“I’m joking…don’tdo that.”
We all move around the room in that easy choreography you learn when you love the people you live with—handing over borrowed chargers, turning off lights in sync, swapping throw pillows, telling each other goodnight.
I crawl under my blanket and stare at the ceiling until my eyes blur. The room is warm and comforting. I’ve missed it. I’ve missed them. I listen to Simone’s breathing even out, and Lani’s mattress creaking when she turns. I close my eyes and see highways cutting through dark; I hear Atlas’s laugh; I watch my hand hang out the window catching the passing wind; I feel that brief, blissful numbness that comes when you hand your brain the perfect off switch.
My limbs feel restless, and I can’t get comfortable. I never can on my own anymore. The sheets feel wrong on my body, like I’m too hyperaware of them touching me. My stomach knots, and my heart flutters a little.
I just need enough to fall asleep.
I pull the Altoids tin out from my backpack beside my bed, opening it up and searching through the mints for the hidden pills, pulling two out and popping them. I slide the tin under my pillow and lie back, waiting for the off to come. Doesn’t take long for it to finally kick in and calm the heightened sensations. My eyes start to feel heavy, and a familiar warmth spreads through my limbs, causing them to itch a little. My brain never focuses on it for too long before it pulls me somewhere else. Every sentence I try to form in my head keeps losing its thread mid-thought. I slowly let go of them all and fall into the only safe place in my mind—the unconscious one.
50
Lydia
I don’t sleep for the first three days of spring break. I basically just nap with my eyes open. The beach is crowded. There’s loud music, coolers full of alcohol, bodies everywhere; a thousand different songs fight to be heard over each other.
I’m in someone’s oversized shirt, covering my bikini, salt, strong alcohol, and a fake strawberry flavor mixing on my tongue. Every thought in my head is barely holding on.
I watch Kay hang all over Atlas, making it a show. We’re not close, and it’s like she’s caught on to some unsaid thing between me and At—that’s not there—so she just smiles at me like she’s forced to because I’m in this group too. I smile back like I can’t feel the electricity crawling under my skin.
My phone won’t stop buzzing.
Simone:Are you eating?
Lani: Send a pic of your face
Simone: Lydia answer me please
Lani: You good?
I flip the screen face-down in the sand and let some boy I don’t know draw a sunscreen heart on my shoulder. Someone hands me a bottle, and I take it because why not? It’s spring break. This is the whole point.
Atlas’s roommate—Nick? Nate? Nate, I think—flings a Frisbee and pretends it was an accident when it lands near my feet. He jogs over with a huge smile on his face, laughing too loudly. He says something about how good I look, and I say something back, flirting too. He moves closer, close enough that I can feel the low vibration when he laughs. The need is there, strong and calling me in, louder than everything else. I could solve the ache I still feel easily with him. We’ve been tiptoeing around the same unspoken desire since we got here Saturday.
“You’re burning,” he says, eyeing the sunscreen heart. “Want me to even that out, or do you prefer the abstract art?”
“Bold of you to assume I’d let you touch me.”
He bites down on a smile.
“Water?” he offers, nodding at the waves.
“Pass.” I tip the bottle. “Hydrating.”
“Responsible of you.”
“I guess Icoulduse some shade if you wanted to take me in one of the houses to cool down.”
He eyes me, knowing what I’m asking for. A smile slowly spreads across his face, and he reaches his hand out for me to take and follow.
Atlas appears like a little angry storm cloud. “Back off, man,” he says lightly, but not joking. “She’s gone.”
“I’m fine,” I snap, annoyed at how protective he’s been this whole trip. “On a scale of one to mind-your-business, I’m a mind-your-business.”
Nate putshis hands in the air, then looks at me and winks. “Maybe another time.”
He walks off, and Atlas replaces his spot, looking annoyed. “You’re making stupid decisions.”
