Swallow

Chapter 1.23:

I had been stuck inside my head, cursing at myself for the last twenty minutes over absolutely nothing and everything at the same time.

Mia was licking her greedy lips as she smiled up at me. I closed my eyes and leaned my head back so I didn't have to look at her. With my eyes shut tightly, I pressed my fingers down harder to apply more pressure.  My index finger shifted and landed in the wrong spot.

I cringed. That wasn't what I meant to do.

Tonight was going horribly wrong. I had thought last night was bad, but this one was much worse.

Everything felt so off. I had to concentrate too hard on every simple thing I was trying to do.

Too fast.

Too fast.

Slow down.

Steady tempo.

Right there.

Just like that.

Slow, slow, and steady.

Much better.

Fuck, I sped up again.

Hold out. Longer, just a little bit longer.

What the fuck was I even doing?

When I opened my eyes again, Mia was still grinning at me, waiting eagerly for me to finish.  She was an idiot and so was JD for inviting her and her friends over to band practice tonight.

I plucked the wrong string harshly and looked over at Aiden. He was giving the side stink eye with his mouth buried against the microphone.  My mistake pulled his vocals sharp and he was irritated.

It was not like we had been talking much since this morning. Things had been tense between the two of us all day. He was still upset about Riley and I couldn't give one fuck about what his brain was conjuring up.

I started trying to finger-pick the buildup to the chorus, but the song we were playing wasn't the one in my head right now.  I had another one simmering on the burner and it had all my attention. I had been hearing the same notes all day as I hid in my room, staring at the pill bottles I grabbed out of the closet as soon as Riley left this morning.

I got as far as taking the lid off one of the bottles, but I put it back on as soon as the pale green pills caught the light. Jake had given me the good stuff as a going-away present.  He knew Oxy was my favorite weakness and he slipped me enough of the strong ones to keep me high for days.

"Stop. Stop." JD yelled out in the middle of the song.

I pulled my left hand away from the strings and squeezed the neck of the guitar with my right as JD looked over in my direction.

"Ezra, what's up with you tonight?" JD asked, sounding like he was slightly concerned.

"Nothing. Let's just keep going." I started strumming again with too much power and speed behind it.  One of the strings snapped in half under the vicious assault.  I pulled my hair at the root and gnashed my teeth together.

Restringing my guitar was not on my fucking agenda tonight.

JD walked across the makeshift platform towards me and motioned for me to step to the side of the stage so he could talk to me with less ears listening in. 

It was his fault we had an audience in the basement. JD couldn't help himself. I had gotten used to Anna's constant presence, but she wasn't even here tonight. I bet the two of them would end up in a full-on war if she found out there were a bunch of girls over the house that she didn't know about. It would be even worse if she knew her dumbass boyfriend was the one who invited them all.