“Bliss!”
The voice was closer, and this time when I looked behind the bar, I saw him—Bartender Boy.
I smiled, and tried to appear happy to see him. But honestly… I couldn’t even remember his name. There were far too many other things that had taken my focus that night. As always when I thought of Garrick, my stomach flipped and I had to concentrate on not getting lost in the memories.
When we were across the bar from each other, Bartender Boy said, “Hey… I hope it’s not creepy that I remember your name.”
It was. A little.
“I promise not to be creeped out, if you’ll forgive me for not remembering yours.”
His lips pulled down in a frown briefly before he smiled and said, “Brandon.”
“Right, Brandon. Of course. I’m sorry. It’s been a long week.”
“Well, let me make it a little bit better.” He pulled out a glass and poured me a shot of tequila. “On the house.”
I felt awkward taking the shot alone, but I couldn’t very well decline it. So, I thanked him, shrugged, and downed it in one gulp.
I laughed, not because anything was funny, but just because it seemed like the thing to do.
“Listen,” Brandon started. “I don’t mean to come on too strong, but do you want to go out sometime?”
Did I want to go out with him? More importantly, did I want to sleep with him? Despite all the craziness with Garrick, I was still a virgin. And I still wished I wasn’t. Here was another opportunity to fix that… one that didn’t involve breaking school rules and risking expulsion. I looked at him. Kelsey had been right; he was cute. And he was definitely interested.
I tried to imagine what sleeping with him might be like. I tried to imagine the shedding of our clothes, his hands against my skin, his lips against mine. I tried, but every image I conjured was of Garrick doing those things, not Brandon.
Damn, why couldn’t I just snap my fingers and not be a virgin anymore? Why did sex have to be involved? And why was it that all I could think about was Garrick, but I’d even backed out of sex with him?
Why did my brain absolutely refuse to make sense?
Brandon answered his question for himself, “I’m guessing that’s probably a no. It usually is if it takes that long to answer.”
I smiled a tight, close-lipped smile. “Sorry. You seem really nice, but I’m just not that interested… right now.” Damn, I always did that. I sucked at confrontation, so I always added phrases like “right now.”
Brandon nodded, “It’s cool. Don’t worry about it. I, uh, better get back to work though.”
He didn’t wait for my answer before he strode down the length of the bar to help a customer at the far end. Sighing, I made my way to the bathroom, where I splashed some water on my face.
It didn’t help the chaos in my brain, but I could feel the alcohol tingling in my stomach, and that at least made me feel okay with the chaos.
I returned to the table, where another two shots were waiting for me, courtesy of Cade, and thankfully the conversation was on to some other gossip that didn’t involve Garrick. By the time we’d had the next round, my skin felt like a warm blanket and my throat ached from laughing at things that may or may not have actually been funny. We were all gone enough that our conversation had devolved into fragments, inside jokes, and laughter.
“I am so drunk,” Rusty started, “That I just want to sit in my car and play my accordion until I’m sober.”
My laughter was embarrassingly loud. “You have an accordion?”
“Hell, yes, I do. Wanna listen to me play?”
“Of course!”
I left my wallet with Cade, so he could pay for mine. I gave him a sloppy kiss on the cheek as a reward.
“Oh! Me too! Me too!” Kelsey cried. She gave her wallet to Cade, too, with a head pat instead of the kiss, and Rusty wrapped an arm around each of us.
“Take notes, boys! The ladies always love a man who can play an instrument!”
Lindsay snorted, “Your instrument doesn’t even like girls, Rusty!”
“Doesn’t mean they don’t like it!”
I’m sure the volume in the bar lowered by half when we were gone, but I couldn’t tell the difference. It was still loud in my head. After a few minutes, the rest of the group joined us outside on the hood of Rusty’s car, where he was playing his accordion and singing a song he said was French (but I’m pretty sure was just gibberish).
It didn’t really matter to us. After a few minutes, we knew the gibberish enough to sing along. We serenaded the bar’s patrons as they meandered to their cars at 2 AM. We sang in English and gibberish. We sang Britney Spears and Madonna and Phantom of the Opera. Cade did some ridiculous rap where he rhymed maybe with scabies. And we continued serenading until they were all gone, and the owner came out to tell us to get lost.