“You want one?” she shouted.
“Why not?”
She poured a cup of punch for herself, one for me, and one for Julian, and we toasted. I asked Ellie about Danny.
“He came over to talk to me. Honestly, it was kind of weird, his trying to hook up with me, but he’s probably just doing it to piss you off.”
“Ellie, do you like him?” I asked, praying the answer would be no.
“Of course not! I’d never do that to you, Kami. You know the rule: Friends’ exes are off limits.”
In my heart, though, I knew she was lying. “Ellie, I’m only telling you this to keep you safe: Danny’s a bad guy.” I had been blind when I’d dated him, but eventually I started to understand, and I regretted ever letting him manipulate me. He was a violent, abusive narcissist.
“Can we not talk about Danny?” she asked. “Let’s talk about your boyfriend instead. You know he got me with that fucking costume of his. I thought I was screwed. Who the hell dresses as a cop at a party full of teenagers?”
“I guess that’s what makes it funny,” I said. I wanted to be sure she understood what I meant about Danny, but I knew it would get me nowhere. At least not tonight. So I asked her if she had seen Tay, who by now I had to assume was deliberately ignoring me.
“He’s over there,” she said, pointing to the couch by the window, surrounded by his friends and all the cheerleaders.
“I’ll be right back,” I said, setting my drink down and walking over. When I reached him, he was lighting a cigarette. I stopped in front of him, as if the other people there didn’t exist, and asked, “Can we talk?”
“I’m busy,” he replied.
“Taylor…”
“What the fuck do you want, Kami? You kissed my brother and didn’t tell me.”
“Yeah, when I was a fucking kid!”
“I don’t care. You should have told me. Fuck, he should have mentioned it too.”
“Why, Taylor? Thiago and I have just barely started getting along and—”
“And why is that?” he interrupted me, standing up and walking away from the curious onlookers. He took my arm and pulled me to a corner. “Why is it all of a sudden you two are so chummy?”
I couldn’t think of a response, and he went on.
“Don’t try to tell me that my brother, who’s hated you for years, who’s basically stopped talking to me since we got to this town, and who obviously can’t stand the fact that I’m going out with you, has all of a sudden just decided that you’re the greatest?”
“I…”
“What happened between you, Kami? I saw you get out of his car the day of the storm. What happened to make you two like each other again?”
I nearly started shaking as I remembered how we’d kissed in the car. Just thinking of it again made my palms sweat.
“We talked,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t hear the trembling in my voice.
“You talked?” He narrowed his eyes.
“Yeah, we talked.”
“About what?”
“Like…I don’t know, Taylor. We talked about what happened that day. I said I was sorry, he said he was sorry. I think we both had repressed a lot of stuff we needed to let out.”
“I don’t like how he looks at you.”
Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck.
