“It’s great,” I said. “I just need to sit down for a minute.”
“Oh, right,” she said. “It’s time.” She opened a drawer in her nightstand and pulled out a little baggie with a few mint-green pills in it. “Here’s the thing: it’s all going to be fine. I know you’re nervous, but think of it like a costume party. We’re just playing dress-up, and it’s all to help you with the test. It’s going to be okay.”
“I guess,” I said, but my head was still hurting.
“I promise,” she said, and handed me a pill. “You need water?”
“No, I’m good.” Was I really going to do this? Had I thought about all the pros and cons, the things that could go wrong? Maybe I hadn’t covered all of them, but I’d thought about them a lot. I always did. And where had that gotten me?
“Bottoms up,” she said, and swallowed hers.
I had nothing to lose. Nothing I cared about, anyway. I put the pill in my mouth and swallowed mine too.
8.
The party was at the house of some guy whose dad was apparently employee number three at Twitter or something like that. Which meant they were loaded, even by Marbella standards. Usually when someone hit it that big, they moved to Atherton or Los Altos, but they’d decided to stay here, and had bought a bunch of land to build this ridiculous house, according to Alex. And “ridiculous” was definitely the right word. I’d never seen anything like it.
I pulled my car into a circular brick-paved driveway that was already filling up. Lots of little red Priuses like mine, along with some BMWs and Audi convertibles. The driveway was big enough that at least twenty-five cars could fit in it. But it was dwarfed by the size of the house itself, which stretched around the driveway and beyond, almost like it was wrapping the brick circle in an embrace.
Alex and I got out of the car and started the long walk toward the front door. She was surprisingly confident in those heels; I could see she’d had a lot of practice. “This is not what I expected,” I whispered.
“No need to whisper,” she said. “We’re not at a museum.”
Maybe it was the sculptures lining the edges of the driveway that had made me feel like we were. Each was a carving of an animal, but not real ones—I recognized a gryphon and some other mythological-looking things. A pegasus? They fit the theme; the house had a sort of Grecian feel to it, with white columns lining the front. And it was quiet outside, quieter than I’d expected, given that we were going to a high school house party.
“Where’s the music?” I asked.
“Just wait,” Alex said. “All will be revealed in time. How are you feeling?”
“Fine so far,” I said. But that itself was noticeable—the nausea was gone, as was the headache and the racing pulse. I didn’t feel particularly good or anything like that; I just felt okay. Which, under the circumstances, was pretty terrific.
We walked between two of the white columns to the front door, which was unlocked. It was like entering a movie set, only for a movie I could never have imagined. The foyer was an expanse of white and silver: white walls with silver-framed paintings, white marble floors swirled with sparkling silver, an enormous white curved staircase with silver railings. It was huge, and it was empty.
“Are we in the right place?”
Alex nodded and led me through the foyer, past a statue of Pan, then off to the right, through a green dining room with a table that could have seated at least twenty people, decorated in green and gold. It was a warm contrast to the cool of the foyer, but I still didn’t see anyone, though apparently people were treating it like a coatroom—there were purses and scarves and jackets everywhere.
“This way.” Alex had clearly been here before; her heels clicked on the hardwood floor of the dining room, softening only when she reached a library, walls covered in books, floor covered in the biggest and most beautiful Persian rug I’d ever seen. In the back of the room was a glass door that led outside.
That’s where everyone was.