Chapter 21
Karla
When Missy texted me that she was at my house, I was still nervous about going with her.
I’d sneaked out of school before, but never my house, and definitely not to go to a party.
I didn’t know what people wore to the kind of party that Colton was having, so I went with my regular black outfit. Black T-shirt, black jeans.
I felt a little tired that evening. It was already after ten when they pulled up to the house to pick me up. Annoyance sprung through me. I’d thought I would already be home by now. A quick visit or something. Instead, the night was beginning a lot later than I thought.
My body was sore from moving around all day.
The last thing I should’ve been doing was going to some party, but I needed this.
I needed it to remind me that I wasn’t some broken girl; I just had a bad year.
The worst year. But maybe things were turning around.
Maybe my regular life was coming back to me.
Maybe I wouldn’t be a freak forever.
As I climbed into the back of Colton’s car, a sharp pain shot up my left leg. Once we pulled away from the curbside, Colton started blasting some music at a stupidly loud level. He pulled out a cigarette and lit it, too, with the windows still rolled up.
I hated the smell of cigarettes. Missy did, too. At least, she used to. I thought she’d hated cigarettes as a whole since her grandpa passed away from smoking. It was surprising when Colton passed the cigarette to Missy and she took a puff.
“You smoke, Kayla?” Colton asked, taking the cigarette back from Missy and holding it in my direction.
“Karla,” I corrected. “And no. I don’t.”
“More for me,” he said, taking a drag of the cigarette.
I coughed a little and cleared my throat.
I slid my hands into my lap and fiddled with them, the same way Ash was always fiddling with his.
I wondered what he was doing that night.
I wondered what he would’ve thought about me being in a car with Missy and Colton, too.
I also wondered if he was wondering about me.
“Karla’s always been a goody-two-shoes girl,” Missy commented.
“That’s not true,” I claimed. If anything, Missy used to be the good girl.
There was a point when she wouldn’t even step on a crack because she was convinced that she’d end up breaking her mother’s back.
I was the more adventurous friend. Now she was acting like I was always this boring girl who never did anything wrong.
“It is true. I’m even surprised you’re coming to the party,” she replied.
“The party you made me leave to come pick her up, might I add. That’s how much we wanted you there, Kayla,” Colton joined in as he smirked my way through his rearview mirror.
“Karla,” I murmured, but he didn’t seem to care.
“Yeah, it’s Karla,” Missy said. She glanced into the rearview mirror toward me and smiled softly. The same soft smile I used to know.
She stood up for me.
“Karla, Kayla, what the fuck ever,” Colton grumbled. “I didn’t ask you to correct me, Missy,” he barked. “Don’t do that shit again.”
Missy’s demeanor shifted then. I watched it happen—her energy evaporated.
Her shoulders rounded forward, and she went back to smoking a cigarette she probably hated.
Colton talked to Missy the same way her father spoke to her mother.
She hated how her father spoke to her mother.
So why was she allowing Colton to do the same thing to her?
I didn’t know what to say or how to act.
I didn’t like Colton. Not at all. I didn’t even understand why Missy liked the guy.
He was a jerk. Ash would’ve never talked to me the way Colton spoke to Missy.
He would never make me feel bad for speaking.
Even when I yelled at him, he didn’t yell back at me.
He just took it. Ash would’ve been an amazing boyfriend. Not that I would ever know.
I hated that I hurt him.
I couldn’t get the image of his sad stare out of my head.
I looked down at my nervous, shaky hands. I wished I had Ash’s toy truck to keep me distracted.
Missy and Colton talked the whole ride over to the party as I awkwardly sat in the back seat, watching Missy shrink more and more as Colton belittled her without thought.
Why didn’t she stand up for herself? Should I have stood up for her?
Maybe if I stood up for her, she’d think I was a good friend and let me be her best friend again.
Or maybe she’d be pissed and call me a freak and tell me not to get involved in her relationship.
I stayed quiet.
At one point, Colton started sipping on a beer. I shifted my body in the back seat, trying to find steadiness. Was he drinking and driving? Wasn’t that a bad thing to do? Dad always told me how drinking and driving never went together. Plus, I knew how fast an accident could happen on the road.
Was he watching for other cars? Why was he driving so fast? Did he care that he had other people’s lives in his hands as he took those fast turns? My mind filled with flashbacks of the night of my family’s accident as I sat in the back of Colton’s car.
I closed my eyes, and I could see Mom in the front seat, Dad behind the wheel, and Lorelai arguing with me in her car seat. I was back to the worst night of my life, on the verge of tears, because Colton drove like a speed racer, drinking and smoking without a care in his mind.
It was wild how I could be in the middle of a panic attack and those two didn’t even notice.
I wanted to go home. I wanted to crawl into my closet and cry against Mom’s clothes. I wanted to stop hurting. I wanted to be with Ash.
Oh my gosh, I miss Ash.
My fingernails began digging into the palms of my hands as I stared down at the floor mat of the car. Every now and then, Missy tried to engage with me, but Colton would turn the music up too loud so we couldn’t talk. Missy gave me a weak smile in the mirror and mouthed that she was sorry.
But it was OK. We could talk at the party, with my other old friends. Maybe Brian would be there, too. I just needed to get through this smoky car ride before I could really relax and have a fun time.
I wondered what Ash was doing.
Ugh.
Why couldn’t I stop wondering about him and what he was doing right now?
All I knew was I didn’t have to use a toy truck to distract my mind whenever I was with Ash. He never made me feel bad, uncomfortable, or unfamiliar. Maybe in a way, he was my toy truck. The thing that brought me comfort.
And I was so mean to him.
I’m sorry, Ash.
I wished he could hear my thoughts, even when we weren’t together. Then maybe he’d realize it was me who had the issues and not him.
When we pulled into Colton’s driveway, I was so relieved to open the car door and breathe in fresh air.
I’d have to go home and wash my hair to get the smell of cigarettes out of it.
If Dad found out I sneaked out to a party and smelled like cigarettes, I’d be grounded into eternity.
Even Ellie wouldn’t be able to get me out of that level of trouble.
She seemed to have some kind of magic touch when it came to Dad and his bad mood, but she wasn’t a true mastermind magician.
Missy wrapped her arm around my shoulder as we walked to the front door.
She smelled like booze and cigarettes. It was like I didn’t know who she was anymore.
I didn’t know people who didn’t go through a traumatic situation could change so much within a year.
Then again, I knew Missy’s parents got divorced.
I knew how hard that was for her, so maybe this was her rebelling in some kind of way.
Or maybe people just changed without much rhyme or reason.
My hope was that the girl I once knew still lived somewhere inside of this new version of her. The same way I hoped the old me still lived somewhere within me.
“You’re about to have the wildest night,” Missy said as we walked through the living room.
The house was packed. I saw a lot of familiar faces, and some that I didn’t know, too.
Some of the kids must’ve gone to different schools from us.
There were clouds of smoke, loud music, and red plastic Solo cups all over the place.
I didn’t know what I thought the party would be like, but this was out of my comfort zone.
“Do you want a drink?” Missy asked as she dragged me toward the kitchen. The way she yanked me around was unsettling. A strong pain shot through my leg, but I didn’t try to slow down. I didn’t want to stand out too much. All I wanted to do was blend in again. To be normal.
“I, uh, I . . .” I stumbled over my words. Did I want a drink? I had a feeling she wasn’t talking about Coca-Cola. “I’m OK.”
“Don’t be so dramatic, it’s just booze,” Missy said as she reached the countertop that was scattered with half-full bottles of alcohol.
She grabbed two red Solo cups, lifted a bottle of whiskey, and poured a shot into each cup.
She handed one to me. “Karla . . . I want you to fit in again. So you have to do things to fit in, OK? Just be normal.”
Normal.
Conforming to a standard.
Usual.
Typical.
Expected.
Average.
“Bottom’s up!” Missy sang before she downed hers.
I downed mine next—and almost threw up.
Missy laughed. “Good girl. Now stay here. I’ll be back.”
She left me standing there in a crowded room, but I felt embarrassingly alone.
People were looking at me as if I didn’t belong, which in turn made me hyperaware that I didn’t belong.
There was nothing about me that read “high school parties.” If anything, I felt like a circus performer who was being laughed at by those who looked my way.
“What the fuck happened to your face?” a stranger said as he walked past me, laughing as he went to get a drink. “You look like Scarface,” he chuckled. He poured a shot into a cup and downed it as if it didn’t taste like rubbing alcohol.
Then he headed off as if he didn’t just belittle me.