You’re right.
The wind blows my long hair into my mouth. I yank it away and look up at the stars. Even with all this music and people, the stars are still glowing. I’ve always thought the stars were a lot more beautiful than the sun. The sun just sits alone in the sky, but the stars all have each other to form constellations with. Also, the stars only come out at night, my favorite time of the day.
“Where you going?” Colter says from behind me. “And don’t say, why do you care?”
I dig another strand of my hair out of my mouth and try to think of a witty retort. But I forget it when I meet his eyes. They’re looking at me with something. Interest? Before my next blink his words echo in my mind.
You remind me of someone.
I attempt to recover and snap back into the moment. Why can’t I act like a semi-normal human around him? “I wanted to see what the DJ had to play other than this pseudo hipster shit that isn’t good enough to be made into elevator music.”
He smiles wide. “Not a fan, huh?” He rocks back on his heels, biting his lip a little.
I look away from him. “Remind me again, why are you talking to me? I thought we had an understanding. I said I wasn’t a petri dish and you agreed.”
“Maybe I like talking to you.”
No, no, no. This is bad.
I glance back at him and he still has that stupid grin on his face. “That’s weird.”
He laughs. “Not really. You’re kind of interesting.”
“Interesting? You just don’t hear that enough.”
He leans on the DJ’s table and the DJ, a guy with spiked purple hair and a hundred tattoos on his arm, glares at him. I envy the DJ. He wasn’t scared to do that to his arms. I want a tattoo. A haircut too.
No, you want to die.
12
Jackson finds me at the DJ booth and saves me from the awkward conversation with Colter. “Having fun?” he says.
Janie smiles at me then looks at Colter. “I didn’t know you two knew each other.”
Colter runs a hand through his hair. “Yeah. She’s in my English class.”
“And now choir,” she says, eyeing me like she knows a secret about me that no one else knows.
I smile nervously and say nothing.
She gives Jackson a conspiratorial look. “They’re playing spin the bottle in there.” She turns to me. “I mean, are we twelve?”
My gaze turns toward the house. Maybe she thinks I want to play. She’d be wrong, but she doesn’t know me. Most girls probably want to kiss guys. Why am I here? I should just leave.
“Spin the bottle?” Colter says, grinning. He looks over at me. “Let’s go play.”
My heart starts pounding out an uncomfortable rhythm. It’s not real. I don’t belong here. I can feel it in their gazes. The way everyone looks at me like I’m an elephant in the middle of a gaggle of geese.
Jackson chimes in. “Uh, let’s not. I have my own personal spin the bottle and it’s in Janie’s room.” He squeezes Janie to him and whispers something in her ear.
She giggles.
I roll my eyes as Janie leans up and gives Jackson a kiss. They get really into it and Colter and I sneak uncomfortable glances at each other.
“Get a room, dude,” I say.
Colter laughs.
Jackson lets her go, but Janie is still kissing his neck as Jackson cranes his neck toward me. “I’m gonna go upstairs. Colter?”
Colter perks up at his name.
“Can you take Ell home?” Jackson grins deviously at me.
Hell, no.
I glare at Jackson and squeeze my hands into fists. “I can find another—”
“Sure,” Colter says.
Janie and Jackson leave, her stuck on him like a leech, him groaning in pleasure.
Colter turns toward me. “Let’s go get something to eat. I’m starving.”
He doesn’t wait for me to answer and starts walking toward the front of the house. He looks back once and gestures his neck toward the cars. Without another choice, I follow him.
We stop at a white Escalade. I should have known it was his SUV I saw at Kmart. He opens the passenger door and waits for me to get in. There are so many things wrong with this. I glance at him like he’s nuts and hesitate for a moment.
He gives me an impatient, exasperated look and rolls his eyes.
Taking a deep breath, I get in. The seats are leather and plush, and the interior smells like his cologne. I sink into the seat and feel it enclose all around me, the trapped feeling hovering in the foreground of my mind waiting to manifest into echoing noises and slams of car doors in my head. I try to think of anything else.
Why is he a security guard at Kmart if he can afford a car like this?
That moment between him closing my door and walking to his side is palpable—it feels like a surreal dream. My heartbeat magnifies and the scent of his cologne brings me back to the night when he stopped me from getting arrested. I can’t believe I was that stupid. I wouldn’t be able to kill myself in juvie as easy as I could out here. I can’t make any mistakes like that again.