Addicted To You .L.S.

Thirty Three.

One Year Ago
(Sixteen Years Old)

Adams's back field is flooding with people. Schools finally done and his mums out of town, leaving him and his brother to throw a party that everyone in the whole Country seemed to have shown up for.

After waiting forever for the bathroom and a much needed pill break, I head outside to find Harry and Aaron. I stumbled down the back steps and I tell myself it's because of my leg.
It's not.

"Hey, Louis, careful." Adam hurries over from the cluster of kegs and coolers at the end of my deck, grabbing my arm. He leads me over the the picnic table, where Amber is sitting next to a tray of Jell-O shots.
"Having fun?" She asks me as Adam wraps
an arm around her waist.
"Yeah." I lie. I'm sweltering, I rather be home then out here; getting drunk and bitten by mosquitoes. I've already had a few drinks, but I take the little plastic cup Amber hands me and we tap them together before popping them back. Fake cherry and vodka slide against my tongue and I swallow hard.

"Where's Harry?" Amber asks.
"Not sure. I thought with Aaron," I say.
"I saw him in the house earlier with Jess," Adam says. He squeezes Ambers waist, pulling her closer as music suddenly booms through the yard. "Oh, you gotta dance with me, babe." And Amber grins at me as I wave them off.

I abandon the Jell-O shots and go back into the house, weaving my way through the crowd of older people. They are definitely Matt's friends, if the smell of pot coming off them is any indication. I'm walking through the living room into the kitchen when I hear it.
"Screw you, Harry!"
I walk in on the tail end of confrontation. Harry and Jess are smack dab in the middle of a crowd of people, Jess swaying on her heals planted in the brown plush carpet. She's right up in Harry's face, and Harry clutches onto his red plastic cup looking miserable. People are staring and I catch Kylie's eyes from across the room. I mouth, how long?
She shrugs and raises her eyebrows like, need some help? I shake my head.
They've been fighting on and off for a week now, so I'm used to it. I walk over to him and grab his arm. He's shaking, wobbly in a to-many-jello-shots way and he stubbles against me.

"You're suck a jerk!" Jess lunges at him and someone grabs her by the waist, pulling her her away and out of reach from us. Harry steps towards her, like he's gonna fight and cause more of a scene. I grab him, struggling to stay balanced and restrain him at the same time. It's kind of hard considering I'm borderline drunk and I just snorted two lines in the bathroom.
"I'm done, I'm done!" Harry says. It's more for my benefit so I don't end up falling, because I will if he keeps this up. He rolls his eyes when he realizes the rooms gone silent, everyone's staring at him. "Let's go," he huffs and he stalks out of there, with me following, as usual.

"Um, Jess still has your keys," I say as I try to catch up with him. He's already half way across Adam's yard, heading towards the winding dirt road that leads to the highway.
"I took care of it," he says. He stops, turns, and waits for me. When I reach him, he loops his arm in mine. Out here, away from lights and cloud cover, the stars shine amazingly bright and Harry tilts his hand up to look at him, a smile on his face.

"I'm so breaking up with him," he announces. "And I don't want to talk about it anymore."
I stumble, kicking up clouds of dirt with my boots, navigating around tuffs of prickly thistle. "Whatever you want," I say, but inside I'm glowing, triumphant.

"Come on, Lou," he skips ahead, shaking his hips to the strains of music floating from the house. I grin, following him.
"Who'd you call?"
"Gem."
I stop. "You didn't."
"Of course I did." He tugs me forward, knocking his hip against mine. The moon is bright and I'm messed up enough to let my eyes linger on the curl of his hair, the dark ripple against his pale skin. I can smell vanilla underneath the pine and almost-rain scent in the air. "She'll freak when she sees us drunk."
"I don't care. She'd freak more if we ditched Jess and drove drunk. You know how she gets about cars."

This is true. Gem is morbidly afraid of something else happening to me. Even years later, she watches me in that way I've gotten used to, part fear, part want, all protectiveness. Occasionally I'll turn, meet her gaze. Sometimes she doesn't look away and I catch a glimpse of what all the other boys see in her, what they want from her.

"Becks probably with her. He hates me," I say.
Harry laughs, a little too long. He always was a light weight. "He really does; you should hear him talk about you. He's gotta mouth."
"Gems boyfriend talks about me?" I ask, surprised through my Oxy-vodka haze.
"Well, not to me. I heard him on the phone one day after you left. I took care of it."
"What was he saying?" I stagger to stop and face him. "And what do you mean you took care of it?"  Harry sighs, dropping his arm from mine and leaning against a fence post. He bends down a plucks a flower, twirling it between his fingers. "It doesn't matter." I watch him tear off the petals, one by one–he loves me, he loves me not–before tossing the stem on the ground. He spins in a lazy circle, his arm fly around him.
"Anyway, everyone knows you and Gem are gonna get married with babies and stuff," Harry says with a smile, but I can hear it; the bitterness underlying his slurred words. "And Beck wants her for good. She can't admit the only person she wants is you."
"But I don't want Gem," I exclaim.

Sometimes I wish Gem knew that she was caught in the middle of this; then I wouldn't feel so guilty. But she can't imagine it because Harry hides behind his secrets and I wither away my soul with pills and we are Just Fine, Thank You. Reckless boys dancing down the dirt road, waiting to be saved.

"We'd be brothers if you married Gem," Harry whispers, his lower lip sticks out like he's pouting at the thought of it. Like Gem's taking away a toy she wants. The idea horrifies me, it makes me want to vomit. 

"You are not my brother."

Harry blinks and his eyes glint in the moonlight. I want to lean forward, press my lips against his. I need to know what his mouth tastes like—sweet, maybe, like strawberries. I'm almost messed up enough to do it, emboldened by his fight with Jess and how high I am. I step towards him, but my knee gives out, the pain sharp and sudden, and it makes me falter. I pitch forward with an 'oomph' and Harry catches me halfway. But I've got four inches and twenty-five pounds on him and we end up tangled in the dirt, laughing. Giggles fill the air as truck headlights wind down towards us.

"There you two are." Gem leans out the window as she cuts the engine. "I heard you shrieking all the way down the road."
"Gem!" Harry beams at her and his hands squeeze my waist in the way that makes my stomach leap. "You came! I'm breaking up wth Jess. She's a bitch."
"And you're drunk." She gets out of the truck and hurls him up, gently setting him on his feet. She brushes dirt off his shoulder before crouching down next to me. "You fall, Lou?"
"I'm okay." I smile and she smiles back, the corner of her face retreating. She waits until I hold my hand out for her to pull me up.
"Steady," she says when my leg wobbles and I lean into her. Gem is solid, warm. Harry giggles and presses into her other side until she's got two armfuls of us. We hold on to her. Put her between us like our barrier against the truth. But his hand finds mine behind her back our fingers lace together, the click of our rings a secret sound only we understand.
Some barriers, they're made to be broken.