What Remains of You

The Club

Bright music filled her ears like someone yelling into a canyon. It kept echoing through her, keeping time with her calm heartbeats as she passed the bouncer with the fake ID she just made beforehand. He did give her a bit of a sidelong glance but she suspected that was more to do with her dress, or hence the lack of it, than her age. She had everything ready. And that was when she filled her mind with Dennis.

His eyes, his face, even his room where she had found the diary that began her journey. She knew he wasn't gone, but simply sleeping, yet she told herself that he had died and she would never see him again. Soon enough, tears had pricked her eyes and began to flow a little more steadily down her brazen cheeks. She calmly opened them and took in her surroundings. There were tables set out around her and a coloured light was dancing patterns around the club. The song had changed to an upbeat undertone and her mind raced with the possibilities. Her eyes searched around the place, especially the tables set more at the back, when the perfect thing filled her line of vision.

It was four friends sitting at one of the six person tables with two long leather seats opposite each other. There were two girls and two boys seated there and three of them had drinks in their hand while one girl did not. They didn't look too drunk which was good and who she supposed was the designated driver looked like a pushover with two much nice-ness to give around. She was probably a perfect student who got everything she wanted because everyone thought she was just the sweetest thing and oh how Rebecca hated her already.

Found my victims. She fought the urge to smile again and instead took on a face of fear and smudged her makeup a little more. It's time.

She began her way over to the table that the four friends were sitting at and did her best to look like she was running away from something. She continued to try to push tears down her face and ran making sure that her dress looked as if it had been pushed upwards. As she jogged and jostled towards the people sitting at the table, they glanced her way and gave a concerned look as she sat down beside them. She tried to make it seem like she had been friends with them all along and even did her best to nudge closer to the people sitting there. When one of them was about to open their mouth to speak, she cut in front of them.

"Sorry my boyfr- ex is trying to look for me. Can I just pretend as if I'm with you guys?" They all seemed to look at each other in question, wondering what they should do in the situation.

Rebecca noted everything as one of the men looked really reluctant to have her there. The girl she suspected to be really nice seemed to be nudging everyone along to allow her to stay there while the other two seemed a little sceptical but all around were not against it. It seemed that the general agreement was to accept her, just as she thought it would be.

The nice one with light-brown hair similar to her own spoke up after a few seconds of harsh glances at the opposite boy at the table. "Of course you can stay!" Rebecca thought with disdain that she seemed too happy to be genuine. It didn't matter of course, since her plan had been working so far. She smiled faintly and tried to wipe off her smeared makeup with the back of her hand. The other girl with a square face and fair dark hair spoke up.

"If you want, I'll go to the bathroom with you and help you clean up a bit." She seemed like the kind of person to judge you if you didn't follow her lead so Rebecca agreed to get on her good side and both girls followed her to the bathroom located near the back. When they entered she went straight to the mirror and used a makeup wipe from her purse that she had brought just for this occasion.

As they cleaned up their faces a bit in the reflection, the nice one began speaking, "I'm Avery and this is Alex. Try not to get confused since they both start with A." She beamed and chuckled softly. "The blonde one is Kyle and the other Max." Rebecca returned her smile and looked at her eyes in the mirror as she told them her name. "Re-Kristen." Half-way through speaking she decided it would be best not to use her real name and went with the first one that popped into her mind, she just hoped they didn't hear her slight misstep.

Avery smiled again, we get it, you're happy, Rebecca thought, and placed her hand on 'Kristen's' shoulder. "I'm glad you came to us Kristen, we are happy to help, and just tell me if you need Kyle or Max to knock him out." She winked and Rebecca remembered that she was supposed to be running away from her 'ex.' Alex jumped in too saying, "I have a pretty mean punch too so count me in! He can rot in hell for whatever he did to you." Rebecca wasn't even sure what that thing was going to be yet but she smiled anyways and thanked them.

They made their way out of the bathroom and headed back to the table where the two boys seemed to be in a pretty heated conversation about which sport was the hardest to play. Rebecca made up her mind and jumped into the conversation as she sat down. "I think soccer is the hardest, all the rest are just a bunch of wussies who lean on the other people in the team and pretend like they do things." Kyle and Max stopped speaking and looked at her simultaneously. Maybe I pushed it too far. That was when Max blushed slightly, and Kyle smirked.

"I guess you and Max have the same opinion then," Kyle started. He nudged the dark skinned man beside him who blushed even deeper much to Rebecca's surprise. Avery and Alex sat down and Avery faked being mock-hurt.

"I always thought you had the hots for me Max, but I didn't think I would be replaced that easily." Her hand pressed against her chest in exasperation and everyone laughed. Even Max did, who had loosened up slightly after the comment.

They continued to talk all evening, getting drunker by the minute except for Avery of course. Rebecca didn't get anything to drink, making up excuses as to why not, not because she didn't want to, but instead so she could have a clear head for her whole plan to work out. The only thing she needed to do was get Avery drunk.

The seemingly simple task turned almost impossible. She refused everything her friends offered her, keeping up the perfect 'oh I'm so good, I don't need a drink because I'm going to get you home safe' ploy. Rebecca thought it was utter bullshit but kept her opinion to herself as the night dragged on.

Just as Rebecca was about to turn to plan B, a thought bloomed in her mind. She scuttled closer to Avery who was eyeing Max's drink with resentment.

"Go ahead and have it, I can drive all of you home in my car since these three shouldn't be anywhere near a wheel." She gestured to the three friends who were practically jumping over each other and slurring their words so much to the point where she could barely understand them. Avery beamed at her with a winning smile that she probably practised in the mirror and took Max's drink from the table to which he barely batted an eye. He probably wouldn't even realise it was gone.

Avery took one huge sip of the cocktail and the effect was almost instantaneous. Wow, I thought that only happened in the movies, Rebecca thought, as her pupils dilated and she downed the rest of the drink in one gulp. A shout escaped from her lips as she joined her rowdy group of friends across the table.

Time to continue with the plan.