When You Were Everything

by Ashley Woodfolk

  “The offer to leave still stands, by the way,” I said. She shook her head, elbowed me, and laughed.

  “Would y-you stop with the leaving?”

  * * *

  —

  We bumped into Jase a few minutes later.

  “Cleo Imani Baker! And Layla Zafirah Hassan!” he shouted. Layla hated her middle name, and I had no idea how Jase had found out what it was. But he was grinning as he said it, and it was hard for anyone to be mad at Jase when he was grinning.

  He and Mason were both dressed in all black, and knowing them, they were probably ninjas or something. I didn’t ask. I pretended to be annoyed when Jase gave me a bear hug, but truth be told, I was so relieved to see his familiar face in this crowd I could have cried.

  Mason looked at Layla like he’d been in a desert for hours and she was a tall glass of cold water.

  “Hey,” he said coolly. His brown bangs hung over his eyes like the tail of a comma, and he shook them away with a quick toss of his head. His voice seemed huskier than usual, but I just pressed my lips together and didn’t say anything when he reached out and pinched a bit of the fabric on Layla’s dress, gently tugging her forward.

  “You guys want a drink?” Jase asked us.

  “I think I do,” I said. I normally wouldn’t have anything, but with the Chorus Girls in their matching costumes, and with tension coming off Layla in waves, I wanted just a little something to take the edge off. I figured it couldn’t hurt if I took it slow. I looked at Layla, who shook her head and moved a little closer to Mason. She tugged on one of the strings hanging from his hoodie. I expected her to say something about me having a drink, but she didn’t. Which just made me want it more.

  “Come with me,” Jase said, grabbing my hand. Ever the wingman, he pulled me back toward the kitchen to give Mason and Layla some privacy.

  Jase poured me something using more than one of the tall glass bottles on the counter, and the only ingredient I recognized was Coke. He watched me as I took a sip. “I…don’t hate it,” I told him, nodding my approval as he mixed something up for himself, and he grinned the widest version of his lovely, dimpled grin.

  “You know about anything happening next Friday?” I asked him, because Jase had always been honest to a fault.

  “I think Sloane is having another thing. Smaller, I think. You coming?” Jase asked. “I hope you’ll beeeee therrree.” He sang the words to the tune of the song that was playing, and because I didn’t want my features to betray me, I laughed a little. I shook my head and took a sip of my drink.

  “Can’t,” I said without further explanation. I swallowed down more of the mixed drink and said nothing else. The truth (that I hadn’t even been invited) would have left more of a bitter taste in my mouth than the booze.

  We stood together near the kitchen for a while, nodding to the music and looking around the party. Layla and Mason had started kissing. The nuns had all moved into the living room, and they were dancing in the center of everyone.

  That was when I spotted him. Dom was standing across the room dressed like a badass warlock, in a hooded black robe, ripped black jeans, and thick-soled combat boots. I wondered if it was a nod to his sleight-of-hand magic. He pushed off his hood, and there was a series of stars shaved into his hair. They reminded me of the ones that topped every page of the Harry Potter novels. He was drinking out of a mug shaped like a mini-cauldron that matched his getup too well for him not to have brought it with him, and he looked really, really good. A minute later, he turned and saw me seeing him. He smiled.

  I said a hasty goodbye to Jase and started in Dom’s direction without hesitation, feeling buzzed, brilliant, and brave.

  “Hey,” I said. “Can you guess who I am?” I didn’t know if Dom knew my costume, but I also didn’t know if he knew I was the girl inside it, and for some reason I kind of hoped he didn’t. Hiding behind the mask made me feel fearless and powerful.

  Dom smirked. “Only if you can guess who I am first.”

  “Easy,” I said. I sipped my Coke-and-who-knows-what-else. I pulled on the edge of his robe, and it sort of flopped open because he didn’t have it zipped up. “And not that creative, considering you do magic all the time. Warlock.”

  “Close. But not nearly specific enough,” he said, leaning closer to me so I could hear him over the music. This must have been what it looked like when Dom flirted. I liked it.

  “Can I have a hint?” I asked. He nodded, and the rush of his breath against my neck gave me instant goose bumps.

  “Something wicked this way comes,” he whispered, and then he leaned his head toward the side of the room, where I saw that Jase had rejoined Mason. It took me a second, mostly because they hadn’t committed nearly as much as Dom had (the robe made a huge difference), but then I realized that they too were holding cauldron-shaped cups. I was so surprised that I nearly dropped my unidentifiable drink.

  Gender-bent weird sisters. “No way,” I squealed, completely losing my cool. I immediately wanted to grab and shake him for being so damn brilliant, because I knew Jase and Mason well enough to know that those knuckleheads didn’t come up with these costumes. It had to have been all Dom. Overexcited, I blurted, “I’m Lady Macbeth!”

  He took a step back and looked me over, a smile spreading slowly as he took in the small details of my costume. I flushed under his gaze. I could see him still connecting the dots when I got jostled into him as a few girls danced by us a minute later.

  “Hi,” I said again, this time very closely to his face. I’d put my hand on his chest to stop from falling, and he’d grabbed my elbow. Even after the girls passed, we kept holding on. “Hey,” he said. He smelled smoky, like his cup was an actual cauldron, and I wanted to ask him what concoction he was drinking. But before I could take my flirting to the next level, I spotted Sloane and Layla over his shoulder.

  Sloane was on the phone, and from her body language I could tell that she was pissed. Layla was in front of her, and she looked pretty concerned, too.

  My best-friend alarm sounded somewhere in my head, and it was too loud to ignore, even with Dom only inches away from me.

  “I’ll be right back,” I said to him, and I stumbled away through the suddenly thick crowd of bodies toward Layla.

  “Lay, what’s wrong?” I shouted, so she could hear me, because it seemed like the party was still increasing in volume. Layla turned as soon as she heard my voice, and she immediately looked a little relieved. “C-Cleo, thank God,” she said, pulling me a few feet away. “Look, we have…a situation.”

  I frowned, but then I nodded. “Okay?”

  Layla let out a heavy sigh and glanced toward the door. She took out her phone and pulled up a text from Cadence.

  “C-C-Cady went outside to take a call and t-texted me,” she said, and for a second I wondered when she had gotten on nickname terms with Cadence York.

  The screen glowed bright in the dark, crowded room.

  Omg!! Sloane’s ex is down here. He’s wasted. And I think he’s coming up.

  TODD

  “Why is it a big deal that her ex is here?” I asked.

  “I swear I’ll explain later, b-b-but right now I just need you to help me.”

  “Okay, okay,” I said. “But is it something juicy?” I raised my eyebrows.

  “Are you g-g-going to be gross and g-gossipy or are you going to help?” Layla asked, putting one hand on her hip.

  I laughed. “I was just—”

  “Help or not, C-C-Cleo?”

  “Help. God.” Layla got bossy when there was impending disaster, so I started to get that the ex coming over was serious even if I didn’t understand why.

  “Go watch the d-door, then. And make sure it’s locked.”

  I started toward the door, squeezing around drunk kids in all kinds of costumes. I tripped over the foot of a zombie cheerlead
er and got tangled in a Sailor Moon wig, and a sexy vampire almost spilled her drink on me.

  When I finally made it to the door, I peered through the peephole, but the hallway was clear. I still had my own drink in my hand, so I took another big sip and turned around, looking back into the party. A great song came on, one of the few non-jazz-age ones that I liked, and I started bouncing, loving the light, buzzy feeling that was filling my head. Was this easy slowness, this delightful heaviness, what drunk felt like? I drank a little more of my drink, thinking about the music and how my limbs felt like they were a part of the song, and then my eyes popped open.

  Oh crap, what if I was drunk?

  I put down the cup and turned back to the door. I looked out again but still didn’t see anyone. My head was all fuzzy. I felt like I was forgetting something.

  I texted Layla. I think I’m drunk. I’m not sure I’m the best person for the door job.

  Just as I hit send, the door I was supposed to be guarding burst open. The knob hit me hard in the small of my back.

  “Ow,” I said. And then, “Don’t you knock?”

  The boy standing in front of me was bleary-eyed and pretty. He had thick brown hair and bright green eyes rimmed in red, and he was almost as tall as my dad. He had a little bit of blond stubble on his chin and cheeks, and I spent more time than I’d like to admit thinking about how I didn’t understand white people’s coloring. (I didn’t know a person could have brown hair and a blond beard. I wondered what that meant for the hair on his legs; the hair on his—)

  “Where’s Sloane?” the guy said, and I blinked a few too many times, like I was waking up.

  My mind cleared, and in a single, horrifying moment I realized that this was Sloane’s ex, the boy I was supposed to be preventing from entering the apartment.

  Double crap.

  “Um, I think you have the wrong apartment,” I said. I tried to open the door and show him back out into the hall.

  “I’m not an idiot,” the guy said. He stepped around me so easily it was like I wasn’t even there.

  No. No no no. Oh no.

  Everyone was still dancing, so I pushed back into the crush of bodies, hoping the guy would have as much trouble finding Sloane as I had making it to the door. I pulled out my phone. I couldn’t see where Layla had gone and I didn’t know where Sloane was, and the Chorus Girls were all suddenly MIA.

  He’s here, I sent to Layla. What do I do?

  Shit, Layla sent back. How the hell did he get in if the door was locked?

  Yikes. That was what I was forgetting. Triple crap.

  It may not have been?

  Jesus, Cleo. You had ONE job.

  I could see Sloane’s ex making his way through the party much more efficiently than me.

  Where’s Sloane?

  She’s in the bedroom with me. Valeria’s coming out to try and get rid of him.

  What does he even want?

  “Sloane!” the guy yelled then. “I just want to talk to you! Sloane, where are you?!”

  Valeria came into the room and tried to quiet the guy down and usher him toward the door. Then Dom and Jase and Mason were there too. The party had gotten significantly quieter.

  “Bro,” Jase was saying. “You don’t want to do this.”

  “You know you can’t be here,” Valeria said softly, and I wondered what she meant by that.

  The guy pulled away from them all. “Sloane!” he shouted again.

  Girls backed out of his way, and after a while, so did most of the guys.

  “What the hell are you doing here, Todd?”

  Sloane was standing near the back hallway, and I guess the other Chorus Girls had been trying to keep her in her bedroom until the situation was under control, but with Todd screaming, she couldn’t be contained.

  Her normally rosy cheeks were bright pink, from the wine coolers she’d been sipping all night or from the situation, I didn’t know.

  “I just want to talk, babe. That’s all. Let’s just talk, okay?”

  Sloane looked around quickly, and maybe it was all of us staring at her, but something inside her seemed to snap.

  “Everyone needs to get the hell out of here,” she said.

  When no one moved, she got louder. “Did you losers hear me? Get the fuck out!” She was bordering on hysterical, and even though she sounded mad as hell, there were tears in her eyes. Layla had her hand on Sloane’s shoulder, and I could tell it was meant to be a comfort, but Sloane shrugged her off.

  Some people yelled “Booooo,” or “Worst party ever.” Sloane disappeared into one of the bedrooms with Todd in tow.

  I went looking for my jacket and found it on the floor near the chair I’d thrown it on when we first arrived, then went looking for Layla. She was in the kitchen stacking used cups to throw them away, and waving goodbye to people as they left.

  “That was so crazy,” I said. “But I guess we should go?”

  “I’m g-g-going to stay here,” Layla said. She didn’t stop picking up empty cups or balling up napkins or dumping chips from bowls back into their bags.

  “You’re…staying?” I asked, like I hadn’t heard her.

  Layla nodded.

  “But it seems under control, right? They went to go talk.” Jase nudged me as he and Mason headed toward the door, and I reached up to hug him goodbye. Mason leaned forward and kissed Layla on the cheek.

  “Sloane’s…upset,” Layla said to me as the guys left. Her mouth flopped open but no sound came out. I waited as she took a deep breath and started again. “I d-doubt she’s g-g-going to want to be alone once T-Todd is finally gone.”

  “Of course she’s upset. But why do you need to stay? Won’t Valeria and Cadence and Melody and Sage be here?”

  I listed them off on my fingers. Sloane had plenty of friends, but Layla was my only person.

  Layla looked around at the emptying apartment. She took a deep breath and sighed before saying, “I just do, okay?”

  “Is it because I forgot to lock the door? Are you pissed?” I felt my chin wobble a little bit. Yep, I was definitely drunk. “I told you. I think I’m kind of drunk.”

  Layla grabbed my hand and pulled me into the bathroom. She closed and locked the door and slipped off her mask before she said anything.

  “Yes, okay? I’m p-p-pissed that you forgot to lock the d-door, but that’s not the only reason. Some b-bad shit went d-d-down at Sloane’s old school.”

  “Bad how?” I asked.

  Layla hopped up on the sink and I sat on the toilet. She pulled out her phone, which she sometimes did when she had a long story to tell. She hated her stuttering even more when she had a lot to say. Layla typed for a long while, texting me detailed secrets about Sloane and Todd, and all that had happened at Sloane’s old school. Things I had to swear I wouldn’t tell anyone…ever. Things, Layla told me, no one knew except her and Valeria.

  Layla took a few deep breaths as I read and read, letting all the information wash over me.

  “Whoa,” I said. “That’s really messed up.”

  “Yeah,” Layla agreed. “And she still loves him, C-Cleo. Even after everything.”

  Her nostrils flared, and she looked away from me. “I probably shouldn’t have t-t-told you any of that. Swear it, C-C-Cleo. Swear you really won’t t-tell anyone.”

  I swallowed around a sudden lump in my throat because I didn’t know how long she’d known Sloane’s history, but I did know we never used to have secrets. She was still the keeper of mine, but it seemed she’d become the keeper of someone else’s too.

  “I swear, Lay. I’m so sorry. I wish you’d said something sooner. I had no idea.”

  I wasn’t used to sharing Layla, but after that story, even I could admit that Sloane needed her more right now than I did.

  Layla reached out and touched
my shoulder. “I know. My mom thinks I’m st-st-staying over with you, though, so if she calls, c-c-c-can you like, c-cover for me?”

  I hated lying to Mrs. Hassan, and if my mom picked up the phone it would be all over. But I sighed and agreed. Layla smiled sadly, and hugged me.

  “Thanks. I’ll t-t-t-text you later.”

  EMPTY THREATS

  “So it was you?”

  Sloane stormed up to my locker on Monday, right before homeroom. I had no idea what she was talking about or why she was even talking to me at all. She had barely ever spoken to me directly since the day we’d met.

  “Uh, hi?” I said. “What are you talking about?”

  Sloane looked behind her and stepped a little closer to me.

  “Layla just told me she told you to lock the door at my party, and you didn’t. That you were the one who let him in,” Sloane whispered. She was standing so close to me that when she said the word “party” she spit on my face a little. I reached up to wipe it away.

  “Oh,” I said.

  Sloane crossed her arms. Her cheeks had gone ruddier than they usually were under her freckles, so I could tell she was really mad. “Are you stupid? Were you really so wasted after one drink that you couldn’t even figure out a lock?”

  There was danger in the way she was looking at me. A little too much intensity for me to brush her off.

  “Sloane,” I said seriously, “Look. I’m really sorry. But if you didn’t want him there, why didn’t you just kick him out?”

  She didn’t look away from me, and her pear-green eyes felt almost sharp. I took a step back from her and hooked my thumbs under the straps of my backpack. I tried to look around her, to see if Layla was at her locker, but Sloane stepped into my line of sight.

  “Are you really that dumb?” she said. She smirked and looked evil as hell. “You know what? You must be. Can’t even lock a fucking door. Dumbass bitch.”