Sloth

“Totally,” Hale agreed after his turn, already looking tuned out to the world.

Reed didn’t say anything after his turn, just fixed his eyes on Beth. She looked away, waiting for the room to start spinning or her tongue to start feeling absurdly big. She felt nothing, except the same panic and fear she’d felt for days.

“Time for another little toke,” Hale said eagerly, grabbing it back. “Yeah, that’s good. Dude, I’m totally high.”

“It’s like… yeah. Cool,” Fish agreed.

“Hey, uh… Reed’s girl, you feeling it?” Hale asked.

Lesson one of getting stoned: Talk about how stoned you are. Beth learned fast. “Yeah,” she lied. “It’s really wild.”

”Dude, Fish, you know what I just realized? You totally look like a girl,” Hale cried, a burst of giggles flooding out of him.

Fish ran his fingers through his straggly, straw-colored hair as if realizing it was there for the first time, then looked at Beth in wonderment. “Yeah,” he agreed. “And I must be hot. Blondes are hot.”

Beth laughed weakly and searched herself for hysteria, paranoia, munchies-something to testify to the fact that she’d just ingested an illegal substance for the first time in her life. But she felt, if anything, more self-conscious than ever, as if they could all tell that her mind was running at normal speed and that she was, even here, a total fraud.

“You usually don’t feel much the first time,” Reed confided, again using that just-for-her voice. “You didn’t do it wrong.”

Once again, he’d known exactly what she was thinking. A horrifying thought occurred to her: What if he really could tell what she was thinking? What if he knew about Harper, and about Kaia, about everything? And even if he didn’t, what would happen if he found out?

Maybe this is paranoia, Beth thought, and now a hysterical giggle did escape her. Maybe I am high.

“So, you guys, like, live here?” she asked, trying to make her voice sound as slow and foggy as theirs.

“Fish and Hale do,” Reed explained. “And I crash here sometimes.”

“He brings his ladies here,” Hale cackled. “All except-”

“Dude, shut up,” Fish snapped, pelting him with another fast-food wrapper-this one seemed to have a chunk of something oozing out of it.

”Oh, yeah. Right. Sorry, bro. Didn’t mean to-”

“Whatever.” Reed turned the stereo up and then threw himself down on the couch in between Beth and Fish. He leaned his head back, closed his eyes, and kicked his legs up on the milk crate. “Awesome song.” He sighed.

When in Rome…, Beth thought. Do as the potheads do. She closed her eyes, kicked her feet up on the same milk crate so that one leg crossed over Reed’s, and forced a serene smile. “I’m, uh, totally hungry,” she said tentatively. “Anyone got anything to eat?”

It was such a relief not to have to screen her calls anymore that Harper forgot to play it safe; she forgot that there were still plenty of things she needed to avoid.

“So, I was thinking, tomorrow night,” Adam said as soon as she picked up.

“For what?” She lay on her bed, facing away from the window so she wouldn’t be tempted to look out for him, or wonder if he was watching her.

“For our date.”

“Adam-” she began warningly.

“I paid good money for that date,” he pointed out.

“Don’t remind me.” Her list of humiliating moments was mounting up daily, but stepping onstage for that auction still hovered near the top. “Let’s just forget the whole thing.”

“Tomorrow night,” Adam said again. “Eight. I’ll pick you up.”

“I told you that I’m not doing this,” Harper told him, but she was too tired to fight. “You and me…”

“One night. You owe me that.”

She sighed. “Fine. Eight. See you then.” He started to say something else, but Harper hung up.

It was barely past nine, but she was already in her pajamas. Her homework lay undone-as usual-in a stack on her desk. Her Thoroughly Depressing Music mix (Nick Drake, Norah Jones, Belle and Sebastian, Anna Nalick) was on repeat.

“ ‘Breathe, just breathe…,’ ” she sang along under her breath with the mournful melody. “‘There’s a light at each end of this tunnel, you shout ‘cause you’re just as far in as you’ll ever be out…’ ”

Yeah, right. Everyone had a cliche to offer, and they were all wrong.

Harper was wearing one of Adam’s old T-shirts, a Lakers shirt that he’d brought back from his one trip to L.A. a few years ago. Before going, he’d bragged to half the school about going to see Shaq and Kobe play. His mom was dating some real estate hotshot she’d met at a conference, and the guy had gotten them floor seats and all-access passes. He might even get into the locker room, Adam had bragged. But on the night of the game, his mom and her bigwig boyfriend had disappeared for the night, leaving Adam back in the hotel room to watch porn and steal candy from the minibar. He showed up at school the next week wearing the Lakers shirt, full of stories about Shaq’s giant feet and the way Kobe had winked at him. Harper was the only one he ever trusted with the truth. She’d borrowed the shirt once last summer, after a drunken water balloon fight had gotten out of hand. She never gave it back.

Summer had been easier, she thought, but then stopped herself. Even then, things hadn’t been right, not really. Adam had been slobbering over Beth while Harper pretended not to care. She imagined she could still see shallow imprints in the heel of each hand from where she’d dug her nails in every time she saw them together, hoping the pain would distract her. She had thought that if she got rid of Beth, somehow, all her problems would just go away. After all, she was Harper Grace-she wasn’t supposed to have problems. Ask anyone. She could still remember when that had been true-not last summer, but the one before that, when everything in her life had still made sense.

Kane measures out a small shot of vodka into each of their plastic cups, then tucks the silver flask back into his pocket. Harper puts an arm around Miranda and leans against Adam and, after they clink glasses, downs the shot in a single gulp. A warm tingle spreads through her.

“This idea wasn’t nearly as dumb as I thought it was,” she admits to Kane, who has dragged them out to the lame ghost town in the dead of night. He gives her a mock bow. They have snuck inside the fake saloon, squeezing up to a table already occupied by plastic mannequins dressed in cowboy clothing. A frozen bartender stands behind the bar, holding a jug of whiskey that will always remain half empty.

“Agreed,” Adam says, clapping Kane on the back. “Excellent plan. “

“I’m full of them,” Kane brags.

Miranda snorts. “Is that why your head’s so big?”

He grabs her and puts her in a loose headlock. “Watch it, Stevens,” he warns, “or I might be forced to…”

“I’m terrified,” Miranda says sarcastically. “I’m shaking. What are you going to do?”

Kane doesn’t respond, just drives his knuckles into her head and spins. A noogie.

“What are you, ten years old?” Miranda squeals, convulsing in giggles as he lets her go.

Adam and Harper exchange a glance and smile.

“So where’s your latest conquest?” Kane asks Adam. “I figured you’d bring her along. “

Harper suppresses a laugh. Adam doesn’t bring his girlfriends out on excursions like this. They’re excess baggage. They’d miss the jokes and spoil the flow of banter honed over the years. They are a foursome, and Adam knows better than to screw with that.

“This one’s kind of cute,” she tells him, ruffling his hair. “A little bland, but-”

“Who needs a personality when you’ve got a body like that?” Kane points out, giving them an exaggerated leer. “She’s hot.”

Miranda smacks him on the shoulder. “She must have some