Anthony reached out his hand to me to offer me help. “Come on, sweetheart. I’ll help you out of there.”
My eyes shot to Jase. He had turned his face against the side of the boat, leaning his forehead against it. His arms were wrapped around his stomach, and he was breathing hard like he was in pain.
I ignored Anthony’s hand. “Jase?”
He faced me again, and in the dim light I could see the shine of tears in his eyes. “Just fucking go. Yourboyfriendis waiting.”
There was an audience of people surrounding the stupid boat now, waiting to see what I’d do.
I snapped my head toward Anthony, who was still holding his hand out to me. I realized I didn’t want it, because Jase was right. I never kissed Anthony like that. “I’m going to ask this again.Didyou tell a locker room full of guys that I had sex with you, Anthony?”
“Shit,” he stammered. “Charlotte, let’s go somewhere else and talk, okay? Baby, this is a private conversation.”
“Is it?” I snapped. I felt the heat of everybody’s eyes on me. Little tiny prickles of heat spiked across my shoulders and chest. I couldn’t let a boy talk about me like that, especially when it wasn’t true. “Or is it because you don’t want everybody to know how much of a disgusting liar you are? Because I don’t know whose legs you’ve spread, but they sure as heck weren’t mine.”
Anthony coughed and cleared his throat, fidgeting and squirming. He still held his hands out to me. “I’m not angry with you, let’s just go someplace and talk, okay?”
Moving closer to him, I leaned on the side of the boat and got in his face. “You’re not angrywith me? Well, isn’t that a relief! And here I was thinking about how I should be pissed off atyoufor lying about sleeping withme. But, I’m just so glad you’re not angry withme. It makes it so much easier to tell you just how over this relationship is.”
I turned to Jase, who was smiling his stupid ass off, and asked, “Are you coming? I feel like having a few drinks for your birthday…since I’m single and all.”
Laughing and stumbling, Jase jumped up and fell over the side of the boat. Jase made me climb onto his back for our usual piggyback ride. He turned to Anthony and said, “You don’t deserve a girl like Charlie. Now get the hell outta my way, Assmunch.”
He carried me to the bonfire, and Joey handed me a red cup filled with some dark liquid.
I looked at the inside of the cup, curiously.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to, Charlie,” Jase whispered hotly in my ear. “But, it’ll make what just happened with your boyfriend go away.”
“Okay,” I said, taking the cup from his hands. I took a small taste. It burned the insides of my mouth and my throat, flooded warmth in my chest, and warmed the pit of my belly. I grimaced and almost coughed one of my lungs up. “That burns; what the Hell did you give me, gasoline?”
Jase laughed. “It’s Jack Daniels whiskey. We all raided our parents’ liquor cabinets and brought something. That’s my father’s. It’s an acquired taste, but you get used to it.”
Scrunching my nose up, I grimaced. “Why in the world would anyone want to get used to drinking something that tastes like burning gasoline?”
Joey bumped his arm into mine. “You’ll see. After a few sips you’re going to feelnice. And you’re going to forget all about Anthony Charles.”
I shrugged my shoulders and took another sip from my cup, feeling the burn slide down smoothly. “Who is Anthony Charles?” I laughed. Looking up, I noticed Jase’s eyes on me, intently watching. I took a bigger gulp, the burn in my belly making me feel a little braver. “I’m more interested in trying to forget about Kylie Simpson giving a certain someone a blowjob.”
“Come here,” Jase demanded, pulling me gently toward him and wrapping his arm around my waist. The heat of his hands, mixed with the burn of my drink, made my head start to spin. Joey smiled next to us. “I forgot about Kylie the minute I zipped up my pants.”
Thatmade me take a bigger gulp of the burning gasoline. “Blah, you’re making it worse.”
Jase’s eyes locked on mine and he pulled me tighter against him. “You don’t think it affected me thinking that you were screwing Anthony? Besides, she was all teeth.”
An array of loud giggles exploded from my mouth, and I was unable to stop them. “That’s horrible.” Laughing, I took another big gulp and spilled some all over my shirt. I looked up at him deadpan, feeling the bravest I ever felt in my life. “I’ll make sure not to use any teeth, Jase. And I’m damn good at it, I’ve been told.”
“Fuck, Charlie,” Jase whispered into my hair.
Hours later, Joey, Jase, Ava, and I were stumbling around in my backyard, trying to climb up the tree house ladder. The swaying of it turned my stomach so violently that I ran to the bushes and vomited out whatever it was I drank that night. When I finally finished, and I looked up to see the dark sky spinning overhead, I realized that Jase had been behind me the whole time, holding back my hair.
“Feel better?” he whispered.
I giggled an answer. “Happy Birthday,” I whispered back.
“Come on, Charlie, let’s get some sleep,” he said, pulling me to my feet.
Carefully, we climbed up the rope ladder; it took a few giggling tries and Jase’s hands on my ass pushing me up the whole way. Joey and Ava were already asleep on the beanbags, and I tried to take a picture of them, but ended up tumbling over and falling into Jase.
