heavy perfume and alcohol wafted in the kitchen, pushing out into the backyard through the open slider door. A faint breeze was coming through the opening, but not enough to calm the sweat that beaded my palms.
Oliver must have noticed my trapped expression because he grabbed my arm gently and started pulling me towards the hallway. His hand on my arm sent a wave of electricity through my veins. I made a fist and tried to shake it off.
"What are you doing?" I asked because it seemed like an appropriate question. Frankly, I didn't care what he was doing as long as we were going somewhere else. Somewhere I didn't have to watch Josh ogle another girl.
Say something, part of me commanded. Confront Josh. He's yours.
But then another part of me said no, he's not yours. You didn't make him yours, and now he's leaving you for someone else.
My heart pinged with a message. "You're not good enough."
But a year - a full year was how long Josh and I had been at this on-again-off-again-What-Do-You-Mean-They're-Still-Not-Dating train. That was a lot. Our rocky romance had been, surprisingly, one of the only stabilities in my life when we'd started seeing each other.
It just didn't feel right to let it all go, no matter how much we didn't mesh. In Cinderella, the glass slipper didn't fit the stepsisters, but that didn't stop them from slamming their big feet into the thing.
I just wanted us to fit, to be what we used to be.
The sharp tug of Oliver's pull on my arm pushed me back into reality. "Where are we going?" I asked, observing that we were in a hall I hadn't been in before. Past the kitchen and deeper into the house. Oliver didn't answer; he just tugged me along in silence.
We entered a large room with a huge ceiling. A sparkling chandelier hung from the highest point, glinting with the sparse amount of light in the leftover rooms of the house. The party seemed to be concentrated in only the living room, hallway, kitchen, and backyard.
We headed towards the broad staircase, covering the full length of the wall to our left.
"People might be having sex, by the way," Oliver mentioned, his face nonchalant. He pulled me up the stairs.
I climbed the sleek, white steps and gagged at the thought. It was a usual high school party, but still, I wouldn't ever think of dirtying a random person's room like that.
"Um, why are we going upstairs?" I asked, my voice oddly high pitched. Suddenly I wondered if the reason we were going upstairs was that he expected us to have sex. I tried to tug my arm back from Oliver's grasp.
"We're not just going upstairs," he said, looking forward.
We were almost at the top of the staircase. "Um, do you see this?" My voice was getting higher and higher as I pointed at the steps below us. "This right here, what we're doing, is us going upstairs. And if you think I'm going upstairs with you because you want to-"
Oliver whipped around, and my body slammed into his. We were at the very top of the stairs now, standing on the landing. The chandelier was sparkling right above our heads.
"I told you we're not just going upstairs," he said. His voice turned stern suddenly, as though he was offended that I'd even implied what I did. "I would never take advantage of you like that." Shadows shaded half of his face, but I could see his thick eyebrows drawn, his lips forming an angry frown.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply--"
"We're not simply going upstairs," he said, interrupting me - even though we were on the second floor, classifying us as upstairs. "We're going to the roof."
Totally different.
He began walking down the hallway to our right, not taking my arm this time. I stood frozen for a second, confused and - if I admitted it to myself - hurt that he'd looked at me so angrily.
I played the scene again in my head. Why had he been so offended? Sure, what I'd implied hadn't sounded flattering, but it hadn't been far fetched. I knew him, but I didn't really know him. It was entirely reasonable that you'd be wary of letting a random guy take you upstairs.
But then why did I feel so ashamed for thinking it?
The dampened laughter from the party downstairs was the soundtrack as I followed Oliver further into the house. We passed three doors before he stopped, knocking on the fourth one, and listened.
"Hopefully, no one's in this one," he murmured. When nothing else happened, he opened the door. He stepped back and motioned for me to go inside.
"Oliver," I said slowly and apprehensively.
"Just trust me, Sorry," he said with a look. I hesitated, and he spoke again. "You know, most girls beg to be in this situation with me."
I hid my smile by pushing past him into the room.
The room was dark, illuminated only by the full moon shining through the large window on the opposite wall. I ignored the bed, walking swiftly past it and to the window, which I assumed we'd be climbing through to get to the roof.
Oliver appeared behind me, reaching around my body to unlatch the lock. He smelled intoxicating, and it hit me how drunk he was, making me feel, even as I was completely sober.
I cleared my throat and stepped away from him. He slid the window open, and a cool rush of air flooded the room. It smelled of campfire and pine.
"Ladies first," Oliver said.
I looked at him. "I'm scared of heights."
He scoffed. "That's idiotic."
He must have read the incredulous emotion that scrambled my face because he laughed at it. "A fear of heights is completely unreasonable if you refuse to fall."
"Who are you, Shakespeare?" I asked, clambering past him and out onto the ledge outside the window. The roof was directly above my head. If I walked, standing, and pressed against the house, I could reach a point in the roof where it dipped down, and I'd be able to climb up onto the highest part.
I did this effortlessly.
"I thought you were afraid of heights," Oliver commented, copying all the moves I'd done.
I picked at the shingles. "Your earlier words were so deep that they sparked inspiration within me, and now my fear is gone."
Oliver laughed, loud and without hesitation, into the dark night. "You're so full of shit."
I smiled.
Oliver climbed the rest of the way onto the roof, settling in next to me. We looked out onto the front yard, so high we could see half the rest of the neighborhood, houses lit up with lights peeking through windows. For a second, the world seemed empty.
"What's your last name?" I asked suddenly. It occurred to me that I didn't know anything about the boy I was sitting next to. It occurred to me that I just now wanted to.
"Manning," Oliver answered smoothly. "Oliver James Manning."
His face was made of the fragments of shadows.
"Lane," I copied. "Skylar Sue Lane."
After a moment, I asked, "How old are you?"
Oliver gave me a look like he was surprised I didn't know. "Just turned eighteen. I'm a senior."
I thought about that. Oliver was my older brother's age, so he'd be graduating in a few months.
"Where are you going to college?" I asked.
He shrugged. "Not sure. I got accepted into a few places, but I can't decide which lucky school will get to have me as a student."
I laughed.
Then we were silent for a while. A shiver climbed up my back, but I suddenly realized I had lost my flannel. Never go to a party with something you don't mind leaving there. This was the rule of partying. Either you were going to be too drunk to remember to bring it home, or someone else was going to be too drunk to realize it wasn't theirs. All of this was to be kept in mind when getting ready to go out.
I cursed myself for forgetting this rule.
"Here," Oliver said. He laid a heavy sweatshirt across my shoulders, and I pulled it closed over my body. Now he was just wearing a black Twenty One Pilots band tee.
What was it with him and band tees?
I meant to say thanks, but my mouth seemed frozen. Oliver's green eyes were almost glowing in the night.
Oliver drew his knees up and wrapped his arms around them, lazily. "So your boyfriend," he started.
I groaned. "What about him?"
"He a good guy?"
My brows furrowed. Why'd Oliver want to know that? I thought about Josh, two floors below me, probably dancing with another girl, not wondering where I was. He wasn't even really my boyfriend. I reminded myself of it daily, which brought me sadness and also a relief.
Did I even want him?
I wasn't naive to think he deserved me, or that I couldn't do better. I wasn't blind to the fact that he wasn't investing in me as much as I was in him.
I picked at a blue fingernail.
"You don't play sports, do you?" Oliver asked, suddenly.
"Hmm?" I murmured, leaving my thoughts. My brain processed what he'd asked, and I was thankful for the change in topic. "Is it that obvious?"
Oliver laughed. "No, you look like you could beat me in an arm wrestle, no doubt." I glanced at his biceps, smiling at how blatantly false the statement was. "I just know most of the athletes from your school, and I don't really know you."
So, like me, he must have also felt odd that we didn't know anything about each other.
"No," I repeated. "I don't play sports; I'm into theater."
"Oh, the theater!" Oliver exclaimed in such a faux dramatic tone that it made me cringe. "That's actually really cool. Are you going to be a famous actress one day, then?"
I smiled. "No, I'd settle for a non-famous acting career."
Oliver looked at my face for so long that I got distracted and antsy from the attention. His eyes explored my face, and I looked away. "There's no way that face doesn't become famous one day."
I blushed and looked away.
No one said stuff like that to me.
A whoop of drunk laughter came from below us, and a few partiers erupted into the yard. They stumbled across the grass before collapsing into a little red car across the street. The car made a loud noise as it drove away.
I cleared my throat. "So, uh, what sports do you play?"
Oliver's face lit up. "I grew up playing baseball and soccer, but now I focus mostly on football." So my original observation of him back when we'd first met at Fran's had been partly right. He was a jock. But then why all the band tees? It wasn't that jocks couldn't be more than just jocks, it was merely that Oliver had too many faces to consider. "I'm the running back, which, of course, has all the ladies falling for me."
His tone was joking, but I wondered if, like Josh, he used his popularity to get girls.
"Joking," Oliver murmured, watching my face. "I have cooties."
I laughed a little. "You mean like Herpes?"
He chuckled, leaning back on his elbows. "You wish. I bet I'd look so good with herpes."
I was just about to fling a retort his way when a group of guys stumbled out of the front of the house, bellowing and swinging drunken fists. Four guys surrounded a single person in the middle, circling.
"Don't you fucking look at her ever again, you asshole!" One guy yelled, throwing a loose fist at the guy in the middle, who dodged it.
"Hey, man, settle down. Not my fault the chick prefers me over you," the one in the middle said. We were too high up to see their faces, but I knew who the man in the middle was just by the sound of his voice.
"Shit," I muttered.
Oliver leaned over the side of the roof to see better, fingers clutching the shingles. "What's happening down there? Is that-" he squinted his eyes in the darkness "-is that Josh Waterson?"
I sighed. Unfortunately, yes.
"Jeez," Oliver continued. "That guy's a joke."
The guys below us continued to yell, and I debated staying on the roof or going down to remove Josh from the situation.
The latter seemed so unappealing.
I sighed again, crawled over to the ledge, and began climbing back to the window. "That joke down there is kind of my boyfriend, so, see you later." The climb down was a lot easier than the climb up, and soon my legs were safely on the carpet of the second-story bedroom. I crossed the length of the room.
"Wait," Oliver said behind me, already down from the roof himself, "that's your so-called boyfriend?"
His judgmental tone stirred up something inside me. "Yes, he is," I said, exiting the room and walking down the hall. "And I don't really have to explain anything to you."
He followed after me. The shouting from outside got louder. I hurried down the stairs, past the elaborate fireplace, and through the tall archway. The dance floor was now empty, everyone congregated in the doorway instead. People spilled out onto the lawn to watch the fight that had arisen.
"Good lord," I murmured. "Can't go one freaking party without drama."
I pushed past people, knocking shoulders with wide-eyed girls and ducking under the big arms of whooping jocks.
"Yeah, Josh, kick his ass!" One guy screamed in my ear.
Nope. I thought. Nope, please don't do that.
I finally pushed my way to the inner circle, rolling my eyes at the events that were transpiring.
Normal. Why couldn't I just have a healthy relationship?
Because this isn't a relationship, part of me said.
I looked at the fight scene. Gone was the circle of boys, replaced by two going head to head instead - Josh and another guy I didn't recognize.
Everyone occupied the massive circle around them. Doing nothing to stop it, the crowd just watched as the fight progressed from one side of the lawn to the other. Both boys were muscular and athletic, throwing fists that could have crushed a small girl like me into the ground.
"Go, Logan!" A girl screamed. "Kill him!"
Oh god, where are the cops?
Logan rolled on top of Josh, getting a single punch in before Josh punched him in the gut. Blood dripped its way onto the disheveled grass.
Josh hooked his hands in Logan's shirt, spinning him around until Josh was on top. His fists moved like bullets, pounding punch after punch into the other kid's face. The look on Josh's face made me close my eyes, nausea churning in my stomach.
He was enjoying it. Whatever had caused the fight, Josh didn't care. He was living for the attention and the crowd.
Things were moving in slow motion. There was a distinct cracking noise, Logan's body crumbling on the ground like a stale cookie.
He was motionless.
In the very back of my mind, I was screaming.
Sirens filled the air in place of the whooping crowd.
"Run!" people yelled, escaping down the dimly lit street or disappearing in cars. My body was stuck to the floor.
The tell-tale red and blue flashing lights of a police car turned the corner onto the street.
Josh paused, still on top of the other boy, and swung around to face me. His chest was rising up and down as he struggled to calm his breathing. The blood gushed freely from a wound on his forehead. A red veil of blood nearly covered his entire left eye.
The police car was getting closer.
Thick arms scooped me up and carried me across the yard. Lights flashed, people screamed, and the wind whipped through my hair.
"You need to leave," Oliver's warm voice whispered in my ear.
"I'm not drunk-" I tried to protest - the cops couldn't arrest me either way - but he rounded a black car, opening the passenger door with me still in his arms, and dropped me in. The smell of leather was the only thing I registered in the pitch-black vehicle until Oliver got in, turned the keys, and the headlights flashed on. With renounced fever, he sped through the grass and onto the road, passing the approaching cop car and rounding the corner out of the neighborhood.
My chest was still heaving, even as we sped miles and miles from the scene.
Oliver drove silently.
I picked at a fingernail.
Rain started to fall, throwing drops at the windows.