Chapter 8 #2
“I found you,” Scarlet called out, approaching them with a small group of people.
She was clearly drunk, holding a stack of plastic shot glasses, a bottle of tequila tucked under her arm.
She plopped down on the arm of the loveseat next to Quinn, handing out shot glasses to everyone, even Quinn, even after she said no, and called for them all to raise their glasses.
“To the end of swim season, so Quinn can finally have fun.”
Emma downed her shot along with Scarlet and her crew, but Liv caught Quinn’s eye from the other side of the couch. She quietly mouthed, “Are you okay?” and didn’t take her own shot until Quinn nodded, still holding the tequila Scarlet had poured for her.
“Are you not going to drink that?” Scarlet asked, eyeing her like this was a very important question.
“Let’s go dance,” Emma said to Liv, jerking her away from Quinn. Emma had picked up on a tension that no one else in the group seemed to mind, but Quinn was glad her friends weren’t going to witness this.
“I’m not,” Quinn replied. “I’m not in the mood to drink tonight. ”
“But this party is for you,” Scarlet said.
Quinn rolled her eyes. “This is not for me. But I’m happy to be here, with you and with my friends.”
“I’m going to go get more liquor,” Scarlet replied, as if that was a direct response to Quinn. As soon as she walked away, Emma and Liv came back to check on her. She assured them that she was fine, and she felt like she did a decent job selling the lie.
“Come dance with us,” Liv called to her, but Quinn immediately shut that down.
“I’m smart enough to not dance with my hot friends at my girlfriend’s party,” Quinn replied, and she regretted it as soon as she said it, even if there was little chance that either of them would remember this conversation in the morning.
“You think we’re hot,” Emma teased her.
It was the way Liv was looking at her, though, that held her attention: her cheeks tinted pink, her lips pulling up shyly at the corners, the slightest hint of flirtation shining in her eyes. It was possible that Quinn’s heart stopped beating for just a second.
Oh. This was bad .
“Y’all go have fun, I’ll keep an eye on you from here,” Quinn told them. She had to create some distance.
It wasn’t particularly coordinated, or even overtly sexual, but watching Liv and Emma with their arms around each other was the best kind of torture she’d ever have to endure.
She was having a normal reaction to seeing this.
Normal for anyone attracted to women, she was pretty sure.
It was entirely ordinary for her to suddenly feel like she needed a cold shower.
“Are you going to be babysitting all night?” Scarlet asked, throwing herself into Quinn’s lap. “I know I told you to bring them, but I thought we’d get to spend some time together.”
The fact that a gaggle of her friends were following her around didn’t seem to register at all to her until someone made a comment about Liv and Emma.
“They’re such a cute couple,” they said .
“They’re not a couple,” Scarlet howled, as if it was the most hilarious thing she’d ever heard. “The ginger has a boyfriend .”
The way she said this burrowed into Quinn’s skin, but she tried to brush it off, reminding herself that Scarlet was drunk.
When she looked back over to where her friends had been dancing, though, she realized that something was off.
Emma still had her arms around Liv, but it had turned protective, worry etched across her face.
Quinn shot out of her seat when she saw that Joel had approached them.
She didn’t know what he’d done, but they were clearly uncomfortable.
It was only a few seconds before she had her body completely between him and her friends, and she was pressing her hand into his chest to push him away.
“Back the fuck up,” Quinn yelled. He was slightly taller than her, but scrawny, and she’d never thrown a punch, but was confident that she could take him if it came to that.
“Dude, back up, I was just being friendly,” he mumbled. She could smell the alcohol on him, too, and he wouldn’t meet her eye.
“Quinn, calm down, he’s a nice guy,” she heard Scarlet say, approaching the interaction.
“Did you even see what happened?” Emma snapped. Frankly, Quinn didn’t need details. The uneasiness on Liv’s face said more than enough for her.
“He just started dancing with us,” Liv said. She was clearly embarrassed to have so much attention. “He didn’t ask, and I didn’t want his body on mine.”
“It’s a party, everyone was dancing together,” Scarlet replied, and Quinn honestly couldn’t believe that she was making excuses. “Joel is harmless.”
“Yeah, you’re right, I’m sorry,” Liv said, her face turning a shade of red that on its own would have concerned Quinn.
“No, absolutely not,” Quinn responded. She glared at Scarlet. “Your friend needs to get his shit together. You and I can talk about this later. We’re leaving. ”
“Quinn,” Scarlet called out.
“No. You fucked up. If you figure out how, call me, and we can talk more.” With that, Quinn hooked her arms around Liv and Emma and guided them outside.
She wrangled both of them into the back of her car and made her way back to campus, all of them too exhausted from the intensity of the night to say much of anything.
Quinn parked in her designated spot, and the three of them walked across campus, stopping at Emma’s dorm first. When they got to the door, Emma hugged them each before clearing her throat.
“I know that that got messy, but can I say something inappropriate?”
“You’ve never needed permission before,” Quinn replied, eyebrows raised.
Emma shrugged. “I just have to say…that was incredibly hot. I’m going to go call my boyfriend before I try to climb you.”
Quinn rolled her eyes, laughing. “You’re an idiot.”
“I know,” she replied, grinning. “Let me know when you guys are in your dorm. I’ll come see you in the morning.”
She hugged them again and walked into her building. They watched her as she made her way down the hall, waiting until she turned into another corridor before they began the short walk to their own dorm.
“I’m so sorry,” Liv said quietly after a few minutes of silence.
Quinn felt her jaw drop. “Why in the world are you sorry?”
“I probably made that a bigger deal than I should have,” Liv replied. “He gives me the creeps, and when he pressed against me tonight, I just… I really didn’t like it.”
“Liv, you have nothing to apologize for,” Quinn told her. “I wish I hadn’t teased you about him flirting with you. I’m an asshole, I’m sorry. ”
“You didn’t know, I should have said something,” she said, shaking her head quickly, though she stopped soon after, holding her hands up to her face. “Uh, I didn’t even drink that much, and I still feel kind of fuzzy.”
“One drink and a shot, as fast as you drank them, when you don’t have experience with it… It doesn’t take much,” Quinn replied.
“Please don’t ever tell them, but my parents might be right about this one specific thing,” Liv told her, and Quinn gently laughed, pulling Liv’s hand down so that they could walk arm in arm, the alcohol starting to affect Liv’s balance.
“Let’s get you back,” she said. Quinn walked her to their room and, after firing off a text to Emma that they were in for the night, helped Liv take her shoes off.
She asked her where she kept her makeup wipes, and helped remove the beauty products from her skin, then laid out a set of pajamas for her to change into while Quinn went to change in the bathroom, stopping on the way back by the vending machines down the hall to grab a couple of bottles of water and a few packets of Tylenol for the morning.
Quinn handed the items over to her when she walked back into the room, before they both laid in their respective beds, Quinn on her back, staring at the ceiling, Liv angled so that she was facing her.
“Are we okay?” Liv asked softly, sounding close to sleep.
“Of course.”
“Good,” she replied. “And Quinn?”
“Yeah?”
“Emma was right,” Liv said, before adding, as she drifted off to sleep, “That was incredibly hot.”
Suddenly, Quinn was very much awake, and maybe she wasn’t so okay after all.