40. Hendrix #2
“Heard you guys were skipping the rest of the day…so I figured I would join you.”
“That’s not how this works, baby girl, and you know it.”
Theory waves off Saint and removes her heels, then throws her blazer over my desk chair. “Whatcha watchin’ Good Guy?” She sashays over to my best friend, who’s letting out a harsh huff of annoyance as she scoots next to him.
“Just FYI. Not once have I ever agreed to this stupid pet name.”
Sucking air through his teeth, Saint replies, “The math test isn’t for another thirty minutes, so there’s still time to be a rebel.”
Archer shoots to an upright position. “Shit!”
“Shit.” I mirror him, because I actually studied for this one.
“Why are you so quiet?” Archer presses Levi as he slumps on one of my kitchen chairs.
Levi doesn’t offer Archer words, only harsh glares.
“Whatever,” Archer grumbles, officially giving up on the test and prying as he lies back down on the bed.
“You good, Leviathan?” I question, because he looks three seconds away from throwing something across the room.
Specifically at Archer.
“I’m fine.” His response is curt, but not nasty as he types away at his phone.
“He didn’t get to see Riggs today.” Theory mouths to me when I look at her.
Shit.
Not again.
This is the second time since Riggs was sent to rehab that Leviathan got denied a visit, even though his uncle promised he would be allowed.
“I’m sorry you didn’t get to see Riggs.” I tell Leviathan when his attention moves from the screen.
“Yeah, well, it is what the fuck it is I guess.” His eyes slice to Archer. “Every sinner pays his penance.”
A glint of sadness passes Archer’s face so quickly, you could blink and miss it. But he offers Leviathan nothing in reference to the guy I caught him fighting with the night before he got sent away.
Damn, I wish my boy would talk to me…because I don’t know how much longer I can go on giving him privacy before shaking the deets out of a pissed off Leviathan.
It’s not like Saint is any help, either, because he swore on my vagina he had no idea what went down with Archer, Riggs, and the sus as fuck fire in the girls dorms.
“Okay…enough with the weirdness.” Theory cringes. “Let’s order a pizza and watch some trashy shows, yeah?”
To my surprise, nobody fights her on this, and by nobody, I mean her irrational controlling older brother. In fact, Saint spends the next couple hours uncharacteristically chill when it comes to Theory hanging out with us.
Through three pizzas.
Two episodes of Love Island .
He even rooted for her during the pizza eating contest she challenged Leviathan to. Which I’m pretty sure was only done to turn the guy’s brooding frown upside down.
It worked, thank fuck for small favors, and now we’re scattered near and around my bed in total zen. Something each of us could use for our own specific reasons.
“Alright, Good Guy. Here’s your chance to kick the name.” Saint removes the blunt he rolled earlier from behind his ear, using a lighter and a few pulls to get it burning.
Archer waves away the smoke drifting in his face. “Pass.”
“So. Very. Good of you.” Saint takes a longer pull, holding it in briefly before leaning back in a chair next to the bed and blowing out a cloud of smoke.
Archer rolls his eyes, but I can tell deep down he wants to consider letting loose, and man I hope he does. Not because I think he needs corrupting, but because I know he needs a break from whatever battle he insists on facing alone.
After a few more puffs, Saint passes the blunt to Leviathan who’s in a chair facing him. “Make sure you get her home by midnight, motherfucker.”
Levi chuckles, but stays mostly to himself as he smokes, and despite my excitement to switch from cigarettes to pot, I don’t have the heart to ask him to pass.
So, I do the next best thing and ask Saint to grab me a beer.
Of course, he comes back laughing, holding a stupid spiked seltzer.
Note to Hendrix: if you want a specific drink, get up and get it your own damn self.
“You just can’t help yourself, can you?” I snatch the opened can out of his hand and take a sip.
Fuck it. Lazy can win one last time.
“Can I have some?” Theory asks, and at first I think it’s me, but when I look over I find her hand out for Leviathan.
Oh, girl, come on. We were doing so good.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Saint snaps at his sister. “Asking to smoke pot?”
“It’s not like I won’t eventually do it anyway.” Theory shrugs. “Now leave me alone and go back to feeling up Hendrix like you were under the table.”
“Hey!” I toss a pillow at her.
“Sorry, girl.” Theory winces. “But nobody moans that loud over pizza.”
And here I am thinking I was being hella smooth.
This makes her high, idiot brother snort a laugh.
Asshole.
“You know what, Theory? I think being in a controlled setting is the perfect time for you to experiment.” No longer giving a shit about Leviathan’s feelings, I reach over the bed and snatch the blunt from him mid toke.
“The fuck, Hendrix?!” He chokes hard enough for Archer to risk asking if he’s okay. But not hard enough to actually make Archer move from his perch at the far corner of the bed.
I give Leviathan a quick, apologetic smile before turning my back on the traitor with the magic fingers, and hold out the blunt for Theory to take.
“Jimi,” Saint warns, and I hold up the hand fisting the can I didn’t ask for.
“Your days of babying your little sister are over, Letterman.” I smile mischievously at Theory. “Because now she’s got a badass big sister.”
It must be a sign of the times, because Saint refrains from diving across the bed when Theory brings the blunt to her lips, giggling to try and hide her nerves.
“You’ll be going over my knee for this one.” Saint mumbles the threat in my ear, and a deep shudder runs through me so fast I have to drown the excitement with a gulp of nasty seltzer.
Because, well, what kind of girl doesn’t like a good spanking?
I’m gonna shoot fast and say not a lot of ’em, Montgomery.
Pretty sure you used to be one of ’em.
Fucking whatever.
Ignoring the hormone induced crazy, I instruct Theory in detail on how to handle the blunt, since the last thing I need is her coughing up a lung and giving Saint a reason to get scary pissed, not sexy pissed.
“Take in just a little at first, okay? Don’t inhale for too long.”
Theory nods, doing exactly as I say as the rest of us watch. Two with uncertainty, one with agitation, and then there’s me, a basket case of nerves and arousal.
As I suspected, the second the smoke hits Theory’s lungs, it’s pushed out through a loud cough, making Saint jump out of his seat to race to her side.
“Oh my God, Letterman. Stop being dramatic.” I slap him away from Theory as he looks her over. “Her lungs aren’t gonna fucking break from a little Mary Jane.”
Theory reassures him with a thumbs up, while still choking.
Guess it works, though, because Saint takes a few steps back.
“Try again, girl,” I instruct when her breathing settles. “It’ll be a bit easier, promise. Just keep the pull light.”
Whaddya know? Hendrix was right.
Because when Theory inhales the second time, it’s with very little violence, and a lot of satisfaction.
“Oh, that’s good.” She stares down at the blunt, then helps herself to another pull. “Really good.”
“Alright, alright.” I huff a laugh and motion for Theory to hand over the goods, and when she does, it’s with a newfound sense of grace.
In other words…the exact opposite of me going sip for toke for over five minutes.
“Your turn, Arch.” I wiggle my eyebrows at my best friend. “You know you want to.”
He purses his lips. “I do not.”
“Oh, my fuck, dude! Live a little!” I practically shove the blunt into his hand. “And don’t you dare try and pull an ‘I don’t know how to smoke’, because I caught your drunk ass with a cigarette at one of Sampson’s parties.”
“Well, shit.” Saint blows out a breath. “Someone call this guy a priest.”
“Fuck off, Lavell,” Archer mutters through an intense stare down with a rolled piece of paper. Then a while, and I mean a while later, he shoots it to his lips and inhales.
Holds.
Exhales.
Without fucking coughing!
What in the good guy in the streets, freak in the blunt sheets is this shit?
“Dude!” I chuckle in astonishment. “You have so much explaining to do!”
With that, Archer rolls his eyes and passes the blunt back to Theory.
Which gets intercepted by Saint.
“That’s enough for tonight,” he grits out, keeping a testy eye on me and Theory.
Yeah, I’m not about to push the envelope on this one.
Theory’s lack of rebuttal tells me she isn’t either.
Holding two hands up in defense, I say nothing as he returns to smoking, the rest of the blunt being shared between him and Leviathan as we discuss potential shows or movies to watch next.
“The Bachelor,” Archer suggests as he aims the remote behind me at the T.V. screen.
I grimace. “Hard no.”
Channel flip. “Jersey Shore.”
“Harder no.” Theory shakes her head.
“The Kissing Booth.”
Saint’s face contorts. “The fuck is that about?”
Archer’s response is as instant as it is dry. “I don’t know. Someone falling in love with the best friend’s sibling or some shit.”
“Fuck no,” Leviathan grunts his disapproval.
Okie dokie.
Before anyone can question the hostility, Archer’s sudden, belted out laugh smooths it away.
“Oh, I’ve got it, bitches.”
The sound of an animated cartoon plays behind me, specifically a girl talking to what I can only assume are animals by the pitch of their voices. When I turn, I find pretty much what I expected, a small child surrounded by a bunch of talking stuffed animals. Only part I missed was the doctor coat.
“Oh, my God, yes!” Theory squeaks. “This was literally my favorite show growing up as a kid. I was obsessed . Even had the plush I slept with every night”
“Turn it the fuck off. Now,” Saint demands so harshly it startles everyone in the room, and when I turn I find his eyes glazed and filled with agony.
Horror, even, before he looks away from us.
What the heck just happened?
Unsure how to react discreetly to this level of Saint’s emotions in public, I go with squeezing his leg, which is shaking beneath my fingers.
“Hey…what’s wrong?” I whisper, but not low enough because Archer chimes in.
“For real…” He lets out a perplexed scoff. “What do you have against Doc McStuffins, man?”
My back straightens.
Doc McStuffins…
The little girl from his school who was obsessed with her.
Realization slams into me at full force, ripping a gasp from my throat, followed by the churning of acid.
Saint’s irrational need to treat Theory like a child.
The broken jaw she refuses to talk about.
The constant obsession over whether or not he hurts me.
“ It was me who hurt you first, Jimi ,” the vow Saint made me the night in the woods plays like a haunted record in my head, “ So I promise to never let anyone else hurt you ever again. ”
No.
No.
It can’t be.
It fucking can’t be.
All the pieces come together to rip me apart as Saint tries to hide the tear dripping down his cheek with a swipe of his hand.
Lost is the caveman crazy boyfriend.
Gone is the overbearing big brother.
In their place is the scared little boy suffering in silence as the universe so viciously rips open wounds he’s spent years punishing himself over. The ones I thought I’ve been helping to heal.
But a wound this deep? Love isn’t even enough to offer a Band-Aid.
Hate on the other hand…there’s more than enough of that to create a whole world inside a person’s head. Where they grow accustomed to being portrayed as the enemy.
Maybe even a monster.
I’m lost on what to do at this moment, but I have to try something because watching Saint crumble before me is literally breaking my heart into a million pieces.
“Everybody get out,” I mumble as the voices of our friends spin around the room like a tornado, making me too dizzy to think clearly on how to keep it together. But nobody hears me.
Saint’s got both hands rubbing his thighs, and I know it’s only a matter of seconds before he can no longer fight back tears.
Which is the exact spark I need to sober up and scream, “Everybody get out! Now!”
Leviathan and Archer know better than to intervene, so they leave the room without question. Same goes for Carlo right after he barges in.
“W-what the hell is going on?!” Theory panics at Saint’s side, hand barely on his shoulder before he shrugs her away. “Hendrix!” She glares at me. “What is h-happening?”
“I need you to go, Theory!” I demand, voice hoarse and cheeks soaked with tears of my own. “Please, just let me handle it.”
“I c-can’t leave Saint like this…you k-know that.”
“Yes. You can and you have to. Please trust me.”
She shakes her head as I grip her arms. “I have Saint, okay? I fucking promise I do but you need to go.”
“Hendrix…”
“Theory…” I whisper into her ear, watching Saint from my peripheral tug at the roots of his hair. “I know.”
“You know w-what?”
I close my eyes, wishing I didn’t believe the words I’m about to say. “That you’re the little girl he almost killed.”