Drift

Chapter 12

"Hath anyone ever told ya that ya hair is like... Dat chocolate water fountain. Yeah. The one from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I can thotally see that. I could just eat it up."

Then Alex started gnawing at my hair.

I think you could say that she was sufficiently drunk, thank you very much.

It only took one distinctively familiar "WHOO" from her to make me realise that maybe she was having a little too much fun and that I'd need to abandon my tour of Charlie's house to rescue her.

She wasn't puking yet though, which was a good sign.

"You know," she started. "If we were characters in a movie. I'd totally be the main character. You'd be the sensible sidekick that keeps. Me. In. Check."

I smiled in vague acknowledgement and looked worriedly for Charlie. She needed to sleep right at that moment, and he was our ride home.

I also didn't know how much longer I could stand personal-space-invading, very drunk Alex.

"Hello, Mrs Girl-who-can-argue-for-America! Fancy seeing you here!"

I smiled at an incoming Kendall, who was already smiling at me.

Once he reached me, I let myself laugh and reply, "that's a pretty long last name. Especially since my real one only has 4 letters."

He raised his hands in surrender, "that's fair enough. But you should really try to make a witty greeting with the music as a distraction. It's very hard."

"You're HOT!" Alex interjected. It was funny, because she wasn't even looking at him. Her eyes were closed.

"Thank... You." Kendall replied with a chuckle. "How drunk is she right now?"

I looked at her forlornly. "On a scale of one to ten? I'd say, a solid seven. But she's not very aware of personal space. She was chewing my hair less than a minute ago."

"Ah," Kendall said with his signature chuckle. "It means you probably want some company."

I nodded and he sat beside me. We were sitting on a couch and watching the party progress right in front of us. The lights, the dancing, the music, the people. It was all very overwhelming if you weren't really in the party mood.

"So," Kendall began. "What brings you to this bomb party?"

"The food," I immediately replied, nodding my head in assurance. I didn't want to tell him that I was only here because Alex forced me to, and that the only enjoyment I'd found was snooping in Charlie's house and finding a Perry the Platypus poster.

"I, too, came for the beverages. I dunno, parties aren't really my scene most of the time. I had to do it for Alan, though. You have no idea how long he's been waiting for control freak Mandy to break up with him."

I sat back on the couch, intrigued by the story. "Why didn't this Alan guy just break up with her and avoid all the grief?"

Kendall chuckled, "yeah that's the thing. Breaking up with Mandy Williams is just something you don't do. She will bring hellfire on us all, condemning Alan to a sad, lonely life because girls would be too scared to date him for fear of her wrath. He realised all this when he got to know that Mandy's last boyfriend was the most unpopular guy in school. People hated him, and they didn't even know the reason. Only Mandy did, and she felt no remorse. So, you see, one simply does not break up with Mandy Williams. You have to get her to break up with you. Make her think it was her idea this whole time."

I was dumfounded. How could one girl cause so much... Havoc? In my experience, if you were so problematic that people needed complex strategy to avoid you (and threw a large party when they finally got rid of you) then something needed to change somewhere in your personality.