Bishop gives Devon a little salute as I pull him toward the patio door.
I spot Brooke right away. I mean, it’s kind of hard not to spot Brooke. She’s double-fisting drinks as she dances sloppily to an electronica song, sloshing beer everywhere so no one stands near her. She’s stripped down to boy shorts and a lacy bra, and someone’s drawn crude images across her stomach and arms with a Sharpie. I don’t know what she’s supposed to be dressed up as, except maybe the token drunk girl. A group of boys laugh at her, but she’s completely oblivious.
Huffing, I slide the door open. It’s hard to decide what I want to do first: get Brooke out of here to salvage some of her dignity, or sock every single one of the assholes laughing in the face.
I reach out and touch her shoulder. She startles, swinging around to see who’s touched her. Her glassy eyes finally focus on me, standing right in front of her.
“Look, isss Indigo,” she slurs to no one in particular. She tries to stand still, but her body sways like she just hit land after a long boat ride.
“Can we go somewhere to talk?” I ask.
“?’Bout what? I’m having fffun.” She lists sideways and beer sloshes out of her bottles, down the front of my shirt.
Ugh.
I look at Bishop.
“About Samantha,” he says. “Your friend who went missing.”
Brooke’s face darkens, her lip jutting out in a pout. “I don’t wanna talk about her. It makes me sssad.” She takes a swig of her beer, then coughs uncontrollably.
I snag the bottles out of her hands and slam them down on the patio table.
“Hey!” she protests. “Give that back.”
She tries to lunge for the bottles, but loses her footing and stumbles to the ground. Bishop catches her before her head smacks the pavement. I crouch down on my knees to get to eye level.
“Brooke, this is important. We need to know what happened when Samantha was kidnapped.”
“I don’t know anything,” she says. Her head bobs, like she’s struggling to stay conscious. I bite my lip in frustration.
“You must—you were there. Come on, any details. Anything at all could help. Just think.”
“Who the hell said you could come in?”
I stiffen at the sound of Bianca’s voice. I look over my shoulder and find her framed in the patio doorway, hands on hips, but it’s hard to take her seriously when she’s dressed in only a white corset that leaves little to the imagination. Judging by the elbow-length gloves, half ton of jewelry, and hair teased into a big eighties pouf, she’s going for “Like a Virgin”–era Madonna. Ironic.
“I distinctly remember not sending you an invitation,” she adds. Julia comes up to her side. She’s wearing the usual Fairfax High cheerleader’s uniform of blue pleated skirt, silver spankies, and a fitted silver shell, but she’s got fake rot on her cheeks and blood dripping from her mouth. She eyes my jeans, tank top, and bunny ears and gives a condescending little snort.
“Nice costume.”
“Thanks,” I say, feigning nonchalance. “You should have dressed up too. I mean, you do the whole brain-dead-cheerleader thing every day. Where’s the fun in that?”
Snickers burst out around me. Julia’s cheeks flame, and she flares her nostrils like she’s a bull considering charging.
“Come on, let’s get out of here,” I say to Bishop. “Pick Brooke up.”
“We’re taking her with us?”
“Well, we’re not leaving her like this!”
He shrugs, then hefts a now-unconscious Brooke over his shoulder. Together, we push past Bianca.
“I wasn’t done talking to you!” Bianca shrieks, grabbing my arm. “This is private property and you’re trespassing. I should call the cops!”
Someone starts up another chant of “Fight, fight, fight!” All of a sudden, everyone from inside the house is spilling outside to see what’s going on.
I look down at Bianca’s hand, then up at her face. “Then call the cops,” I say, barely restraining myself from pulling her hair out. “I bet they’d love all the underage drinking going on here.”
“So you’d narc on us? You’re even more of a loser than I thought.”
“What?” I shake my head at her moronic words.
I could just leave—actually, I really should just leave. But as much as I’ve tried to tell myself otherwise, the way Bianca has been treating me ever since I caught her with Devon has upset me. We’d been friends since the first grade, and sure, her personality took a nosedive in recent years, but did all that history mean nothing to her? How could she treat me so badly? Where is the friend I once knew?
Strictly speaking, a party with hundreds of my peers isn’t the best place to have this conversation, but I can’t help myself.
“What happened to you?” I blurt out.
She crosses her arms. “Oh please. Don’t be so dramatic. Nothing happened to me.”
“No, it did,” I insist. “You changed. Don’t you remember…” I stop myself from listing some of the great times we had together—dressing up in furry hats and trying to convince people we were Russian sisters, singing and dancing in the car at stoplights to embarrass her mom, staying up until four a.m. watching marathons of our favorite reality TV shows—there’s no point. Nothing I can say is going to make her suddenly realize she’s become a horrible person. I have to let go. But I have one more question before I do.
“Listen, Bianca. Things might not have been good with me and Devon, but I trusted you. The least you could have done was be sorry about it after I caught you. Instead, you’ve treated me like scum. And I just want to know…why?”
She bites her lip, and I feel a tiny flicker of hope come to life inside me. Bishop adjusts the weight of Brooke in his arms. I wait. And wait. But Bianca doesn’t speak. Finally, I shake my head and turn my back.
“Stop.”
She says it so quietly I might not have heard her if a deafening silence hadn’t descended over the party. I glance at Bianca.
She hesitates, and in that moment, Julia drapes her arms around Bianca’s shoulder.