While watching the revelry in the Barn, I’d had an epiphany. Parties weren’t just about who was who and being seen. It was about letting go. About celebrating that we all made it through one more boring week. Everyone came together in one place, and for a while, it was as if nothing mattered except the music and the energy and being away from all of the adults in our lives. These parties were about freedom.
And friendship. They were about friendship too. All the tension I’d felt between me and Emily during the past weeks faded away. I remembered why I loved her so much and why she was my best friend. Emily was smart and talented, and she never apologized for being her own person. She was so much better than everyone in the Mills, and she didn’t even know it. And she got me. We clicked in a way that I just couldn’t with other people. What did it matter if she had a weird boyfriend? What did it matter if she was about to leave me?
“I’m going to miss you,” I shouted.
“What?”
I leaned and tried again. “I’m going to miss you.”
“Where am I going?”
“The music thing.”
“Don’t jinx it,” Emily said, but she was laughing. She knew she’d get in.
“And college.”
“You’re going to college too!”
I wasn’t even sure what I’d be doing the next day, let alone the next year.
“You’re my best friend in the entire world,” I said.
Emily hugged me in response, and I knew what she was trying to say. That she wasn’t leaving me, even if we wouldn’t be in the same place anymore. That we would always be best friends, no matter what. That somehow, everything would be OK.
“Come on,” I said and pulled Emily closer to the stage. “Let’s go watch your boyfriend.”
We danced, and the room swirled around, and I could hear Logan playing the guitar through it all. I was sweaty and tired, but I was alive. What was more important than that?
? ? ?
When Logan’s band finished playing, Emily went to find him and tell him how good they’d been. I had no idea where Enzo was. It was very suddenly too warm, and even though I stopped spinning, everything around me kept going.
I pushed my way through the crowd. If I could get outside in the fresh air, I figured I’d feel better. But I didn’t really. I stumbled around the side of the barn and promptly threw up, hating myself the whole time. I was just as bad as the rest of them.
That’s when I heard a voice that I one hundred percent had not expected. “Thorny? What the hell?”
I heaved a couple more times and looked up. Connor was standing a few feet away. Before I even had time to think that the situation couldn’t get any worse, Rush came up behind him.
“I don’t feel good,” I told them weakly.
“You don’t look good either,” Rush said. “Are you done throwing up?”
“I think so,” I said, hating how pitiful I sounded.
“Hawthorn Creely, I never thought this day would come,” Connor said, as if my being drunk at a party was some big joke.
“Don’t,” Rush warned him, then moved to my side.
I leaned against my brother and tried to clear my head, make the world stop tilting back and forth.
“I want to go home,” I said.
“Who’d you come here with?” Connor asked.
I didn’t know why he thought that was any of his business. “Why are you two here at all?”
“It’s a party,” Rush said.
“A high school party. Aren’t you a little old?”
“At least she’s sober enough to insult us,” Connor said.
With one of them on either side of me, we walked around the side of the barn toward the highway. We didn’t get far before Emily came running up.
“I was looking everywhere for you. What’s going on?”
“I don’t feel good,” I told Emily.
“She’s drunk,” Rush said.
“No, I’m not.”
Emily ignored me and spoke to my brother instead. “Are you taking her home? I’d rather he not do it.” She nodded her head in the direction of the party.
“Who?” Rush asked.
“Her date. Enzo Calvetti.” At the dry tone of Emily’s voice, all my warm feelings for her vanished.
“Don’t be like that,” I snapped.
“Like what?”
“Judgmental.” I pulled away from Rush and reeled for a second before balancing.
“I’m not making a judgment. I’m stating a fact. You came here with him,” said Emily.
“And you hate it. You hated him before you even met him.”
“Like you were so open-minded about Logan.”
“I’m here, aren’t I?” I shouted. People around us turned to look.
“Hey,” Rush said, “keep it down.”
Emily didn’t heed my brother’s warning either. “You’re here, but you brought that creep with you, and you’re drunk and making a scene and making this all about you, just like you do with everything!”
“I do not.”
“You do! That’s how it always is. That’s how it’s been for the past ten years, Hawthorn. Well, guess what? I’m not a supporting role in your life story.”
Then Emily stomped away.
I tried to stay on my feet and puzzle over what she’d said at the same time. Before I made any progress on the latter, Enzo walked up.
“Hawthorn, you OK?” I could tell he was concerned, which made me happy. Even though he’d abandoned me.
“Back off,” Rush said to him.
Enzo scowled. “Who the hell are you?”