Chapter 23 #2
“Wandy’s gal! You wanna join? We can make room for one more.”
I eye the dubious foam floating on the top of the mixed pint, as people who don’t even know me are smiling, calling me over, making space to include me. “Er, I don’t think…”
Isn’t this what I wanted, though? Isn’t this what everybody wants, when they think about going to house parties?
Isn’t this the teenage dream, the stuff of rom-coms?
This is how I become the cool girl, popular and well loved and oozing “fun” from every pore, and Jake will wander in and see me getting on with all his new friends, see me being the life and soul, and he will sit down next to me to join in, hating to be left out, and…
If it was all the girls playing, if it was Daphne asking me, would I join in? If it was Jake asking me to play, would I hesitate?
I can’t even summon up any excitement about being referred to as Jake’s “gal.” My stomach is too busy churning.
“We were just gonna go get some air,” comes a reply for me, and I’m being steered out of the room to a disappointed chorus that ends before I’m even through the living room door, and my brain doesn’t catch up until we’re in the hallway.
I twist around, shoving Max’s arm off me.
“What the hell was that?”
He rolls his eyes, head facing more toward the living room than to me. “I know, Raf means well but—”
“Not him. You!”
“What?” Max turns now, looking at me properly, his eyes searching mine as a frown begins to crumple his forehead.
“I didn’t need you to step in for me, you know. This is real life, Max. I’m not some damsel, and you’re not Sir Grayson.”
“That wasn’t—”
“And it’s not up to you whether I join in a drinking game or not; I didn’t ask you to interfere. Maybe I wanted to—”
There it is. That scoff.
Again.
As if he knows better. As if he’s so high and mighty, and…
It boils my blood. It really, really does.
I sneer right back at him. “Please. You don’t know me, you don’t—”
“I know you better than you’re giving me credit for. And anyone could see that you were looking for any excuse not to join in that game. But let me guess—you’re worried what they’ll be saying about you, that you didn’t fit in well enough.”
“It’s not a bad thing to want to fit in! Just because you don’t give two shits what people are saying behind your back—”
“You’re right. I don’t. If it’s that important, they’ll say it to my face.”
“Well, consider this me saying it to your face, Max—nobody likes a self-centered prick who spends all their time looking down on everybody else, especially those of us who actually want to fit in, who want people to like us, who care. Being lonely doesn’t make you better than the rest of us—it just makes you an asshole. ”
With nowhere else to go because he’s blocking my path to the living room and the rest of the hallway, I tromp up the stairs. The three girls are still there, though they’ve acquired some fresh drinks and nobody’s crying anymore.
“Yes, bish!” one of them yells to me as I clamber over them. Another says, “You tell him!”
At the top of the landing, I almost collide with Daphne.
Her eyes are wide, her cheeks still flushed, but she doesn’t look like she’s having such a fun time anymore.
If anything she looks annoyed, her glossy lips in a pout.
Her curls are limp, and there’s a sheen of sweat around her forehead, some of her eye makeup smudged.
But when her eyes light on me, she lunges for me, grabbing my wrist with a smile.
“There you are! Omigod, Cerys, so Daniel totally kissed me—and then he said he was going to get a drink, and he’s just vanished.
I thought maybe it was code for ‘meet him upstairs,’ but obviously not.
Haha! God, how embarrassing…I was actually thinking I might just leave.
Anyway, I’m so glad I found you. Shall we go back down to the party?
How’s things going with Jake? You can tell me everything—”
And it’s all too much. Anissa and Jake, Max with his chivalry and Raf with his drinking games and Daphne wanting to ask about it all like I could even tell her. It’s too much, and I want to scream.
I wrench away from her, breathing hard, and snap, “Omigod, Daphne, I don’t want to talk about Jake. Or Daniel, or…” Or Max. Especially not Max. “Do you even hear yourself? I don’t want to talk about your shitty boy drama!”
“But…I wasn’t…” She blinks at me, her face blank, and for once she doesn’t look like the polished icon of put-togetherness that I’ve envied for the past couple of months. She looks young. She looks hurt.
And then her face contorts into a scowl that probably matches my own.
“Well, screw you, Cerys! As if you’re not the one who’s constantly whining about this boy who doesn’t fancy you back, as if it’s the only interesting thing going on in your life!
Forgive me for the fact that a guy actually is interested in me, and you can’t handle that! ”
I don’t stop her as she storms off. I know—a tiny part of me knows—I should go after her. That I’ve been callous and cruel and she’s upset, and I didn’t mean any of that, but she’s right, I do only talk about Jake, and I should fix this…
But it’s such a small voice in the back of my mind, crushed quickly by the raging thought of: good riddance. At least now all my horrible secrets can stay buried.
By some miracle the bathroom is empty, and I shut myself in, being sure to slam the door to give myself that satisfaction of finality. Fight with Daphne aside, I’ve finally put Max in his place after weeks of putting up with his attitude. I should feel on top of the world.
But instead, I’m standing in the middle of a bathroom clutching a drink I don’t even want, feeling more wretched than ever.