Chapter 16
Tristen
My pulse hammers as I wade through the thick of swaying bodies.
Some of them are slumped over, heavy-lidded. Barely moving to the deep bass beat rattling the foundation.
The scent of weed and alcohol is so thick that I can barely breathe. The flashing lights fucking with my vision.
It’s dark and my fingers are prickling with that familiar tingling.
Not now. Not with Em outside.
I just have to find my best friend among the incapacitated and drag him back home.
Focus.
Forcing a breath I regret with how thick it feels, I swallow back the nerves that rise and head up the stairs.
“Hatley!”
Door after door does nothing but reveal bodies fucking, snorting, shooting and my palms itch.
“Hat.”
The noise is too loud. The chatter of the filled hallway too much to hear over the buzzing taking over my veins.
I want … quiet.
My jaw clenches as I pass through the blown fog of someone’s exhale.
My hands are full on shaking when I plant them against what I think is a bathroom door and push.
Quiet. Quiet, quiet, quiet.
I gasp as the panel clears.
“Hatley,” I call and rush to his slumped over body where he’s cradling the toilet, his head laying limp on one arm. “Fuck, man, what did you do?”
Pushing his hair back from his sickly pale face, I pull back an eyelid and watch his pupil contract.
He groans, his brows scrunching, and he tries to swat my hand away.
I catch his wrist just as it splashes into the toilet.
“Okay, up you go.”
Pushing on his shoulder, I search for a towel or something to dry him off and curse when the best thing within reach is toilet paper.
Unrolling a handful, I swipe at the drips as he groans, the paper practically disintegrating with each pass.
“Mother fuck.” I toss it into the bowl and wriggle Hat’s arm across my shoulders to lift him.
“Wait! Wait,” he says, his words a slurred mess, and tugs on my hold. “My friend’s coming to get me. I’m gonna wait for him.”
His voice thickens with each word, his muscles going tense in my grip.
“Who?”
“My best friend,” he cries, eyes filling. “My best friend’s coming.”
“H-Hatley,” I say, and it cracks a little as I gather the man up in my arms. “It’s me, man.”
“Ten?!”
For the first time since I watched him walk out of the house, Hatley turns and really looks at me.
When his eyes focus on me, his face crumples and he cries. Throws his arms around my shoulders, nearly pulling us both back to the floor.
“Ten,” he sobs. “I fucked up. I fucked up.”
My burning eyes find a spot on the wall, and I suck back a breath. “I know, man.”
He crushes me tighter. Sobs harder.
“I’m so fucking sorry, Ten. I’m so sorry.”
The tears that rush from his eyes dampen my shirt and stain my skin, each one a searing reminder.
“I know, Hat.” I swallow hard and get an arm around his waist. “Let’s go home.”
“Okay,” he whimpers, his voice so small that it’s breaking me as he clings to my side.
It’s a fucking chore to practically carry him through the dense crowd, the scent of booze and drugs burning my nose.
It’d only burn for a little bit—
“Quiet.”
“I-I’m sorry, Ten,” Hatley chokes out.
He’s muttering it over and over, crying into my shoulder, and seeing him like this is ripping me to shreds while simultaneously tempting me to join him.
And I’m not sure which is worse as I stare straight ahead.
Right past the line of coke cut up and pretty on the table. The beer pong table that has turned into a bar littered with alcohol. The pipes lit up. The bongs bubbling with breath.
The spoons.
Needles.
Emmett’s in the truck. Em’s waiting. Emmett. Em.
“Hat-tley,” I stutter out when his weight gets heavier, my hands gone numb. “Please keep walking. We gotta get to Em. He’s in the t-truck.”
“I’m so sorry, Ten.”
He’s shaking, his feet dragging with each step we gain.
I’m shaking with the temptation to turn any direction beside straight and find a fix that’ll make all of this better.
It’ll only be temporary, I know that.
Just a short high.
But the itching in my hands would stop.
The pain in my chest would disappear.
The tension keeping me upright as I push through would ease.
Until it didn’t.
My stomach rolls as we hit fresh air, its thickness choking me. The porch seems like it lasts a mile, the truck even farther away.
Too far.
If I just turned around, it would be better.
I could just disappear into the haze, right along with my best friend.
“Tristen.”
I’m gasping for air as I drag Hatley across the grass towards the truck and we both fall to the ground.
“Get … him,” I choke out and it’s shaky. I’m shaky.
Everything hurts.
My chest expands but I can’t pull in enough air.
It’s tight. So tight that it hurts and I curl into it.
“Shiiiiiit.”
I gasp for air I can’t quite find.
It feels like I’m drowning on the thing I need to live.
My lungs won’t fill.
Arms locked around my ribs won’t uncurl when I hear my name again.
“Get him,” I whisper to the voice and roll to my knees, my face buried in the grass.
“I can’t lift him, Tristen!”
Blond hair.
Pretty eyes.
Like a rubber band, my mind snaps back from that deep, dark place.
Those sweet, haunted eyes.
The grass beneath me is wet.
I blink against the darkness lit up by flood lights.
Gasp in air that’s humid and too warm, and feels like it’s stabbing inside my chest, cracking all the way through to my spine.
“Tristen.”
The desperation in his voice snaps me upright and I wheel around, searching. Seeking.
“Emmett.”
Blond hair fills my vision, and fists wrap up my shirt just as I see the lights flash over the side of the house.
The sound of sirens filter in, close. So close.
My feet are under me before I realize I’ve moved and I’m helping Emmett hoist a passed out Hatley into the truck. I shove Em in next and run for the driver’s side.
I’m slamming us into drive before the door closes me in and peeling out, my chest clenching up for a whole new reason.
“Get him on his side as best you can,” I pant out and jam the shifter into a higher gear.
Emmett pushes at Hat’s side until his head is hanging off the seat next to my knee.
Bracing an arm across him, I whip the wheel around, sending the truck out onto the back alley I know leads the opposite direction of the flashing lights.
They fill the rearview, the red and blue.
Gogogogogogo.
The gas pedal hits the floor.
All I see is flying pavement, the road moving.
All I hear is the engine rumbling, choking on the force it’s moving with, the creaking of gears grinding.
The lights get dimmer in the little mirror, the glass filling with other cars following us out.
“What the hell?” Emmett screams, and I whip my attention to him.
He’s pinned against the door and pushing on Hatley’s thighs, trying to put space between them, but there’s nowhere for Hat to go.
“Bub, I’m sorry. It’s only a few miles, okay? Deep breaths.”
“I hate it. I hate this,” he chants and my chest cracks open as I stare at the straight away coming up. “I hate you.”
I clench my jaw and wrap up Hatley’s arm in one of mine as the road straightens, tugging him to me until his head is in my lap. It barely fits between me and the steering wheel, and it still doesn’t give enough room for Emmett.
Getting my knee situated on the wheel, I use it to steer as I work my hands beneath Hatley’s clammy pits.
“Push,” I demand.
Emmett jams his palms into Hat’s ass at the same time I pull, and his torso lifts off the seat, his body leaning hard into me. I wrap an arm across him and pin him upright between me and the seat.
“Goddammit, man,” I grit out as the cars behind me pass on a double yellow and speed down the road. “What the fuck were you thinking?”
“Shouldn’t he be throwing up by now?” Emmett asks and it’s quiet. Too quiet.
I get a better grip on the wheel with my free hand and ease back on the gas, downshifting so I can drive one handed.
When I don’t answer, Emmett asks the question again, a little louder this time, and my stomach rolls over.
“He’s had a little practice,” I mutter through clenched teeth.
We both have.
But I don’t say that last part out loud.
Emmett doesn’t need that. Not right now.
Swallowing hard, I glance over at the human ball tucked in the passenger side. “He’s gonna be okay.”
It comes out thick.
But it’s the truth.
He’s breathing, and that’s enough.
For now … that’s gotta be enough.