The longer I read and reread, the heavier my eyelids grow and the more the words slide together. Despite the blue light of my laptop being a supposed stimulant, I find my brain failing and my head slumping. That’s when a drunken idea pops up like a comic strip bubble:Send them. I dare you.
It’s a bad idea in more ways than one, but a protagonist on a kiss quest needs a costar, right? My mind doesn’t register what my fingers are doing. After about an hour, lost in my feels, I pull off my Warby Parker knockoff glasses, lay my head down, and pass out to a soft, sweet chorus ofwhooshes.
Chapter 3
The morning sun mars my dreamful sleep. In all the chaos and cannolis, I never closed my blinds. When I open my eyes, I realize I never even made it to my bed. I’ve got squares impressed into the left side of my face from my laptop keyboard.
I sip from a Rosevale College water bottle like a wayward traveler lost in the desert. It does nothing to mitigate the feeling of cotton balls in my mouth, reminding me of when I got my two impacted wisdom teeth removed. Only this time I’m not under the influence of fun anesthetics.
The pounding in my head plays on as I get up. If death came by delivery app, I’d place a request right away: one large order of eternal sleep, hold the stomach nausea.
At least it’s Saturday. I have exams to study for and papers to write and group presentations to plan for but…I have nowhere to be.
My muscles instantly relax at the prospect of a self-care day before the triathlon that is finals week. I slip an old-timey VHS tape out of my impressive collection and let Nora Ephron nurse me back to health.
I curl into the fetal position on my twin bed and groan, setting the remote down at my side. There’s no better way to cure a hangover than to listen to Tom Hanks waxing poetic about pencil bouquets. The movie projects itself onto the inside of my eyelids. I’ve seen it enough times to know it shot by shot. The autumnal colors come to me with little effort.
A notification ding intermingles with the Cranberries crooning over the fabulous Upper West Side montage. Maybe it’s Professor Tanson looking to schedule our end-of-semester meeting. She’s my film studies advisor and the head of the department. If I don’t email her back within ten minutes of receipt, she will inevitably lose track of my response in the mess of her ever-flooding inbox, so I slog over to my laptop, covered in vinyl stickers of Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach to see what she needs.
The email banner scrolls across the top, and when I click into it, I’m confused by an address I haven’t seen in a long time.
FROM:[email protected]
SUBJECT:Re: Tonight at the Drive-In
Hey stranger,
Long time, no talk.
Wow…I did NOT expect to wake up to this.
No.
Nonononononono.
Memories from last night harpoon me to the chair. My jaw locks and my pulse quickens.Pleasetell me time travel is still in the cards for my impending secret superpower…
Panicking, I launch a Google search and attempt to figure out how to unsend an email. An already-received email. An already-read email. An already replied-to email.
This is what happens when you hit the vodka a little too hard. This is what happens when your best friends chastise you for being a stupid romantic. This is what happens when you take that extra shot despite your hurting heart, desperate to catch back up to the crowd you call your peers.
I think I might throw up. I slam the laptop shut and bolt for our shared bathroom, racing past Avery in the living room. She’s conked out on the futon, snuggling our favoriteTwinks and Otters and Bears, Oh my!pillow. Mateo, thankfully, is nowhere in sight.
Hanging my head in the chiffon-yellow toilet, I dry heave for a few minutes, but my body won’t expel anything—not the alcohol, not our pregame munchies, not even my mushy ball of mashed-up feelings. Instead, I slump down on the cold, white tile, open my phone, and read on:
I’m thinking maybe you sent this to me by accident. Totally cool if you did. No worries.
No worries? I’m 110 percent worries and angst and idiocy.
From the floor, I reach blindly onto the cluttered sink counter and pull a tiny paper cup from its sleeve. I flip on the faucet, letting the cold water run over the back of my hand. It’s the first nice feeling I’ve had all morning.
As soon as I take a calming sip, a loud voice rings out from the front doorway. “Baaaaaaabes, I’m hooooooooome!” It’s very Ricky Ricardo, but the audience laughter isn’t for Mateo’s flamboyant entrance. It’s all mocking me, the boy stuffing chocolates into his mouth as the conveyor belt of his love life speeds up and out of control.
I do a spit take into the toilet as I remember:Mateo got one of those emails.
When Mateo, Avery, and I all moved into 3B at the start of junior year, I should’ve deleted the email. The feelings had faded by then. Our almost-kiss at the Pride House basement beach bash, wearing matching Hawaiian shirts and leis, was a thing of the past. The door to something more was shut and sealed ages ago.
