20 Million Tiny Particles

7. Visions

After a few days of on and off texting, Sheridan invited me to her house. "Another party?" I asked via text.

"Just to hang," she replied with a smiley face.

I emptied a packet of Pink Diamond into my reusable water bottle, a red metal thing I used to bring to the gym, back when I still worked out regularly. That wasn't a Dead Mom Thing, necessarily, perhaps only a mix of summer heat and post-graduate depression.

Plus the Dead Mom Thing.

The first night I opened the giveaway boxes, I glazed through the nutritional facts while dumping the dust of a Cloud Crystal packet into a mug of water. Mostly vitamins, as Sheridan had promised, with vague references to dyes and additives. 200 milligrams of "natural caffeine" sourced from "plants" per cup. Zero calories. Zero sugar, too, but certainly something that made it so unnaturally sweet. That wasn't a vitamin E byproduct the last time I checked.

Cloud Crystal was so-so, but Pink Diamond was addictive. I found myself swirling it around in glasses of ice water throughout the day, avoiding using the whole packet at once so that I could hang onto it for longer without having to purchase it myself. But now, I found I was shaking out the last flecks of pink powder into the bottle.

At this point, the jitteriness I felt the first few times had mostly worn off, but I had to give Sheridan some credit: that first jolt of caffeinated buzz sure did make me feel good.

Now, I was pouring it into my water out of habit, and to show Sheridan that I was in fact enjoying her gift. I swirled the drink around, ice cubes clanking against the inside of the bottle. It was much better cold.

I got to Sheridan's house around eight that night. She opened the door in pink and black patterned leggings and a sports bra. "My class ends at 7:45," she'd told me when sending the invite. "So I might be a little sweaty."

Sure enough, she had a light glean of perspiration on her collarbone, her hair tied up in a topknot and pushed to her skull with a thick black headband.

She told me to come in and immediately apologized for her appearance. "I normally just do yoga classes, but they needed a sub for cardio dance, so I had to take it."

She was an instructor at the Y, one of her many part-time gigs that kept the income rolling in. "I love being busy," she'd texted me when I asked her about her work. With a smiley face, of course.

I followed her toward the back of the one-story house to her bedroom, where I hadn't been during last week's Diamond Party. "Are your parents home?" I asked, noticing the quiet in the house. Chloe the dog had sniffed my shoes as I walked in but then retreated to her afternoon napping spot, too bored with me even to bark.

Sheridan shook her head, now standing in the entryway of her bedroom. "They both work late tonight. Dad had to close at the store and Mom does the night shift twice a week now."

"What do they do?"

"Oh," she said, remembering that we barely knew each other. "My dad manages Ace Hardware. The one on 8th?" She said it with a question so I nodded back at her. "Mom's an ICU nurse at St. Mary's. My sister stays with my Grandma anytime I can't be home, and Dad picks her up on his way back."

A part of me knew she had a sister, and now I wondered how old she might be. I also wondered if it was more of a financial choice or a personal one that Sheridan elected not to watch her for her parents and work instead. Maybe both.

I looked around the room. Sheridan said to make myself comfortable, taking herself to the chest of drawers at the far side of the room to get a sweatshirt from the bottom drawer. She threw it over her sports bra while I took in the space -- an overly white, gauzy type of room, with Hobby Lobby style prints in white frames on the wall above her bed that read "Be vibrant." and "You glow, girl." The room was small, a full-sized bed pushed into a corner with a white wood bedside table, a chest of drawers with jewelry boxes and various clutter strewn about on top, her white desk I'd seen only on Facebook, and closed closet doors. On one wall was a floor mirror with post-it notes stuck on. I couldn't make out what they said from where I stood still in the doorway.