Lint

Shed

She sat at the edge of the cliffside, only a few yards away from the pool patio, holding a red plastic cup filled with alcohol. It was dusk and the breeze was subtle. Music blared from the house along with the chatter of a ton of unrecognizable people. Typical college party. Her hair was tied back and she wore a plain T-shirt and blue jeans.

Once a month she shed.

    She took a deep breath and sipped some of her drink, still looking at the horizon that was hazed with sunsetting colors.

    "One more day." She whispers at nothing.

    "One more day till' what?" Her body tenses for a moment, not expecting to hear the voice of a guy she didn't know. A boy then walks up from behind and proceeds to sit next to her. He had a mop of curly hair on his head and bright brown eyes.

    "Sorry?" She asked rhetorically to dismiss his question. She scooted only a few inches away. He then looked a bit dumbfounded.

    "OH, shit. My bad girl." He looked ahead only for a moment in an awkward silence before turning his attention back to me.

    "You looked like you needed someone to talk to or something," He shrugged and took a sip of his drink. She sighs, feeling almost rude for her unnecessary hostility.

    "No, yeah." She shakes her head and then puts on a more welcoming face.

    "Just- one more day until I leave town for a night." She looks ahead and completely downs the rest of her drink, holding back a face from the lack of having a chaser.

Once a month she shed.

He nods and smiles.

    "What's your name?" He asks.

    "You can call me Thorn." She holds back a smile. She knew she sounded way too anonymously weird to be tolerated by anyone who was considered cool. Either way, she would never have to worry about getting too close to anyone. It never happened before and most likely never will. She figured to might as well make a joke out of it.

He snorts and raises his eyebrows up, then down in a 'sure okay' kinda way. Very sarcastic. Of course it wasn't her actual name, but it was her nickname.

    "Okay Thorn." He then downs the rest of his drink.

    "Where's your crowd." He wonders. She rolls her eyes.

    "I'm here by myself." He then looks at her quizzically and shakes his head.

    "Come on, lets get some more drinks." He offers right before standing up and brushing off the backs of his pants. She looked out at the horizon before tearing her gaze back to him.

    "Sure."

    They both continue to walk over back to the house, making their way through the crowd and to the kitchen. He then pours some vodka into two cups, along with some juice. He hands her one and takes one for himself.    

    "Yo!" A couple of guys then walk over to him and try to get him to check something out in one of the rooms.

    "Yeah for sure, later though." he nods. They glance at Thorn for a second before shrugging and walking away. She pursed her lips before taking a huge chug. Talk about awkward. She then downs the rest of her drink and pours herself another cup. He chuckles.

    "Already?" he grins. She smiles back. She liked how he was going out of his way to be friendly. She had planned on getting drunk alone before tomorrow night. It was sort of a tradition.

    Once a month she shed.

    He looked at her as he licked his lips before taking a few more gulps of his drink. More and more people started to crowd the area they were in.

    "You wanna go back outside?" he asks without breaking eye contact.

    "Sure."

    They both made their way back outside before refilling their cups again. She walks over to the edge of a pool and decides to hang her feet in the water. He sits down beside her and does the same.

    "Why'd you show up alone?" He bumps his shoulder with her's.

    "I usually do." She explains, looking up ahead skeptically at the horizon.

    "Oh." he nods, looking at the drink in his laps. He then peeks over back at her, leaning toward her.

    "Do...you have a boyfriend?" he asks. Her eyes light up in amusement as she meets his gaze. Of course this was happening.

    "No I don't." She takes a gulp of her drink.

        *        *        *

Everything was a blur as they both ended up in the upstairs guest bedroom, both intensely intoxicated and enamoured. Both were sitting on the couch right below the window, just rambling on about anything. Before she knew it, he had made a move and leaned over to kiss her lips. It wasn't anything intense, despite them both being motivated by the alcohol. She looked over and felt it a bit bazaar that the light from outside was brighter than she had anticipated but she let it go anyway. He noticed her glance out the window in a perplexed gaze.

"Did you want to go back outside?" He asked in between neck kisses.

"No." she replied, tilting her head back.

"You sure? I heard there was a full moon tonight." She froze in place and lightly pushed him away.

"What?" She then looked at her nails and saw that they had grown sharper. She glanced out of the window and noticed her eyes look more red in the reflection.

"Are you okay?" He brings his hand up to hold her chin and observes her eyes as if he was examining something that was unorthodox.

"How drunk are you?" He asks in awe. She stands up abruptly.

"I have to go." She heads out toward the door and swiftly makes her way down the stairs. It wasn't without difficulty to make her way through the crowd as she eventually reaches the front door, ignoring the heightened senses of everything that was around her. After walking aimlessly past everybodies cars, she finally spots a thicket of trees. She begins to stumble her way toward them as she looks up furiously at the sky as she tries not to writhe in pain. He was right.

Once a month she shed.