Two strikes,what the fuck happened with Mason?
Three strikes,did you fuck him, Ivy? Did you?
And the final strike once I told hernoand she went in for the kill.I don’tbelieve you.
And she left me for dead.
“What’s wrong with her?” asks Ava, as I try to breathe through the hole in my lungs with little success.
“She needs another shot, is all,” says Alexis, and before long, she’s passing me more tequila. “Go on. Have another. It’s the least you could do.”
I don’t allow myself to think it through. I take the shot, and it burns less going down this time, the alcohol easing my tension and allowing me to take a real breath. For a moment I forget why I stopped drinking. Why, when it makes Alexis’s acidity so much easier to stomach?
“What’s Brian doing tonight?” she asks Kinsley.
“No idea,” Kinsley says.
“We should invite him over. Him and his friends.”
I should protest, but I don’t, because even through the liquor haze, I’m afraid she’ll say that name again, just to hurt me. So when she hands me another shot, I take it, because with each one I drift further and further away from the reality of it all.
From the truth.
Sometime later, I end up on the couch, sandwiched between Kinsley and Ava. The apartment’s full now with boys I’ve never met, and it’s the last place on earth I want to be. Every time I tried to disappear into my room, though, Alexis leveled me with a warning look, and something about it kept my ass in this seat.
The cushion dips beside me, and I glance to my right to find an unfamiliar boy breathing my air.
When did Ava leave?
A look of confusion passes over his face. “Uh, not sure,” he says, and I realize I asked the question aloud. I squirm. The couch is too small, and he’s too close, his shoulder brushing up against mine. “What’s your name? I’m Patrick.”
“Ivy,” I mumble.
Kinsley snickers from my other side. “Jeez, Ivy. How much have you had to drink?”
Three shots. No. Four?
Beneath the haze, a jolt of panic shoots through my body. Shaking my head, I push off from the couch, eager to move away from this strange guy I don’t want to talk to and definitely don’t want to touch.
Suddenly needing fresh air, I start toward the door, only to have my arm tugged back.
I don’t think. I just act, whirling and yanking my arm out of his grip, accidentally smacking him across the face in the process. Except it’s not the guy. It’s Alexis, standing there with a reddening cheek and a look of shock that quickly morphs into rage.
“Fuck. I’m?—”
I can’t get the words out before she retaliates, striking like a snake, only this time with her fist to my face. My head snaps back, pain bursting from my cheek bone as my skull cracks back against the wall, and I know she’s been waiting to do that since theI don’t believe youin the girls’ bathroom junior year.
“You fucked him,” she seethes. “Admit it. Just fuckingadmitit.”
Tears spring to my eyes, and I nearly lose my balance. I wonder if that’s why she’s been plying me with alcohol all night—to get me drunk, so I’ll finally tell her the truth.
Not a chance in hell.
Something inside me snaps, and I know I’ve reached some kind of breaking point. Alcohol lowers my inhibition, the pain in my cheek urges me on, and when the words come out, I don’t recognize them. They’re all venom, poison thrown back in her face, and I don’t recognize the part of me willing to dredge up this memory for the sake of a comeback. I don’t recognize this girl who’s capable of fighting back because I didn’t think she existed.
“He told me things about you, you know,” I rush out in a low voice, my heart slamming into my sternum. Heat floods my veins, and my whole body quivers, the anger inside me combustible. I wantherto hurt for once. I wantherto know what it’s like. “He told me you were annoying and desperate. He told me your ass was too flat and your chest nonexistent and that he was only with you because you were easy and jumped at the chance to suck his di?—”
She lunges for me again, and I shrink against the wall, shielding my face with my hands. I’m not fast enough, though, and her nails make contact before someone’s dragging her off of me. My chin burns where she scraped off a layer of skin.
