“Nah,” Snake says with the shake of his head. “I’ll get Brendon to come get him.” He takes a loud gulp of coffee, sighing as he swallows. “Shit, I feel like hell. How about you?”
“Not that great,” I admit. It draws my attention back to the fact that my head is throbbing and suddenly it seems much worse than it originally was. I’m grateful, however, that I don’t feel like I’m going to throw up. “Do you guys have painkillers?”
“Second cupboard along from the left, top shelf,” Snake informs me, pointing his mug to the kitchen.
I get to my feet, taking a long swig of my coffee before laying it down on the coffee table, and shuffle my way over to the kitchen. It takes effort to even walk. My back hurts from sleeping on the floor and I could do with some rest, but I’m way too riled up to sleep. I open up the cupboard and stretch up on my tiptoes, rummaging around. My hands only seem to be grasping at lighters.
“Do you smoke or something?” I call over my shoulder to Snake.
“Huh?” he says, perplexed. I hold up a lighter as I continue to search with my free hand, never turning around. “Oh, those,” he says. “Nah, I don’t. You find those painkillers yet? Red box?”
“Got them,” I say. I fetch myself a glass of water and take a couple of the pills, hoping to feel much better, and head back to the living room to grab my coffee. I don’t sit down, only fix Snake with a defeated look. “I’m gonna go freshen up.” I frown at Alex once again. I’m starting to wonder if he’s even alive anymore. “Make sure he goes home.”
Snake nods in agreement as he slumps further into the couch. Behind him, Emily darts from Tyler’s room to Snake’s, which is technically her own. Just like Tyler’s is kind of mine for the summer. She’s still wearing Tyler’s shirt, but she’s carrying her dress and her heels, looking rather shameful. At least the walk home is only two feet across the room.
I’m thankful she’s left Tyler’s room, though, because now I can actually go grab some fresh clothes. With my coffee in hand, I head over, and when I enter the room, I’m surprised to find that Emily has tidied the place up. The curtains are drawn back and the windows are pushed wide open to allow the sun and some fresh air to come in. The bed’s been perfectly made, the pillows fluffed up. Even my own crap that’s been lying around seems to look neater.
Quickly, I grab some sweats and a hoodie and dash to the bathroom before Emily can beat me to it. Hot showers are the best when it comes to soothing away a hangover, so I increase the temperature and stand under the water, my back against the shower wall and my eyes closed. I stand there for a while, motionless, just breathing. I try my hardest to relax, but I don’t think I can. I’m still mad at Tyler. Emily? Not so much. It’s not like she knew about Tyler and me, and at least she was brave enough to stay in the apartment, unlike Tyler, who ran away at the first chance he got.
Dithering in the bathroom for thirty minutes, washing my hair and pulling on my clothes, I pull the hood of my hoodie up over my head and float back into the apartment. I’m holding my little black dress. The one that I think I’ll never wear again. I swoop down and grab my heels from the living room floor as I pass by, and I also notice that Alex is gone. Emily and Snake seem to come out of nowhere, both diving for the bathroom, but Emily gets there first, shutting the door on him as he groans.
“Seriously?” he yells through the door. “You girls take forever. I only take five minutes. C’mon. Let me in first.”
“You can help me clean up,” I suggest from the other side of the room. Snake cranes his neck and looks at me hard. “What?” I say. “We’re gonna have to do it at some point anyway.”
I drift into Tyler’s room to toss my dress and heels onto my suitcase, not bothering to pack either away, and then join Snake again. Surprisingly, it doesn’t take much to convince him to help me. In the twenty minutes that Emily takes in the bathroom, the two of us make a start on cleaning up the apartment. We start in the kitchen, ramming the leftover booze into the refrigerator and piling the empty bottles and cans into trash bags. The worktops are sticky with spilled drinks, so while I wash them down, Snake gathers all the shot glasses, cups and straws from throughout the apartment, groaning as he does so.