T R I S T A N
In many ways, Zoey was a complete fucking mystery to me. Sure, I had returned the principal's minivan, but it wasn't like she was contractually bound to drive us to the concert. We had a deal, yes, but why should she keep her end? The minivan was back. The game was happening. She got what she wanted.
I had only returned the car in the first place because I thought she might actually go to the police if I didn't. Caitlyn and I had already started making peace with the fact that we would probably have to take a series of crowded buses to get to the concert. And then Zoey had showed up by my locker at school and said she would wait for us after class, just as she had promised.
Why? I had no idea, but Caitlyn and I had actually made no peace at all with having to use public transportations, so we agreed. After class, there she was. Did I pepper-spray her seconds into seeing her? Yes, but it was an accident. Was she still willing to keep her end of the deal then? I know I wouldn't be. But she said she was. Promised even.
We didn't believe her. We had our reasons, but I didn't feel like thinking about them anymore. We had made it to the rooftop of the concert venue. We were too close to a night of music and drugs to think about the past. Except maybe not. Maybe we were closer to watching Zoey fall off the edge of a building instead.
She had finally jumped over, landed on her feet, smiled, and then lost her balance almost immediately afterward. I reached out as fast as I could and pulled her towards me and away from the edge. There, no one was dying tonight.
Before I knew it, she was hugging me. She was actually hugging me. Arms around my shoulders, her breath on my neck, and the words, "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"
I put my hands on her waist and pushed her away, "Never do that again."
"Definitely not. I thought I was gonna die."
"I meant the hug."
"Oh." Her eyes were still very red, and so was her nose, her cheeks too. "Right, I'm sorry."
"It's not like I was gonna let you fall," I started, and she smiled. I decided to state the obvious, "It would ruin the night, wouldn't it?"
There, smile gone. Eyes off me too. She was looking at Caitlyn instead, standing by the door that would lead us downstairs and onto the actual venue, her hand on the handle, the other turning something inside the lock, one way, then the other. I knew it wasn't the key.
"Is she picking the lock?" Zoey asked, walking closer.
"Don't ask stupid questions." Wasn't it obvious she was picking the lock? Where would she have gotten the key otherwise?
The door opened. Caitlyn had opened it. She had managed. She always did.
She turned around with a smile on her face, "Let's go, bitches!"
We followed her inside. Then down the stairs. There was an elevator, but it wasn't safe to use it, might we not just run into someone who could get us in trouble. So the stairs it was. Flights and flights of stairs.
Everything hurt by the time we made it to the last floor. Zoey was breathing hard behind me and struggling to take off her sweater. Did she share her closet with her grandma?
Caitlyn didn't wait. She kept going through the hallway, past the lines for the bathroom, and into the main hall. It was already crowded, almost all the way to the end, where we stood, two-thirds of us out of breath.
Caitlyn held my hand, "I really wanna make it to the front row."
I wanted to say no, fucking no, please no. Instead, what came out was, "Lead the way."
She looked back at Zoey, her sweater over her shoulders, cheeks still red, "We'll meet you in the car once it's over."
Then she turned around again and dragged me into the crowd with her. No one was really happy to have someone trying to break through to the front, so they pushed, and pulled, and cursed, and when the band that was coming to open the show started playing, they all started jumping around us.
I didn't know who this band was, and my legs were hurting, and so were my feet. I hoped my head didn't join the party any time soon. Usually, it didn't need an invite to show up. Usually, I had to just shut down the party altogether. Sleep it off. But not tonight. Tonight, if a headache did show up, I would just have to deal with it.
In front of me, Caitlyn kept pushing through the crowd. I wasn't sure how close we were to the front row, but surely this was close enough. Caitlyn didn't think so.
"We're almost there," she told me, her hand still in mine. She looked at it. She was going to turn it around and trace the fucking questions on my palm. I pulled away.
"I'll wait here." This was the best I could come up with. "You go and get us a place in the front. I need to smoke."
She just nodded, turned around, and disappeared into the crowd. I reached for the joint I had hidden in one of the inside pockets of my jacket. Then I found my lighter.
"Is that weed?" Zoey asked.
"How the fuck did you get here?" She was standing right behind me, looking very seriously at the joint in my hand.
"I don't think you can smoke in here," she continued. "Especially not weed."
"How did you find me?"
"I've been to a lot of concerts before. I know how to get around a crowd." She shrugged. And then, with her hand on my shoulder and a concerned look in her big brown eyes, she asked, "Are you okay?"
I pushed her hand away, "Yes, why?"
"You don't look too good." She was looking at my face.
"Fuck you!"
"I'm serious," she said.
I took the joint up to my lips and inhaled. I didn't feel good, that was true, but I doubted I looked it. I blew the smoke in her face and watched as she waved it away frenetically.
"I feel great, thank you very much." I could feel my body loosening up. My mind too. I closed my eyes.
"Where's Caitlyn?"
I opened them again. She still had the concerned look on her face.
"Front row probably."
"And you're not there because..."
"I wanted to check on you."
"Really?"
"No," I said. "Of course not."
"Then why â"
"Do you ever just shut up?" I asked, right after an attempt at smoking half of the blunt in one go. I wanted desperately to feel nothing. Nothing at all.
Then someone pushed Zoey and she came crashing against me.
"Watch it!"
"Sorry," she said.
"Not you." Obviously. I wasn't even looking at her. My eyes were on the guy behind her, the one holding a beer almost bigger than his head, the one who had pushed her. "You."
"My bad!" he said over the music, but someone pushed him almost immediately after, and the beer spilled over and fell on Zoey's shoulder. She looked disgusted at it and moved closer to me.
"Just fucking drink it already!"
He did, but somehow also managed to spill some more beer over, this time on Zoey's shoes. I would laugh if it didn't mean her having to move closer and closer to me to try and get away from the idiot.
I rolled my eyes, "Just come here already."
She let me move her to the space in front of me instead. Then smiled. It was a very smug, very un-Zoey-like smile.
"Careful," she said, "your heart is showing."
I leaned over her ear, the joint between my lips, the burning edge almost touching her cheek, "I think you might just be high from all the second-hand smoke."
I exhaled before she could answer, and the smoke surrounded us both completely. She pulled her t-shirt over her mouth and nose in a silly little attempt not to inhale any of it. I couldn't help but laugh.
I kept laughing even when she actually tried to take my joint away. It was useless, of course. All I had to do was stretch out my arm and she couldn't reach it even if she jumped. She didn't jump. She just gave up. I looked at her face.
"Your eyes look so fucking red. You're definitely â"
"Because you pepper-sprayed me!" She interrupted me, which wasn't very nice, was it?
"No." I laughed some more. I couldn't stop. "You're fucking high!"
She shook her head, "God, I hate you."
I didn't think she should say the lord's name in vain, but I also didn't believe in the lord, so who was I to say? Instead, I opened my mouth and let the words out one by one. I was high out my fucking mind.
"You won't ever hate me half as much as I don't care."
She ignored me. She had been doing that a lot today. I decided I didn't like it and took one last drag of my joint before dropping it.
"Did you just throw that on the floor?!" She shouted when she saw it at our feet.
"It's just cardboard. It's biodegradable." I shrugged.
She bent down to grab it all the same, "It's disgusting. You're disgusting."
"You just put that in your pocket," I noticed. "You're disgusting. Fuck this, I'm going to the front row."
"I'll throw it away later," I heard her say as I moved away. I had no idea if she would follow me or not, but I also didn't care.
I cared only about getting to the front row, finding Caitlyn, and watching the band get on stage just a few steps away from me. Then the drums, the guitars, the screaming, and singing. They said anger was a gift in one of their songs.
Life had given me so much anger over the years. When you weren't given much else, eventually it did start feeling like a gift.