“Wereallydon’t have to,” I say. “I’m fine with what I see from the car. Really.”
“Fine.” He sighs. “Then I’ll drive the car onto the quad.” He pulls out his keys and stands.
“What?Sam—”
It’s something he would absolutely do. I grab him before he steps around the car. “Okay—I’ll go.”
Sam smiles as he takes both my hands and helps me out of the car as fog begins to rise around us. I follow Sam into it like walking through a wall of smoke, as strobe lights flash all around me and music begins to blare, growing louder until I realize I’ve gone somewhere else.
The smoke fades as Sam takes me down to a crowded basement in someone’s house while their parents are out of town. It’s my first high school party and I don’t know anybody here. There’s a Ping-Pong table littered with red and blue cups. People are not really dancing, but swaying to the music. Several guys are wearing sunglasses indoors. It looks like I came late.
“Did you want something to drink?” Sam asks through the music.
“Sure—what do they have?”
Sam looks at the bar against the wall. “Do you like beer?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I lie. I’m not planning to drink anything. I just wanted something to hold. I remember a trick my mother told me she used back in her day. “Dump it out and fill it with cranberry juice,” I hear her voice in my head.
Sam leads me through the crowd toward a red couch in the back where a girl in a white sweatshirt is sitting with her legs crossed.
“This is my cousin Mika,” Sam introduces us. “This is Julie. She just moved here.”
Mika stands to shake my hand. “Nice to meet you,” she says. “Where are you from again?”
“Seattle.”
“Right. I can tell.”
“You can?” I ask, unsure of what to make of that.
Sam looks at her then back at me. “So how do you like Ellensburg so far?” he asks. I can tell he’s already had something to drink.
“I don’t know yet,” I say. “There isn’t really a lot to do around here.”
Sam nods. “Yeah, I guess. You’re probably used to like, what, laser shows and holograms and 3D arcades and stuff like that.”
“She said she’s from Seattle, not the future, Sam,” Mika says.
“No, we have some of those things,” I say.
Sam looks at Mika. “See.”
Someone bumps into me, almost knocking over my drink, so I step out of the way.
“This is a senior party,” Sam says to impress me. “I had to ask Spence if you could come. He’s the one that lives here. It’s his older brother’s party.”
I can’t think of anything else to say but, “Cool.”
A minute passes without saying anything. Sam tries to make small talk.
“So, what do you like to do for fun?”
“Uh, I like to write,” I say.
“Like books?”
“I guess so. I mean, I haven’t written one yet. But someday.”
