10. Chapter 10
Neither Lizzie nor I remember the first time we had sex.
I thought she wrote me off because she didn’t answer my texts for days, but then out of nowhere she called asking me to go to a party with her. As we approached, we saw the big house just bloated with college kids, spilling out onto the wraparound porch. The ones inside were gyrating while the ones on the porch were smoking and playing flip cup. One person was puking. A Kanye West song blasted from inside, and there was a couple near the door having an argument.
“Thank God we opted to drive instead of taking a ride with someone else, so we can make an early exit,” Lizzie said to me as I waited for a car to pull away from the curb so I could take its spot. “Sorry if this ends up being a shitshow.”
I gave her knee a squeeze as I turned off the engine. We both liked to drink and have a good time, but this scene was a bit of a turnoff for both of us. “Let’s just go say ‘hi,’ at least. Have a drink and see what happens.”
I got a smile from Lizzie, who replied, “Just give me a sign when you want to leave.”
The music got louder as we approached the house and when we slid our way inside, pushing between sweaty bodies, she yelled something over her shoulder at me, but I couldn’t hear what she was saying. I grabbed onto her hips as I followed her through the crowd so we wouldn’t get separated, and she reached back and wrapped her hands around my wrists.
When we landed in the kitchen, a dude knocked right into Lizzie, splashing some sort of pink drink onto her. “Oh, damn, sorry ’bout that, sweetheart,” he said to her as he grabbed a disgusting dish towel off the counter and tried to dab her chest with it.
“I got it,” I shouted as I ripped the rag from his hands and prevented myself from ramming it down his throat.
“Sorry, bro,” he said, hands up, a grin on his face. Yeah, walk away fuckwit. We watched the guy disappear into the crowd, then Lizzie—hands on her hips—looked down at herself and laughed.
“What’s so funny?” I shouted above the music.
“My mom—hell, everyone—always says not to drink the punch at parties like this. And now I’m wearing it.”
I found it endearing she was laughing at herself, with her white Green Day T-shirt and jean skirt covered in splatters of pink, instead of storming out and saying her night was ruined because some asshole spilled his drink on her.
She walked over to a big plastic tub and peered at the concoction inside. “Yeah, that’s a hard pass,” she said as she turned her gaze toward the keg. “This way.”
“Hang on,” I said, reaching for her elbow before she could turn away. “Why the cold shoulder before tonight?” When she only looked at her hands, I pressed further. “I called you. Texted. Why didn’t you answer?”
Looking back up at me, she said, “I did … finally. I mean, I called and asked you to come tonight, didn’t I?”
“Sure, sure,” I nodded. “But what took so long?”
Locking eyes with me, Lizzie took a deep breath, then said, “I thought it would go away, but it didn’t.”
I cocked my head to the side. “What didn’t?”
We both knew what she meant, and I was forcing her to say it. Hands on her hips, she did that thing where she turned her face down, then looked up at me through her lashes, making my dick twitch. “Wanting to be around you, OK? I liked it. I like it. I don’t want to, but I do. Happy now?”
She started to turn and make her way toward the keg, but I stopped her once more.
“Ugh, are we ever going to get a drink?” she asked as I swung her around and, with my free hand, cupped her face and silenced her with a kiss. Then another. “One other question,” I finally said. And then another kiss. “Why don’t you want to like being around me?”
Eyes pinched shut, Lizzie pulled back from me ever so slightly. “I saw what she offered you,” she said, then looked me in the eyes. “What’s-her-face. The Barbie chick. I saw her wave a baggie in your face. I’m not into that, Knox. I drink. I’ve smoked. But I’m not into anything else. I’ve been with guys who are into that, and it wasn’t worth it.”
My hand still on her face, I tipped it up to make her look at me. “If you saw her offer, then you saw me decline.”
“Yeah,” she smiled. “I did see that.”
The cheap beer hit my stomach in a rush. We both downed a cup right there at the tap before filling up again and making our way further inside, because we didn’t want to have to go back and wait in line for another drink.
Just as we entered another room, a blonde in a mini dress and fishnet stockings grabbed my shoulder. “Can yous guys step in for us?” she slurred, pointing to a guy whose eyes were just tiny slits. “Wes gotta go to the bedroom.” She hiccupped and giggled as I wondered how in the hell someone can go into a bedroom in God-knows-whose house and fuck on God-knows-whose bed.
“Hell, yeah!” Lizzie responded as I looked over her shoulder and spotted the table filled with cups. “I love beer pong!”
And with that, we stepped up to the table.
“Have you played this before?” she asked as she started arranging a triangle with the cups.
“Uh, yeah,” I answered with an eye roll. “I may not be a college student, but this ain’t my first rodeo.”
“OK, OK,” she laughed. “I’m really good at this game.”
“The line for the keg’s too long,” said a shirtless guy with abs of steel and low-hanging jeans who came around with a bottle of Barton vodka. “We’ll just play with this instead.”
He started filling the cups generously, and I was thankful Lizzie said she was good at this game.
Lizzie fucking sucked at beer pong. Literally didn’t sink one single ball.
And neither did I.
Needless to say, after several cups of cheap vodka we were both feeling too good to be ashamed of our skills.
“I guess we lost,” Lizzie shouted at me as we left the table.
“Yeah, definitely wasn’t one of my better games,” I said as we stumbled into each other. Somehow the house was even more packed than it was when we arrived. It was ungodly hot, and incredibly loud, but there was a small part of me that wasn’t hating it. Maybe it was the alcohol talking.
I grabbed Lizzie”s hand and pulled her back toward the kitchen, where we found a bunch of girls in line to be hoisted up for keg stands by a couple of bulky jocks. We were pushed around a little as we tried to shuffle by, and then I heard someone say, “You’re next, sweetheart. Up you go,” followed by a shriek as Lizzie’s hand was pulled from mine and she was in the arms of the two Vikings who were turning her upside-down.
“What the fu—” I started to scramble, but then a laugh left Lizzie’s lips as she grabbed the top of the keg to brace herself. “It’s OK, Knox. I got this!” she shouted to me as someone put the tap to her lips.
I was gaping at her as her lips suckled on the tap, her hair hanging all over the place. Then someone sidled up next to me, extending his hand with a lit joint. “Hey bro!” I looked over and saw it was Jared.
“Hey, man!” I said in surprise as I took his offering with one hand, and we pulled each other into a bro hug. “What are you doing here?” I turned as I took a long pull and inhaled, then slowly exhaled, hoping Lizzie didn’t see. Although, she said she didn’t mind smoking, right?
“Hey, I go here, man. What are you doing here?”
I pointed to Lizzie, who had beer leaking from her lips and streaming down her cheek and forehead. She smacked one of the guys’ arms to let him know she was tapping out, and they started to set her down. I adjusted myself in my pants and took another hit before passing the joint back.
“I see the blind date went well,” Jared said, low enough so only I could hear, and I just gave him a smirk. “Sorry I can’t catch up. I have to find Janice somewhere in this zoo.”
“Good seeing you, man,” I said as we shook hands, and he disappeared into the crowd.
Lizzie barreled into me. “Was that Johnny? Jack? ... What’s his name?”
“Jared,” I said louder than intended as I grabbed her hips to steady her, but I wasn’t much help because the world was starting to sway a little for me.
“Yes! Jared!” she shouted, even louder than me. Her eyes were red and her cheeks flushed. “I don’t know why I’m shouting!” She giggled, slapping a hand over her mouth.
My hands traveled around so I could flex my fingers around her ass . God, what I wanted to do to that ass. She looked so damn cute right then, I could have just …
“DANCE PARTY!” some guy shouted from nearby, and a rush of people flooded into the living room as the music somehow got even louder, and Lizzie and I rolled our eyes as “I’m Too Sexy” came on.
“At least the line for the keg is gone,” Lizzie said as she headed over to it.
“Thing’s kicked!” someone informed us as he made his way toward the crowd.
“Well, that shucks,” I slurred as I rubbed the back of my neck and craned my head, glancing around the kitchen, my eyes landing on the tub of pink liquid.
I looked back at Lizzie, who raised an eyebrow at me.
I was screaming at the top of my lungs about heading down the Atlanta Highway toward a love shack. I had one fist in the air and a cup of pink liquid sloshing around in the other, while Lizzie and I bounced amid a crowd of sweaty, stinky bodies.
She slurred the lyrics as loud as I did as she made a V with her fingers on one hand and dragged them across her eyes while sipping her third cup of punch.
Or maybe it was our fourth round. I lost count.
I threw my head back and roared out a laugh and when I righted myself, the entire room was spinning, but I didn’t care. I pinched my nose and slunk toward the ground and back up, like I was snorkeling, and that garnered a throaty, uncontrollable laugh from Lizzie, who snorted—actually, fucking snorted, from her nose—and pink spit went everywhere. And that, of course, left us both in a fit of laughter.
We danced and jumped and ground on each other, sweaty and out of breath, while the crowd chanted along to “Love Shack.”
I dropped my cup to the ground—I didn’t even care whose house it was and whose carpet it was staining—and pulled Lizzie into me. I wiped my hand over her nose and mouth, clearing it of whatever the hell we had been drinking, and closed my mouth over hers. It was the worst kiss in the history of kisses. It was sloppy, and wet, and we could barely match our mouths up because we were so wasted, but it was fucking fire.
She wrapped her arms around my neck as I tangled one hand into her hair and pulled her face tight against mine as I used the other hand to hike her meaty thigh up over my hip, ready to dry fuck her right there in the middle of the crowd.
Hell, I was fairly certain other people were actually having sex nearby.
“Baaaang, baaaang, baaaang!” people sang along all around us.
And I continued mouth fucking her, and she kept right up with me.
“Baaaang, baaaang, baaaang!”
Our hands and mouths were all over one another.
“Bang, baaaang!”
We ground on each other some more.
“Bang, baaaang!”
Our lips still fused together, Lizzie mumbled, “Take me upstairs.”
“You’re what? Tiiiiiin roof, rusted!”
The bass couldn’t possibly still be thumping, but something was. Something right inside my brain. Right behind my left eye, next to my ear, drilling a spike through, and holy shit, I wanted to die.
I knew I should open my eyes because God only knew what the hell time it was or where the hell I was, but I couldn’t seem to peel my eyelids off my damn eyeballs because they were so dry.
I could feel someone next to me, laying on my outstretched arm as I laid sprawled on my back. I hoped to a higher power it was Lizzie. Please be Lizzie.
I finally peeled one eye open, and it took a while for the image before me to come into focus, but it most definitely was Lizzie laying next to me. Well, somewhat on top of me.Her hair was a matted mess all around her. Black eye makeup was smudged and streaked halfway down her face. And she was naked.
I opened my other eye and lifted my head enough to glance down at myself. Yep, also naked.
With my free hand, I pinched the bridge of my nose and tried my hardest to recall the night before. I remembered the beer pong, the keg, the music, the punch … Oh God, the punch. My stomach soured at the thought.
But then my memory went blank.
Shit, did we …
Lizzie started to stir so I pulled my arm out from under her. She opened her eyes, and I could see confusion set in as she glanced around, her eyes ping-ponging here and there before they landed on me, next to her, naked, in bed.
She pulled back a little, grabbing the sheet that was balled up at the foot of the bed and bringing it up to shield her body. Her reaction was a punch in the gut.
“Hey, it’s OK. It’s just me,” I said as I reached over to smooth her hair, but realized from her drawback that she needed a minute.
Or at least, I hoped that was all it was. I hoped she wasn’t terrified we had sex and regretted every second of it. Oh, God, maybe she was coherent for it, and I was so totally bombed, and it sucked for her.
Holding the sheet up to her chest—I didn’t think it was a good idea to point out that her nether regions were still exposed—she looked down at my crotch. “Yeah, uh, I see … you.”
I looked down and saw my morning wood standing at full attention.
“Shit!” I scrambled off the bed in search of my pants. Or briefs. Or ANYTHING. I grabbed a used towel off the floor and, as disgusting as it was, wrapped it around my waist.
Lizzie was sitting up, her legs flung over the side of the bed, as she rubbed her temple with one hand. “What the fuck?” she groaned.
“Yeah … I’m a little, uh, foggy, myself.” I came around the side of the bed and stood in front of her, careful not to crowd her space. “Are you, um … Do you feel OK? I mean …” Shit this was awkward.
“Did we …?” Lizzie stood up, draping the sheet around her, and again I didn’t tell her there was a wet stain on it. She didn’t need to know.
“Um …” I scratched the back of my neck.
She gawked at me, and I could see the black makeup stuck in the creases under her eyes. Her hair was an absolute wild mess. And I could totally see her nipples behind the sheet. If my brain weren’t thumping out of my skull, I would have been tempted to take her right there.
But then I felt like shit because we probably had sex, and it would have been our first time and I didn”t even remember it.
“Lizzie, I’m not really sure if, or what, we did. Do you feel, you know … Are you sore or anything?”
She looked at me incredulously and I felt stupid. “Look, Thor. I can tell you’re well endowed,” she said as she gestured toward my appendage that was, yep, still erect. “But if you think that after how much we drank last night and how I’m feeling right now that I’m going to be able to tell if you penetrated me, well—”
She stopped abruptly, and just when I thought it was because she hated me, and I was an asshole, she heaved and blew chunks all over. Folding over at the waist she emptied out her stomach while I pulled her hair back and rubbed her shoulders.
“Yep, there’s the pink punch again,” I said, and that got a groan out of her.
“Why? WHY did we drink the punch?” she asked as she wiped her mouth with the sheet.
“You did warn against it,” I replied.
I saw her still, then reach under the bed and pull out a condom wrapper. “Well, at least we were smart about it,” she said as she stood up.
“If that’s even ours,” I retorted, and she dropped the wrapper with a shiver and wiped her hand on the sheet.
We stood there awkwardly for a beat, me wrapped in a soiled towel and her wrapped in a dirty sheet, until I couldn’t stand the few feet of distance between us anymore.
“Hey,” I said as I stepped toward her. “The only regret I have is not being able to remember our first time. If that’s what happened. You deserve better,” I said as I wiped a knuckle across her cheek bone.
“No, I don’t,” she said with a sigh. “I don’t deserve better because I was a drunken fool last night.” Placing her hand over mine on her cheek, she added, “I have no regrets, either. Well, except maybe the punch. Yeah, I definitely regret the punch.”
That made my heart swell. “Really?” I asked.
“Really.”
She gave me googly eyes and started to lean in, then stopped and said, “I’d kiss you right now, but I have puke breath.”
That made us both laugh. I pulled her in to kiss the top of her head. “Let’s find something to wear and get breakfast. Pancakes will help soak up the alcohol in our stomachs.”
“Deal,” she said, looking around the floor for our clothes.
We never did find them. Instead, we stole some from the dresser in the bedroom, and when we entered the nearest diner, she was wearing a pair of men’s sweatpants rolled up at the waist and a white T-shirt, with no bra. I was wearing a lumberjack-looking flannel shirt and blue checkered pajama pants.
We looked absolutely ridiculous as we ate blueberry pancakes and Belgian waffles covered in chocolate syrup and drank gallons of orange juice, water and coffee. Lots and lots of coffee.