Chapter 40
Griffin
Ifucked up. Actually worse than that. I double-fucked up.
The first fuck up happened last month. I was dragged to a frat party by David–simultaneously my best friend and bane of my existence.
When he convinced me to come to Texas Tech after Eleanor ripped me to shreds, I regretted the decision the moment we crossed the county line. I’ve already decided that I’m not coming back next semester, despite David’s attempts to convince me that he might die if I leave.
You know what, maybe I’ve actually hit some sort of unholy trinity of mistakes.
The first mistake was going to the party in the first place. The second was getting so belligerently hammered that I hooked up with a random sorority girl in the bathroom without even asking her name.
And this isn’t a Cinderella “oops, I fell in love and forgot her name” type of disaster.
This is a “the girl I hooked up with while blacked out texted me that she might be pregnant, except I never saved her name in my phone and can’t really confirm if the text was even meant for me” type of disaster.
Which brings me to the third–and probably not final–problem.
I thought that college was supposed to make you smarter, but David decided that the best way to cope with my drunken disaster was to get even drunker this weekend, which, admittedly, I didn’t think was even possible.
When I woke up this morning with the hangover to end all hangovers, I wracked my brain trying to remember the events of the night before.
Flashes of fireball shots, mechanical bulls, Crunchwrap Supremes, and even more fireball shots were making my head spin until one very clear flashback stopped me cold.
There’s no way I did that, I thought to myself as I pulled up my call history log. I’m not that dumb. When I see the most recent outgoing call, I realize that I am, in fact, that dumb.
↗?Eleanor Turner - 1:37 AM
Fuck. Of all the people in the world I could have called, I picked the worst possible option.
Before I can think better of it, I fire off a text.
Griffin: I shouldn’t have called you. That was a mistake. Ignore it.
I stumble out of bed, and pull on the first pair of sweatpants I can find before heading straight to David’s room. After pounding on the door for a solid two minutes, he finally opens it.
“Uhhh I’m sorry, did the world end? Is there a reason you’re yelling at the ass crack of dawn?” he groans, looking nearly as bad as I feel.
Pushing past him into the dorm, I say “It’s 12:30, it’s not early–you’re just hungover.” He mumbles something under his breath that I can’t hear, and then lets out a strangled yell when I open the blinds. I turn toward him and bark out, “What did you let me do last night?”
It comes out more accusatory than I intended, but I’m too pissed that this whole semester has been spent with a David-shaped devil on my shoulder convincing me to make bad decisions to care.
With a wicked grin on his face, he says, “I don’t know what you could possibly be referring to. I didn’t let you take rapid shots and then get on the mechanical bull, you did that all by yourself, buddy.”
I roll my eyes and collapse onto his couch. Why am I friends with him again? “I’m not talking about that, bozo. What happened to friends not letting friends dial drunk?” I shoot him an accusatory look, and watch the wheels in his head spin until it finally clicks.
“Wait, you drunk dialed someone? Was it Maggie? Because Sarah told me that her pregnancy test came back negative so you don’t even need to worry about that anymore.”
Maggie, that was her name. “No, this isn’t about Maggie.” I drop my head into my hands and sigh. “I called Eleanor.”
He’s quiet for a beat, then lets out a low whistle. He looks genuinely sympathetic when he asks, “What’d she say, dude?”
“She didn’t say anything. She didn’t answer.” Right? Using every single brain cell that wasn’t drowned in alcohol last night, I try to remember how that call went. I pull my phone out to check the duration of the call, and when I see that it was under 90 seconds, my stomach unclenches a bit.
Until I remember the voicemail.
Uh, hey darlin’....
….Uh, basically I fucked up and I don’t know what to do.
And things always make more sense when I talk to you.
Or maybe they don’t anymore. I don’t know.
I drag my hand down my face, then bite my knuckle hard enough to leave a mark. Regret and shame crawl up my spine with the same determination to make a reappearance as the Crunchwrap Supremes apparently have.
Maybe I’m imagining it, I think to myself hopefully. Maybe I didn’t actually make a complete ass of myself after working so hard to shut out every thought of her for the last two years.
My phone dings with a text notification, and that hope is gone even faster than it came.
Ellie: Hope everything is okay. You know I’ll always be here if you need me, Griffin.
I lurch myself to the trashcan just in time to empty last night’s contents from my stomach. But I don’t think it’s the hangover making me feel sick now.