Page 17 of When in December

I chuckled.

“You’re laughing at me,” he said, as if he wasn’t sure.

I shook my head. “No. I’m not. Are you okay?”

“Course I am.” Aaron snorted. “Why wouldn’t I be okay? I’m fantastic.”

I looked him over. “I’m sorry. That was kind of a stupid question.”

“Yeah? Why’s that?” he asked, waiting for my answer.

Because I heard your parents died, I wanted to say.

Instead, I sat down next to him. “You’re kind of lying in a mountain of coats.”

He laughed as if I had said one of the funniest things in the world. “Freaking comfy pile of coats.”

I pressed my lips together, trying not to laugh with him. I shouldn’t. I knew laughing with him would be wrong considering the state he was in.

“You can laugh at me.”

“I’m not laughing at you,” I said.

“You are,” he insisted. “I’m certain.”

“Are you?”

He shrugged, less confident in his answer. “Stupid party.”

It was, but I didn’t answer. If I contradicted him, I’d be lying. If I answered honestly, I would be a big loser, like Cassie always said I was.

“ What?” Aaron tried again. “Don’t you think so?”

I shrugged.

“You wouldn’t have any fun.”

He was right; I wasn’t.

“Why did you even come here?” he asked.

“I was invited.”

“So?”

“So, I … my friends …” I tried to come up with a better answer, feeling my heart race as I thought of one that would make me sound better than simply coming up with the answer I’d had all night before I escaped down the hallway, away from the music and people who hadn’t given me a single ounce of care whether or not I’d shown up in the end.

I didn’t know why I was there.

“And where are they?” Aaron asked me. He raised his eyebrows, which had a tint of red to them, especially in the dim lighting of the room.

The lamp on the nightstand was on, leaving the smallest amount of yellow light to bounce onto the bedspread and across his face—warm brown eyes, half closed yet rimmed in a red, which I couldn’t tell if it was from the alcohol or tears. Though this was Aaron Hayes, so it had to just be from the alcohol, right?

His chapped pink lips parted as he took heavy, uneven breaths.

“I don’t know,” I answered him. “Probably out there with their other friends. Dancing, maybe with their boyfriends or getting boyfriends … I don’t know.”

“Don’t you have a boyfriend?”

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