Party (5 page)

Of course, if we did jump in the ocean, we might also ruin any buzz we had going at the time. All of us—me, Ryan, Daniel, and Matt—had been planning to get hammered at all costs ever since we got the party flyer on the last day of school. The plan was to meet here at Matt’s, hang out for a while, then head over to the party and get good and drunk. Josh would drive, as usual, since he didn’t drink. He’s cool like that.

Then Josh showed up. His mood sorta ruined the evening, which sucked because usually it was his mood that got the party started even if he wasn’t a drinker.

I looked over at him.

“So what do you want to do?”

“Fuckin’ kill her,” Josh spat.

I said, “Okay.”

I finished my cigarette and we went back into Matt’s house. Ryan and Daniel were playing Madden Football as Matt rummaged through his CDs. All trying to act like it was just another night out, when for Josh it was anything but. That first weekend without your girl is a bitch, I guess.

We needed to get him to the party, fast. Maybe even try to get a couple beers in him for once and spend the whole night ragging on his ex. Problem was it was still early; lots of time to kill. It was only eight-thirty.

Josh didn’t say anything as we walked back into Matt’s room. He went over to Matt’s desk and slumped down in Matt’s ratty old swivel chair. Matt gave me a look as if to say,
He feelin’ any better?
I shook my head a little. Matt frowned and shut off this Jennifer M. & The Pasadena Theory CD—she had this voice that punched your guts but it was somehow not appropriate background noise—and traded it out for Minor Threat. Probably to try to cheer up Josh.

“You can’t just be happy with what you got,” Matt said suddenly in response to a lyric.

We all looked at him.

“It ain’t possible,” Matt went on. “Even if it was, it ain’t
practical. If you was just happy, like … like livin’ each day like it was your last or something, you wouldn’t go to school, you wouldn’t go to work. You’d just bang every babe you could.”

He paused and took a breath. Looked around at everyone.

“Right?”

We all laughed at him, because that’s what friends do. Matt took an appropriate moment to look pissed, then laughed with us, because that’s what friends do, too. We didn’t laugh too long, though, because the “bang every babe” comment had hit Josh hard, and none of us caught it until it was too late.

You could see Josh thinking,
Wish I’d thought of that
.

Morrigan and Josh had been going out for about five or six months. He was really into her, but not so into her we all got left behind. You know how that happens sometimes. I admit, we all pretty much liked her; she didn’t seem to mind that he spent time with the guys, since she was permanently attached to her friend Ashley. The girls I’d dated inevitably got all pissy about me hanging with Josh or the guys, so I ended up breaking up with them because it was like, you can’t tell me who my friends are, right?

Ryan, on the other hand, never broke up with anyone, because he never actually
dated
anyone. He just hooked up. He was one of those guys who could pick a girl out of a crowd, like a lion picks out a weak gazelle or whatever. Ryan hooked up like nobody’s business, and I think the guys were a little jealous of him for it. He stayed away from the girls they liked or dated, though. Maybe it would have been better if he
didn’t. Josh never would have gone out with Morrigan if Ryan had been there first.

Thing is, Josh was a virgin, but we never gave him any grief about it. Well, almost never. He was cool with it. It was some half-religious, half-straight-edge thing with him, or at least that’s how it sounded. So we gave him shit sometimes, because that’s what friends do, but we also envied him somehow. Just a little. He never threw his guts up or woke up hacking green crap, for instance. So yeah, we were jealous of that.

At least we were until Morrigan tore his heart out. He didn’t have the consolation of even having had sex with her.

So she had to die. I suggested we discuss how to kill Morrigan Lewis.

The topic got Josh talking again. Awesome. Daniel and Ryan even turned off their game.

“Dragging her behind the Blazer has a certain appeal,” Josh said. “Or maybe just like a couple of baseball bats. Beat her ass like a piñata.” He flexed his fists, his two black X tats squirming under the skin as if to get out and attack his ex.

“Antifreeze,” Daniel suggested. “Slip it into her beer. That would be hard to trace back to anyone.”

Josh nodded enthusiastically and flipped his bangs out of his face.

“Just shoot her,” Matt stated. “Why get complicated? I mean …”

“Who’s got a gun?” Josh asked.

None of us did.

“Plus then the news gets involved,” Ryan pointed out. “If it bleeds, it leads.”

We stared at him before laughing again. Ryan flipped us off and checked his cell for the time. He was probably ready to start drinking. And he was probably ready to start his prowl for a chick to spend the night with.

“You know what the problem is,” Daniel said, “is that we’re even talking about this. If you’d attacked her right when it went down, it would have been a crime of passion. Now it’s premeditated. That’s like first-degree murder or something.”

I didn’t mention we’d all be guilty of conspiracy, but whatever. Not that it mattered; it was all testosterone macho horseshit anyway.

“And hey … I didn’t hear the whole story, Josh,” Daniel added cautiously. “I mean, I know what happened, but …” He let the word hang. Daniel’s the analyst of the group. He loves it when there’s tension so he can dissect people’s heads. He won’t pick a fight, but if there’s a conflict, he’ll be there to pick it apart and study it.

Josh stared at the carpet. It was stained with three years’ worth of Super Big Gulp soda and ashes from when we used to smoke in Matt’s room. Evidence the room had been populated with high school guys, I guess.

No one said anything; the spotlight was Josh’s, if he wanted it.

“I went to her house,” he said.

None of us moved. Distraction could end the story. I could tell Ryan was struggling not to look at his cell for the time again, ready to get the story over so he could get “drinkin’ and
doin’,” as he called it. The Minor Threat CD was still playing, like an outraged sound track to this monologue. Very cinematic or something.

“And she came outside,” Josh said. “Said we needed to talk. I said okay. She asked me why we hadn’t slept together, and I told her—I was like, because I don’t think it’s a good idea. And she’s all, because of me? And I said no, that wasn’t it at all. I just thought we should wait, that’s all. It’d be worth it. We could do other stuff, you know? We
did
do other stuff. And then she’s all, so you don’t love me. And I’m like, no, that’s not it. I just kinda feel like it would be wrong, you know, because, you know … that’s what God
says
, and it’s what I believe in anyway …”

I saw Ryan roll his eyes, but kind of behind his hand so Josh wouldn’t see.

“And she goes, ‘I don’t care if God loves me, I care if you do.’ Which if you think about it is pretty fu-cocked. And I said, I
don’t
want to do it because I
do
love you. And she’s like …”

Josh paused and shook his head.

“She said, ‘you don’t want to touch me,’” he went on. “And I told her that was dumb, I touched her all the time, but she just started shaking her head. And then she said it was over, and that if I couldn’t show her I loved her, then there was no point.”

“Is it the first time she’s brought it up?” Daniel asked.

“Yeah,” Josh said. “I thought she was happy.”

He ran a hand back across his sloppy black hair.

“I guess that’s what I get for trying to do the right thing,” he
muttered. He used a fingernail to pick at one of the X tats, like he was trying to scrape it off. I don’t think he knew he was doing it. I wanted to stop him.

Was it the right thing? I mean, the rest of us had done it at least once, and it was no big thing. At least, I didn’t think so. Josh was coming from a different place, and it’s not that I looked down on him—it was his choice, and he’s my bud, so I backed him up. He never told
us
not to get laid or drink or … whatever.

“So is she gonna be there tonight?” I asked. I was hoping not.

Josh shrugged again.

“Do you wish …,” Ryan started, then shrugged. “Nah.”

“What?” Josh said. “Do I wish I would’ve done it with her?”

“Well, I’m just saying.”

“No, Ryan, what are you saying?” Josh was getting pissed now.

Ryan must’ve felt the change in temperature. “No, nah, it’s nothing,” he said, and pulled out a cigarette.

“Whoa,” Matt warned. Matt’s mom was cool, but didn’t let us smoke inside anymore, citing Matt’s carpet as evidence. Fair enough. Ryan rolled his eyes, not hiding it this time, and shoved the smoke back into the pack.

Josh’s hands kept clenching and unclenching. “Look,” he said, like he was trying to stay all calm, “I know you guys think I’m like this total freak show for not having sex, with Morry or anyone else. But it’s my choice, all right? No
babies
, no
diseases
.” He tossed that in Ryan’s direction, since Ryan’d
had more than one brush with both over the last couple years. Ryan just rolled his eyes again. I was happy when Matt punched him hard on the shoulder to make him stop; it was annoying.

“It’s one thing I know I can get right, it’s one thing I know I can control,” Josh went on. “Me and her get together and that’s fine, it’s cool. Well, we
used to
get together. If she didn’t like it, she shoulda just broken up with me, then she could go screw whoever she wanted! Which, it turns out, is exactly what she did, so no, I’m not sorry I didn’t have sex with her. Especially not now.”

The rest of us looked at each other. No one wanted to take the ball. Ryan looked a little guilty, but I could tell he wasn’t about to open his mouth and make the night worse.

“I need a smoke,” Matt announced.

It broke the moment, and we went out front again.

Outside, we all lit cigarettes, except Josh, of course. Him and me sat on the lowered tailgate of his Blazer. Matt sat on the roof, and Josh didn’t seem to care. Daniel and Ryan stretched out their legs in the backseat. A few months ago, Josh had flipped the rear bench seat to face backward. “Tailgunner,” we called it.

“Well, soldiers, technically, it’s senior year now,” Daniel said, and blew a couple of smoke rings.

“Yeah,” Matt said from above us. “Senior year. Dude, Josh, forget Morrigan! We’re gonna be seniors. You can date whoever you want! Seriously, man. Forget her, I mean …”

“Totally,” Ryan said. My guess was he was trying to make
up for what he’d said in Matt’s room, to get Josh to feel better. Ryan hated it when people were mad at him. “In fact, you should get so hammered tonight, man. Just get blitzed for once. Forget all about her. That’s what I’m doing.”

“You’re gonna forget all about Whore-igan?” I joked, which got a laugh. Nice.

“Man, I’m going to forget my own
name
,” Ryan said, and we laughed again.

All of us but Josh.

I wanted to grab him and shake the crap out of him. Josh was the guy we all relied on to get us out of our own shit when it went down. He was the one whose house you could go to at three in the morning and wake him up so you could bitch about your parents or girlfriend or whatever. I knew because I’d done it more than once. I just liked hanging with him like that. Seeing him this way tonight was throwing us all off. I could tell I wasn’t the only one who thought so. I hated Morrigan Lewis for doing this to him, and I hated her for what it was doing to
us
.

We’d been friends since junior high, us five.
Cinco amigos
. Band of the Hand (taken from this dumb eighties movie Matt loved). That sort of thing. Now at the top of our last summer together, it was going downhill because
Whore
-igan got it into her head to throw my buddy under a bus for choosing something that I’d have thought most girls would find—I don’t know, noble or honorable or something. I just don’t get women sometimes.

“Forget it,” Josh said, and leaped off the tailgate. “I’m out.”

He walked to the driver’s-side door and fished his keys from his pocket. None of us moved. I wondered if he’d try driving off with us still splayed on his truck.

And I saw our whole night going down in flames.

“Josh,” I said. “C’mon, we all gotta go party. If she’s there, you can show her what a great time you’re having without her, you know?”

Josh nodded; then the nod turned into a shake. “Naw, man” was all he said.

“What else you gonna do?” Matt asked him, looking like a modern-day gargoyle on top of a cathedral.

“Let’s go get totally hammered!” Ryan cheered. “Rack up some sweet chicks and tear it up.”

We ignored him. Josh spit on the street. “I’ll prob’ly just go home,” he said.

“What do you want
us
to do?” I asked, sort of squinting an eye at Josh. I didn’t think it was a good idea for him to be alone all night.

Josh flipped his key ring around his finger,
jang-jang-jang
. “Call me in the morning,” he said. “See if I’m still here.”

The rest of us traded looks. Josh could have meant anything by that.

“Hey, man,” I said. “If you don’t go, we can’t go. And we can’t not go. C’mon.”

“Exactly,” Daniel said. “Someone’s got to drive the getaway car after we poison her.”

“Wait, what happened to shootin’ her?” Matt demanded.

“Nobody’s got a gun,” Ryan reminded him.

“Oh. Yeah,” Matt said, frowning. “Well, whatever we do, let’s do it fast, ’cause I gotta eat.”

We all looked at Josh, who was still flipping his key ring around in one hand, like he hadn’t heard a word.

“Josh?” I said.

Josh shook his head. “Look,” he said, gripping the key ring hard, “I don’t think I can—”

Right then, Matt cut this magnificent fart, and we all laughed our asses off, rolling in the street. It was like a machine gun being fired underwater. It was an expulsion to be proud of, one for the history books. I knew we’d be telling stories about this epic Matt Fart ten years from now. He leaped off the roof of the Blazer like his ass had caught fire.