"What the hell is going on in here?" Jase asks, and apparently his voice shocks Seraphina, who gasps, wheeling around and staring at him. She still has one of the straws in her hand, a fine dusting of white powder covering it. "Phina... what are you doing?"
"I was just teaching miss Betty Sue here how to have fun, sue me," Seraphina responds, a grin on her face even though she's acting defensive. "Though... you could have some fun with us instead!" she runs up to him, her legs a bit wobbly as she does so, practically clinging onto his shoulders like she's going to fall over without them. Jase puts a hand around her waist, but his eyes aren't on her. They're on me... taking me in, studying me, the way I've practically fallen to the ground after Seraphina left, the shaking that's overcome me. "Did she get any?" he asks Seraphina after a slight pause, his voice low and quiet, and something tells me, a hell of a lot more sober than the rest of the room.
I mean, thank god for that if nothing else.
"No... but the night is still young. She was about to... and you can too, gorgeous," she says, playing with his hair a little in a way that makes me want to scream, but at her words, Jase seems to relax, his worried look turning a little more condescending and a little less pitying.
He still doesn't think I can handle this.
"Phina. Don't. I'm serious," he says, pushing her off of him. "If you want to get super high and risk serious consequences, be my guest. But don't drag her into it just because you're jealous of how much more innocent she is."
"Jealous? Please," Seraphina laughs, turning her gaze to look me up and down. "Not sure who on earth would be jealous of little Homebody here."
"Seraphina. Stop. Go back out, I'll see you in a second. You too," he says, pointing to the rest of the girls and waiting for them to leave before he offers me a hand up. "Last time I checked, the bathroom floor wasn't exactly a very comfortable place to sit."
"Shut up," I mutter, looking very intensely just past his left shoulder and lifting myself up without his hand. "Thanks. For helping me. I guess."
"Try not to need any more help, okay? I have better things to do than babysit you all night."
My eyes widen out of surprise for just a second, a little bit of hurt flashing into them. But of course this is what he thinks. I can't handle this. I shouldn't be here. Hell, I spent 5 minutes with these girls and almost let them pressure me into doing coke?
I'm so, so stupid.
"Sorry. Won't happen again," I say, my eyes downcast and my voice low before I slip past him.
"Wait, Red, that's not what I-" I hear him say, but there's no purpose.
I'm already gone.
--
The downstairs area club is filled with more raucous dancing, strobe lights, and music... but everyone seems to be into it. Chrissa (even though I don't even think I saw her take any coke, which just says something about her natural personality), Seraphina, even Mayah. All dancing around, acting like they've never been happier in their lives.
Euphoria.
If only I realized earlier that was from the cocaine instead of genuinely enjoying the party.
I look back to see Jase emerging from the stairwell, coming back to Cody Chasen and Corey Westbrook, who try to offer him some sort of drink. I watch him roll his eyes, taking a few sips, and then subtly place the rest of the drink on the counter when they aren't looking.
Huh. Weird.
But before I can observe further, I remember the way he spoke to me upstairs. Like I was a child, a burden. Like I'd never fit in with these people.
Innocent. That's what he called me.
Since when does making responsible choices make me innocent?
But whatever. I quickly turn away from him and start dancing with Chrissa, Christine and some other girl, Amber, I think, with a pink buzz cut. "You've got such pretty ears!" I hear Janine say over the wild music. She reaches a hand out to touch my ear, laughing. I can feel how much she's shaking, and it makes me very glad I did not get high with her. "Chrissa... do I have pretty ears?"
I can't help but laugh at how crazy they're all acting, and then my eyes float to the middle of one of the tables...
Where Mayah's doing shots in front of like... 30 people.
"Oh, this is really not a good idea," I mutter, looking up at her. I may not be versed in drugs and alcohol, but even I know that mixing large amounts of alcohol with cocaine is a terrible idea. "Mayah, stop it!" I yell, my voice barely audible over the raucous crowd- but it makes her put down the shot she was drinking as I walk over, her eyes narrowing. "Ah, look. It's little Miss Perfect here again to ruin my fun! Let's all drink to that!" Mayah laughs, looking around at the group of girls- all giving each other confused, what-is-going-on expressions.
Ha.
If only I knew.
"Mayah, seriously, this isn't you," I say, my voice steady as I climb onto the counter. "Just put the glass down, please."
"Why should I?" Mayah asks, smirking down at me. "Why should I listen to little virgin Sienna with her innocent eyes and thick thighs... that rhymed. But anyways, no guy would ever want you."
I shrink backwards. "Mayah, I'm just trying to help..."
"Well, take a hint and learn that I don't want your fucking help. You're ugly and annoying and boring... so boring. The only interesting thing about you is Jase... but we all know that he'd never really get with you. Maybe if you got a brother, that would-" she continues, but I've already started to tune her out.
Is this what Mayah really thinks of me? And if this is my best friend's opinion on who I am...
What is everyone else's?
"What the hell is going on here?" Jase asks (at this point, I'm starting to think it's his signature phrase, like Peter Kavinsky's 'whoa whoa whoa'), causing me to turn around and face where he's standing, his arms crossed as he looks at me and Mayah.
Dammit.
"Oh, there he is... in the flesh. Jason Turner, I have a question for you."
"Yes...?"
"You'd never screw her, right?" she asks, pointing down to me, the gleam in her eyes wicked and spiteful.
"What? What kind of question is that?" Jase asks. "Mayah, I think you're a bit dru-"
The fact that he doesn't even give me a straight answer is all I need to hear to send my heart plummeting...
Though not as much as it does when I see Mayah sway to the side, her shakiness making her take wobbly, uneven steps-
Until she falls off the counter, Jase and Janine somehow managing to catch her mere seconds before her head would've hit the floor.
"Oh my god," I hear a voice that sounds surprisingly like my own... but I don't remember talking. "Mayah!"
I hear her laugh, shoving her arms out of Jase's hold and looking me up and down, her movements jerky and disoriented. "Ah, Little Miss Perfect just has to be here for the rescue again. You're pathetic, you know that? And no matter how hard you try, no one is ever going to want you because..." she seems to barely be able to stand up straight, practically falling back into the counter she was standing on. "Because... because..."
Jase unlocks his cell phone, handing it to me without a second glance. His expression is urgent, stormy, and something else I can't quite decipher as he quickly looks at me before turning away. "Red- call an Uber. Tell them to get here ASAP- I don't care how much I have to pay."
"O-okay. Yeah." I quickly open the Uber app, the simple motions of going through it taking my mind slightly off everything that just happened, everything that's happening right now. I don't- I don't know if Mayah's going to be okay, and I'm scared. Terrified.
But some tiny, awful piece inside of me is afraid that she... is okay.
Because it means that the words she said to me were true.
Thankfully, I'm able to focus all my energy on getting an Uber and don't have to think about how horrible of a person I am as Jase, Chrissa, Janine, Cody and I all try to get out of the club as fast as we can- as fun as it seemed earlier, it's now making me claustrophobic, and the intermingling scents of sweat, alcohol and weed are almost sickening. When we finally do make it outside, I can't help but take a deep breath of the fresh, clean air- before I see Mayah, still struggling to get away from Jase, who's half-carrying her, half-dragging her to the car.
Our Uber driver, Matt, gives us a stunned look as we get in the car, his dark, bushy eyebrows raising like caterpillars. "Oh- no, no, no. I am not letting a bunch of wasted teenagers get into my car."
"Please li-" Jase starts, but I cut him off, my voice low and murmuring. "Jase, maybe this is a better idea anyways. We should probably get her to a hospital or something... I mean, what if she overdosed?"
Jase shakes his head, his voice quiet enough that the Uber driver won't be able to hear him. "She'll be fine, I promise. Besides, the second we take her to the hospital, trust me, people are going to get involved that we don't want to be involved. People like the police. And I don't want to explain why we all were at a club and why some of us are high on cocaine."
"But isn't that better than her DYING?" I ask, not able to keep my voice low anymore.
"She's not going to die. She didn't overdose. She's just very, very drunk and the cocaine is starting to wear off. She's going to be fine, I promise."
"I'm right here, you know," Mayah says, though her words are so slurred that it sounds like she's speaking in cursive.
For the record, I'm horrible at reading cursive.
"Are you just going to stand here all night?" Matt asks, shifting over and keeping one hand on the steering wheel. "I have places to be that don't include shepherding around a bunch of teenagers."
"No, we're coming," Jase says, sliding into the backseat of the car as Janine takes shotgun and Chrissa and I squeeze in next to Mayah, who's practically passed out. Matt tries protesting again, telling us to get the hell out, but after Jase slips him a few bills, he changes his tune pretty quickly, starting the car and driving through the city to Mayah's house, paying absolutely no attention to the argument going on between me and Jase.
"She's fine, Sienna, I swear."
"She's shaking."
"That's what cocaine does to a person. Seriously, Red, calm-"
"And you'd know this from first-hand experience?"
Chrissa laughs then, looking over at Jase, and then at me. "Hell yeah he'd know it. Do you remember the first time you and I got-"
Jase gives Chrissa a glare and she stops talking, rolling her eyes. "God, take a joke, Turner."
This is really not what we need to be focusing on, as much as I want to hear more about this. It's for another time. "Jase- you've experienced this before?"
"That's literally what I've been trying to tell you," he says with a slight chuckle. "I ended up fine. She will too."
"But... but..." I'm struggling to think of reasons this is a bad idea.
"Fine," Chrissa sighs, like we asked her a question she finally knows the answer to, not like she's interrupting my very incohesive ramblings. "I'll stay with her, if y'all really want. I'm not really in the partying mood right now, anyways."
It still takes Chrissa and Jase the next 20 minutes until we get to Mayah's house to convince me that she actually is fine and not about to die of a cocaine overdose, but it's not until she and Chrissa actually get inside and we turn around, heading back to the party for Janine, that I realize... everything that just happened.
My best friend just called me boring. She just said that no guy would ever want to date me.
My best friend. The girl who sold ham sandwiches and lemonade with me in first grade- I remember we got so annoyed with stirring the lemonade packets into the water that we started using our feet. Thank god no one bought it.
But this is the girl who I've been able to count on, no matter what, the one person who's been able to stick with me through thick and thin, through my father's death...
If I had known how she's felt about me this whole time, how different would my life be?
Apparently I'm too caught up in my thoughts to notice when we get back to the parking lot of the club, Jase gently nudging my leg with his knee. How is it that such a simple touch, the briefest of gestures, can send a shiver through me?
"You okay?" he asks, and it takes everything in me not to crack in half as I turn away from the window and towards him, muttering "yeah." He gives me a searching look, like I'm some sort of mystery he's trying to unravel, before opening the car door and holding his hand out for me.
"Uh... Jase," I say, looking down and biting my lip. "You should go back to the party, but I don't... I don't want to annoy you anymore. I think I'm just going to go home."
"Wait- why would you do that?" Jase says, and he looks genuinely confused.
"Because it's eleven-thirty at night...? We have school tomorrow, and-and I don't want to make you feel like you have to watch me, and I-"
"Just get out of the car, Red," Jase says, shaking his head but giving me one of his signature mega-watt smiles as he takes my hand and pulls me out of the Uber, shutting the door behind him and waiting for the car to drive off, before turning and walking in the direction of the boardwalk nearby, in the direction of the ocean. "Jase-" I say, though I don't let go of his hand. "What are we doing?"
His blue eyes have a dangerous gleam to them as he sits down on the wooden post of the fence in between the club parking lot and the path leading down to the beach, the boardwalk... "We're not going to that party. But we're not going home, either."
"But-"
"No," he says, and I realize that his hand is still clasped with mine, the subtle coolness feeling nice against the humid heat- practically alien at this time of year. "Listen to me, Red. This is completely your choice, but..." at the same time as he's talking, he pulls a silver flask out of the pocket of his black leather jacket. "You can go home if you really want to... cry about Mayah, and the party, and go to school tomorrow. And everything will be the same."
"Or...?"
He flashes me another smirk, holding out the flask. "Do you remember that bet I won while we were at the hospital?"
"How on earth could I forget?" I ask flatly, trying to subdue the slight pink that I'm sure is dusting my cheeks by now. Thank gosh it's dark. "But what does that have to do with any of this?"
"You lost... so technically, you have to do anything I want. And what I want is for you to let loose, maybe actually drink for once in your life... and come with me."
"I don't... I don't know if that's such a good idea."
"Like I said, it's your choice. You can go back to what's easy, what's safe... or you and I can explore whatever this is."
"Whatever what is?" I ask, looking up as my eyes grow to the size of saucers. Does he know I have feelings for him?
"I think that's a question you have to answer for yourself," Jase tells me, an eyebrow still raised. "So what'll it be? Yes or no?"
My mouth opens for a second, but no sound comes out. Because this should be easy. I should just want to go back home, sleep, not do anything illegal... take the safe path. That's always been what I wanted, what I needed.
But there's something in Jase's blue eyes that I just can't help but hold on to, something that's just drawing me closer, towards what's wild, what's unsafe, unknown.
And I'm so tired of fighting it.
So against my better judgment, I shake my head, a small laugh bubbling up-
And take the flask.
A/N: Hey guys!! Wow, I really did nOt like that chapter at all, I'm very very tired (from doing literally nothing, mind you) and so it definitely sounds like a delirious goat trying to write - I'M SORRYY!! However, get ready for Tuesday's update, because man... things are about to get...
Nope. Not gonna spoil it for you, you'll just have to wait to see what happens when it comes out!
As always, thank you to all my lovely readers for continuing to support me with LWTBB and if you like it, please make sure to let me know by voting or commenting :)
Alllllso, I really want to get the cast list finalized soon, but I still really don't know who I want as Jase... and I still have a couple options for Sienna. So, if you have any ideas for actors/actresses to play either of them, make sure to message me or leave a comment, and then I think I'm going to post a "chapter" for people to vote along with my regular update on Tuesday.
Ily all and have a great weekend! <3
-Selene