Did he say two million dollars is a small amount of money? I blink and try to keep my eyes open. I’m bored. This is boring. I’d very much like to be somewhere else. Anywhere else.
“It was nice to meet you,” I tell him as someone squeezes past us, taking the opportunity to get the hell away from this guy. “I should go find my friends.”
None of my friends are at this party, though. Someone I went to high school with invited me, but none of my high school friends are here, and I’m starting to see why, not that I had many to begin with.
I didn’t realize there would be real people here, not just college kids, and by just looking you’d think the people here were even younger than that. This apartment has amazing bones and it’s in a high-end building, but instead of wallpaper, whoever lives here has opted to line their walls with groovy tapestries and Cheech and Chong posters.
I should have known from the zip code that it would be a grown-up party, and I should have known by the smell to turn back as soon as I got here.
It’s a learning experience. Lord knows I need more of them.
“Don’t go,” he says as he comes with me toward the end of the narrow kitchen. “Olivia, was it?”
“Yeah,” I say, feigning interest, “Brett?”
“You’re good with names,” he says, putting his hand over mine. I feel my mouth pool with saliva and I try to swallow as I pull it away.
“I should go,” I repeat. If this guy doesn’t get the message soon, I might have to get his email address so I can put it in writing.
“We were having a nice conversation,” he says, his words starting to slur, “and you said yourself that it was nice to meet me.”
“It was,” I reply emphatically, “but my friend doesn’t know many people here and I should go find her.”
“Come on,” he says, grabbing my wrist as I try to shove past him. My heart jumps into my throat and I pull away from him again. “I thought we were having a nice time together.”
“I said no,” I spit at him. I think that’ll do it, but he moves to block my path.
“Come on, what if we go to my room and watch a movie together?”
Ah, so this is his apartment. Our society should stop giving guys like this high-paying jobs. Hard-working or not, he doesn’t deserve it. He’s a jackass.
And if he’s so hard-working, I heard the university is hiring janitors. I’d be willing to bet a janitor works as hard, or harder, than a guy like this who pushes numbers around on a spreadsheet all day.
“No thank you,” I say to him, putting my hands up. “Now if you’ll excuse me. Technically this is kidnapping. You’re preventing me from reaching the means of egress. I’d like to leave now. I have to get my coat.”
“What are you, a lawyer or something?” he asks, his nostrils flaring and jaw ticking. “And what happened to the friend? I thought you wanted to talk to your friend.”
“Can you please just get out of the fucking way?”
With that, he grabs my arms and tries to push me against the counter, but without thinking, I raise my knee - hard. Hard enough to make him double over, hard enough to make him look up at me with an expression that says I’ve just made matters worse. I’m able to step around him and I make my way out into the living room, where the smell is worse than it was in the kitchen and it’s darker and very crowded.
Every girl is hanging off every guy, and every third person has something lit hanging from their lips. I dash toward the back of the apartment where my coat and purse are, grab them as fast as I can, and sneak out into the hallway without being detected by Mr. Asshole.
When I get outside, I’m still shaking. I hope I didn’t hurt that guy…but oh man maybe I hope I did. Just enough to make him think twice before pulling that shit with another girl. I swallow the nervous saliva pooling in my mouth and sit down on a bench, trying to steady myself. Maybe I didn’t do enough.
I shake my head. I did what I could in the moment, and if I could have done anything differently or better, I would have.
A few minutes go by and I still feel a little outside of my body, but I can’t stay here all night, so I get up and start walking.
I don’t know what to do. If I go home, my parents will know I lied about where I’d be. I told them I’d be sleeping over with a girl I went to high school with, which technically isn’t a lie. I just didn’t tell them that prior to the sleep-over I would be at a party. A party with drinking, guys, and well…everything they’ve always tried to keep me away from.
It was just a little fib to get them to let me out of the house.
Maybe my parents are on to something.
I cross my arms over my chest and pull my coat up a little closer to my throat. I chose a coat tonight that was more fashion than function, and it’s not doing much to shield me from the cold air whipping around.
I brace myself and walk through the cold wind for a few minutes. When I get to the next corner, I ask myself if I walked toward this block on purpose or if it’s purely a coincidence that I’m standing on my crush’s block.
Harrison would understand. He wouldn’t judge me. He’s strict, but he’s not like my father. He actually cares about my opinion. Realizes that I can have one, which is a low bar to clear, but when you’ve been raised by people who think they know more than god and definitely have more money than him, it’s hard to be seen as your own person.
But Harrison clears that bar and so many others, and he makes it look so easy. He wouldn’t judge me. He’d open his door to me. He’d tell me I didn’t do anything wrong, that there’s nothing wrong with wanting to have a little fun.
Just the thought of his name sends a shiver down my spine and makes my belly flop over. Maybe it’s because of the way I feel when I say his name. Maybe it’s because of the way I feel when I hear him say mine…
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