Lucy in the Sky Page 13

  We had sex.

  I froze, and my stomach dropped, but not in a happy way. My head hurt so badly that I closed my eyes for a minute. Blake gave me a soft kiss on the forehead and slipped out of bed into the bathroom. I heard the shower turn on, and I grabbed my underwear off of the floor. It was the only thing I saw of mine in the room. Then I remembered the rug.

  I pulled a blanket off of the bed and wrapped it around my shoulders and headed downstairs. My phone and purse were on the counter in the kitchen. I walked into the living room and felt a flood of relief when I saw Lauren curled up on the couch under a blanket.

  Then I was shaking her awake, and we both checked our phones and it was after noon. The only thing that went running through my head was that I needed to find my skirt and shoes. I collected the pieces of my costume, pulled the skirt on, and carried the corset back upstairs.

  Blake came out of the bathroom in a towel as I sat down on the edge of the bed to buckle my shoes. He asked why I was leaving so soon. I asked if he had a T-shirt I could borrow so I didn’t have to lace myself back into the corset, and as he fished through a dresser drawer, I realized there was something else in my head besides the pounding:

  A nagging question.

  As it formed in my brain, it sank down into my stomach, and I felt another wave wash over me. This one was a wave of pure undiluted terror that forced the words from my stomach up into my mouth and flying out of my lips:

  Blake? Did we use a condom?

  The way he smiled at me was different from the smiles I’d seen from him before. He handed me the T-shirt, and he tried to lean in and kiss my neck. I pushed away from him and looked into his eyes.

  He said, What? You’re on the pill, right?

  The room started to spin a little bit when he said it, and I took a step backward. My cheeks were hot and I gulped a deep breath. Blake saw the answer before I even said the word no.

  He shook his head and snorted a short laugh through his nose. He looked at me like I was the silliest, stupidest girl he’d ever met.

  As Lauren drove us down the highway along the coast, I couldn’t help but think that he was right. Lauren grabbed my hand and held it as I told her everything. She told me that I didn’t need to worry: She had morning-after pills at home. She got them from her doctor in New York.

  I leaned my head against the window and just stared at the gray clouds and the angry waves that pummeled the rocks along the beach where I first went to watch Ross surf. I thought about that girl who’d sat on the sand and watched Ross ride that day. She was so different from this girl: the one who had done Ecstasy last night, and had sex with a 20-year-old with no condom. This girl who was going to her best friend’s house to take a morning-after pill.

  Who am I now?

  How did this happen?

  That’s when Cam texted me: WHERE ARE YOU?

  I texted back: AT LAUREN’S.

  He called me, and when I answered, he yelled into the phone: NO YOU’RE NOT!

  When I didn’t answer his texts this morning, he’d driven over to Lauren’s and knocked on the door. Her dad told him that Lauren had spent the night at a friend’s last night and that I wasn’t there.

  I hung up on him. We raced back to Lauren’s, I gulped down the morning-after pill, then she dropped me off at home.

  Mom and Dad met me at the door, and I was terrified that Cam had already told them I hadn’t actually spent the night at Lauren’s, but he hadn’t. They wanted to hear all about the party. The very last thing on the entire earth that I wanted to do was sit down to brunch with Mom and Dad and tell them about the party, but as I did, I realized they didn’t know that Cam had left early with Astrid.

  By the time we were done eating, I felt terrible. My headache had gotten steadily worse after I took the pill, and now I felt sick to my stomach. I was dizzy as I left the table, but Cam followed me to my room and hissed: What the HELL are you thinking? Did you spend the night at Blake’s?

  I just stared at him and then said, Why do you care?

  His face got bright red and he said, I swear to God, if I find out that asshole laid one finger on you, I’ll kill him.

  I told him to calm down. That I could take care of myself.

  He left in a huff, and I’ve been lying here, thinking about last night, and trying not to throw up.

  Blake just texted me. He says he wants to see me again soon. Tonight. I texted him back and told him I have homework to do. We have essays due in American government tomorrow. It’s the last thing I want to do.

  All I want right now is to feel Blake’s arms around me again. I want to hear him tell me I’m beautiful. I want to feel those amazing waves of pure happiness crash over me again and again.

  I don’t care what Cam says.

  I don’t care what anybody says.

  November 2

  Didn’t finish my American government essay. I’ve never not turned in an essay before. Lauren didn’t have hers either. Mr. Daniels made us stay after class so he could talk to us. He told us we could hand it in during class on Thursday or he’d drop our scores one letter grade.

  I don’t care about Abraham Lincoln and the treaty that ended the Civil War. Writing this essay is going to be like pulling teeth.

  Blake keeps texting me.

  I haven’t texted him back. Lauren says I should play it cool. I really want to see him again, but I am still pissed at him for not using a condom.

  November 3

  I handed in my freaking essay this morning.

  While I was proofreading it last night after dinner, Blake texted me. He was driving through our neighborhood. I decided that I deserved a little reward for finishing my essay, so I met him down at the end of the block, got in his car, and made out with him for a minute. He had a one-hitter with him, a little metal tube that was painted to look like a cigarette. He loaded it a few times, and we smoked out and talked and kissed for a while. I was maybe gone for like fifteen minutes. No big whoop. If Mom saw me come back inside, I was gonna tell her I was looking for my gym bag in her car.

  When I walked through the door, Cam was standing in the entryway with his arms crossed. He came to my bedroom and gave me the 3rd degree. Said he followed me out and saw me get in Blake’s car. Asked what was going on with me. Threatened to tell Mom and Dad that I was going out with a 20-year-old.

  I told him he was being a moron and that if he said a single word to Mom and Dad I would make sure that they knew he and Astrid had left the Halloween party without me and that he was wasted so Astrid had to drive.

  Thank God Cam’s got his big invitational soccer tournament out of town this weekend. That means he’ll leave tomorrow with the team after school and be gone until late on Sunday night. I need a break from him.

  November 4

  This.

  Day.

  Will.

  Never.

  END.

  Lauren and I have one more class after this one: choir. Then we’re going to her place with Ross, and Blake and Ian are going to meet us there. Lauren’s dad is in New York for the weekend, and Astrid is going to watch Cam play soccer, so it’s going to just be us.

  This week I have felt like I’m walking around under Jell-O. I just want to feel good again. At lunch I asked Ross if he had pot to bring to Lauren’s tonight. He smirked and said, But what about the pact?

  Lauren rolled her eyes and laughed, but something about his question stuck in my stomach. I realized I wanted to feel good, and it didn’t matter how much I promised myself I didn’t want to do drugs anymore. What did it matter? What was the point of being so good? Wasn’t it so I wouldn’t do stupid things like sleep with boys with no condom? And I’d taken care of that. I can handle this. I can make my own decisions. I don’t need Cam or anybody else telling me what to do. If I want to have a drink or do a line, or smoke a joint, it’s nobody else’s business but mine.

  I must’ve made a funny face because Ross asked me if I was okay, said he was just teasing. I said
the pact was pretty much broken last weekend.

  I cannot wait for this class to be over. All I have left today is choir with Lauren, then we’re headed to her place. First stop: cosmos. And some weed. Then I’m gonna drag Blake into the master bedroom and make out with him. Maybe more.

  Lauren asked me how the sex was the other day. I told her that I thought it was incredible, but of course I don’t have anything to compare it to. She said that if it was good, it was good, and that I shouldn’t question it. She said you don’t have to have lots of experience to know when something feels right.

  I always feel like she has way more experience than I do. She’s like this grown-up version of a teenager. She never makes me feel like a moron, though. She’s always really kind to me. In all of this craziness, she’s been the one person I can count on.

  Lauren’s friendship makes me feel really special, like I’m worth it.

  November 5

  I am so upset I don’t even know how to put it into writing. I can’t even sit up and hold my pen. I can’t stop cry.

  LAUREN IS A FUCKING BITCH.

  November 6

  I am never speaking to Lauren again.

  I am never speaking to Blake again.

  I am never doing drugs again.

  Cam had a gut feeling about Lauren and Blake and Ian, and he was RIGHT about ALL of them. I feel so shitty for not believing him. I should have listened. I should have trusted him. Instead, I trusted these so-called FRIENDS.

  I’m not even making any sense. If anyone ever read this (which would be like my WORST NIGHTMARE) they would think I am a lunatic. Maybe I am a lunatic. Maybe I’m the stupidest woman to have ever drawn a breath on the planet.

  I don’t even want to write about it.

  I don’t want to think about it.

  I don’t want to feel this feeling in my stomach. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. I can’t think.

  Mom thinks I have the flu. She keeps coming to my room with saltines and 7Up and asking if I want any soup. She’s being SO SWEET to me, and it just makes me feel EVEN WORSE for doing all of these things that she would be so upset about.

  I can’t stop crying.

  I HATE THIS FEELING.

  Later …

  I know if I don’t write this down, I’ll never get it out of me. So, I’m just going to write it as fast as I can. Just the facts. Just what happened.

  On Friday I left school and walked down to Lauren’s place with her and Ross. We went inside and Ross packed a bowl, and we all smoked out. Lauren made cosmos and we raided the fridge while we watched TV. Blake and Ian showed up and we all headed down to the Promenade for Mexican food. Ian has a fake ID and ordered a pitcher of margaritas. Lauren and I finished our water and Blake poured margaritas into our glasses.

  I was feeling really buzzed when we got back to Lauren’s and Ross was smoking more weed. I said I was getting too tired from the weed and the drinks and the food. Blake looked over at Ian and said, Well, I’ve got a solution to that.

  Then he pulled a big bag of cocaine out of his pocket and Lauren clapped her hands. Ross and Ian said that they were staying away from the blow as much as they could, but after Blake and Lauren both did lines, we all decided that we’d just do a little bit and then go get in the hot tub on Lauren’s roof.

  The coke instantly perked me up and I felt so much more awake. Lauren dragged me back to her room to put on swimsuits. We must’ve taken a long time because Blake poked his head into her bedroom, and was like, Ross and Ian are doing another line. You girls want more?

  That’s the bad thing about cocaine: Even when you say you’re only going to do one line, you end up doing more because it makes you feel so on point. I had been making Lauren laugh, and I felt beautiful in the little white bikini she gave me. I waltzed out into the living room in nothing but her swimsuit and Blake convinced me to let him do a line off of my stomach. I lay down on the couch, and he poured a little line of coke out right under my belly button. I was laughing so hard when he snorted it because it tickled, and then he licked the place where the cocaine had been, and ran his tongue all the way up to my breasts, then between them up to my neck, and kissed me in front of Ian and Ross.

  Lauren walked in and saw us kissing, and was like, You two get a ROOM! Blake said he was fine with that idea and picked me up and threw me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and headed down the hall over my giggling. I tickled him until he dropped me and then we all went upstairs to the hot tub.

  Lauren and Blake brought up two shakers of cosmos and plastic glasses for everybody. Lauren’s hot tub on the roof is AMAZING. You can see the pier with the big Ferris wheel and roller coaster all lit up, and it was a clear night at the beach. We laughed and talked about God knows what, and Ian smoked some cigarettes because he does that when he does cocaine.

  I kept sniffing and feeling the cocaine drip down the back of my throat and I realized that I kind of liked that feeling now. I remembered how weird it had felt at first, but now I could feel the buzz of the coke—making me want to talk and laugh. Coke makes everything interesting, and alive feeling, for about 20 minutes or so, and then I always want more.

  Lauren went back downstairs to fill up the martini shakers again, and Blake followed her down to help out. I was trying to take deep breaths in the hot tub and just relax, which is hard to do on coke. Ross was talking about how his mom was going to have to work on Thanksgiving, but that was okay because the hotel had an amazing 5-star restaurant and he was going to get to hang out there with Ian, whose mom and dad were still in Italy.

  I started feeling this weird anxious feeling in my stomach and asked Ross if he was feeling it too. He said he was, and Ian said it was because they must’ve cut the cocaine with something speedy. He said that some Xanax would help level out that feeling, and I remembered that the last time I’d done coke Lauren had given us Xanax.

  I told the boys I’d go get us some, and I grabbed a towel. Ross whistled at me as I got into the elevator, and I blew him a kiss. When I walked into Lauren’s place, I heard music coming from the speakers hidden in the ceiling and walls of the condo. Lauren and Blake weren’t in the kitchen, so I walked back toward Lauren’s bedroom. I saw her door was open about a foot, and I opened my mouth to call her name, but that’s when I heard it: a gasp.

  I’ve been thinking about that gasp for two days now. Wishing I would have just turned around right then, and gone back into the kitchen, and mixed another drink, and gone back up to the hot tub.

  But I didn’t.

  I couldn’t.

  Maybe it was the coke, or the vodka, or both. I felt my heart start to race like a locomotive about to pound through my chest. I smelled the coke in the back of my throat, sort of greasy like gasoline, and I felt the bottom drop out of my stomach. It was fear and rage all rolled into one. My hand was shaking as I touched the doorframe, and I held my breath as I peered into the room.

  I saw Blake’s naked body on top of Lauren on the bed, her legs wrapped around him, her fingers running down his back, and that’s when I heard the second gasp. I saw the mirror of cocaine on the bedside table, and something in me snapped. I kicked the door so hard that it slammed open and hit the wall.

  And as I kicked the door, I screamed.

  I cried and screamed the words that echoed in my head as Blake scrambled for his jeans, and Lauren pulled the comforter over herself, the words I repeated over and over as she cried and begged me not to be upset, the words that Ian and Ross heard me sob as they drove me home:

  HOW COULD YOU?

  Later …

  Blake and Lauren have both texted me a gazillion times. Finally I turned off my phone.

  Cam came home a little bit ago and poked his head in my room. He closed the door behind him, and walked over to the bed, and sat down really gently, like I was a glass of wine balanced on the pillow and might spill all over the place.

  He looked at me, and then down at the striped rug that pokes out from under my bed. He told me tha
t Lauren had texted Astrid while we were driving back.

  I was silent for a second. We just sat there looking at each other. Cam could have said anything at that moment:

  *I told you so.

  *You’re so dumb.

  *What did you think was going to happen?

  *Did you think he actually liked you?

  But that’s the thing about Cam: He doesn’t care about being right. He cares about me. He reached over and took my hand, and instead of saying any of those things, he said:

  I’m sorry.

  Something about those words knocked me over, and I spilled out all over him. I cried, and he leaned over and hugged me and I pressed my face into his shoulder and that’s how Mom found us when she came in. She wanted to know what happened, and once more I held my breath and waited for Cam to spill the beans.

  But he didn’t.

  He just said that Lauren had been unkind to me.

  Unkind.

  Who talks like that? But you know what? He was right. It wasn’t that I cared so much about Blake. It was that what Lauren did … well, it’s not what friends do to each other.

  Blake didn’t break my heart.

  Lauren did.

  November 7

  I am leaving for school in 2 minutes. I don’t know how I’m going to make it through this day. I don’t even want to SEE Lauren, let alone TALK to her. We’ve eaten lunch together almost every day this school year.

  How is this going to work?

  Later …

  Turns out it’s not so hard not to speak to Lauren today. She walked up to me at our lockers and said, I’m sorry. I didn’t look at her. I didn’t answer her. I just closed my locker and walked away. She didn’t even try to meet us for lunch. I walked down to the cafeteria with Ross and Cam and Astrid. Astrid gave me a hug and asked me if I was okay. I smiled and told her I would be.

  But I don’t think I will.

  Not because of Blake, or Lauren, or what happened last Friday. It’s because I feel this sense of dread in my stomach since I’ve sworn off drugs and drinking again. And something in my head feels like I’m going to miss out on all of the fun. Isn’t that CRAZY? After everything I’ve gone through? After all of the bad stuff, and tears, and feeling terrible?