Page 7 of Together We Rot

“Yeah, get me whatever you’re having.”

Harvey sidesteps me instantly. “Kidding, kidding.” He isn’t kidding. “I’ll get it.”

He squints, rifling around in one of the dozen coolers on the floor. I hear the slosh of half-melted ice and the wet grip of his hand on the can. Harvey pulls back with one for the both of us.

He offers it to me like it’s his firstborn son and I’m the devil he was stupid enough to make a deal with.

Ronnie shuts him up before he can say anything else. “I’ll see you around, okay?” she lies.

She loops her arm around mine, pulling me out of the kitchen and into the smoke-hazed living room despite Harvey’s pathetic mewls for attention. The music is blurred over the sound of tipsy laughter and shouted conversations. Drunk people only shut up when they’re passed out or throwing up.

“You owe me for all of this,” she whispers once we’re out of earshot. We might be surrounded by people (in a county this small, this has got to be the highlight of the year, and that says something), but the music is loud enough to drown us out. “Big-time.”

“I am indebted to you forever, my liege,” I promise.

Ronnie rolls her eyes and gestures with a nod of her head to the staircase. I take a seat beside her and I’m enormously thankful that no one has sloshed beer on this carpet yet. I highly doubt it will stay that way. The whole place reeks of Budweiser, sweat, and Axe body spray.

“God, everyone and their cousin is here,” Ronnie groans. There’s a shy edge to her voice; I don’t miss the subtle twinge of pink on her cheeks. “Do I look okay? Is this too much?”

Not that long ago Ronnie’s perfume of choice was Catholic Guilt. She reeked of it. No wonder her mom despises me. Her daughter, Veronica, is long gone. Ronnie, however, is much more fun.

“Are you kidding? You look amazing!” I flick her shoulder. I pretend I’m injecting her with confidence, a syringe piercing the vein.

She shimmies a little, my words rolling over her. I hope they hit the mark. “Thanks, Wil. You look great too.”

I snort, but it’s not worth correcting her. Everything about me is messy. I look worse than I did this morning. Black bags have sprung up beneath my eyes, and you can tell my haircut is the lovechild of a rusty pair of scissors and a two a.m. breakdown. I don’t make a habit of looking in the mirror. If it’s not my own reflection I see, it’s my mother’s. All the little imprints she left behind.

Don’t think about that.

I busy myself with people-watching. Seeing as how Pine Point has the population of another town’s food court, I know everyone here.

Brian Schmidt is laughing about something with his posse. He’s as big of a delinquent as I am, but popular. He not-so-casually snakes an arm around his girlfriend, pulling her so close that she’s practically sitting in his lap. The two of them are shameless with each other when they’re sober. Get a bit of alcohol in their system and they’re downright disgusting.

Her shrill laughter nearly shatters my eardrums. “Stooooop, Brian!” She’s got a voice like a wounded hawk, one that needs to be put out of its misery. Her main claim to popularity is being the loudest one in the room. “You’re the worst.”

That much is true.

“I think I’d have more fun in an intensive care unit,” I growl under my breath.

Ronnie rests her cheek in her palm. “Remind me again, whose idea was this?”

Ugh. Okay. She’s got a point. “Mine,” I drawl, “but I’ve got a plan.”

She cocks her head. “And what was that plan again? Corner Elwood and badger him for information he may or may not have? You never even told me how you know he’s here.”

I bite my tongue. I really don’t think she’d approve of me lurking outside of someone else’s house with binoculars. “It’s a hunch.”

She side-eyes me. “I barely know the guy and my hunch is that this is hardly his scene. I don’t think he even knows what alcohol is.”

“Speaking of that...” I pop open my beer and take a quick gulp for confidence.

Unfortunately—due to my missing mom and all—I’ve grown quite the tolerance for binge drinking. But I’m not the one here who needs to get plastered and spill all their dark secrets. “Okay, Ron, let’s go track that loser down.”

I offer her a hand and she clutches it, allowing me to guide her through the human sea that used to be Lucas’s living room. We don’t get very far before the chanting starts. “Drink, drink, drink, drink!”

I look toward Brian Schmidt on instinct. If anyone’s getting wasted for attention, it’s got to be him, right? But when I track down his drunken face, he’s busy sloppily making out with his girlfriend. I wish I could burn that image out of my retinas. I trace the chants to the very corner of the room and find a boy upside down doing a keg stand. His shirt lifts a little and I see the scarred pale skin beneath. I recognize his familiar soft curls, the dark lashes, the little mole resting on his cheek.

“Oh shit, you were right,” Ronnie gasps. “That’s—”

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