Lost in Hollywood

Halloween With No Candy

"Dude this sucks. Prom without a date is like Halloween with no candy. There's no point." Eli muttered, over his sadly non-alcoholic drink.

He wished he were drunk. At least then this wouldn't hurt so fucking much. But no such luck. He was sober and alone, and this night was quickly proving to be one of the worst of his whole fucking life.

Prom without a date, he had said, but truly he meant prom without Sky. It wasn't just any date he craved for. It was the one and only, the love of his life, the most amazing girl he had ever met, and whom he had lost so many times he couldn't even keep count.

But Demetri, of course, knew all that without him having to spell it out.

"You can only blame yourself for this one," he said, not sugarcoating the truth one bit. "Things were going fine, and you blew it. Again. Had you not decided to act like a jealous asshat, you could be dancing with Sky as we speak."

"Right," Eli rolled his eyes. "Cause I have no reason to be jealous over whatever the Hell it is that's going on over there."

He glanced towards the table where Sky was sitting with her friends from the grief group. Or maybe he should say "friends". Sky had assured him that was all they were, and Eli had actually felt bad about accusing her of something else— but now he was pretty sure his gut feeling had been correct the whole fucking time.

"Seriously, Eli—" Demetri sighed, sounding frustrated. "You need to get your eyes checked. Or your brain. She's sitting and talking with her friends. If that's too much for you, then maybe you need to do some soul-searching before even thinking about dating."

"Oh, so you'd love it too if Yasmine was hanging out with two dudes like that?"

"That's different."

"How come it's different?"

"Because," Demetri made a face, looking incredibly uncomfortable as he struggled to put it into words - the fact that Yasmine was his girlfriend, whereas Sky wasn't Eli's, and thus Sky was pretty much free to do what she wanted. "Because—"

"Forgetaboutit," Eli muttered into his stupid non-alcoholic drink and took a long gulp hoping that believing it was alcohol would make it so. Quite like Jesus turning water into wine.

Of course, he knew Demetri was right. Of course, Eli only had himself to blame for how things were between him and Sky now, but still— was it really too much to ask that Demetri could have been supportive, instead of taking her side in this?

"Tell me it's all in my head—" he said to Demetri, after a short, awkward silence. "Tell me I'm being paranoid and that guy isn't hitting on her."

"Who, Tom?" Demetri frowned, confused.

"No, idiot. The other one. I don't know his name."

Demetri turned to take a look, just in time to see how Sky leaned closer to the tall, good-looking stranger, and laughed heartily at something the boy said. The sound of her laughter felt like someone was stabbing Eli's heart with a burning dagger.

"I don't know," Demetri shrugged, looking rather uncomfortable. "But even if he is, what can you do about it? It's not like you can walk up there and make a scene. As long as she's fine with it, I guess you're just going to have to accept the fact that there will be no candy during this Halloween."

Trying to swallow down the sudden tightness in his throat, Eli turned his eyes back to his useless drink, wishing he had just stayed home. A Halloween with no candy. Right. An understatement of the year. This was no Halloween, nor a prom. This was a fucking torture chamber, where he was slowly being ripped apart limb by limb, his intestines fed to a pack of wild dogs as he watched and bled to death.