Page 37 of Free Fall

“It is my birthday, after all.”

Seren began to scramble up. “I’ll be right back.” When she was upright, she turned and groaned. “For crying out loud, it’s the wonder twins.”

Two footsteps sounded behind me and Avery, only stopping when a hard shoe jabbed at my kidney. “Didn’t take you for the frat type,” Cole’s annoying voice said, making me tense up, straight back into fight mode.

“We’re not,” I retorted, turning to glare up at them. What the hell were they doing here? They weren’t in any frats that I knew of. “Using them for the free booze.” Cole was probably here selling drugs, Jesse tagging along out of boredom. I didn't know for sure if he sold them on the regular, but he always had something on him, ready to hand over — mostly to cause chaos, I think.

“Yeah, I’ll be right back,” Seren said, nudging past them and entering the house with a flounce.

Avery and I stood, the world spinning a little as I got used to not being on my ass. I ignored it though, took another swig of beer, letting the cheap alcohol fizz its way down to my gut. Jesse turned back around, having kept his eyes on Seren as she left. He looked kind of bewildered, his mouth slack and his eyebrows furrowed.

“Don’t often see that look on your face,” I blurted, pointing at him.

He furrowed his brow more, turning into a glare. I showed him my palms in defeat. I was used to Cole’s bad side, hadn’t seen Jesse’s. Didn’t much want to.

“How much have you had to drink?” Cole asked, amusement blatant as he looked me up and down. We’d spent most of the vacation avoiding each other after the mess of a night in the club, and since then I’d played a long game in dodging family functions. He’d got what he wanted out of me, out of the situation, and didn’t seem interested in explaining himself. Not that I’d tried to get him to. It was too damn awkward. I dressed as akittenfor him. Sat at his feet, my head on his thigh. Horrifying.

Still, I wanted to ask him why he wasn’t blabbing about me and his dad. So suss.

“Heknows?” Avery asked, stepping back a little like he was uncomfortable. Cole was staring at him pretty hard. Burning a hole through my friend’s lovable face with his glare.

“Ah, shit.” My mind words weren’t staying inside, it appeared. “He does, yeah. He’s having a fucking great old time with it, too.”

Avery and Cole began talking, but I had trouble focusing on what was said, it was gobbledegook, like they were teletubbies making various indecipherable sounds. Definitely too much to drink. Happy birthday to me. Avery dropped my arm and moved into Cole’s space, his voice sounding all threatening. I thought it was very sweet and grinned at him for a moment. But then my favorite song came on inside the house and yeah… I wanted to dance to that shit.

Neither of them followed me into the house, too busy glaring at each other with all their heated words and protectiveness or whatever. So I weaved through the crush of frat bros and sweaty cling-ons, singing and moving to the beat of the music as it swept me up.

Some girls had climbed up onto the dining table, bouncing around with their drinks sloshing over the crowds below. When one girl fell off, caught in a crowd-surf by her friends, a space opened up. Wobbling, I strode closer.

It looked like fun. And it was. Fun as I was pulled up, someone’s hand on my ass to haul me to the top. Fun as I screamed the lyrics and jumped around, bouncing off the other giggling bodies.

A tray of shots bobbed over people’s heads as someone moved through the room with it. They were colorful. I wanted one.

Not fun as the table disappeared from beneath my feet and I fell.

Twenty

Luca

“Whatthehellareyou doing in here?” Jesse asked, flicking on the light of his bedroom. I groaned, turning my face into the pillow to hide from the too-bright glare.

His bedroom had become mine. Since the night in the studio with Zelda, after I came home with her smell on my body and forced it on my wife, I’d slept in Jesse’s room, changed the sheets to ones I preferred and settled my ass right in. And now he was barging in, waking me up like he owned the damn place. I blinked away the sleep, biting back all the vicious things I wanted to say.

It wasn’t always here. I spent a lot of times in hotels too, with Zelda. But we had to manage that right, and we weren’t always available at the same times. At least here, in this space that didn’t feel like my home anymore, I had all my shit. Or I’d live in a hotel permanently.

“Why are you home?” I complained, rolling onto my stomach, furious that he was here. In his own room. My children caused me nothing but pain.

Jesse stayed in the doorway, not coming in, so I sat up and looked at him, swiping the sleep from my eyes and blinking away the sharpness of the ceiling light. At least turn on a fucking lamp first, Christ.

He hovered, looking a bit lost, uncomfortable as he kept averting his gaze from me, looking around his room instead. It was a good size, with a king bed and a decent entertainment set up, not even that messy before I’d parked myself in it.

“Uh…” he said, “do you want me to sleep in Cole’s room?”

My brow furrowed as I looked at him properly, concern rising for my quiet son’s strange behavior, for the state he was in. He was disheveled, his shirt covered in splatters of what looked like blood, his hair matted with sweat and his face exhausted. Instantly wide a-fucking-wake, I flew from the bed. “What the fuck happened?”

He looked confused for a moment, baffled even, then ducked his head, taking in his clothing with a sigh. “Oh, uh, yeah.”

“Where’s Cole?” Panic for my fucker of a son built in me. Did Alison know? Did she decide not to tell me something had happened to our child out of anger for me? I strode over to my not quite as much of a fucker of a son. “Jesse?”

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