Positively Negative [Rewrite]

July12: There's A Name For That

Once the kids had been dropped safely back at home, diving into their candy collections like the little monsters that they were, Abby and I bid my mother a goodnight. I knew, of course, the amount of sweets the kids were ingesting would ensure she had no such thing, which may have had something to do with the twinge of her lips in reply looking more like a grimace than a smile.

Having turned the corner of my street, Abby pulled out a pre-mixed bottle of vodka and passion fruit juice from her bag and offered it to me proudly. I grinned her my thanks as I took it. Mum had made me promise not to drink too much, but I would certainly stop a shot or two from that point. Maybe. Just then, however, it was all about starting right, even if I couldn't end so. I was nothing but nerves vying between cowardice and courageous energy and I was just trying to focus on getting to the destination, even if I would chicken out minutes later and say my goodbyes. Not only was I attending a huge event without the only person I'd ever leaned on besides my mother, I'd kissed Freddie again. I'd admitted to him fractions of the confusion I felt, and I had no idea where we stood from now on, but it didn't quite feel like solid ground. He'd seemed to react positively, but for all I knew he could have just waited till I left to blast the whole encounter around the school. I didn't particularly think him capable, but after everything with Ryan and Courtney, I wasn't about to trust my instinct and judge of character.

After gulping down a sweet mouthful, I passed the bottle back to my friend and got my phone out to text Curtis. On our way. Are you still waiting at the bus stop?

"I never tried that mix," I marvelled. "That's, like, really sweet. It's nice. And, by the way, I wanted to thank you."

Abby flapped her left hand at me as she took a swig of her own. "It's no big deal, get me some ciders later. No doubt we'll be through with this in no time."

"No, I mean for coming trick-or-treating. You didn't have to do that, I'm sorry. I know it's kind of lame."

Abby looked at me incredulously as she sipped.

"What makes you think that?" I shrugged in reply. The fact that Courtney had said it over and over, maybe. And even Ryan would give the odd look ever now and then, though he was never as out spoken about it, possibly as he'd grown up alongside me and watched mum house several kids over the years.

"Well," she continued. "Don't even mention it. Plus, you're getting me into a uni party. Consider us even."

That was true, and despite my earlier resolve, I was getting nervous. Curtis had offered us a lift that I had turned down due to having to be with the kids, so he was going to either meet us at a bus stop nearby the party or would already be there. Arriving with him, however, would have been a lot easier than turning up knowing no one—besides Abby. Even her agreeing to come with me I felt very grateful for.

The party wasn't far. It was a twenty-five minute walk into town that turned into thirty-five due to the occasional pauses to indulge in Abby's adventures to off-licences for cigarettes and more alcohol, and my tipsy piss in the only empty alleyway we found on the way. By the time we arrived, I was drunk enough to have accepted an offered cigarette, but not so much so that street signs blurred as Abby loudly announced they did for her.

The party was in full swing. Bodies were spilling out of the semi detached house and onto the quiet residential street. Even what I could see from the garden, which seemed to curl around the right of the house, was comfortably inhabited. The noise was enough to result in more than one neighbour peering out suspiciously, but Curtis had told me earlier that though police had often been called on parties on the very same street, all the other student houses had been given invites. Those that weren't student houses had been approached by any one of the ten students living in the property, with a baked basket of cookies and a plea for one night of wildness before their November deadlines. So far, it seemed the sweet treats had done their job.