“Finish those drinks!” he shouted, thumping his chest, doing his weird lunge dance. “Chug, chug, chug!”
Brennan laughed, but Cole went for it, and Tony kept chanting, “Chug, chug, chug!” like a goddamn cartoon train, until eventually Brennan joined in and all their drinks were drained.
“Fuck yeah,” Tony said, stance relaxing from his strangely intimidating ritual, clapping Brennan on the back. “Go get refills! WHOO!”
He disappeared into the crowd, and as he did Brennan realized he was wearing a cape. In his wake, Mari approached with a full plastic cup, swaying slightly, watching Tony go with an unreadable expression.
“Is he smashed already?” Brennan asked.
“I might be,” Mari said somberly.
“Frat-boy party habits die hard,” Cole explained. “Have you been drinking water? Let’s go get you some water—”
“This ain’t my first rodeo, bro,” Mari said, swaying forward in her heels.
“She only calls people ‘bro’ when she’s drunk,” Cole told Brennan, and took Mari by the arm to head toward the kitchen.
From there, the night went by in a blur of sweat, pop music, too-sweet mixed drinks, dancing, and talking. Brennan rotated between friends, and every time he looked across the room he saw Cole mingling with a different group. Brennan didn’t know if Cole truly knew that many people, or if he was making an effort to befriend every single person who could be crammed into the apartment. Neither option would be surprising.
Nellie and Sunny hung out with him most of the time. Sunny inevitably returned to being glued to her phone, and Nellie chattered his ears off about different parties she’d been to over the decade, Sunny occasionally chiming in to add details Nellie forgot.
Tony had apparently taken it as his personal duty to make sure everyone got properly smashed, continuing to wander around and randomly yell at people to “CHUG CHUG CHUG.” Often he’d head to the kitchen and start a round of shots.
Tony dragged Brennan into a round of a drinking game, and he shouted and rooted for him each time he made a shot like he actually cared about him. Nellie tackled his side in a strangely aggressive hug to celebrate a good throw on her part, and as soon as she released him, aharsh hand was on his shoulder, and then Mari tugged him aside into the relative privacy of the hallway to the bedrooms.
“Listen here, Brooks,” Mari stood in front of him, her tough demeanor undercut by glassy eyes and a slight sway to her stance. “I don’t know you, and I don’t like you.”
“Oh,” Brennan said. “Awesome. What is this?”
Mari poked Brennan’s chest hard. “This is a shovel talk, genius. Cole freaking likes you, god knows why, and you need to know that if you hurt him at all, in any way, I know where you live and will not hesitate to cut off your di—”
A rising clamor from the kitchen had the whole party peering over to see Tony starting the keg stands, hoisted up with help from two guys and soaking himself with beer when the hose got loose. The guys set him down and he stripped his beer-soaked shirt off, grinning and taking a bow.
“Oh for fuck’s sake, thisnight,” Mari said, throwing up her hands, then turned on her heels and stalked away.
“Good talk,” said Brennan.
Brennan scanned the party and caught sight of Cole and Nellie sitting on the kitchen counter, leaned together in a hushed conversation with serious expressions on both their faces. It took everything in Brennan not to either barge over or run away screaming. He could listen, if he really tried, despite the music and chatter. He’d gotten quite good at it, actually. But that was the point of inviting the vampires: he trusted Cole and Nellie enough to allow these parts of his life he’d wanted to keep separate to collide.
Tony and Sunny waved him back over to the game table. Brennan let himself stop thinking for a change, and the night went back to the pleasant haze it had been before.
At one point the makeshift dance floor that had formed in the living room found Tony, shirt still off, with Mari grinding up next to him.
“Good for her,” Sunny said absently.
Cole and Nellie found them again, and a half-formed list of questions popped into Brennan’s head—What did you ask her? What did she say? Are you afraid of me? What’s going on in your brain, please and thank you?But Cole didn’t hesitate to press into Brennan’s side, throwing an armaround his shoulder. The anxiety melted out of Brennan’s mind, replaced by embarrassingly sappy thoughts about howwellthey fit together.
Another round of drinks, and somehow, Nellie started on the topic of modern poetry. Brennan was drunk enough to end up on a rant, with Cole, Tony, and Sunny watching in amusement.
“Listen! I get it! I love that she made poetry feel more accessible! She was a gateway drug to poetry for a lot of people and I love that for them! But you cannot look at me and tell me honestly thatMilk and Honeywasgood poetryso help megod—”
“Alright, Mr. Know-It-All,” Nellie challenged. “What accessible entry-level poetry do you have up your sleeve?”
“Youmockme,” Brennan said, because they probably thought he was too cool to have limericks memorized for no reason at all but, in fact, he did.
And, well, maybe Brennan was drunker than he thought—it had been awhile, with all his vampire stuff, since he’d really relaxed—because he ended up pushing himself to stand on the kitchen island, cackled, and started loudly and dramatically shouting limericks.
“There was a young lass of Madras
