“Dude, you’re barking up the wrong tree—” Some guy I recognize as a junior smacks Andrew on the back, but he is too drunk to be embarrassed, so he just laughs, and everyone laughs with (or at) him.
“You’d have better luck with Jessi,” Eric says. I freeze at the sound of my name and try not to react to the words that follow. “Everyone knows she’s easy.”
I give him what he wants anyway. I flinch.
You can hear a pin drop in our group, until Willow whacks his shoulder. “What the hell, Eric?”
Even after all these months, she still manages to be shocked at his comments.
“Yeah, not cool, bro,” Brett says.
“Fuck off, Eric,” I say. Embarrassment snakes its way around my body, but I force myself to look him in the eye. It’s nice of Brett and Willow to stand up for me, but I am more than capable of telling Eric which cliff to jump off.
Not that it helps.
“Great suggestion, Rumfield, but I don’t think I will.”
You can slice the tension in our group with a knife.
“How can you drink that?” Andrew asks out of nowhere, pointing to my club soda. “It tastes like piss.” His comment is meant to be a diversion, an easy out of the friction all around us. I’m supposed to say something funny and smile, but I don’t play along. As it turns out, I’m also more than capable of making myself feel like shit. I don’t need Eric to do it for me.
So I turn around and walk off, empty my half-finished soda in the garbage can near the drinks table. I hear Willow telling somebody off, and then she’s running across the yard to meet me.
“Hey, are you okay? We can leave if you want.”
“I’m fine.” I roll my eyes to make it seem like Eric’s comment was only slightly annoying. “I was just going to wait in the car until you’re ready. I don’t want to make you leave.”
Willow hooks her elbow in mine. “As if I’m going to stay and hang out with these jerks.”
“Wills—” I start to argue, but she doesn’t let me finish. She’s steering me toward the backyard gate and around the house again to the place where we parked.
“I’m really sorry,” I tell Willow for the third time when I pull up in front of her house.
“Can I ask you something?” she asks, quirking her head to the side.
“Yeah, of course.”
“Why does he do that? All these comments ...”
I look out through the windshield at her house. “We’ve just never gotten along. We’ve known each other since we were kids.”
“Yeah, but it seems so personal. And, like, somean.”
I shrug. “That’s just Eric.” I attempt a smile, but she doesn’t buy it. If she knew everything that happened last summer, she’d probably hate me too. Now she leans over and hugs me.
“Just think, once this summer is over, you never have to see him again.”
“Yeah, I know,” I say, though it’s not really true. We live in the same small town, and though everyone thinks they’re leaving and never coming back, they do. Even if it’s just for visits or holidays or whatever.
In my case, I’m not even leaving.
Willow climbs out of the car then and waves at me.
As I drive home, I’m trying not to dwell on Eric’s asshole comment, but I can’t help it. It’s not even that he said it in front of everyone, or that he’s been making these digs for months and clearly doesn’t intend on stopping. It’s that I know in my heart that he’s right about me.
That I’m not a good person, no matter how hard I’ve tried to make everything right.
There’s so much I can’t undo.
