As Easy As Murder

12. prince repulsive

Packed bodies move against each other, swarmed by high-pitched screams, the air radiating with excitment. Liquids slosh in cups, love is found and lost. I've found myself at another party with Jesse and Loretta. Janey couldn't come because of you know who, and the other 3 just aren't pushovers and enablers like yours truly.

Loretta is off in the corner somewhere, showing off those moves I interrupted at the library yesterday. Me and Jess are sitting towards the back of the building in blue comfy chairs. I pull down my dress, thighs rubbing against the course fabric. I'm leaning over the armrest to see Jesse's phone containing a photo of his little brother Joshua at his first ever school dance. 

I smile warmly. Joshua has his arm around an equally tiny and awkward girl, looking like he's debating his every room, the panic in his eyes evident, "I remember those days," I recall, and suddenly feel really damn old. 

Jesse nods, "Me too. I think I spent my whole first dance in the bathroom. Putting on make-up, washing it off, putting it on again, washing it off. Debating if being judged for being the feminine guy was worth the risk to look like myself." He sighed. I put a hand on him arm, letting him know my pride for him. 

The host of the party, a hotshot guy with a mohawk, stands up on the bar counter, drunken swaying and all, and unfolds a piece of paper, then starts..proclaiming a speech? "Thank you all for cominnnnnn', I uhhhh...It's....FUN. Fun fun funnifdy funny...yoohoooo! If I were a rich man, de ne ne ...ne ..." He trailed off and stage-dived, being caught by his tipsy group of friends, and they all go down like a domino effect. 

Me and Jesse burst into laughter, as does most of the room, besides the guy, who shuffles off to the bathroom ashamed. I look down at my drink, and decide I need a refill. I excuse myself from Jesse and go to stand next to Loretta, who is also refilling  her beverage. 

"Hey, be careful, alright?" I say, nudging Loretta, noticing that she seems a bit out of it. She nods. 

"I'm older than you, shouldn't I be the one giving you advice?" She leans against the counter, red solo-cup in hand. I shake my head, snickering, "Not In this case." She rolls her eyes, but smiles. She looks back over her shoulder at a really cute guy, a fluffy-haired corner kid, backed away, avoiding all the intoxicated noise. Just Loretta's type; the underdogs, the shy guys who don't know what they're doing. 

I shake my head, "Don't do it. Guy looks traumatized already, you go up, and he'll admit himself in a psych ward." She laughs, and looks back over at the practically cowering guy. 

"I wasn't planning on seducing him," She rolls her eyes again, "I was gonna ask if he's okay. He looks shell-shocked." Upon another glance at the kind of cute first-time part-goer, I nod, and push her over, figuring she'd maybe help him at least step a toe out of the corner and maybe even say his first curse word. 

I walk back over to Jess, who is trying to explain to a wasted girl that he doesn't swing that way. I put an arm around him, the girls valley-girl words slurred to almost incoherency. "He's livin' la vida loca." I explain. This obviously doesn't help the girls confusion. 

"Cover our drinks," Jesse says as I sit down, and he starts to guide the girl back over to her group of friends who seem to be looking for her. In his absence, one of the guys who had to catch mohwak back there approaches and sits down in Jesse's seat, slinging an arm over my shoulder. Oh great. 

"SOOOOOOO," He starts at about 100 decibels. I actually jump a bit, eardrums threatening to file for assault. "What's with theeeeeee....get-up? Are you likeeeee, a fortune teller?" 

I look down at my flowy-sleeved purple cocktail dress and see where he got in the impression. I shake my head. He inches closer, smell of alchohol strong enough to kill an elderly person. I move away, but he just does it again, and we end up in this bizarre shuffling dance, until I'm backed up against the wall with drunk Dave over here looming over me like a storm cloud. 

"Back off," I yell, pushing him. He staggers, but returns to his position, I roll my eyes, the Elton John on the speakers not really fitting the situation. Memories of my ex once again pour into my brain like a witches potion, sturring around until they have me under a dazed spell, frozen into a half-there state, the other half of me wandering back in time to all those awful nights, the awful arguments, the crying in Loretta's arms. 

"Y'nowwwww...I like those fishnetsssss...but I think they'd look better ripped...." Just at that moment, Jesse comes running over at superman speed, and rips the guy off of me, swinging him around like a wet noodle while giving him multiple pieces of his mind, yelling things that ranged from stupidity to threats to castrate the mowhawk having perv. 

I eventually get him to calm down, leaving the guy laying on the ground with a chunk of mowhawk next to him. He grabs my arms, "Are you okay? I can't believe this happened again. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have left you alone. Do you want to le-" 

"No, I made you guys leave last time. Have fun, I'll power through." We go back and forth for a while with a lot of 'are you sure's' and 'I don't know if thats a good idea's'. He eventually believes me. And I powered through alright, on alchohol. It was a weak moment, but the alcohol help relieve the memories, so I just kept going, until my stomach was warm, my legs felt wobbly, my thoughts were disconnected, and Jesse and Loretta were helping me out of the party.

We got out into the still night air, but I felt anything but still. The world arounf me swirled like I was seeing it through a decorative glass, I mumbled things that I couldn't even understand. Loretta's grip on my right arm weakened enough and I drunkenly pulled out of her grip, I fell right over the curb, knee landing on a sharp unfinished peice of pavement, getting a nasty gash in my knee. 

Blood gushed out of the wound, and Jesse's panickes voice faded as I started to close my eyes. When I opened them again, I was sitting on a bench outside of the hospital. Red light from the emergency room sign illuminated my surroundings, Loretta was holding a cup of water out to me, and my knee was bandaged up. 

I took the cup of water, sipping it slowly. "Thanks..." 

"No problem," Loretta nods, and Jesse hoists me up. "Can you walk?" 

"Yeah, I think so, did they..did they sober me up a bit in there?" I steady myself, gesturing to the hospital behind me. They both nod, and I sigh, ashamed of what I did. Not that the injury was my fault, but how out of I got was. I promised myself I'd never let myself develop bad coping mechanisms, that I'd deal with it naturally. And I broke that tonight. 

Interrupting my solemn thoughts, a car passes by blasting ubeat music, and Loretta starts twerking, earning a honk by the car behind it. I start laughing, and Jesse follows, then so does Loretta. Our laughs echo through the street, and my spirits lift a bit, the world suddenly feeling like a decent place to be, afterall, it's only a dying rock floating among others in a big black void. 

We pile into an Uber, Loretta bugging the driver with one million tipsy questions. Even though she didn't end up black out drunk like me, she still managed to get to flirt-level drunk. The Uber driver  is also, um, about as old as her grandfather. He's just smiling amusedly. Jesse looks at the two of us. 

"Next time, I'm going to get wasted to give you two a taste of your own medicine. I'm tired of being the Dad." 

We all laugh, and the Uber driver suddenly interrupts with, "My Dad's dead." 

We all go silent, eyes wide. Then we all start laughing again, including the Uber driver. Interesting ride. 

Eventually we pull up outside the dormitory. We all get out, and I tip the driver graciously for having to put up with Loretta's awful pick-up lines, Jesse's alcohol burps, and the laughing about the death of his father. RIP.

We enter the dormitory, and a surge of pain goes through my knee, like  my body just remembered it hurts out of the blue. Jesse helps me get to the elevator, and it opens to reveal, who else. The brain worm i've been fighting myself. The guy who ruined Blondie. My murder case partner, introducing, Kori. Is the elevator his spawn point or something? 

His lips part to release a snarky comment, but close when his eyes reach my knee. Blood has seeped through the bandage, and his brows furrow in something that resembles concern, but he quickly regains his belligerent demeanor. "Uh-oh, what's that, Morticia Adams? Looks like you partied too hard. And why are you dressed as a wizard?" 

Okay, never wearing this dress again. I don't need to be walking around looking like I'm going to present you your Hogwarts acceptance  letter. 

Jesse and Loretta don't defend me and instead chuckle, and I want to show up to Prof Simon's lecture with all 3 of their obituaries and tell her I got confused about the FAKE part of the murder assignment. Kori is straight-faced, still waiting for an answer about the knee. 

"None of your buiness," I hobble past him, using the elevator bars as support. His arrogant demeanor faulters again as he sees my struggle to walk, and it looks like he's actually feeling sympathy. Babies first emotion. What a milestone. 

When he realizes I'm not going to give him an answer, and amn't clear-minded enough to anyway, he turns to the Jess and Loretta, raising his eyebrows in expectance. Almost like he's blaming them for this, almost like he's..mad at them for not protecting me. Almost like he..cares? 

Jesse sighs, "It's just a shallow gash, didn't even need stitches. Why do you care, anyway? I thought she was disreputable?" 

His eyes go wide like a deer in the headlights and he clears his throat, "My parents are nurses, I suppose the amount of medical talk in my house has rubbed off on me a bit, when I see an injury, I ask about it, alright?" His tone goes from calm to agitaded and accused, French accent making another entrance. He finally steps out of the elevator. 

"By Lucifer." I give him a princess wave as the elevator doors close in his face. It opens on my floor, and Jesse makes sure we are settled before calling a ride back to his condominium. Loretta makes me lay down, even after I assured her I'm okay. She goes into the bathroom and comes back with bandages, and adds another layer of dressing onto my knee. It's a low moment, the usual reckless and spontanious girl leaning over me and having to be the responsible one. 

She sits down on the ottoman, taking off her shoes. I do the same, removing my knee-high lace-ups. I put on my favorite true crime podcast and let out a deep breath, memories of my ex still at the edges of my mind, like seaweed caught in a fishermans net. I just have to wait, wait until I catch that special fish. 

I text Dad a goodnight next, inform him about my injury, send a picture, and then call it a night, slipping into a negligee, because they make me feel like I'm in the sleepover scene from Grease. I fall asleep to the sound of my podcast and Loretta argueing with Janey on the phone about breaking out of her collin-set handcuffs. 

I have my own set of metaphorical handcuffs to break, while also studying about physical ones. 

How do you find a prince charming in a world of Gaston's?