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Lozen rolled her eyes.
“You’re just avoiding confrontation with your dad.”
“Maybe,” Saber said with a shrug. “I absolutely do not want to fight with my dad. We’ve gone, like, eighteen years without a real fight. Might as well make it to the finish line.”
“Crazy that you’ve never fought with him. I love my mom, but we fight constantly.”
“Well, Lozen, me and my dad barely know each other.”
Lozen sighed.
“A night out would be good for me, maybe,” she said. “I’m sending off my early-decision application to USC. I’m kind of freaking out about it.”
“Oh, wow,” Saber said, looking at her.
“Yeah,” Lozen said, smiling and shaking her head. “I have to get into USC or UCLA or I think I’ll fucking die.”
“You won’t die. I’m not even applying to college. I think I need a year off after everything. Maybe I’ll go travel.”
“Maybe,” Lozen said in a sort of far-off way.
They got dressed together at Saber’s again and took her car, turning down another persistent offer from Rex to pick them up. They drove to the address they were given, another big house off a winding road, and arrived at another totally average high school party. Lozen didn’t hesitate to have a drink this time, but Saber, planning on driving, abstained at first.
“You and Lozen could just stay here if you wanted,” Sophie said, offering Saber a mixed drink, rum and pineapple. “We have plenty of room.”
“Do you care?” Saber asked Lozen.
“I absolutely do not care.”
Saber took the drink.
She never really liked the taste of alcohol, but the rum and pineapple was easy enough to sip. She finished one, then Rex made her another. She hung out and stood by as everyone played a game involving flipping red solo cups over on the kitchen island and drinking beer as fast as they could. Feeling the same disconnected feeling she had at the last party, she walked around the house, looking at the (bad) art and bookshelves with boring books, before wandering out into the quiet backyard.
Without a fire, the outdoors were a lot less welcoming. She stood in the cold by herself listening to an owl call, thinking about how these parties always made her feel the most like she’d been transported into another life, a life that wasn’t really hers. Everyone was drinking and having a good time, and it wouldn’t matter if she was there or not, it would still be happening. She’d never felt that way back home, where she hung out with people she’d grown up with, where she felt like an integral part of their gatherings.
“Hey.” Rex ambled up beside her.
“Hi, Rex,” she said, her smile strained.
“You’re hiding.”
“Not hiding. Just in a weird mood.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“In this kind of mood?”
He kissed her and, for a moment, she kissed him back. She felt déjà vu.
Then she pressed her hands against his broad, muscular chest, pushing him away playfully, and for a moment she felt an intense longing for physical connection. He took her hands and moved them down his chest, down, down to his stomach.
“I’m about to leave,” he said. “Would you go with me?”
“Leave? Where?”
“Just this other little get-together,” he said, and leaned in, further, still holding her hands, as though he were about to kiss her, but he didn’t.
