The Anti-Prom - By Abby McDonald Page 0,68
They should know by now to get out of my way.
Then I see a flash of someone familiar. Meg’s over in the dining room, watching the table hockey game. She looks breathless and happy for some reason, and as the crowd shifts, I see that reason slip his arm around her shoulders, grinning down at her. Tristan.
So, she got her Prince Charming after all. I watch them for a second, and I can’t help but be envious. Not of the status or that preppy jerk, but how damn happy she is. Meg didn’t ask the world for a thing, but there she is, granted everything she ever wanted. Sure, it’s just the same old high school bullshit — the pretty dress and the cute boy — but everything about her is shimmering with delight. Maybe that’s the trick: to expect so little from life, you never feel one ounce of disappointment. Maybe that’s my lesson.
I press on. Brianna’s stocked the bar, I’ll say that at least for her; I pluck a half-full bottle of vodka from the kitchen counter debris and head outside, away from the bright party lights toward the edge of the garden and the silhouettes lurking there. I don’t bother saying hey, or even announcing my presence; I just wander right up and plant myself in the center of the knot.
“Jo-lene Nel-son.” One of the guys drawls it, exhaling a long plume of smoke from the joint in his hand. “What’s up?”
I stare at them all, nonchalant as hell. It’s a motley collection of boys from school: some of the party jocks, a few preppy assholes, a couple of guys I recognize from detention. “You tell me.” I shrug, taking a gulp from my bottle. The vodka burns the back of my throat, fire all the way to my stomach. I don’t shudder, but somewhere inside, I feel a small pang of regret.
I thought I was done with this.
Mikey gives me a sidelong look. He should have graduated last year, but his credits fell short, and the football team was happy to keep him around. “Not your kind of party, I would have thought.”
“Want to throw me out?” I reply, enough challenge in my voice to make him hold his hands up in a kind of defeat.
“Whoa, no offense. I was just saying.”
“And now you’ve said it.” I look around at the dark faces, lurking here like they’re committing some grave crimes instead of smoking some of Mikey’s weak-ass weed. I roll my eyes, not that they’ll see it. “Anyone got a cigarette?”
They shake their heads and shrug. Daniel offers me the joint. I pause. “No,” I sigh, remembering the last time I mixed alcohol with that stuff. “I need nicotine.”
“It’s a bad habit,” Nico tells me, his lips curling in a smile. I stare back. He’s one of the rich, preppy guys that drifts on the edge of Brianna’s clique, but it looks like he’s slumming it tonight. His white dress shirt is wet through from the pool, and his tuxedo pants droop from a thin leather belt. I offer him the bottle with a flicker of my eyebrow.
He takes it and swallows a gulp straight down. Hands it back. Smiles again.
So this is how it goes.
Suddenly I’m so tired I can barely stand. I lean back against one of the old trees, taking tiny swallows from the vodka as they pass the joint around and murmur idle conversation in hushed tones. The haze is back, still cloaked heavy around me and almost too sad to bear. Anger, I can use, but this aching melancholy? It soaks through my whole system, mixing with alcohol and the sickly sweet smell of the weed until I feel dizzy and too, too hollow.
Dante was right.
“Cool party, huh?” Nico edges a couple of steps closer to me, and I realize that most of the guys have left. Just a few people are still around. A few people, and Nico. He smiles at me, teeth white in the shadows.
“Sure. If you like this kind of thing.” I shrug, still thinking about Dante. I wonder where he even is. Did he go straight home, or out to some party with his new friends? His girlfriend? The idea chills me, so I take another sip. I miss him so much it hurts, but that won’t change a thing. It’s done. We’re finished. The last possibility of him is gone for good, and I’ve only myself to blame.
He was right. God, he was right