“Well, I’ve never had it, so I want the full experience.” Lion sips, raises an eyebrow, and then takes a drink as long as DeeDee’s. He gasps a bit and squeezes his eyes shut, but overall he takes it like a champ and I’m impressed, considering he doesn’t have any practice. He moves his shoulders back and forth like he can shake the taste out of his mouth. “Fuck, that is horrible.”
“The worst is over,” I say, remembering what Iris told me when we drank together for the first time. I didn’t think she could possibly be right, as medicinally awful as the vodka had tasted. But each drink went down smoother after that first one, every single time, even if I never did grow to like the taste.
I grab the bottle, tip it back, and send the honey-colored fire tearing down my throat. This particular bottle of rum is so not fucking around. But I swallow it down; stick out my tongue and cough a bit as I hand it back to Dee.
“So, what’s the deal with Alicia?” I ask as she rests the bottle in her lap. And I’m so glad I’m with my best friend and brother, because none of us are trying to impress each other. Lionel appears just as relieved that we’re taking a break before round two. I’m already starting to feel fuzzy. “What did she do to earn your wrath?”
DeeDee traces her fingers around the edges of the label. “I want…” She pauses to glance at Lion but must quickly determine it’s okay for him to hear this, because she blurts, “I want to date other people and Alicia isn’t up for it.”
“Why don’t you just break up with her?” Lionel’s voice is clear but looser than normal.
“That’s the thing—I don’t want to break up with her. I want her to see other people, too.”
“Like an open relationship?” I say as the rum makes a slow, warm trip through my stomach and legs and arms, all the way to my fingertips and toes.
DeeDee’s cheeks are flushed when I look over. “Yeah, I guess… if that’s what you want to call it. I just don’t want to be tied down to one person. I’m not even seventeen yet.”
“What brought this on?” I raise my knees to my chest under the sleeping bag, pulling it tighter around me. “Do you like someone else?”
“I don’t know.” Dee shrugs. “I’m always looking at other girls, wondering what it would be like with them. And it doesn’t feel right to hold her back, so I wanted to see if we could just keep things chill for a while. She completely freaked out.”
“Doesn’t that kind of freak you out, though? The thought of her being with other people when she’s not with you?”
“Not really,” Dee says, and I believe her. “God, sometimes I wish I were bi. Like, I definitely don’t want to be with any dudes, no offense”—she looks at Lionel, who holds up his hands as if to say he gets it—“but it’d be so nice to just go back to a guy when you got tired of being with a girl. You’d never be bored.”
I stare at her, waiting for the laugh, the one that makes it clear she was joking. It never comes. “Um, Dee, you know that’s, like, one hundred percent not what being bi is.”
“So, it’s not about liking guys and girls?” She takes another drink of rum and Lion passes so now it’s my turn, but I’m already feeling so hot inside that I don’t know if another drink is a good idea.
She knows I’ve told Lionel, but I’m uncomfortable talking about this with him now. I still want to know if Rafaela would make me feel better than when I was with Iris, or if being with her wouldn’t feel as exciting as when I’m with Emil, or if she’d make me feel something new altogether. But he likes her. He called her two days after they met, and they have a date this weekend. I haven’t seen him so excited about anyone—anything, really—since he met Grayson, and I can’t take that away from him.
“That’s part of it, but… it’s not about getting to switch between guys and girls when I’m tired of one of them. It’s about being open to whatever happens with either one.”
“I know a few girls who said they were bi and then, like, six months later they only wanted to date guys,” she says. Her voice isn’t mean, but she’s challenging me, and I don’t like it. “What if you’re just experimenting?”
“What if I am, DeeDee?” I don’t mean to sound defensive, but I don’t appreciate the pressure, especially after she seemed so chill about it earlier. Maybe I’m bi, maybe I’m queer, maybe I’ll never like another girl besides Iris and Rafaela. I’m not totally clear on my identity yet, and maybe DeeDee wouldn’t be so skeptical if I told her about Rafaela. But I don’t need her telling me what I am and what that means, best friend or not.
“Sorry.” Her voice is unmistakably contrite, and I feel bad about snapping at her, especially in front of Lionel. “I’m just mad about Alicia. And this rum is really strong. And I thought—well, after you told me what happened with Emil…”
Lionel is holding back a smile, because when I returned to his car after delivering the soup to Emil, he took one look at me and said, “You were totally making out.” I tried to protest, my hands fumbling with the takeout containers as I slipped into the passenger seat, but he knew he was right. Emil had walked me to the foot of the stairs and Catherine, grinning at us both, had said in a knowing voice that she was happy to see how much better he was feeling.
“I don’t want to talk about Emil.”
Not because I would take back what happened between us—I’ve thought about that afternoon so often since it happened, I’m embarrassed—but because I don’t know what to do about my feelings. We hang out this summer, and then what? We have only a couple more months before school starts up again. I’m due back at Dinsmore in the fall, but of course I’ve thought about what will happen if I don’t go back.
With my job and Lionel’s therapy and the meds they think he’s taking, Mom and Saul have no reason to think I’m missing out on my life or making his problems my own. They’ve already admitted they didn’t handle things so well last year; I probably wouldn’t have to fight so hard to stay. But then I might never see Iris again. And I don’t want that, either. Because a voice I keep trying to squash deep down in me is wondering if I could ever be truly happy with Emil or Rafaela or anyone else if I never make things right with Iris.
“Little, seriously, what’s your deal with him? You like him. Own it.” Lionel’s words slur just a little. He’s had only a couple of swigs, but the alcohol is hitting him harder because he’s new to it.
And he’s chewing at the skin around his thumbs. I watch for a few moments before I swat his hand away from his face, and my stomach twitches as I wonder if this is the sign I’ve been waiting for. If that little tic, a common bad habit, was the switch that officially flipped him from Medicated to Nonmedicated Lionel. He frowns and swats back at my own wrist but he stops chewing his thumb.
“It’s not Emil. I like him. It’s…” I swallow hard. I’m with two of my favorite people in the world, but sometimes that makes saying uncomfortable things harder. I worry that they’ll judge me, yell at me, tell me I’m a bad person. It’s hard enough for me not to believe it myself sometimes. “I was a real shit to Iris before we left Massachusetts.”