Out of Time

Chapter 2

Cooper had never enjoyed tequila. Though, he had no issue with most other forms of alcohol. So when Gabe offered to get everyone drinks, he agreed without sending any preferences after him like the rest of his friends. Chances are, whatever he brought back would suffice just fine.

Besides, it wasn't the taste he was after tonight. It was the effect.

The easy bliss that rolled over him like a fog covering the morning. The empty conscience, as clear as the sky after a storm sheds its last tear. The lack of worries and anxieties, a slate as perfectly clean as a newborn's.

That is what he needed. It was, after all, the day before he went home for four weeks of winter break with no one but his mother for company.

Intent to reach this goal as quickly as possible, Cooper shouted for a competition to see who can down their drink first as soon as Gabe returned, his arms laden with red solo cups. Only two of the others even bothered to try and beat him, but that didn't matter. Now he was the victor instead of someone with too much experience. He was a champion instead of someone to worry about. Now he was grinning with his friends in the midst of the party with a pleasant itching at the corners of his brain, scratching away the edges of his anxieties. He would need another few drinks to erase them entirely for the night, but he could wait until someone else suggested it. He certainly didn't want to appear desperate.

Two and a half drinks in and the itching was replaced with a warm blurring at the edges of his thoughts. He would need another soon. Something was still nagging at him and if he focused on it for too long, it would come to the surface instead of hiding in the shadows where it belonged.

He was swirling the last dregs of his cup around, letting his friends' conversation bounce around him when he heard his name. His head snapped up.

"What?" he asked, blinking rapidly to force his mind to focus on what was in front of him.

Gabe smirked and pointed vaguely at Cooper's cup. "I said, what are you looking for in there?"

"Still searching for the purpose of the universe, Mr. Philosopher?" Dylan added on, guffawing at his own, blandly reused joke. Anytime he was caught lost in thought, someone had to bring up his major of choice.

"Nope. Searching for a fuck to give about your girl problems." Cooper thanked the small part of his brain that had somehow tracked their conversation.

"Or lack thereof," Tyler tacked on.

Now, the others joined in on the laughter. Cooper found a cruel sense of vindication at the red seeping through Dylan's skin. An emotion he would have quickly tampered down if this was before alcohol's whispering influence in his ear. That vengeance, that burning desire to avenge any inkling of weakness, to turn any vulnerability on its head before it even knew what hit it – that was his nurture, not his nature. That was something he could dial down. Though in his current state, he was relying far more heavily on his nurture-raised habits than the current ones he was attempting to build.

"I'm already over her. I just think–"

"Then why did we spend the last five minutes listening to you whine about how she rejected you?" Max grinned, a pointed eyebrow raised in Dylan's direction.

A few snickers bubbled over and Dylan sputtered incoherently, searching for an adequate response.

"Don't worry about it. Plenty of fish in the sea and all that, right?" Cooper said, taking pity on the poor boy. Boy? Man? Of the entire group, Dylan seemed to be the one still teetering towards boyhood with his slightly pudgy cheeks and small eyes.

"Max? Is that you?"

Cooper turned with the rest of the group towards the new voice and instantly regretted his hasty judgment. If Dylan was teetering on boyhood, this kid was barely in elementary school. Sure, he and Dylan looked around the same age, but this kid had an air about him that screamed a lack of practice in any social situation. Maybe it was his rectangular glasses that framed his nervous eyes. Maybe it was his straight black hair that hung in a limp cut and had clearly never before seen the benefits of gel. Either way, Cooper could tell that this kid was trying on an extrovert's skin for the first time, as if he had just discovered the word's definition.