and I can barely see her face. But I hear her just fine. She says, “How dare you do that shit at someone’s house? During a party? You’re sick.”
I ask her to get Paige for me. “Please,” I say, drooling.
She rolls her eyes and says, “Think your little dyke bitch is gonna nurse you back to health? You’re pathetic, Ade. And by the way, your new girlfriend is sucking some dude’s dick upstairs.”
I close my eyes and focus on my high.
Everything in me has shattered.
The Buzz is all I’ve got left.
I’m floating in it until Paige shakes me back. She helps me up and takes me outside to the front lawn and then I collapse again.
She sits at my side crying, rubbing her nose on my sleeve.
She tells me that she hates me. She tells me that she wishes I was just dead sometimes. She says, her voice all breaking, “You’re the most selfish person in the world.”
FIVE
The Buzz lasts for about an hour.
It must be the alcohol-concussion combo but I’m pretty much unresponsive the entire time. Except for the twitching. When it wears off and I sit up, rubbing my eyes, Paige tells me that I was shaking like I was seizing. She tells me that a whole bunch of people asked her if they should call an ambulance and a whole other bunch of people told her that she should just put a bullet in my head. Paige says, “They told me I should just put you down.”
“Thanks for defending me,” I say.
“I didn’t defend you,” Paige says. “I just didn’t shoot you.”
I say, “Thanks for not putting me down. What time is it?”
“Two.”
“Party still-”
“Yeah, but the beer’s cashed, so most everyone’s gone. By the way, she was looking for you and then she saw you and went back inside.”
“Vauxhall?”
“She’s over there.”
Paige points over at a huddle of people smoking. Vauxhall’s still got her costume on. She’s a monster in the moonlight. I grimace and Paige notices. She pats me on the head and says, “You’re not any better. You know that, right?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say.
Paige laughs. “I’m going inside. Come in and get me when you want to leave.”
I lie back on the lawn and stare up at the stars. The back of my head is still spinning and it’s like I can feel the planet moving beneath me. The stars stuck and flashing and the soil whirling, me in the middle. I feel so much better. So much stronger.
“What’re you looking at?”
It’s Vauxhall sitting next to me. Her non-face all ghostly.
“Nothing,” I say. “Space.”
Vaux looks up. Shrugs. “You crack your skull open?”
“Heard about that?”
“Saw the blood. I don’t understand why you’re not in a hospital right now.”
“I’m a professional.” I manage to prop myself up on my elbow. I ask, “Any chance you’re going to take off that costume?”
“I wasn’t going to sleep in it.”
“How about now? At least let me see your eyes. Easier to talk.”
Vaux pauses and then takes off the shades. And then she takes off the hat and lets her hair hang down. Lets it breathe in the half-light. “How’s that?”
“Great start.”
And it is. Even with her face wrapped up she’s still striking. And despite the emotional pain, I actually don’t blame her. I’m disappointed but not mad. In my head I’m not ranting and railing about her being a slut. Maybe it’s the head damage, but I’m not wanting to spit in her face. No matter how many dudes she hooks up with tonight or in the next week or month, the two of us will be together and in love and she will be mine. It’s like a sour candy; this is just the bitter outer part. Eventual sweetness this way lies.
“Would you believe me if I told you that I’ve seen you before? That I’ve been thinking about you for years? Like in a dreaming sort of way?”
“Maybe. How many girls do you say this to?”
“Only you. You’re the first. So, why’d you sing to me?”
“I don’t know. You’re cute.”
With that, Vaux slowly unravels the bandages from her face. This is like a striptease but the payoff is so much better. She does it slow and teases something awful and part of me dies and is reborn with each inch of face she reveals. First her eyes. Then her nose and finally her lips and chin. She’s amazing, in the night, under the stars. Her features aren’t flattened by the fluorescent lights. Her skin breathes out here.
She asks, “What have you heard about me, Ade?”
“What do you mean?”
“You know, the rumors.”
“I haven’t heard any rumors about you, Vauxhall. Wouldn’t matter, anyway.”
She smiles. It’s a heartbreaking smile.
But then I say, “I did see you with that guy Ryan a few hours ago. And…”
“Does that turn you off?”
I look at Vauxhall as hard as I can, push my eyes to see under her beauty. “I don’t… don’t think I’d be the right person to be judging you. It’s not like I think it’s, well, I just… Are you with Jimi?”
“What did Jimi tell you?”
“Nothing, but other people have said that you were.”
Vauxhall nods. “It’s complicated. A long story, but the short answer is that we have a connection but I don’t think I love him. If that makes sense.”
I swallow and it hurts. “I think it does.”
The last few jags of Buzz go rattling down my nerves and my eyes roll back into my head for a second while I just let the feeling surge through me. The overwhelming peace of it like falling asleep but never sleeping. I don’t know how long I’m like this when Vauxhall says, “Hey. Come on.” And her voice shakes me back into the present. She is so incredibly soft in this light. Then, looking back at Oscar’s house, she asks, “Want to go to the roof?”
“Okay.”
We make our way back upstairs not saying anything.
Of course, I’m thinking maybe she’s going to do with me what she did with Ryan Mar. Whatever exactly that was. Part of me, the lower part, is excited at the thought, has been sleepily dreaming of this. The other part, upper, doesn’t want it to go down like this. Really doesn’t want this.
But just being in Vauxhall’s presence I’m getting goose bumps again.
It’s like she’s radioactive. Like there’s a Geiger counter in my chest that’s pinging violently the closer I am to her. This girl is not only beautiful and deeply funny and clever and complicated and so freaking flawed and hooking up with random assholes, but something tells me she’s also like me. It’s the same thing that tells me that we will be together. It is inevitability. Going upstairs I’m giddy with expectation, the same way I felt when I went into Black Bart’s haunted cave at Casa Bonita for the first time. Scared. Jazzed.
Up the stairs she’s in front and I can’t peel my eyes away. Despite the boxy suit, I catch glimpses of feminine shapes beneath. A calf. Thigh. Ass cheek. It’s intoxicating but over so quickly.
Now the party is just ten loud people. They’re falling over each other. Lying in sleepy piles. Guys are copping
