June 10

The night is stark and humid. I’m at the high school, sitting on a marching band platform, staring at empty parking spaces under flickering lampposts. Though they’re empty, they still feel full, like ghostly imprints. It’s only been a week since school ended and I already miss making fun of the marching band panting under the hot afternoon sun. I’m pretty sure I see my parking space, 563. For some incredible reason, I miss it.

I get a call from Briony, asking me to come over, and I can hear giggling in the background. I figure it’s probably Alissa or Jordine or both. I tell Briony okay, and then a blacked out car drives up and parks but no one gets out, so I leave.

I’m parked outside Briony’s house, gripping the steering wheel until my knuckles become white and the smoke from my joint floats out the cracked window. I get out of the car and Briony answers the door and she’s wearing a red tank top and boxer shorts.

“Hello,” she says, high-pitched. Her eyes are burnt, but so are mine.

“Briony,” I smile.

We hug and I kind of let my hand slide down her back and she laughs and hits my arm. As I follow her up to her room, she asks, turning around, “Do I smell like a bar of soap?”

“What?” I ask.

“A bar of soap. Do I smell like a bar of soap?”

I lean into her. “I don’t know. Maybe? You smell good, though.”

“You’re the best.”

“I know.”

As I predicted, Alissa is sitting at Briony’s vanity, packing a pipe and cussing.

Jordine’s on the bed reading a magazine and saying, “If Pete Wentz can take a x-ray picture of his heart, then Noah can do the same.”

“Yeah, he’ll totally pay to get cancer for you,” Alissa says, then turns to me. “Your eyes look kind of red, Mitch. Put some eye drops in or something. Freaking me out.” And then she turns back to Jordine. “Look, Pete Wentz isn’t even that cute.”

“Are you stupid?” Briony says, flipping through her CDs.

“Oh stop,” Alissa laughs, waving her hand.

Jordine’s staring at the magazine. “God, Pete Wentz can kill me anytime he wants.”

Alissa finishes packing the pipe. “I hope he does.”

“Eat me,” Jordine says.

Fall Out Boy starts playing on the CD player, and Jordine’s waving the magazine, wielding it like a microphone.

Alissa starts smoking. “I can’t believe you like this shit.”

“I think I’m going to do this right now,” Briony says, holding a spray tan bottle. “Who wants to help me?”

“You still do that?” Jordine asks.

Briony’s twisting the bottle and bopping her head. “You don’t?”

“I started going to the salon,” Jordine says.

“The salon’s so much better,” Alissa adds, handing me the pipe. “It’s actually way more expensive, I know. But it’s actually safer. You can actually get cancer from that artificial stuff.”

“Is that new?” Jordine asks Briony.

Briony picks up the CD player and smiles. “Yeah. I got it from the mall the other day.”

“Oh yeah, what the fuck? You can’t get cancer from a spray tan,” Jordine tells Alissa.

“Um, you can,” Alissa says.

Briony’s holding the CD player up to her ears. I notice the pipe’s almost out so I hand it back to Alissa who just gives it to Jordine, who’s still looking at Pete Wentz, and the lyrics scream throughout the poster-plastered room, “This is side one… Flip me over… This is side one… Flip me over…

I sit on the floor and lean against a fake palm tree and spot a white book under Briony’s bed. I pull it out. The title says “Learn to Speak Portuguese in Under Thirty Days.”

Briony leaves the room then comes back with a bottle of tequila. We pass the bottle around the room and the fake palm tree starts to sway, slowly…   

…somehow I’ve ended up at Russo’s and everything is blurry and I had to tell the waitress to go away three times then I feel okay enough to order so I call her back.

“What would you like?” she says, her voice sounding pretty hot.

“I am.”

“What?”

“What?”

“What do you want?”

“A slice of pepperoni and you,” I say, grabbing her waist. She slaps my face and then I figure it’s probably time to go. I stumble to my car and drive home and fall asleep in my driveway, wondering if Briony will get cancer.

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