This Girl I Met

10

It's 4 AM when Moe and Danny finally leave. That leaves us alone, just the two of us. When I turn around, she is staring at me, her arms crossed against her chest. 

I smirk. 

"Alcohol ?" 

She smiles. God that smile is too much. I feel my stomach being attacked by butterflies. I know I have to regain control. 

"Yes, please" she says in an almost begging voice. 

We settle on the couch. 

During the rest of the evening when the others were still here, she would talk to anyone but me, trying to keep the conversation as far of her troubles as she could. But she knows that it doesn't work with me, and since I accidentally told her I like her (ugh), there's no way back. She seems tensed, but happily take the glass I hand her. I crack a smile, surprising myself. The thing is that, when I am drunk, I become seductive to people I am attracted to. I doesn't happen much (I don't find a lot of people attractive, to say the least), but now I just can't help it. She seems to play the same game than I am. 

After ten minutes of drinking in complete silence, our eyes meet. I giggle, and she seems to look at me deeper than she usually does, her sparkling blue eyes never leaving mine. I find it funny how I am not disgusted by this. 

"You know you'll have to talk about it, right ?" I softly say, trying to catch her into my seduction net. 

She drinks again. "Probably." 

I don't want to force her to talk. But now that I am invincible thanks to alcohol, I can't help but ask about it. I mean, seeing her with a black eye or other things on her body she doesn't deserve makes me angry. The truth is that I want to help her, even though I am not supposed to like her. And that's the weirdest feeling ever. 

She looks at her hands, and starts talking :

"My dad was an alcoholic" she says in a sadder tone. I try to say something, but she immediately goes on : "He was beating my mom, my youngest brother, and my twin sister. The whole fucking family. When he passed away - overdose - she just blamed us - me - for everything. So she just started to act like him." 

I immediately sit nearer, and try not to be too obvious. She watches me doing so, a grin on her beautiful face. 

"I'm sorry." I let out, honest. 

She looks up at me, quite amused. "Well, my life is full of crap. I live with it." 

"That must be... hard" I say, not sure she wants to say more about herself. 

"Believe me, you don't wanna know what's next. Because usually people are just like freaking out and don't talk to me anymore, just because they don't know what to say" she continues, looking down at her half-empty glass. 

"People aren't me" I whisper. 

That makes her laugh. She then gives me one of those looks she never gives anyone : it's a mixture of nostalgia and smirk, a look that is hard to understand when you're in front of her. I smile. 

"You sure aren't." she lets out, taking another sip. "Enough about myself for tonight"

I am slightly disappointed. "For tonight ?" I ask, raising my eyebrows. 

She laughs. 

"I guess you'll have to see me again. Alone." She then straightens, and fills our glasses with Vodka. I am starting not to feel that well, but I take it anyway. She then just smirks and enjoys the little grins I make while drinking. "Your turn, Horan." 

I suddenly feel very tense, which has to show, since she immediately seems to regret what she said. I close my eyes : I don't like people to get too close. Especially not someone I could actually like or something.  

"We should probably go to bed" I abruptly say. 

She nods. 

**

When I wake up the next morning, she's gone. 

I sigh, taking my time to go out of this bed. It's 10 AM already, and I have to be ready in one hour maximum. When I go in the kitchen, I only see Bati, working on his laptop. When he lifts his eyes and finally sees me, he just gives me our usual high five and keeps on working. I take some food from the fridge, and then sit down on the couch. I turn the TV on, watching some stupid news about how people did stupid things. A trial of a man that got caught stealing some stuff because he wasn't clever enough to know there were security cameras, or a heroic fireman that saved a cat instead of a woman. Typical. 

When the door opens, I see Allie rushing to the fridge, taking something as well, before sitting next to me. She knows I dropped a party here last night : she actually was the one to tidy everything up, cleaning the dirty floors and hiding the bottles we left behind. She's not the kind to make any comments : she knows I'd have done the same thing for her. But she looks concerned. 

"Have you seen the cops on the streets ?" she asks, her eyes locked on me to see my reaction. 

My brain doesn't take long to make up some stupid ideas. I look down at my corn flakes, trying not to dramatize. 

"Where ?" I ask in a cool voice. 

"At Sonnett's. They've been here for ten minutes, and it's like an ambulance is on its way, I..."

Before she can even finish her sentence, I make the connection. The cops. Sonnett. Her mom. I rush outside of the house, Allie and Bati following me. When we get to the place where the police car is, we see a security barrier, as well as some of our neighbors. I feel my heartbeat accelerate, as I am trying to see something, anything that tells me she's okay. But I don't see anything. 

Allie tries to reach one of the officers, but they just ignore her. That's when I see her, all covered in blood. 

I mean, her face is. She probably got punched in the face by her mom, and then one of her teeth broke or something. Seeing her so weak, so hurt just gives me the courage to go over the barrier and run to her, avoiding the cops. While I am running, I suddenly see someone next to her. Some policemen are taking someone out of the house on a medical table. She seems unconscious, and highly white for a person. It then strikes me : she looks just like Sonnett, so I guess it's her twin sister. 

When she sees me, Emily just burst into tears. I finally reach her, and pull her closer without even thinking. While I am hugging her, I realize she isn't hugging me back, only her hands are grabbing my arms with strength, and she's crying on my shoulder. That doesn't stop me from hugging her tighter. I have one hand on the back of her head, and another around her shoulders. I then see some cop telling the officer that followed me not to do anything. My eyes then fall on her twin sister, who seems to be dead. Like, really dead. 

I didn't realize it before because I was too caught up with Sonnett's health, but her mother is standing right here too. She is yelling at the officer, while two cops are holding her back by the arms. 

"Let me go !" she yells with fierce. She then sees me, gives me a meprising look, and then puts her attention back on the police. "I didn't do nothing ! That bitch did that to herself !"

But the cops aren't stupid. They took her on a car, while the ambulance is taking her twin sister with them. That's when Emily just pulls away and says : 

"She's been brain dead for two years, there's nothing you can do"

The officers look at her, in shock, but decided to take her to the hospital anyway. When she looks back at me, she's got tears in her eyes. I suddenly think of something. 

"Where's your brother ?" 

"My brother ?" she repeats, clearly misunderstanding. 

"Yes, last night you told me you had a younger brother" I explain, frowning. 

She sighs. "He's dead too."