The Arts

10 - ...And I'll Cry if I Want To

ANDI

          Andi wasn't totally sure, but she had the sinking feeling that she was high.

          She had never smoked weed in her life, but there was simply no other explanation for what was going on with her. The fuzzy vision, the feeling of her brain fading in and out of focus, the sudden urge to raid this Jack guy's kitchenette...all of that just from eating a brownie!

          Wait, how many brownies did she eat?

          Four. Literally four.

          She had arrived to the party late to avoid Kiara, resulting in virtually no food being left over. Andi's choices were to eat pizza with black olives and mushrooms or to dig into the desserts. So she had managed to plow through four weed brownies. In her defense, they were tiny, like, not even the size of a regular brownie, so eating several made sense at the time.

          Andi wasn't even that freaked out about consuming weed, which she frankly didn't even think was possible — seriously. She had seen weed brownies in a TV show once, but she didn't know if she could take it as legit. The party answered that question for her. No, she could not believe that she had the audacity to flirt with Tyler.

          Confidence was never Andi's strong suit. She always figured her dream relationship with Tyler would be a slow burn, but she had single-handedly ruined that entire plan by accidentally getting high, openly flirting with him, and then losing her balance while getting rejected by him and pushing the both of them to the ground.

          If her goal had been to embarrass herself and become the laughingstock of the entire freshman class, she was hardcore overachieving.

          Andi couldn't stop the tears from coming. With her back against the wall, she slid down to the floor and buried her face in her hands while heaving sobs took over her body. She hadn't even had a minute to herself before there was a knock on the door.

          "Go away!" Andi screamed.

          "Um. I have to pee," the voice on the other side said.

          Andi groaned and slowly stood up to unlock the door. Someone stepped in. "Just make it quick. Don't worry, I won't look, I'm high and can't see anything." She grimaced as she spoke, having completely lost any semblance of a filter. She sounded like an idiot.

          The other person — he was a boy, Andi could tell that much — re-locked the door and leaned against it. "I lied. I don't have to pee. I just wanted to check on you."

          "Oooh, sneaky liar," Andi's back was once again to the wall. She crossed her arms and sniffled.

          "You know weed's disgusting, right?" The boy's mouth was curled into a look of disdain.

          "Of course I know that," Andi rolled her eyes, "What I didn't know was that the brownies had weed in them. This was an accident."

          "I believe you," he said. Andi wasn't sure he was telling the truth.

          "You know what, I don't need this crap," Andi doubled down, getting defensive. "I just got rejected by my crush, and then everyone saw it because I'm accidentally high, and you come in here pretending to care when you just want to scold me? What are you, my dad? Just get out of here!"

          The boy's face drooped a little. "I'm sorry. Hey, I'll be right back."

          He left for what felt like forever, but returned with a cup of water and a throw pillow from the couch. Andi placed the pillow between herself and the wall and took the cup from the boy.