Our eye contact was broken my my friends crowding around me. "That was awesome!" Heather gushed. I blushed a bit at all the attention, and allowed the group to lead me outside near the pool. Zac and I shared a lounge chair, the center of the newly converged group. The subject had since changed, and I found my attention drifting away.
Zac gave me a worried look when I got up and excused myself, but I returned his expression with a reassuring smile. "I'm just going to get a drink," I explained, "does anyone want anything?" I asked.
Macy broke from the conversation to ask for a refill, and handed me her cup. I took it and wove through the throngs of people to the keg we'd just left. There was a bit of a line, but it went quickly. I hurried to fill the two cups, not wanting to make others wait behind me. In my haste. I spilled one of the newly refilled cups down my shirt, soaking the material in a soppy, frothy mess. I groaned, filling the cup, yet again and moving away from the keg to assess the damage.
I found one of the, surely several, bathrooms in the house, which thankfully had no line. When I entered, though I found I wasn't the only one who'd taken advantage of the tucked away room. Inside, a couple was groping each other, a blonde getting what would almost surely be a hickey. Though I tried to exit quietly as to not draw attention to myself, the two turned and my eyes once again met those from earlier. Chad.
I need to get out of here, my brain said, but my legs were having trouble moving, the shock of the sight in front of me, cementing them to the floor. I quickly recovered and stammered a lame 'sorry' before running down the stairs.
My friends were still outside where I'd left them. "What happened to you?" Heather asked. Was my face really that transparent? "Your shirt is a mess", she finished.
"Oh, I spilled a little, you know me." I shrugged. My friends were used to my clumsy nature by now, and they laughed at my latest episode.
As they returned to their conversation, I couldn't pay attention to them. My mind was drifting again, to Chad, as always. I thought that this party would be good for me. I thought that it would help to get my mind off of him and the disappointment I felt. But, once again, I'd been wrong.
I'd allowed myself to entertain the possibility that perhaps that girl he was out with the other night was just a friend. I hadn't seen them touch or kiss or anything, so the idea hadn't seem too far fetched. But now, after what I'd just witnessed, I could easily rule that possibility out and face the fact that we'd been on two completely different pages.
I needed to move on, I thought. "Zac," I said quietly, nudging him. "Can we go inside?" I asked, wanting to tell him about everything, privately.
Zac nodded and excused us from the group. "What's going on?" he asked, expertly reading my expression. "You seemed off ever since you got back."
I hadn't updated Zac on what was going on with Chad and me in awhile, so I had to start a bit further back. I explained the pizza parlor, Chad coming to my room at night, me hitting him on accident, the bathroom incident.
It felt good to tell him everything, though he seemed a little shocked once I'd finished my story. "You know honey, I'm all for the bad boy thing. But you don't need that drama." he said, giving my hand a comforting squeeze. I knew he was right. "Come on, he said, tugging my arm, "There's a whole party of boys here. Let's find a cute one to cure you." He winked, mischievously.
Zac's shenanigans were no stranger to me, and I knew that a bit of shenanigans were exactly what I needed tonight. I downed the rest of my cup and followed him to the beating heart of the party: the dance floor.
There were several bodies shimmying and gyrating to the beat pouring out the DJ's large speakers. We wove our way toward the center and joined them. Before long, we were both partnered up. The boy dancing with me, I recognized from the soccer team. After a few songs filled with flirting and less than holy dancing the chiseled blonde bent down to be better heard, "Do you want to go outside?" he asked.
