Page 4 of More Than Chemical
I hit the water and froze solid. My heart seized. My lungs squeezed so tight I couldn’t even scream.
The soft lake bottom made me stumble. Water rose past my shoulders and numbed the lobes of my ears.
The EMT pushed me to the ladder. Another person hauled me out of the water, my clothes plastered to my body. I started shaking so hard it was like I was standing next to someone jackhammering a sidewalk.
My legs wouldn’t move. They were made of one-hundred-pound ice cubes.
I looked up…and there was Texas, standing in line and looking straight at me. His chocolate-colored eyes made direct contact with mine and fused. I couldn’t glance away. Couldn’t stop staring. As much as I tried, my gaze remained frozen to his. As if a Fudgsicle held us together.
Priya was right. He was good-looking.
He flashed me a young Heath Ledger smile. The kind from10 Things I Hate About You, where the muscles tug up at the corners of his mouth and form half-moon creases.
Ugh. It was official. Texas passed my appearance requirements.
Two
The Kiss
Iclosed the bathroom door behind me, and the loud volume from the house party’s speakers muted. But that didn’t stop the bass from rattling the empty beer can on the sink.
On the knee of my favorite party jeans, I noticed a splash of bright pink. Vodka mixed with fruit-punch-flavored Crystal Light. Not my favorite. I hated the aftertaste, and artificial sweetener tasted sweeter to me than one of my energy drinks.
Playing a drinking game with the girls from my floor had been fun, but I’d topped it off with my second—maybe third—Coors Light. Mixing hard alcohol with beer was never a good idea.
Standing, I peeked into the toilet. Just as I thought. Clear.
Like Cinderella hearing the clock toll midnight, clear pee meant only one thing. It was time to leave. I’d drunk enough to be able to fall asleep without problem when we got home, but not so much that I’d get a bad hangover.
I finished and stumbled out the bathroom door, bumping into the girl at the front of the line. “Sorry,” I muttered.
She gave me a blank stare. Must have had some cannabis gummies.
I walked into the main area, where multicolored lights flashed in the dark, and the music thumped. I scanned the room, but my vision was failing. Or maybe the circling white lights from the disco ball were making me dizzy.
Now to find Priya and Emma. They wouldn’t have left without me.
I studied the room again, and my wobbly gaze landed on Texas. He wore a baseball cap pulled down low. He was standing on the dance floor with another guy, and together they were chatting up a girl with long, wavy hair.
From the tip of my nose to the ends of my toes, my body quaked. Right there, in the flesh, I was witnessing Texas on the prowl.
How did he do it? What was his trick?
Fueled by a little alcohol and my continued euphoria from the plunge, I needed to know the answers to those questions. I needed to know themright now.
I marched across the floor, tripping on a few treacherous spots and smacking into a couple of partygoers before I pulled up alongside him. I didn’t give the girl a second look. She was unimportant. I wanted to know how he practiced his lecherous ways.
“Excuse me.” I tapped him on the shoulder.
He turned. Save for the continuous blobs of light whizzing past, his visor shadowed his face. But I could tell he had an angular jaw and a strong nose that didn’t overwhelm his chin.
“Hey.” His bottom lip was full, but not too full. “I know you.”
“No, you don’t.”
He took a sip of his beer. “You live in my dorm. You were at the polar plunge today.”
“Right, but that doesn’t mean you know me.” Because he didn’t. No one really did.
