FOUR

ARABELLA

"We're here, sluts!" is what Adrian call out to Imogen Ryan's house when we pull up by the sidewalk. Mrs Hale, our local neighbourhood crazy cat lady, gives us an evil eye as she scoops up her mail from the letterbox.

"We're coming!" Mandy Kineski shouts from her open window. We can see the two of them scrounging around in her closet for cute things to wear to the party. She's in a lace bralette, not caring that everybody on the street can see her changing. As Mandy and Imogen wrestle into their clothes, Adrian uncaps the bottle of vodka sitting on her lap and take a long swig. You might be worried since she's behind the wheel while she's tossing back straight alcohol but she can drink all night and hardly feel it.

"Here," Adrian gestures for me to take the bottle from her lap with the end of the cigarette she has lit up a few minutes ago. "Have some."

I wordlessly take the vodka bottle off her and sip a little, the taste of straight alcohol burning my throat. I grimace. God, I hate the taste of alcohol. And I hate drinking in general. It makes me feel out of control.

Adrian finishes her cigarette and flicks it out the window. As she moves her hand to honk down, the two other Raptor girls finally appear out of the door. Even though Adrian and I are tight as hell, we're pretty close with Mandy and Imogen as well. They've been part of our crew since freshman year. They did try-outs with us and they make the team at the same time we did. Now we're juniors and every time there's a party, we go together.

Imogen is picking her way down the walkway in thigh high boots, even though it's summer. Her dark hair flies behind her like a cape while Mandy's strawberry blonde has been strung up in two space buns on top of her head. Mandy is channelling some serious Aaliyah vibes with the distressed mom jeans and the spaghetti strap top tuck inside.

"Nice boots," Adrian snickers as Imogen and Mandy slides in the back.

"I know right?" Imogen flips her hair back and we laugh. She makes a clawing gesture with her hand and I pass her the vodka. She takes it the same way how all the girls here take it- straight with no mixer. Everyone jokes that going to Riverside High prepares you for the total college experience: you learn how to study while you learn how to drink on a budget.

"I hear Katelyn Rossi is gonna be there," Mandy pouts into her compact mirror to double check if her frosted lip gloss has smudged.

Adrian groans, annoyed. Katelyn Rossi is Adrian's current worst enemy (yeah, it changes almost every week), mostly because Katelyn's dating Thomas Fuller, who Adrian kind of have a thing for. The thing is that Adrian goes through crushes like I go through Fresh Prince episodes so you can say that her crush for Thomas isn't too serious but nonetheless, Adrian despises Katelyn. "Ugh, great. The party's now ruined with white trash."

"Adrian!" I gasp, my tone full of disapproval.

"What?" Adrian rolls her eyes as she lights up another Camel. As the traffic light switches to yellow, Adrian presses her foot down the gas. Mandy squeals as the vodka she's about to sip splash onto her top. "It's true. Katelyn is so white trash I'm not surprised if she ends up going to college in a fucking trailer park."

Imogen and Mandy laugh at that while I just shake my head. I can never full on bitch about people the way how Adrian does, especially about Katelyn since she has never really done anything wrong to me. And I wish Adrian will just see that Katelyn's an actual sweetheart- she's always really cheerful about everything and she helps out a lot at church, especially with the bake sales.

"Anyway, who cares about Katelyn Rossi? What matters is Jonah and you," Adrian casts me a sideways glance. "What happened yesterday night?"

I can feel myself turning warm. I'm so glad my skin is dark enough that it doesn't show. Yesterday night, Jonah, my boyfriend of two months and a half, had picked me up for a date at the bowling alley. It had gone alright until we were driving home. There's this moment when Jonah has to slide his hand under my shirt and he's roaming around and gripping it like a doctor looking for lumps on a breast cancer patient. I try to make myself feel turned on like I'm into it, but somehow I can't find myself liking it.

When I've pushed him off, Jonah went all 'What the hell?' and I told him I couldn't do it. It felt wrong and I didn't want to do it with a guy I've only been dating for a week. You would think Jonah and I are the types of people who belonged together- he's Quarterback and captain of the Riverside Football team and I'm the captain of the Raptors. But I couldn't do it. And the thing is, it's not even Jonah's fault. It's not the first time I tried to make myself enjoy a sexual experience with a boy and I've clammed up. I don't know why I'm so touchy about it- whether it's just because I don't like the idea of sex or maybe I'm afraid of it.

Needless to say, Jonah and I kind of left things in a stale situation. He told me he didn't know when we're going to get serious and I basically went on a whole rant on how sex isn't the way how we'll decide. Then he pretty much broke up with me on the spot. Truth be told, I'm kind of slightly relieved we broke up. I hate the way he kissed, all full of tongue and saliva, and now that he's out of my life, I don't have to pretend like I genuinely enjoyed his company.

The weirdest part about this whole thing is I used to have the fattest crush on him. When I won Homecoming Queen last May, he came up to me to congratulate me and I was so elated that I kept smiling for hours. But then we officially became a couple and suddenly, I realize how annoying he was. Like how his 'make me a sandwich' jokes are unfunny and sexist. Like how he never washes that Yankee sweatshirt he wears almost every day so it smells like mildew and sweat. And it's like what's wrong with me? Half the school wanted to go out with Jonah Wilson. It's not like I was totally miserable with Jonah but it's just that I have to keep finding reasons to why I liked him in the first place. And now I don't. That's what I meant by us breaking up being a relief.

"Um...we kind of broke up," I confess to Adrian.

"What?" Adrian's eyebrows stitch together. "What happened? You guys seemed to be doing so well!"

"He wanted to have sex and I wasn't into it," I shrug, settling myself in on the passenger side of Adrian's rundown ancient tan Ford Taurus, which me and the rest of the girls have nicknamed Starkeisha, getting a familiar whiff of vanilla from the little cardboard tree dangling from the rearview. "So we broke up."

"What the fuck?" Adrian almost screech. Her knuckles tighten over the wheel. "He fucking broke up with you because you won't put out? That's fucking bullshit. I'm going to murder him. If that's the first thing I do when I get there." 

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finally updated lmao