Chapter Two
Leah
I leaned into the mirror, taking a closer look at my makeup.
I’d done it the same way I always did—my lips coated with a thin layer of lip gloss, my mascara dragging my lashes up about a mile high.
Even for a party, I didn’t like to do nighttime looks.
I kept things light and fresh—usually with my mother’s voice in my ear, saying, Are you sure that’s the right shade of blush?
“You look fine,” my best friend, Soph, said from behind me. I could see her through the mirror; she was sprawled out on my bed, feet kicked up behind her.
“You haven’t even looked up at me,” I said. I pushed my dirty blonde hair behind my ears, sighing. I had a knot in my chest that was so tight I could hardly breathe. I would say that I didn’t know why I was so nervous, but I knew exactly why.
“I don’t have to look up at you to know.” She readjusted on the bed, propping herself up. “Any word on if Kai will be there?”
She said Kai with the flat tone of someone who felt compelled to ask but didn’t really want the answer.
I knew for a fact she was sick of hearing about her, sick of hearing about her and me.
It’d gotten so bad that she went from thinly veiled you’re sure you want to see them again?
comments to turning my inability to just let the brief summer fling go into a drinking game.
She’d gotten five shots deep one night before she nearly put a gag on me to stop me from asking Do you think I should just text them? again.
It would all be a much-appreciated gesture of love in about three months, but while I was in the throes of it, I didn’t really want to hear it from her—even though I knew someone had to keep me in check.
“I don’t know,” I responded simply, because it was true.
I didn’t know. After a summer fling that was mostly made up of sex—still with no orgasm—and underwhelming departures in the middle of the night, Kai had completely ghosted me.
Initially, I’d chalked it up to being busy during the first week of school.
But then another week passed. And another.
And now I was here, deep into October and scared to go to a party because she might be there and I might have to navigate whatever would be waiting for me.
“This will be a good chance to maybe find someone new,” she said. “Lots of things happen at The 151.”
“And not all of them good,” I reminded her. “I still haven’t forgiven you for giving me a Buzzball that one time.” I sighed. “My gut is telling me she’ll be there.”
“What makes you think that? Our campus is small, but it’s not that small. You’re not going to be, like, on top of each other. You haven’t even run into her yet.”
That was true—in addition to being ghosted, Kai had been nowhere to be seen.
I hadn’t run into her in any of the spots students frequented, academic buildings or otherwise.
The only proof of life I had was that she occasionally posted on Instagram—usually perfectly curated photo dumps of the intentional-but-pretending-it-wasn’t variety—and her band was still playing gigs in the area.
“That’s what makes me think it’s coming,” I said. “And The 151 is, like, the lesbian hangout. I don’t want to have to avoid it all year, but I also…” I shrugged defeatedly.
“You guys fooled around for, like, two months very casually.” Soph put her whole body and spirit into the very, which was reasonable because it seemed like it still hadn’t completely sunk in for me yet.
“It’s not like she left you at the altar.
I know it’ll be weird, and it’ll suck to run into her, but it won’t be the end of the world.
People do it literally all the time, and with people who were actual exes of a serious, exclusive relationship. ”
“I know,” I lied. I’d tried to explain it to Soph before, but she never understood.
She was the ultra-confident one of the two of us, always out flirting and meeting people and flashing her bright smile.
We met through cheerleading, but that was where most of our similarities ended—other than a strong, unwavering dedication to each other and our friendship.
I didn’t know why I couldn’t just let everything with Kai go. I’d tried to think it over logically, tried to give myself the ick a thousand times, and still couldn’t dig myself out of the hole I’d willingly dug myself.
The only saving grace—and I truly meant the only—was that I hadn’t texted her at any point after she ignored the last text I sent.
I stood firm, waiting for her to follow up, wanting her to be the one who had to ask for my attention again.
Even if I couldn’t be cool and under control internally, I was absolutely going to give that impression externally.
“We’re also, like you said, going to the lesbian hangout,” Soph said. “Even if Kai shows up, she definitely won’t be the only option there.”
“You can keep encouraging me to go back into the dating scene, but—”
“Someone has to remind you that you’re hot shit.”
I flicked off the light in my en-suite bathroom and threw myself down on my bed next to Soph. “I know I’m hot shit.”
“You’re definitely not giving that you feel that way.” She turned to look at me, propping herself up on one elbow. “Which is fine, but you also have about a million new people you can meet tonight. Or a million old people who, after a drink or two, suddenly become a new object of fixation.”
“I don’t know if there will be anyone worth paying attention to.”
“Hello? Nab an athlete? There are very few problems muscles can’t solve.”
“You know my sister would never in a million years let that happen,” I said.
Mags being on the basketball team meant that everyone on the team was completely off limits.
It’d always been that way, with every team she’d ever played on.
No matter how cute or nice a teammate was, they were always a teammate first.
Even if they had incredible arms, which I knew GJ did. Not that I was specifically thinking about GJ during this very generalized, very broad conversation about hooking up with athletes. Not at all.
“It doesn’t have to be someone on the basketball team.
” I’d never been so grateful that Soph and I hadn’t yet developed the ability to literally hear each other’s thoughts; there was no way she’d ever approve of GJ.
“Plus, if you can’t handle potentially running into Kai at a house party, you would definitely not be able to handle running into a fling multiple times a week for the rest of the season.
You have softball, field hockey, swim team—”
“I get it.” I laughed, playfully smacking her arm. I sat up fully and looked her in the eyes. “It’s going to be okay, right? You can’t actually die from, like, embarrassment?”“I promise you, seeing the campus fuckgirl at a party will not kill you,” Soph said, putting her hand to her heart. “Swear.”
“Okay,” I said, taking a deep breath. It didn’t do anything to calm my nerves; the only solution was liquid courage. “Let’s do it.”
The best time to arrive at The 151 was just after 10 p.m., which was exactly when Soph and I arrived. We were able to walk to the house and combatted the chill settling over northern Colorado with copious amounts of alcohol and light coats we’d hide in our usual spot.
By the time we walked through the front door, my muscles had relaxed, and I no longer felt like I was at risk of throwing up any second from nerves. It became a tiny bit easier for me to consider hearing Soph out and finally let go of the grip I’d allowed Kai to have on me, at least for the night.
Music blasted through the entire house, bass making the walls and floors vibrate. I could feel it in my chest, a much-needed sensation after being wound up so tight.
I took a swig from my water bottle—Soph and I knew better than to go for the lukewarm beer offered here—and looked around for familiar faces.
The house was packed full as usual. People were hanging out on couches, making out against walls, flirting during games of flip cup.
House parties in Lakeside Green were wild and almost always the preferred spot to be; on a campus this small, there were only a few places to go out and get a drink, and they were too controlled for my liking.
This was the closest we could get to a dingy, underground club.
“Leah! Soph!”
Soph dragged me over toward a group of our friends. Some of them were cheerleaders, and some of them were friends of cheerleaders. A handful were of the randomly assigned roommates variety instead of the initial common interest variety. It was a mixed bag on how long or how well I knew everyone.
The group had gone through major transformations since our freshman year.
There’d been fallouts, replaced best friends, new additions, even some heartbreaks between members of the group.
Most of the girls in the group were not the ones I’d expected to stay in touch with.
But I could see the current group of us, the six or so who shared a group chat and stayed in touch even after the party was over, making it past graduation.
“How are you, Madame President?” Reese, one of my friends who wasn’t a cheerleader, asked. She threw an arm over my shoulders, her blonde curls falling into my face in the process. “Change the world yet?”