by Anna Hecker
For a moment he looks surprised to see me, and my heart tightens. Is he second-guessing what we did last night? Because even now, sober and hungry and hungover, I wouldn’t change a single second.
Then his eyes soften. “Morning, you,” he says, voice mossy from sleep.
“Hi.” I feel like I need to whisper, even though the voices outside are going full-throttle, recounting stories from last night like they’re the exploits of medieval heroes.
“What time is it?” His eyes are still half-closed, hair sticking up in every direction. I smooth it down, and he smiles drowsily at my touch.
I shrug. I have no idea when we went to bed, or how long we slept. Last night existed outside of time. Now I’m reluctant to go back to the orderly progression of hours, afraid it will break the spell of what we had.
He sits up slowly and feels around for his shorts, digging in the pocket for his phone.
“Shit,” he says. “It’s past one. I’m late to meet someone.”
“Oh.” I try not to let my disappointment show. I thought we could have a lazy morning, recover from our hangovers and maybe have sex again, talk about our families and music and everything huge and small in the world.
“Sorry, babe.” He gives me a quick peck on the lips. “We can meet up later if you want.”
“Okay.” I try not to let my voice sound small.
Derek opens a plastic drawer and digs out a fresh pair of boxer briefs, and I rummage in the pile of blankets for my underwear. There’s a smell in his van like the trees in Coletown that bloom white in spring. I guess it’s the smell of sex. I wonder if Britt will be able to tell when I get back to the tent.
Outside the air is moist and heavy, fat gray clouds masking the sun. Derek locks his van and starts down the hill, a backpack slung over one shoulder. His pace is purposeful, not the syncopated amble with keys jingling on the downbeat that I’ve come to think of as his. I hurry to keep up, worrying that maybe he’s trying to get rid of me; maybe now that he’s had me, he doesn’t want me anymore. I’ve heard of that happening, through whispers in the cafeteria and tear-streaked confessions on the terrible teen-vampire shows Crow likes to watch. But last night felt so real, so close. How he told me I was different, the way he opened up to me about his mom.
The path widens and forks where the vendor stalls begin. He stops, waiting for me to catch up.
“I wish I could spend all day with you,” he says. “But I’m late to meet this guy.” The tenderness in his voice makes me angry with myself for doubting him. Of course he meant what he said last night. Of course what we had was real.
“It’s fine.” I hesitate, wanting to put my arms around him, to kiss him. Waiting for some sign that things feel as different now for him as they do for me. But even now, after everything we’ve done together, I don’t think I can say these things out loud. He doesn’t like it when people are clingy or demanding. He appreciates that I can play it cool.
“Hey,” he says, stepping closer. His eyes dig into mine. “Last night was really …” He pauses.
“Cool?” I suggest.
“Yeah.” He nods. “Definitely cool.”
He draws me into a hug and I rest my head on his shoulder, smelling the muted sex scent coming off his skin.
“I’ll text you later,” he says as we break apart, and then I’m watching his back disappear down the path, feeling like part of me is going with him. Is this what it’s like to not be a virgin anymore? Is this how it feels to be in love?
I watch until he rounds a bend, then head toward the vendors. My stomach moans at the smell of frying food and I stop to buy a breakfast sandwich, wolfing it down in a few bites. I can’t remember the last time I was this hungry, or that food tasted so good. It seems like all my appetites are stronger now: for food and sex, for music and dancing. As the last greasy morsel slides down my throat I find my strides growing longer, propelling me toward the Dream campground and, I hope, Britt and Yelena and Shay.
I cut through the woods, swatting at clouds of gnats that weren’t there yesterday, and find our tent.
“Whoozere?” Britt’s voice is slushy as she raises her head, squinting up at me. She and Yelena are sprawled on top of their sleeping bags, still wearing the same clothes from yesterday.
“Me,” I whisper. “Were you sleeping?”
“Not sleeping.” Yelena giggles, staring at the tent’s ceiling. “Sleep is for losers.”
The air inside is warm and stale. I note a pile of empty energy-drink cans in the corner, and a half-full bottle of vodka. Just looking at it makes my stomach somersault.
“Were you guys up all night?” I ask.
Britt takes a long beat to answer. When she does her vowels sound stretchy and spaced out. “We caught the sunrise set at the main stage,” she says. “It was … magic.”
“Then we came back here,” Yelena adds. “Or, wait, did we stop in that dome thingy first?”
Britt laughs, but it’s not her usual up-the-scale chime. It sounds like a car engine turning over, trying to start. “That dome thingy,” she repeats. “That was fun.”
They don’t ask about my night, about why I didn’t come back until now. I open my duffel bag and pull out a change of clothes, wishing the festival had showers. I don’t know what I was expecting from Britt this morning, but it wasn’t this. Maybe I just wanted her to be my big sister so I could tell her about my night with Derek and have her reassure me that it’s normal and he’ll still like me later on today. Maybe I was hoping she’d notice that I’m different (and that I’m wearing the same clothes as last night) and coax it out of me. Already it feels too big to keep inside.
I long to call Crow and Nicky and tell them the big news, even though we haven’t spoken since I slammed out of our chat last week. I find my phone and hit the power button, but the screen stays blank. Dead. Of course.
My head throbs. “Do you guys have any Advil?” I ask.
“Oh yes!” Yelena sits up suddenly. Her hands fly to her head and she rocks in a wobbly circle, her face tinged with green.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
“Fine. Just a head rush.” She tries to steady herself against the wall of the tent, shivering the thin fabric.
“Maybe you should get some sleep,” I suggest. The skin under her eyes is raw and blue, like a bruise.
“Nope.” She shakes her head firmly. “We’ll sleep when we’re dead. Right, Britt?”
“Right,” Britt agrees, struggling to sit.
You already look dead, I want to tell them. Britt’s hair is frizzy and misshapen, and Yelena’s so pale she may as well be a ghost.
“And you need Advil, and we should all go dance,” Yelena announces. She burrows into her suitcase and comes up several minutes later, giggling.
“Here.” She hands me two tablets. I look around for water, but all I can see is vodka.
“You know what else I have?” Yelena says to Britt.
Britt yawns. “Too much energy?”
“Nope.” Yelena laughs a witchy laugh. “More molly.”
“Ugh, I don’t know.” Britt frowns. “Didn’t we do enough last night?”
“Britt!” Yelena looks aghast. “Who are you and what did you do with my best friend?”
“It’s just early,” Britt protests. “Maybe later.”
“Suit yourself.” Yelena pops a pill into her mouth and washes it down with vodka. “Phew!” she says, shaking her head like a wet dog. “Breakfast of champions!”
“Can we go now?” I plead. The Advil is melting in my hand.
“Woo!” Yelena says, which I take as a yes.
I grab my dead phone and a charger and unzip the tent, the rip of fresh air like a warm washcloth being squeezed onto my face. All around me people are moving in slow motion, struggling through the heat. I find the vendor who sold me the breakfast sandwich and order a large iced coffee.
“How ’bout some water for those two?” He points behind me at Britt and Yelena, who are sagging agains
t each other like a pair of wilting plants.
I nod. “I’ll take two.”
I pay for our drinks and gulp down the Advil, the coffee sending a welcome surge of energy through my blood.
“Drink this.” I command, handing water to Yelena and Britt.
“Good call.” Britt takes a long swig.
“So responsible. Like den mother.” Yelena takes a small sip and re-caps the bottle, shoving it in her backpack. “Where to? I want to dance!”
“The Bass Sector stage?” I suggest, thinking maybe Shay will be there.
“Brilliant,” Yelena pronounces. “Lead the way, young DJ.”
I start toward the sound of bass, keeping an eye out for Derek, Shay, or a place to charge my phone. But all I see are limp groups of people dragging themselves across tired-looking grass. Everyone’s hiding behind oversized sunglasses, and the glitter that made them twinkle like fairies last night looks strange and crusty in the daylight, like a disease.
There’s a small crowd down by the Bass Sector stage, dancing to a tech-house set that’s all regimented bass lines and industrial thuds.
“DJ Skizm!” Yelena exclaims, pointing at the man behind the decks and doing her happy dance, hopping in a circle with her hands above her head. She leads us into the crowd and I try to relax into the music, a spare four-by-four beat splintered by bright, ringing chimes. I close my eyes, remembering how good it felt to dance with Derek last night. We still have twenty-four hours left at this festival. Maybe tonight we can do it all again.
The next track is harder, harsh synth chords crashing around us like lightning. There’s a thud that isn’t part of the music, and the ground trembles under my feet. My eyes fly open just as a scream splits the air, a high and terrifying A-sharp. I whirl around and see a snarl of limbs convulsing on the ground, a web of messy dark hair.
The scream comes again, and now I recognize it and my stomach turns to stone and everything goes cold. I push past arms and legs, into the center of the close-packed bodies. I don’t want to look at what’s on the ground, but I can’t help it. The scream comes again, directly below me. It’s all too familiar and all too real.
Britt is at my feet, crouched over Yelena’s body. She grasps Yelena’s hand but Yelena jerks away, her eyes rolling back in her head until there’s nothing there but white. She writhes and twitches, her face chalky and slick with sweat, hair tangling in the dirt. Next to her, the doll head on her backpack stares pleadingly up at me from the ground.
I crouch next to Britt and grab her by the shoulders.
“Call 9-1-1!” I beg. “Now!”
Britt looks past me, her mouth frozen in a new scream. Her eyes are wild, dazed, like she doesn’t know who I am.
“You!” I point at the closest bystander, a guy with a pierced lip and a cowed, frightened gaze. “Do you have a phone?”
Mutely, he pulls it out.
“Call 9-1-1,” I repeat, my voice shaking. “Tell them where we are and to come quick. Make sure he does it,” I say to the girl standing next to him. She nods silently, her nose ring trembling.
Then I turn and run. I remember seeing a tent with a red cross somewhere near the vendors; help has to be closer than the nearest hospital. I nearly fall over my own feet as I dodge slow-moving clumps of revelers, my breath coming in labored bursts. The paths and vendors blur with tears.
I never should have let Yelena take more drugs, never should have trusted her when she said she was fine. I saw her face, the bruise-dark circles under her eyes, the tinge of green. I should have made her drink more water, should have forced her to sleep instead of dancing. I should have made her eat something.
Instead I’m here, running, while Yelena seizes like a hurt animal in the dirt.
Finally the medical tent looms into view. I duck inside, gasping and sobbing. A man and woman in matching EMT polo shirts leap to their feet.
“Let’s get you sitting,” the woman says, guiding me toward a chair while the man reaches for my pulse.
I shake my head, my nose wet with snot. “It’s not me. It’s my friend … by the Bass Sector…. She’s having a seizure or something.”
They exchange glances, and for a minute everything feels like it’s in slow motion. “Hurry!” I beg.
Then the world leaps into action and they’re gathering duffel bags and an oxygen tank and a stretcher, racing out of the tent and loading everything onto a golf cart with a revolving red light on the top.
“The Bass Sector stage?” the woman confirms.
I nod, crying too hard to speak, and they pull me onto the cart and take off down the path, the red light flashing and the siren far too quiet, lost in the clash of sound from three different stages. It’s not nearly loud enough to scatter the clumps of people milling in the path, dumb and slow-moving as cows.
“Did she take anything?” the woman asks as she navigates past the Lip Smacker stage.
A sob freezes halfway up my throat.
“We need to know,” she insists. “So we can treat her.”
“You won’t get in trouble for telling us,” the man adds. “Pennsylvania has Good Samaritan laws.”
“Molly.” The word rips past my lips. “She took molly. MDMA.”
They exchange glances. “And she’s having seizures?” the woman confirms.
“I don’t know.” I’m choking on my own spit. “It looks like it. But I don’t know.”
We pull up to the Bass Sector stage and the crowd parts to let us through. I see Britt kneeling by Yelena’s side, her face blank with shock.
“She’s barely breathing,” she states, robotic as if she’s reading off a cue card.
The EMTs descend, swarming around her. They sweep Yelena onto the stretcher, slide an oxygen mask over her face, and lift her onto the golf cart, the pathetic little siren chirping away the whole time.
“Does she have ID?” the woman asks me. “She’ll need it for the hospital.”
I stiffen, the mention of the hospital making this nightmare all the more real. I find Yelena’s baby doll backpack and hand it over, a limp and silent offering.
“Which of you is coming with her?” the EMT asks. “There’s an ambulance waiting outside.” I take a deep breath, ready to volunteer, but Britt steps forward.
“I will,” she blurts. “I’m her best friend.”
The EMT tells me the name of the hospital as Britt climbs onto the golf cart, her gaze focused straight ahead. “You two stay in touch,” he says to me. “But your best bet is to pack up everyone’s stuff and meet them there.”
I nod, shaking. Then they’re gone, the golf cart’s small, sad siren fading into nothingness before they disappear around the bend.
CHAPTER 23
I find Britt in the waiting room of the ER. Her skimpy festival outfit looks out of place in the sterile, fluorescent-lit room, and she’s hugging Yelena’s backpack to her chest and staring at the wall, her eyes blank and unfocused.
“How is she?” I whisper, sinking into the chair next to hers. The air-conditioning in the hospital is on full blast, and I rub my hands over my arms, trying to smooth away the goose pimples.
“She’s fine.” There’s mascara caked around Britt’s eyes, a nightmare reflection of the panda hat perched on her head. She clutches the backpack tighter. “I mean … of course she’s fine, right?”
I swallow. The last time I saw Yelena, she definitely didn’t look fine.
“Is she with the doctors?” I ask.
Britt nods, holding the backpack tighter.
“Did they say anything? Did anyone come talk to you?”
Britt shakes her head. “They won’t tell me anything,” she says, more to the backpack’s empty, staring eyes than to me. “But she’s okay. She’s definitely going to be okay.”
“I’m sure she will be,” I say, because I can’t imagine the alternative. I put my hand on her knee. Her skin is icy under my touch.
“You want a sweatshirt or something?” I ask.
She lo
oks at me blankly. “Why?”
“You’re cold.” I pat her bare knee. “It’s freezing in here.”
“Is it?” she asks lightly. Her tone turns my blood even colder. It’s creepy the way she’s acting like everything is fine, when everything is clearly not fine. I tell myself to ignore it, that she’s probably just in shock.
“Yeah.” I start to get up. “I’ll get us sweatshirts. And maybe some coffee. They have a cafeteria here, right?”
“Don’t.” Britt clamps a hand onto my arm, her fingers frigid. “We should both be here when she comes out.”
Unease snakes through me, but I sit back down. Britt needs me here now, and that’s more important than sweatshirts or coffee.
“Did you call her parents?” I ask.
“Nah.” She snuggles the backpack closer. “They don’t need to know.”
“Britt!” I pull back, alarm bells clanging in my head. “Of course they do.”
“No, they don’t. We said we were going camping. If they find out about this, they’ll kill her.”
My gut lurches at her choice of words. “Britt,” I say, trying to keep my voice even. “Their daughter’s in the emergency room.”
“But she’s going to be fine.” Britt draws her knees in around the backpack, sinking deeper into the chair.
We don’t know that, a voice rumbles in the back of my head. I screw my eyes shut, but I can’t make it stop.
“Give me her phone,” I say, opening my eyes.
“Huh?” Britt has one arm on the doll’s head, absentmindedly stroking its hair.
“Yelena’s phone. Is it in her backpack?”
Britt narrows her eyes. “This is Emma,” she says, wrapping a protective hand around the doll.
“Okay, fine.” I swallow, the half-digested breakfast sandwich doing backflips in my stomach. “Is Yelena’s phone in Emma? Can I look?”
Britt wrinkles her nose. “I guess,” she sighs, unzipping the backpack. She takes out the full water bottle I bought for Yelena earlier, a sparkly wallet with a star on the front and a packet of watermelon gum before eventually finding Yelena’s cell phone. I reach for it, but she holds it out of reach.