austin's & co.

chapter t h r e e

"miss, what happened here tonight?" the officer asked me, and in my current state he sounded slurred, like i was hearing him from a radio station that was barely connecting. i looked up to meet his eyes, but was blinded by the flashlight he had directed towards me. all i could see was his silhouette behind the luminescent light, but nothing else. there was a groan somewhere next to me, though i couldn't tell who it was.

the question the officer asked was a fair question. what had happened that saturday night?

let me tell you.

-

now, i, lydia jennings, have been to a lot of parties in my seventeen years of being on this earth. i've been to birthday parties, bacherlorette parties, wedding parties, dance parties, raves, and those parties you're invitied to when someone's parents are out of town. i've seen some crazy things happen, things that only happen at parties.

so, when i tell you that the party xander threw the saturday after school started was the craziest party i've ever been to in my entire life, it means something.

xander is known to occasionally throw a party every now and then, inviting his attractive friends, letting his brothers invite their attractive friends. usually it's just them, alex, and me. this was not the usual xander party.

since school had just started and the bitch circle was looking for something to do together to start the year off, alex and i invited everyone in the group to come. that's when it all started.

kylie was in her third block when her phone went off in class, signaling that she got my message. her third block teacher was the awful mrs. redding, who actually took up phones when she saw or heard them, unlike the rest of the teachers, who didn't actually follow the rules, thank god.

"let's see what miss popular over here couldn't wait to get until after school was out." mrs. redding announced to the whole class, holding kylie's phone up to her face. "hey ky. party at alex's place saturday. starts at 9:00. be there or be square!!!" now, i don't know if mrs. redding intended to implode the entire senior class of jackson high, but whether she did or didn't, she could now add it to her resume.

her entire third block heard this message, passed it onto their friends, who passed it onto their friends, and, well, you see where i'm going with this. xander's small get together with a little beer pong and a little music was no more. it was now a jackson high rager, and there was no turning back. we were now in sudden death.

the day the message went out to everyone in my grade was thursday. at lunch right after the incident, i could hear excited whispers all around me. it was like i could feel the atmosphere in the cafeteria buzzing. looking around, the excited aura matched the excited expressions on the faces of the people surrounding me, running from person to person, sharing news. if only i knew.

sitting down at our table with farris and marlee, about to ask what all the noise was about, that's when i saw kylie headed towards the table, her head down. this was unusual. kylie was one to talk, one to flaunt what she had. usually her head was up and she was talking to someone, laughing with someone, her dark curls bouncing around her. did someone die?

it seemed the other two at the table noticed her different behavior, because they swapped glances with me. farris's expresion read, "what the fuck?" while marlee's was more, "what happened?"

in that moment, i could practically feel that something bad was coming. and soon.

the second kylie was a foot away from our table, the words came tumbling out of my mouth, "what did you do?" her startled chocolate brown eyes met mine as she sat down, then they looked apologetic. alex, evie, ian, and lucas were making their way to the table, giving us all the same look we were probably giving kylie. that "what's going on?" look, where you practically have a question mark written on your face.