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The night only looked more phenomenal with him in it. I couldn’t see the color of his eyes, but they were bright with awareness, twinkling with something that might have been amusement. He was watching me carefully, like I might do something impulsive. His face was clean-shaven. I remembered the stubble from the first night I met him, and my hands longed to touch his smooth skin. I guess he was right to be wary of me, because I reached out without thinking, and ran one hand from his cheek down the long column of his throat. The skin was as smooth as I imagined it would be. Julian looked like he was losing himself in the sensation.
“Evelyn,” he muttered, “You should stop.”
I didn’t though. There was an alcohol-induced flush high on his cheeks, and for one night only, I wanted him to be truthful with me.
“I still don’t get what I did to you,” I said glumly.
I didn’t know who started it, but his lips were on mine, and mine were on his, and the world was spinning again, but not in the drunken way I remembered from earlier. Instead, I was suddenly over his lap, my dress brushing across his legs. I leaned over him, the taller one for once, his face in my hands and his hands on my back. Fire was coursing through my veins, and I kissed more hungrily. I could only sense reciprocation from him, but before I knew it, he was detaching himself from me and standing. I sat in the chair and wondered what the hell had happened, even as Hannah stepped out of the elevator. Julian stalked up to her, and I vaguely saw him gesture to me, and then back to Hannah. Her face scrunched up into an unhappy scowl at his words, and then he was gone. Hannah came over to me and fixed her face into something friendlier.
“What did he say?” I asked.
“Oh nothing,” Hannah said loftily, waving her hand. “How are you feeling?”
I internally scanned myself for the answer to that question.
“Fine? I think?”
“You think?” Hannah queried, eyes serious, “what does that mean.”
“Like, I might vomit if I move too quickly but I’m really,reallygood right here.”
In retrospect, I couldn’t even remember how I got on and off Julian without throwing up. I laid my head back on the cool tabletop and watched Hannah.
“Then we’ll stay right here for now,” She replied.
She laid her head next to mine, and we sat there in silence. I thought I dozed off, because when I opened my eyes, I felt freezing cold, and my friend was at the other end of the garden, speaking on her phone. My mouth felt gross, but someone had brought a glass of water and two small red pills to me and left them by my head. Gratefully, I swallowed them and stood. Standing made me nauseous, but I kept moving until I was right behind Hannah.
“Thanks for letting me know, I’ll let her know you all got home safe,” she finished.
She clicked off the call and jumped slightly when she saw me.
“Hi, Han,” I said, but speaking made the nausea worse.
I could feel the water I’d just chugged churning in my stomach.
“You don’t look so hot, Ev,” she said.
I didn’t have time to respond though, because I was leaning over a bush then, emptying my guts into the flower beds while Hannah held my hair.
I woke up in Hannah’s bed. It had been made clear to me that if I wished, I could use any of the guest rooms when I stayed over, but Hannah and I agreed that we didn’t mind sharing a bed. Secretly, I also hated making more work for the maids. So, I woke up in Hannah’s bed. The sheets were soft, rustling against my skin, but my head felt like it was about to explode. I groaned, and rolled to what I thought might be the middle of the bed, but was actually the floor. A startled Hannah appeared from her bathroom, standing in the doorway and looking alarmed. I rubbed my sore behind and stood, squinting into the light she let in from the bathroom.
“What happened?” Hannah said, in a voice that echoed off the walls like she’d used a megaphone.
“Shh…” I groaned, getting back into the bed, “I fell, turn down your voice by a lot.”
I heard the ghost of a laugh as she closed the door again and I heard the shower running. I climbed back into bed, rolled into the middle this time, and stared at the blackout curtains. When I first woke up, I thought it was the middle of the night, but the thin line of light peeking from the top of the curtains suggested otherwise. I grunted as I got out of bed, and rooted around the room for my phone, only to discover it was on the bedside table next to where I had been asleep, plugged in and everything. A grateful prayer went out to the maids, who always checked the phones were charging before going to their own beds. I felt appalled at what time we must have kept them up until.
My phone, in a blaring light that felt tooloudin my head, declared that it was already afternoon, and drifting towards one pm. I couldn’t even imagine what time we’d gone to bed, but I remembered it being dark, so that was a plus. I got back up, figuring that I should pretend to be alive and human again at some point during the daylight hours. I stumbled over to the elevator in a pair of Hannah’s pajamas I had only a vague memory of putting on and took it two floors down.
When I walked into the living room, I couldn’t have been more horrified. There were cups and mess everywhere, and two of the maids were dutifully cleaning it all up.
“Oh my God,” I said quietly, and they looked at me.
“Miss Stearns!” One of the girls I recognized—Victoria, said, “Are you okay? Can we get you anything? If you’re hungry I can—”
I waved her off at the mention of food because the thought of it made me want to be sick again.
“I want to help,” I said with a raspy throat.
