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CHAPTERFOUR
ryleigh
The knocking makes me open my eyes, but it’s the biggest mistake I have ever made. The room is as bright as if someone is standing there with a spotlight straight in my face, and I’m sure everything spins. “Are you decent?” I hear my mother’s voice as the door opens. I plan on answering her, but a slew of cotton balls sits on my tongue, and all I can do is groan. “Well, now.” I hear her voice coming a bit closer. “Why is every single light in the room on?” I don’t know what she does, but I can feel the room go from bright to dark. “Oh my God, are you still in your dress?”
“Mom.” I try to swallow. “I have something in my mouth.” My mother comes over to my bed and the side of the bed dips down.
“I brought you water,” she says, and I open my eyes. In my head, I’m moving, but in reality, I’m still lying on my stomach. The only thing moving are my eyelids.
“Can you pour it in my mouth?” I ask her and she just laughs as I open my mouth, but lying on my side.
She puts the glass of water down on the side table. “Do you want me to help you turn over?”
“No.” I nod yes. “I think I can do it.”
“You want another shot?” She winks at me and all I can do is glare at her, or in my head I’m glaring at her. In reality, one eye is closed.
“Why do you hate me?” I moan as I try to get up on my elbows, but I slip and then fall back down, face-first into the pillow. I take a deep inhale before I turn on my side. “My head is…” I try to think of the word but nothing comes to my mind because all I can do is hear a buzzing sound.
“I have this for you also.” She holds up the bottle of ibuprofen for me.
“You love me.” I open and close my mouth, trying to swallow down the little pieces of sand I think are in my mouth.
I scoot my butt back until I sit with my back against the headboard, and only then do I reach out to grab the water. She opens the bottle and hands me two pills, and before I put them in my mouth, I take a sip of water. “It tastes like tequila.” My face scrunches up. “I don’t want this.” I hand the glass back to my mother and then start to rub my tongue to get the taste off it.
“It’s not tequila,” she snaps. “You probably still have the taste on your tongue.”
I side-eye her, thinking she could be right. “Fine.” I grab the pills. “I’m putting my faith in you.” I place them on my tongue before taking another sip of water. “You were telling the truth!” I gasp. “Why did you let me drink so much?” I ask, and she laughs at me.
“I told you to drink water,” she reminds me. “The rule of the game is one glass of booze, then one glass of water.”
“There was no water anywhere,” I inform her, and her eyes about fly out of her head.
“There were bottles of water everywhere.” She points at me. “You were too busy being the life of the party.”
“It’s not my fault I’m the fun one of the bunch.” I take another sip of water. I was doing whatever I could to try to stay away from Stone. So obviously, partying with his sister and cousins seemed like a better plan than sitting down at the table gawking at him all night long. “What time did we come back?”
“Your father carried you in at four.”
“What?” I sit up. “We were going to watch the sunrise.” I look around for my phone, the fear now setting in. “I lost my phone.” I look at the side table. “Oh my God.”
“Is this your phone?” my mother asks when she reaches toward the edge of the bed, next to an iPad, and pulls up my phone.
“Yes,” I breathe a sigh of relief. “I just dodged a bullet.
“Whose iPad is that?” I ask, and she laughs.
“That’s how you turn the lights on and off,” she tells me, picking up the iPad and showing me by opening the curtains.
“Oh, I think I remember that.” I recall a memory of last night, getting up to get undressed but then I must have fallen back asleep.
“I’m just happy you were in bed.” She gets up off the mattress.
“When we brought you in, you went to bed on the floor.” She points over to where my bag is, my clothes thrown all around it. “We asked you to get up, but you just said you were fine where you were.” She shrugs. “So we just left you.”
“Oh, good, you’re up.” My father comes into the room wearing gym shorts and a backward cap on his head, his chest is all wet. “The plane leaves in two hours.” He looks at me.
“Why are you wet?” I ask.
