“Not a Casa type of girl?” he yells.
“Hell no!”
I’m an Ason Williams Jr. type of girl and he didn’t explain that no matter how many little shots I swallow to chase his taste in a building full of strangers, I’d never find it.
* * *
That warmththat scooped me into its arms is like magic.
It fixes whatever I think is wrong, like all the loud noise that Splashtown produces. It quiets everybody’s hollering into a nice, comforting hum and I wonder why I even hated all the noise. It turns Bryson’s teammates into swarms of buzzing bees that act like I got honey stuck to my skin because they keep brushing against it, even though Bryson told them there wasn’t enough for them. It even made him look different. He wasn’t lil’ Bryson that got his braces off the summer before tenth grade and that same warmth made him brave—toobrave.
“Hold on,” I mumble, pulling his hand away from my sarong again. “I need to pee.”
Bryson smacks his lips and leans his body over mine. “Hold it.”
“No! I been holding it.”
He rolls his eyes and I try to ignore the throbbing fullness between my legs as another bottle makes its way around our corner. Blurry faces and numb feet keep my head spinning and my ass rolling into Bryson’s center.
I’m not the only girl in our corner anymore because DJ G5 named it the “vibers section.” Those same weaves, braids, and wigs from earlier weaseled their way in to vibe with a team they don’t look twice at on campus.
“TheHollywoodeffect.” LaQuan grins, slapping Bryson in the chest.
“Yeah, whatever.” Bryson rolls his eyes. “Half these females be the main ones talking slick about him.”
His face stretches into five different blurred versions of itself. The enticing mirage the liquor created drains while my bladder throbs and he gets more agitated at Ace’s ghost hanging in our section.
I push away from him again.
“I told you to hold it,” he says, gripping my arm and pulling me back into him.
“I can’t! Let me go.”
“I’m not walking you down there. If we leave, somebody might take our spot and I’m not waiting outside no fuckin' girl’s bathroom, anyway.”
“I don’t need you to walk me.” I snatch my arm away. “I’m grown. I can walk my damn self down there.”
“Well, be grown then. Go walk yourself.”
How did my bladder turn into an argument? I guess liquor makes us fuss about everyday things that wouldn’t matter if we were sober. I’ve added it to my list of all the strange magical things it does.
I push out of our corner and a girl eases into my spot in front of him as soon as I step down into the pancake of bodies below us. I float between them, elbowing away strange hands and ignoring girls’ stares until the girls’ bathroom sign sticks out against my blurry vision.
“Finally,” I huff, pushing inside.
It’s as loud inside as it is in the party.
I stumble into a line of gossiping girls. Their voices and the liquor remind me of Chelsea’s made-up stories about the random people we see around campus.
I fall into the gritty wall, shifting my weight from one foot to the other, fighting against another wave of homesickness while another Dough song blasts through the speakers.
This time all the things I tried to fight my homesickness with falls by the wayside—the giggling girl, Bryson, my first party alone. Now, I’m just tired of the warmth and chaos liquor causes. It’s no wonder Ace didn’t want me having it.
When it’s finally my turn in line, I stagger into the open stall. Toilet paper and pee line the rim of the toilet. I don’t have anywhere to sit to make my circling head stop.
DJ G5 scratches the record again. “Y’all still ain’t seen Hollywood in this bitch? Somebody hit that nigga up and tell him we on one in here just for him!”
“Ugh.” I groan, following DJ G5’s instructions and going straight to Twitter.
