James immediately noticed the lines of my face fold into a bewildered grimace, so he let out an amused chuckle.
He was screwing with me, as usual.
“Shouldn’t you avoid smoking and drinking right now?” I asked. Will just sat down on my bed and shrugged.
“My pee is Jackson’s, and his is so clean that I could take a shower in it,” asserted James, cupping his hand in front of his lips to light up the joint.
“James, eww.”
Will and I looked at him reluctantly.
“And so can you two manage like that?”
“What’s your problem?”
“Well, I don’t think that’s right,” I insisted obstinately.
“Keep your moral opinions to yourself,” he spat, embittered.
“James.” William called his name in a mellow voice, but the calmness had left my body a while back.
“What makes you think you can smoke in here?” I went back on the offense.
“This one always ruins the fun.”
“You can stick it where I tell you to. In your ass to be specific.” I said the vulgar comment, now exasperated.
“June!” exclaimed Will laughing, then he got serious and went back to rekindling James’s innate curiosity. “About the first thing we said about doing something fun?”
“What do you meanfun, Will?” An unexpected glint flashed in James’s dark eyes.
“I don’t know. June?”
William threw the ball back in my court, and I didn’t know what to come up with. “What’s fun for you?” he asked, letting his gaze drift on my bookshelf.
“Um.”
I spent my nights watching old true-crime documentaries. I was boredom incarnate, and James would never let me live it down if I told him about my obsession for cold cases.
“Let’s smoke, then, since you guys are completely short of ideas.” A fed-up James shot me down.
“Look, put that thing out. You can’t smoke in my room. I don’t understand why you always have to be so rude!”
“Says the one who—”
James bit his lip, piquing my curiosity.
I shouldn’t’ve provoked him, I knew that, but it was stronger than me. I sat on the edge of the bed next to William and stared at James with my arms crossed.
“Who what?”
James turned around to look me right in the eye.
“Someone who keeps making out with my two best friends.” I turned purple. Immediately. The provocation ended up being stronger than expected.
“You made out with Jackson?!” exploded Will, sounding incredulous.
“What? No!”
