The Best of Us

twenty four

mentions/depictions of sexual content

DECEMBER 2014

JUSTIN'S ARM WAS around my shoulder, his thigh was pushing firmly against mine and his lips were almost grazing the shell of my ear as the music pulsed through the house, ringing inside my head and vibrating in my chest; buzzing right through me.

"What's up with you two?" He shouted, his voice drowned out by the sound swelling in the air. I was submerged, sinking beneath the weight of it; my agitation prickling the space beneath my skin. "Why haven't you been talking to each other?"

I glanced at the sofa where Bradley was sitting, surrounded and squeezed in by various guys and girls. A brunette I didn't know was sitting beside him on the arm of the couch, playing with his hair. She was leaning into him, her lips moving against his ear, and every time he smiled at her, bright and lovely, she smiled back like she had accomplished something. She hadn't. Bradley smiled at everyone.

Unsure of how to answer Justin's question, I shouted, "I don't know! I don't know what's going on with him!" And ignored the pang of guilt that followed.

Watching them agitated me further, but I couldn't tear my eyes away, no matter how much my stomach tightened and how sharply my heart stung. It was only then that I realised how stiff and tense my body was, and I made a great effort to try and sink into the slouch of the sofa, to relax my shoulders and loosen my jaw and release my frown, but my mouth still felt apprehensively held and I wondered if there was a glint of disgust in my eyes. Not that it mattered. It would go unnoticed by Justin and everyone else. Everyone except Bradley, anyway, but he wasn't even looking at me. I couldn't decide if it was intentional.

My inability to forget about him was making me sick of myself. Normally, I was able to have fun at parties, especially Justin's. Normally, I would hang out with my friends and laugh and drink, but my friends were all dispersed or missing and my irritability prevented any chance of a good time. I hadn't bothered counting my drinks, but, however many I'd had wasn't enough.

It didn't help that Justin's parties were always packed. This one was completely claustrophobic, but I seemed to be the only person capable of noticing it. Still, I tried to use it as a feeble excuse as to why that girl was sitting so close to Bradley, but it did nothing to soothe my bitterness towards her.

I wished that Heaven was with me. Being around Heaven was medicine for feelings like those ones. Her composure pacified me. Everything became treatable with Heaven, even if not curable, but I didn't know where she was and hadn't answered the texts I had sent her-- which I had expected anyway-- so there wasn't much I could do.

Looking for her seemed daunting and I couldn't ask any of her friends because I didn't know where they were either. They were probably all together, I supposed, locked together in a bathroom or singing terribly, the music too loud for them to be heard.

I would've been able to relax a little more around her, at the very least. Parties were very hit or miss for her and she would've understood my moodiness without pressing me for answers, which was something I associated more with Layla.

I didn't know where she was either. As predicted, she had come with Heaven and some other girls and had apparently been snatched up by Miles the second she got through the door.

Then there was Bradley, who I hadn't said a word to all night. We didn't talk before Jacob picked us up, we didn't talk in the car, we didn't talk when we arrived. As soon as we got to the house, I lost him and only found him again by chance when I wandered into the living room with Justin, immediately bothered by the fact that he didn't look at me because he was too busy talking to the girl fawning over him.