Page 39 of Dirty Liars
I can’t go to the Halloween party, not with the midterm coming up next Monday. There’s no way. I have to use every spare minute I can to study. If I don’t pass that test, my life here is over. My life outside of here is over. Everything is over. There’s no way I’m going to Victoria’s Halloween party. I have my school career to save.
I go to tell Dana right away, but she’s already started ordering our costumes online. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her light up like this, and I don’t have the heart to tell her I can’t go anymore … so I don’t. I tell myself I’ll find the right time, and find a way to pay her back for the costume I’m not going to wear.
She asks me why I was called to the principal’s office, but I can’t tell her about that either. I just wave it off and say it was a mix up, but the truth just settles like a pain in my gut.
Two days later, I’m in the library studying so late that everyone else has gone, even Dana, who studied with me for as long as she could. I’m focused with laser beam intensity on the material before me in the book when I feel the touch of a fingertip along the back of my neck, pushing my hair away. I gasp and whirl quickly in my chair. It’s Blair.
I look back at my book with a dark frown and try my best to ignore him. “Go away. I’m busy.”
He pulls out the chair next to me and sits in it, facing me. “Oh now, is that any way to talk to someone who just wants to see you? Who’s missing you?”
I turn and glare at him. “Go away, Blair, I’m busy, and I’m not speaking to you.”
He feigns a hurt expression. “Ouch, Bunny. That hurts.” His pain melts almost immediately. “Listen, I’m serious about wanting you to come with me to that Halloween party. How can I make that happen? Is it an apology you want?”
I doubt that apology would mean anything.
With a sigh, I close my eyes and shake my head. “You just don’t quit, do you?” I ask, not really looking for an answer.
Blair leans close and I can smell the faint scent of his cologne. It’s incredible. Enticing. I try to ignore that, too. It reminds me of the way it felt that night, to be in his arms … before he tainted that memory.
“No, Bunny, I don’t quit when it’s something I really want. Now, tell me you’ll come to the party with me. Come on.” He reaches up and gently pushes my long, straight blonde hair away from my face, over my back, and I remember him telling me how much he likes it down.
I immediately tug it up into a messy ponytail.
“I’m not going to the party with you or anyone else. I have a mid-term on Monday, and I have to pass it. That’s all there is to it.” At least I have a great reason for turning him down. There’s no getting around it. And it feels good, tellingsomeonethe truth … since I still haven’t gotten around to disappointing Dana.
But that, apparently, is not reason enough for him.
He looks aghast. “You’re going to miss the party of the year to study for a mid-term? Bunny no … you can’t.” He stops and looks over his shoulder at the empty library, his voice dropping to a just above a whisper. “Listen, if this test is so important, let me help you.”
“Help me? You want to help me … study?” That’s the last thing I expected him to say.
“Oh, god no.”
He glances around for a moment and then reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small plastic baggie. “Here. Just pop a couple of these before you start studying this weekend. Trust me … you’ve never studied before you’ve studied on these.”
Blair pushes the baggie of pills into my hand, and I know I should give it right back to him, but I look down at them and I can’t look away. “I don’t know about this.”
“I do. How do you think I have some of the best grades in the school?”
“Cheating?”
He scoffs. “Don’t need to. I just get a little help when the going gets tough. It’s not even a serious drug, it’s a prescription. It’s just a little boost. A little pep in your step. You take a few of these on Sunday when you get back from the party and you’ll be able to memorize an entire semester’s worth of biology whatever in one afternoon. You can have it all, Bunny. Come on. Say yes to me.”
He leans close and touches my cheek with his fingertip, and I find myself getting lost in those scintillating green eyes. I’m still so mad at him, but he’s so … enchanting. I can’t just say no to him. Not here, not now. Not that he’d take no for an answer.
So, I’m noncommittal. “I’ll think about it.”
“That’s not a yes. Say yes to me. Come on. Look, I’m even trying to help you. This shit is expensive,” he says, shaking the baggie a little. “So come on. Say yes.” He’s relentless.
“I told you I’ll think about it,” I tell him sternly, and he knows by the still-angry look on my face that I mean it. “Unless you want to keep pestering me … and then I’ll make up my mind a whole lot quicker. And spoiler—it’ll be a solid ‘no’.”
“I’ll have to take that. I hope I get to see you there, Bunny.” Blair leans forward and I tense up, thinking he’s going to try to kiss me on the cheek again. But then he stops, a hair’s breath away, and hops to his feet. I’m left with a tingling sensation where his lips should have met my skin and an ache between my thighs that makes me want to smack myself over the head with the book I’m studying for being such a dolt.
My hands curl around the bag of pills in my hand after he leaves. The alcohol, the parties, the sexcapades … and now this? I should flush the whole bag down the toilet right away. I’ve seen what drugs can do. I’m here because of drugs.
But when I look down at the bag in my hands, I don’t see Sadie White in her coffin. I see Dana, happy and excited as she goes over our plans for this weekend. I had a problem, now I have a solution. It’s as simple as that.
