Susan leaned back, her lips tight. I shrugged.
“It’s okay,” I said. “It’ll be fine.”
Katie looked at me like I was a child who needed a Band-Aid. “Are you sure, Anna? I’ll stay here with you, and we can make our s’mores in the backyard.”
Shaking my head, I said, “No, that’s ridiculous. We’ve been planning this for weeks. I’ll be okay.”
Katie crossed her arms. “Okay. But we can leave anytime.”
I smiled as she started texting again.
There was nothing out there. At least, not anymore. I should know. I’d checked. Multiple times after the incident. My old house was on that lake.
It would be fine.
The fire was blazing.Music blared amid the sound of laughter as people sat on tailgates, and others set up tents and chairs. Apprehension crept in like an old friend.
“Anna! What up, girlfriend?” called a familiar voice in a mock, high-pitched voice.
I glanced up and saw Eiryn arriving in his typical rolled to the three-quarter-length position sleeved polo. Relief washed over me as he hugged me.
“Hey,” I said. “I wasn’t sure you were going to make it.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t miss this for the world,” he said, his expression serious as he matched his inflections with his hand movements. “You’re almost twenty! It’s basically a major holiday! I mean, you can already vote and buy cigarettes, and you only have one more year until you can legally drink, but who cares! Twenty is gonna be your year, Anna.”
I shook my head, my mouth twitching into a smirk. I was already feeling the effects of whatever was in the drink I’d finished earlier. Eiryn was always fun to be around, but he was even more fun when I was intoxicated. Not that it occurred often or anything.
“I hope so,” I said. “I could use one of those.”
A new song started playing on the speaker, and Eiryn dramatically put both hands up.
“I. Love. This. Song.”
He grabbed me, pulling me up. There were lots of people here now, and other parties at nearby campsites were blaring in the distance. The energy was surrounding me, vibing down to my bones. It was the right thing to do. Eiryn always made it feel like this. He had a knack for making me forget about anything unpleasant. Or maybe it was the alcohol. It didn’t matter, did it?
After the sun fully descended beyond the horizon, the charge in the air began to sober me quickly. Eiryn had entangled his face with a guy he’d been eyeing the whole night. Their unashamed PDA both amused and bothered me. I couldn’t imagine what it was like to be that free, and seeing it was a reminder of how isolated I was, even here in the middle of so much life.
“Anna,” Katie said, nudging me, breaking the tension building in my limbs. “Look.”
I immediately saw who she was looking at. It was Justin. The guy I had a crush on. If it even was a crush, anyway. After hours of relentlessly needling my brain, I’d produced his name as a guy I found attractive, which provided relief from Katie’s interrogation on my lack of a dating life.
I hadn’t thought about what that relief would cost.
Now, watching him talking to his friends around their trucks, I realized how much of a mistake that utterance had been.
“Come on,” she said, tugging my hand.
My heart was in my throat as I willed myself to resist her, but my body followed along automatically over to the group of guys.
“Hey!” Katie said, halting their conversation.
“Katie! How’s it going?” Justin asked, leaning in for a small hug.
Justin was tall and lean, with a soft, handsome face shrouded by short, wavy hair. We knew each other from high school, from before everything that happened with my mom and the missing year, but I hadn’t seen him since. Of all the guys Katie mentionedtrying to hook me up with, he was the only one I hadn’t completely resisted.
“Katie!” shouted one of Hunter’s friends as he waved his hand with his drink in, sloshing it down his Carhartt.
“Hey, Jaaaay!” she said with a playful twang.
