Save the Date

19

I woke up the next morning with another headache.

Patrick and I had barely managed to get McKenzie into the cab. Once we were outside, the fresh air had made her worse and she wanted to go back to the party. We held her back but she was a woman possessed. When the taxi arrived we tried to shove her in the back seat but she hooked her arm around the back of my neck to balance herself. She pulled my head down so that she could propel herself forward simultaneously smashing my head against the frame of the car door. As I cried out in agony Patrick managed to get McKenzie into a full nelson before she conceded and got into the car. Patrick stayed behind to pacify the owners of the house. My nose had borne the brunt of the collision and had begun to throb. Two minutes into the ride McKenzie had passed out and my phone buzzed. My heart stopped, and for a second I thought that it might be a message from Luca. Then I remembered he hadn't asked for my number. The message was from Chris. I should have been elated; this is what I had been hoping for the entire day. Yet all I felt was disappointment which I couldn't explain. That near kiss with Luca outweighed everything that had happened the night before but the look on his face and the tone of his voice before I had left made me a little uneasy.

When we got to her house, McKenzie fumbled with the keys to get inside, which she dropped a few times. Eventually, we entered the house and I put McKenzie to bed and chose one of the many guest bedrooms to sleep in, took some pain killers for my nose and passed out. Now as the sun shone through one of the gigantic windows, there was a whirring sound coming from somewhere outside my room, my head felt ready to explode. I reached for my phone and reread the message that Chris had sent,

Hey gorgeous, I'm sorry that I'm only sending you a message now. My phones charger cable broke and I couldn't charge it. I'm so glad we met last night. You are all I can think about. Let me know if you want to meet up tomorrow. Send me a text.

This was all I had wanted but now I felt...nothing.

Frikkin' Luca and his stupid smirk. I threw my phone down on the mattress. The whirring sound continued and bore into my head as I put a pillow over my face. An explosion of pain came from the centre of my face. I sat up with tears streaming down my cheeks. I had almost forgotten about my nose. I turned to face the mirror directly across the bed. My nose wasn't broken but it had swollen and gone blue, there were dark blue circles under my eyes. I looked ridiculous. A gasp from the doorway turned my attention away from the mirror. "Oh my goodness! You look terrible!" McKenzie stood at the threshold of the door looking fresh as a daisy. Her skin was glowing and she was dressed in pink and grey gym clothes. She held a green drink in her hand. "No thanks to you," I retorted getting off the bed. "Do you have another pain killer for me?" "Yeah, there's in the cabinet above the bathroom sink," she hesitated before entering the room, "Here I made this for you." She handed me the glass of luminous green sludge, "It's flaxseed and arugula." I winced at the sound of the blend but that sent a jolt of pain that felt like it was reverberating in my brain, "Thanks," I said hoping that I had placed enough sarcasm in my tone. "That was wild last night," she said following me to the bathroom. She said it without irony like she wasn't the one to have literally swung from a chandelier. "That's one word for it," I took two tablets and chased it down with the arugula concoction. To my surprise, it didn't taste as bad as it looked, but I didn't want to give McKenzie the impression that I had forgiven her for maiming my face. "What got into you?" I turned to face her. "I don't know actually," she said sheepishly. "Regina kept telling me story upon story of all the bad things Sean had done, and I know she thought that it was going to make me feel better but I felt guilty on Sean's behalf and that was worse. So I took a couple of tequila shots. And you know what that does to me." "Why didn't you come to find me? We could have left or something!" I said leaning against the sink, my nose throbbing. "I did look for you. You were outside talking to a hot guy. I didn't want to disturb you." My heart broke for McKenzie, again. I couldn't stay mad at her, I moved to hug her and she broke down crying. "What am I going to do? How am I going to get past this?" "We'll get through this. Just maybe no more tequila." I said smiling at her. She blew her nose, wiped the tears from her eyes and gave me a weak smile. I used to envy McKenzie in so many ways. She was strong and brave and nothing could sway her. Now I looked beyond her manicure and expensive clothes and saw how the light had gone out of her. "Thank you for being here for me. I don't know what I'd do without you. And I'm so sorry about your nose!" I tried to smile but it made it feel worse, "Yeah, you got me good! Do you know a professional make-up artist? I'm supposed to be going on a date and I look worse than Mike Tyson." "Ooooh, a date! Tell me everything!" McKenzie made us breakfast while I told her how I'd met Chris and the evening we'd partied away. I neglected to tell her about the awkward situation with Luca. How every time I pictured him giving me a smirk or how close our lips had come to touching, I ached. My chest pulled tight and I wished that I could have that moment over. Chris was right in front of me though and he wanted a date with me. Not some random interaction that usually had someone grabbing onto someone else's arm or a mild form of nudity. Luca had clouded my mind and I had to get over him. McKenzie had said she would take me to the mall where they had those makeover stations. "Honey I'm not cheap but those girls know what they are doing with a brush! And you need to look amazing!" I sent Chris a text that we could meet up for coffee in the afternoon, I wanted to sound casual. I couldn't help but want to keep my options open. I wanted to tell myself that I didn't know why but I did know and I had to stop lying to myself. As much as I'd liked Chris I couldn't ignore Luca running through my mind. The delicious pang of knowing I couldn't get what I wanted. At the mall, McKenzie directed the make-up artists who clearly didn't believe me when I told them that my bruising was an accident. They laughed nervously as one of them applied thick concealers of different colours carefully over the bridge of my nose and under my eyes. Once she had finished you could barely see the blue hue of my skin unless the light shone in a specific way. McKenzie paid for pizza at the mall and then we made our way home. I was grateful for the solitude of my car as I made my way back to my flat. I had to get ready for my date.