“Sorry, go ahead—” she said.
“No, you go ahead—”
“Thanks—”
“Do you want me to take it? So you can be in it, too?”
I said it automatically, impulsively, forgetting that I didn’t want to be there, forgetting that my hands were full of first aid supplies and a wet towel. It was almost like this casual, cool part of my brain spoke before the real me could take over, and for a moment I was stunned by my own voice.
And then the others reacted. I could tell instantly that I had said the wrong thing: The girls who were lined up for the photo shifted uncomfortably, and the girl taking their picture smiled like she was trying to recover from being stung.
“No, that’s okay,” she said in an overly bright way, “but thank you.”
She turned back to take the picture. I waited for them to finish, knowing my face and neck were red and blotchy. This was why I didn’t go to parties or talk to anyone other than Maritza and JaKory: because I didn’t know what to say, or do, or even how to be around other people my age.
“Have at it,” the girl said, handing her phone off to the other girls, and then she turned and looked at me.
“Thanks for waiting,” she said. “They’ve been asking me to take that picture for like ten minutes.”
It was hard to look straight at her. She had beautiful sea-green eyes and a warm smile I didn’t feel I had earned.
“I’m sorry if I said something awkward,” I blurted out.
She shook her head. “You didn’t. It’s just…” She checked behind her and lowered her voice. “They’re all going to UGA next year, so they wanted a pic together, and I … um … didn’t get in.”
I blinked at her, unsure of what to say. She smiled a small, close-lipped smile that told me she was devastated but trying to keep perspective on the whole thing, and I couldn’t believe she was trusting me, a person she didn’t know, with this thing that was obviously paining her.
“That was shitty of them to make you take it, then,” I said.
She broke into a looser, more genuine smile. “Yeah, it was, right? I’m not even that close of friends with them.” She looked intently at me, and her eyes took in my face in a way I wasn’t expecting. “I know you from school, right?”
A warm wave spread across my chest. Ricky hadn’t known me, and no one at this party had looked twice at me, but here was a girl with a pretty smile who recognized me and knew I belonged.
“Yeah,” I said, “I’m a junior—”
Before I could go on, two people swooped in behind the girl and started tugging her away, laughing and shouting. One of them was a short, happy girl with red hair, and the other was a big, beefy guy with a buzz cut and twinkling eyes. They were clearly two of her good friends.
“Come on!” the redhead shouted. “Leo and Samuel are shotgunning!”
The girl I’d been talking to was laughing, even as she tried to resist their pulling. “Hold on, guys, I’m trying to talk to—”
“We’ll bring her right back!” the guy with the buzz cut told me, spinning her away. “Hey, has anyone seen Ricky?!”
There was a commotion in the foyer as everyone started heading for the kitchen, and suddenly I was the only person left standing there. For a moment, I forgot where I was—forgot, until I looked down to the antibiotics in my hand, that I had ventured into this crazy party to grab first aid for Ricky. I turned away from the raucous sea of people swelling toward the kitchen, and a moment later I was back outside, breathing clear air, letting my nerves settle in the silence.
Ricky was still at the base of the driveway, waiting for me. “Everything all right?” he asked. “It sounded really loud in there just now.”
“People are shotgunning?” I said. “Whatever that means.”
“Are you serious? Damn it, I told them shotgunning was off-limits.”
“They were looking for you, I heard some guy asking if anyone had seen you. Here,”—I handed over his supplies—“let me give you some light.”
I shone my phone flashlight as he cleaned his hand, and while I watched him, the heady adrenaline rush I’d felt inside the house seemed to cool and wash away. I felt odd, but it was a good kind of odd—like I’d surprised myself in the best way.
“Thanks,” Ricky said, crumpling up the bandage wrapper. “I owe you one. Do you wanna come back in for a while?”
I was caught off guard by him asking. It felt so possible, so clearly within my reach … I mean, hadn’t I just been in there? Hadn’t I talked to someone I didn’t know? Couldn’t I walk back in there, side by side with the guy who was hosting this party, and feel like I belonged in that space?
I wanted it—and for the first time, I could admit that I wanted it—but I didn’t want to overdo it. Not tonight.
“I should probably go,” I said. “Maybe next time.”
Ricky looked like he was trying to figure me out. “All right,” he said finally. “It was really cool to meet you, Codi. Maybe we can hang out sometime.”
“I’d really like that,” I told him.
“And thanks for—um—not telling anyone what you saw.”
He looked at me one more time, his eyes serious and careful. Then he turned and disappeared into the house, and I was left on the driveway with a subtly different version of myself.
* * *
“This girl was so hot, Codi, you have no idea—”
“—Where are we? Can we get a cheeseburger?”
“—She had this gorgeous mouth, and eyes that cut straight to my soul, I don’t know why she had to walk away like that—”
“—Or nachos! We should get nachos!”
“Will you two SHUT UP!” I yelled, swatting JaKory into the back seat.
We were one turn away from my house, and Maritza and JaKory were even drunker than when I’d first run into them at the party. I’d been trying to drive carefully, not wanting to mess up Maritza’s car, but the two of them had been yelling in my ear from the moment they’d met me in the driveway.
“We’re home,” I announced, turning off Maritza’s headlights as I rolled up to my house. “Now listen.” I turned to stare them down. “The two of you are very drunk, and you’re being very loud, and my parents are going to be very upset if they catch us sneaking in right now. So you’re going to follow me down through the basement without talking, got it?”
JaKory giggled in the back seat. Maritza sighed dramatically and said, “You just don’t understand how hot this girl was, though.”
“Yeah, Maritza, I get it, and I’m sorry you didn’t make out with her, but it’s time for us to go to bed.”
“Will you make us nachos?” JaKory asked.
I sighed. A few days ago, I would have found drunk Maritza and JaKory to be hilarious. But now, after the conversation we’d had by the river, and after the big night I’d had without them, all I wanted was to be alone with my thoughts.
I managed to get them down the driveway pretty easily; JaKory only tripped twice. I got them inside, got all three of us waters and a bag of pretzels, and pulled extra blankets and pillows from the basement closet.
JaKory burrowed into a sleeping bag on the floor while Maritza and I curled up on the couches. For a few minutes we didn’t talk, just ate our pretzels and gulped down water. Then Maritza rubbed her hand down her face and said, “It was really fun, Codi. You should’ve come earlier.”
I didn’t answer. This was the point where I normally would have told them about Ricky, this raw, three-dimensional boy I’d crossed paths with tonight, and about the moment I decided to walk into the party despite my gnawing fear. But lying there in the darkness, any desire I had to share my experience evaporated into the air. Tonight I’d proved that I could be bigger than they believed. That I could be brave, and daring, and maybe even a hint of a real Teenager. And for now, the only person who needed to know that was me.
“I don’t want you to miss out on things,” Maritza went on, peering at me through her drunke
n haze. “You gotta have experiences, you know?”
“Experiences,” JaKory echoed from the floor. His eyes were closed and he was breathing through his mouth.
I got up, turned off the light, and curled deeper into my fleece blanket. Within three minutes both of my friends were snoring. I was used to their nighttime breathing, but tonight I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t turn off my mind.
For the first time I could remember, I left my friends in the basement and went to sleep in my own bed.
5
I had to work at nine o’clock the next morning, which meant I had to wake Maritza and JaKory up well before they’d finished sleeping off their hangovers. They were groggy and slow-moving, and JaKory wouldn’t stop talking about how much he was craving hash browns. I snuck them out through the basement so my family wouldn’t notice their obvious hangovers.
“Feels like there’s an elephant on my head,” Maritza said, hanging over her car door.
“Two elephants,” JaKory groaned, rubbing his eyes.
“Yeah, and nothing even came of it,” Maritza grumbled. She peered at me from beneath her messy hair. “We missed you, though, Codi-kid.”
She said it sincerely, almost like she’d forgotten our heated conversation from the day before. Maritza had always been good at glossing over our sore spots. Usually I appreciated that, but something in me had switched this time.
“Yeah, y’all mentioned that last night,” I said brusquely.
Maritza looked hard at me. It was clear she realized I wasn’t over our argument yet. “Well, it’s true, we really did miss you.”
There was a hanging silence. I didn’t care to say anything back.
JaKory’s eyes went soft. He came over and wrapped me in a hug. “Forgive us, okay? We needed to try something new. Obviously nothing worked out, but at least we gave it a shot.”
I returned his hug half-heartedly and backed away from the car. “Y’all get going. I’m gonna be late for work.”
Maritza looked like she wanted to press the matter, but for once, she let it go. “And I’m gonna be late for my coffee-within-fifteen-minutes-of-waking-up window,” she said. “Come on, JaKory.”
“Ugh,” JaKory said, tucking himself into the passenger seat, “I can’t fathom drinking a scalding-hot coffee right now.”
“So let’s get iced ones, genius,” Maritza said, snapping the door shut.
I watched them pull away from the curb, still squabbling, and as I walked down the driveway to my own car, I couldn’t help but feel relieved that they were gone.
* * *
I worked at a retail store called Totes-n-Goats. It was a small boutique in a shopping plaza where the main clientele consisted of suburban families and where the developers decorated the lampposts with signs like STEP INTO SUMMER! At Totes-n-Goats, we sold purses, patterned handbags, and pretty much anything that featured a decorative animal on it. I’m not sure who had the genius idea to combine these two things, but many women in the area seemed to love it. They’d come in to buy hand towels with alligators on them, salt and pepper shakers shaped like bunny rabbits, even lip balm with owls on the label. One lady came in every week to ask whether we’d “gotten our paws” on any gazelle items yet.
My proper title was “Sales Associate,” but I’m not sure it was all that fitting, considering I never spoke to customers if I could help it. “Creeper Who Lingers in the Back of the Store and Gets Flustered When Customers Ask for Help” might have been a better title. I think the only reason they kept me around was because I knew how to work the register and I never complained when they asked me to pick up another shift.
That Saturday was the start of Memorial Day weekend, so we were expecting heavy sales. My manager, Tammy, made me follow her around the store after we opened. She wanted to coach me, once again, on how to approach customers with a “bubbly” attitude.
“Smile bigger, Codi, bigger,” she said, pointing her fingers at the corners of her mouth. “You can’t look like you’re on your way to the dentist.”
Tammy could be patronizing sometimes, but I knew she was grateful that I’d agreed to pick up extra shifts that weekend. Two of the other sales associates, who were in college, were going to the lake to celebrate the long weekend with friends, and they’d called out last minute.
“Thank Jesus we can count on you,” Tammy said, smoothing a zebra sticker onto my name tag. “You’re not another one of these young people who put partying and friends over showing up and being responsible.”
I didn’t reply. A group of kids my age was hovering in front of the store window, passing a cigarette between them. They were laughing and smacking each other’s shoulders, obviously enjoying an inside joke.
Tammy followed my line of sight, and her face darkened immediately. “Oooh, these yahoos,” she muttered, marching toward the door. “Come on, Codi.”
“Oh, no, I’ll just—”
“You need to learn how to handle these situations,” she said, tugging me by the arm.
We spilled outside the door. The group of kids looked up, not bothering to hide their cigarette.
“Y’all are loitering,” Tammy said, hands on her hips, “and I’ll need you to leave before I call plaza security.”
One of them laughed in her face. I recognized him as an underclassman from my school. “We’re just having breakfast,” he said, rumpling his hair.
“Oooh, and nicotine counts as a breakfast food now, huh?” Tammy asked shrilly.
“All part of a balanced diet, ma’am,” one of the girls said with a smirk.
“There are benches down that way,” Tammy said, pointing with a stubby finger. “Why don’t you take a little walk and have a nice sit-down breakfast.”
It was clear she thought that was a real mic-drop kind of line. The kids snorted at her, kicking their feet off the wall. Their eyes skirted over me as they slouched away, and I averted my gaze, trying to be invisible.
“Damn yahoos,” Tammy repeated once we were back inside the store. “I tell you what, I don’t miss that stage of life at all. Not for a second. I used to wake up hungover as all hell, sprawled on the floor of my friend’s room, thinking I was such a badass. You see this little beast?”
She rolled up her sleeve and showed me a discolored tattoo on her forearm.
“It’s a Mexican tequila worm,” she said. “That’s what happens when you mess around at that age.”
“I kinda like it,” I told her, my cheeks still flushed.
“Ah, well,” she said, with a faraway look in her eyes. “We’re all young once, I guess.”
I couldn’t believe it. Even Tammy, with her animal stickers and goat sweaters, had once been more fun and outgoing than me.
I felt on edge for the rest of my shift. When I finished at one o’clock, I drove back to my neighborhood and made a full stop at the clubhouse stop sign. I sat there for a minute, my car idling, until another car pulled up behind me and honked.
My house was toward the right. On impulse, I turned left instead.
* * *
Ricky’s house was different in the daylight. No line of cars, no pulsing music. It even looked smaller, maybe because there weren’t dozens of teenagers inside.
I wasn’t sure what I was doing there. Ricky probably wasn’t even home; he was probably out with his friends, or maybe with that guy. And if he was home, he had probably only said we should hang out to be polite.
Still, there was something inside me that wanted to be there. I remembered that brave, wild buzz of dashing into his house last night, and I wanted that feeling back.
I stepped hesitantly up to the front door. Last night I’d pushed it open in a rush, anxious to break through the throng of people. Today I’d have to ring the doorbell and wait for Ricky to find me standing there with my armpits sweating and my khaki work shorts sticking to my thighs.
I pressed the doorbell. A muffled musical note sounded inside the house, and a few seconds later, Ricky opened the door.
�
�Codi,” he said, his tone surprised. He looked tired and hazy, like he hadn’t gotten much sleep.
“Hey,” I said casually. “How’s your hand?”
He seemed caught off guard by the question, or maybe by my being there altogether. “Oh. It’s all right,” he said, showing me the fresh bandages. “Probably good that I put antibiotic on it right away. Thanks for that.”
“No problem.”
He nodded, and I nodded, and I had no idea what to say next.
“So, uh…”
“Did you and your friends get home okay?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah. They were pretty drunk, but it was a quick drive, just two minutes to the back of the neighborhood.”
He was watching me curiously, just as he had last night, like he still wasn’t sure what to make of me.
“So … did you come over to hang out?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah, um … I just thought maybe you’d want some help cleaning up. There were a lot of people here, and it’s probably annoying to have to clean up by yourself…”
He watched me again. There was something guarded in his expression. But after a beat, he swung the door back and said, “You know how to clean a place without making it look suspiciously perfect, right?”
He stood aside and let me into the house.
* * *
Cleaning up that party was like showing up to an archaeological dig. Every spill, stain, and half-drunk beer told a story of the people who’d been there last night. Ricky had an answer for everything I found. The half-eaten pizza with Sour Patch Kids on top was the work of Julie Nguyen, whose culinary concoctions got more and more bizarre at every party; the cheap black cape belonged to a guy I knew from lit class, Daniel Parrilla, who had earned the nickname “Magic Dan” because he liked to perform magic tricks whenever he got drunk (“Kid’s a crock,” Ricky said); the bright green thong I found in a potted plant was probably Aliza Saylor’s, who apparently couldn’t stand to wear underwear once she got three Lime-A-Ritas deep.
“So she just starts stripping?” I asked, using a paper towel to drop the thong into a trash bag.
Late to the Party Page 5