Page 18 of Daydream

I decide to avoid explaining how, in a misguided attempt to negotiate with my ex-boyfriend, I committed to not going home for the holidays this year. “That’s a great idea, but I’m kind of in charge of making sure my siblings have something to give her, too.”

“I thought your brother was older than you,” she says, and I can’t help but sigh in Eldest Daughter.

“He is, but, like my stepdad, he’s incompetent. Which means if Idon’t arrange a gift, Mom won’t be getting a gift on her birthday. It’s totally fine. I’m used to being the family manager.”

I know that Cami is the youngest sibling, so she probably has no idea what I mean when I call myself the family manager. Ironically, it’s a title Grayson gave me when we were younger to fully signify his less-than-enthusiastic contributions to any and all family responsibilities.

Cami locks my screen and slides the device away from me slowly. “Y’know what will help you decide… alcohol. I make all my best decisions drunk.”

I haven’t decided if I like drinking yet. I like being invited to things and I like the confidence I get when I’m buzzed, but I despise being hungover. It makes me anxious and tearful and a little oversensitive, but I’m not sure if those invites will stop if I’m not as fun.

“Weren’t you drinking when you decided to home dye your hair?”

Cami’s previously blond hair is now a deep auburn shade, but only after we spent hours in the hair salon, while fighting my first hangover I should add, getting it fixed. “Okay, so maybe my execution was bad, but try and tell me that red is not my color. Four different people have told me I look like Jessica Rabbit. Do you know what it’s doing to my ego? If only I had her titties. I’d be even more unbearable.”

“You don’t want the back pain, trust me.” I instinctively push my shoulders back a little to fix my posture and the space between my shoulder blades crunches. “And you do look like Jessica Rabbit. You should buy the Halloween costume now.”

During our trip to the salon, I learned that Cami had a situationship with West, the guy whose job I got. She thinks it’s silly to be upset since they weren’t even a couple and she kind of hated him anyway, but she is and she’s dealing with it in the only way she says she knows how. Partying as much as possible.

Cami is two years older than me, but she changed majors and didn’t have enough classes to graduate with her own year group. All her friends, and she clarified she definitely wasn’t calling West a friend, moved away for grad school or job opportunities. She said our circumstances are different, but not that dissimilar, and that’s why it’s so easy for us to be friends.

Seeing her so cut up over West made me feel bad accepting any form of sympathy from her about Will. I immediately felt like I was deceiving her, so I tried to clarify that, apart from the occasional blip, I’m fine being single.

She said she was going to pretend I hadn’t said it because it makes her feel less like a lonely loser to have a friend experiencing the same kind of heartache. She laughed, clarifying she was kidding, and told me that if the blips become less bliplike and more dye-my-hair-red-like, she’d be there for me.

Box dye in hand.

I don’t know whether it was the hangover or the general emotions that come with seeing your life change in such a short space of time, but in that moment—literally just a few hours of my entire life—I felt sad for past Halle who didn’t have this.

“You’re right, and I love my little pancakes anyway,” she says as she pats her chest affectionately. “I should wear something that shows them off when we go to a party later. Don’t you agree?”

Part of me wants to say no, I’m staying home to finally start working on my entry to the writing competition. That tonight the planning and the mood boarding and the mind changing finally becomes a work in progress.

But a bigger, louder, and more persuasive part of me is going to say let’s go, because it doesn’t know how to say to no to people, and it’s arguing that isn’t this what I’ve always wanted? My own friends who invite me to things because of me, not because of a man? Isn’t this what I’m supposed to be doing post-Will? Putting myself firstand also having fun? How am I going to decide if I like partying if I don’t try it out properly?

I fold my arms across my chest and sit back in my chair in a fake display of defiance, but in reality, I feel a little giddy, because among all the unknowns, Iwantto learn about myself. “Which party?”

Cami claps her hands excitedly, and staff I can’t remember the names of yet at the next table look up from their phones. “Oh, you’re going to love it. Robbie’s parties are the best.”

“Who’s Robbie?”

THE HOCKEY HOUSE HAS ANentirely different atmosphere at night compared to when I was here for book club.

Even though Henry invited me before Cami’s intervention, I still feel a little weird about being here. I haven’t seen him once, which isn’t surprising, since from the moment we walked in here several drinks ago, the place has been overflowing with people. What is surprising is how much I’ve been looking out for him.

A mixture of liquor and soda bottles have taken over the kitchen island, and every other surface in the large living room is covered in red cups and beer bottles. Music is blasting from every corner of the space, making it hard for me to hear my own thoughts, never mind the guy everyone seems to hate trying to talk to me while we dance.

I think under normal circumstances I’d have backed away from Mason slowly and found an excuse to run away, but these aren’t normal circumstances, because I am heavily under the influence of whatever is in the very large punch bowl.

Punch Bowl Halle isn’t worried that she can’t dance or talk to men, never mind the fact that this one might ruin her life. Punch Bowl Halle is having fun because that’s what she’s supposed to do at college parties. She also opted to let Mason press his very large bodyagainst hers and put his hands on her waist instead of answering his question about why he hadn’t received a text.

I wish Cami was here to save me, but she went outside to call her roommate seconds before Mason found me. Apparently Sober Halle and Punch Bowl Halle have one very clear similarity: they’re both cowards.

“You look really hot,” he yells. His mouth lingers near my ear, his breath warming the sensitive spot on my neck. These are the experiences I’ve read about in romance books. The hot bad boy showing interest in the—let’s face it—inexperienced, sheltered virgin. We’re a cliché, and drunk me finds it funny, but I suspect sober me would be embarrassed as hell.

The worst part is as his hands tighten on my hips, I’ve been waiting for my body to react in some way. My skin to prickle, heart to speed up, something to indicate that my lack of desire was to do with Will. That I’m not entirely sexually dead in the face of a good-looking man. Because that’s how this cliché goes, right? Immediate and unmistakable sexual prowess, but alas, nothing.

I know that I’m still young, and I know that my worth is not associated with what happens between my legs, but I just want to understand myself.

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