Someone I Used to Know - By Blakney Francis Page 0,39

to catch sight of her auburn hair through the loose curtain as often as I could. The boy’s hands squeezed my hips and my eyes popped open.

Gray.

Through a sea of bodies, I was instantly ensnared in the gray gaze that struck me like a pinpoint across the room.

Declan.

My head felt fuzzy and I knew I’d drank more than necessary to simply take the edge off. After blinking a couple times, I knew he wasn’t a figment of my imagination either. Declan was standing in the booth where I’d left Madeline, and he was staring right at me. He was dressed in dark clothes, different from the last time I’d seen him. His face arched with beautiful intensity, and I shivered despite the clammy warmth layering my skin.

How could I dislike him so much, and want him so badly? The vodka shoved the harsh reality front and center – I really did want him. I wanted to slowly unbutton his deep, blue shirt, to see if he looked as good as I remembered underneath. I wanted to run my hands along his naked skin, until there was no clothing left to hinder me.

“That was rather rude.” His voice was a blast of icy water, beating my libido back.

I’d moved towards him without conscious thought, slipping through the swarm of bodies as easily as if they’d parted for me. The white curtain billowed closed behind me. I returned his scowl with an unpleasant frown of my own.

“You just left your boyfriend to fend for himself back there,” he spoke again. His coal eyes burned like embers.

I didn’t turn around to check. The music settled into a frothy melody that carried under his words like the score of one of his movies.

“I didn’t think this was really your scene,” I blurted. Alcohol wasn’t a good idea around Declan. I needed my wits to deal with him. Declaring the first thing that popped into my head probably wasn’t going to lead anywhere good. Especially after all the dirty thoughts I’d been having about him.

Madeline bobbled to a messy stop at my side gripping my arm for support. A dark stain smeared down her navy dress, probably left by the cranberry and vodkas she’d been sipping on earlier.

“We’re going to Dan’s!” she announced yanking on me to follow her like she’d been doing all night. Although, she might have just been using me as a crutch to help her stand up, more than the fact she craved my company.

“Who’s Dan?” I stood strong. I was a little drunk, but that didn’t mean I was stupid enough to pack off to a rando’s house.

She huffed at me, irritated, and I couldn’t help but smile. She actually looked like a teenager when she did things like that.

“He’s in that band, the one that sings –,” she cut herself off to belt a few versus of a very off-key song that I was pretty sure I’d never heard.

“Dan’s a good guy,” Declan stated like that was all the stamp of approval I should need. “I’m going too.”

“Yay!” Madeline’s victory cry was accompanied by her flinging both arms into the air and then bringing them around our shoulders, sandwiching us altogether. “We can dance at Dan’s too!”

And then we were off, even without my consent, ushered into an identical car to the one we’d arrived in, though it could have very well been a completely different escort. I was just drunk enough not to care.

Dan-whoever’s house was in Silver Lake, on the east side of LA. I happily accepted the blurring activity of our arrival, in fear the recognition would spark memories of before. Silver Lake and its neighbor Echo Park were old hangouts of mine.

There weren’t that many people at Dan’s, maybe twenty or thirty, even though his rather large abode could have held many more, and I quickly made my way to the bar to find a drink. When I found Madeline again, she was sitting on a leather sofa in the spacious living room. The curved space was counteracted by furniture with harsh angles, and the centerpiece of it all was the huge, perfectly square coffee table. Most of the partygoers were gathered around it. There was no room on either side of Madeline, so I took one of the unoccupied chairs across from the couch.

“Here’s how the game works,” a guy with dreadlocks was explaining as I settled with the group. “Each person has to come up with something they’ve never done like ‘I’ve never