by Harry Cook
We arrive outside 102 Sweetzer and the place looks like a bloody palace. Three storeys and a lake out front. Yes, an ACTUAL lake. There are even swans on it. Who the hell has a swan lake in their front yard?
We get out the car and walk up the ridiculously long path up to the house. I go to take Eric’s hand, but he acts like he has an itch and avoids it completely.
Inside there is nothing but gleaming marble, crystal chandeliers and long velvet curtains. I feel like I’ve stepped into some period drama and suddenly feel incredibly underdressed. All the guys are wearing polo shirts that show off pecs and biceps and abs and all the girls look like the white cast from The Help. It’s really unnerving and I kind of want to leave.
One of Eric’s beefcake buddies greets us holding a red cup that I saw him fill with Belvedere vodka and soda moments before.
“E.T.!” says the beefcake, giving Eric a bro-hug and taking a sip of his drink.
“Hey, Dan,” Eric says. “This is my friend, Rye.”
Friend?
Dan puts his fist out which I bump lamely and then leads us to the dazzling kitchen to get a drink.
Eric pours us vodka sodas and chugs his immediately before refilling and chugging it down again.
“You okay?” I whisper. He gives me a confused look like I’d asked him to explain Pythagoras’s theorem.
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Oh, no . . . I just meant. Like, you seem a bit on edge and… and you called me your friend.” I smile to try and seem casual about it.
“It’s a party,” he says like I’m the biggest idiot in the world. “And you are my friend, one who I’d like to undress and have my way with.” He says the last bit under his breath in my ear and yes, it turns me on, but simultaneously pisses me off.
We head into another room and take a seat at a couch in the middle with a bunch of other preppy-looking guys and girls. It seriously looks like a photo shoot in here. Eric sits next to me and puts his hand behind my back so nobody can see. The more he drinks the more his hand strokes my back and I can’t help but feel giddy.
“I hope you’re having fun?” he asks.
“Just glad to be hanging with you,” I say.
He smiles and for the briefest moment everything feels really good. I remember what made me so excited when we first started dating. His piercing eyes, massive arms and a sexy edge to his smile that knocked me off my feet.
Sitting near us are a bunch of beautiful people who look like they’ve stepped out of an Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue. A girl with blood-red hair and electric apple-green nails sits down next to Eric. His hand quickly leaves my back and the two of them become engrossed in an animated conversation that I can’t quite hear. I sit and stir my drink with a straw and half-heartedly tap my foot to the music – some weird boppy garbage that you’d need to be electrocuted to dance to – when Dan comes and sits on the coffee table in front of us holding two drinks.
“Here you go E-man,” Dan says, blanking me.
Eric practically shouts “cheers!” and continues talking to the girl.
I take out my phone and check the time: 8:38 p.m. I’m about to check Instagram when an enormous crash from the kitchen makes everyone jump.
We all head in to find a tipped-over chocolate fondue fountain on the floor. There’s a giant lake of chocolate spreading thickly. No swans. In the middle of it is a guy in nothing but his underwear.
“What the FUCK?” Dan shouts. Everyone goes quiet. “Where was MY invite?”
There’s a huge cheer and suddenly everyone is sliding around the marble floor in the melted chocolate.
It’s a mess and I’m not interested. This is some weird privileged shit and I’d rather stick my hand in a blender than be a part of it.
Eric looks over at me and shrugs like it’s something that happens often enough in his social circles and I just stand there feeling odder and odder.
“Come on,” Eric says in my ear before winking and beckoning for me to follow him.
The mess in the kitchen is still going strong as we make our way out into a hallway. Eric leads us into a bathroom, making sure nobody is watching before he closes the door behind us.
“I got us a present.”
“What –” I say, but before I can say anything else, he’s kissing me hard and his hands are all over me. I’m not going to say I don’t enjoy it; I do. It’s more that it feels artificial when he’s so hammered. I want the real Eric. The one who doesn’t need fourteen Belvedere vodkas to come near me in a public place.
He puts his thumb on my chin and gives me a peck on the nose and then fishes in his back pocket for something.
When I look down, he’s holding two little green pills in his palm.
“What the hell are those?” I ask and I’m suddenly pissed. Really pissed. I get that people take recreational drugs and whatever. But I cannot believe he’s offering me this after I told him about my dad and –
“Ecstasy. That girl I was talking to back there hooked me up and I thought we could –”
“Eric, seriously? What the fuck?” My body’s trembling and I want to leave. The room feels really small.
“Babe, calm down you’re –”
“NO, you calm down. You have no idea. No idea what that shit can lead to. I told you about my –”
“I do not need this, Rye. I’ve been trying all night to make things right.”
“Make things right?” I can feel myself losing it, but at this point I don’t care. “Eric, you introduced me as your friend, have barely said three words to me all night and have smashed back about six drinks in the space of half an hour.”
“So when I was stroking your back in there, what? That meant nothing?”
“Sure, Eric. I felt great when you removed your hand at the first sign of anyone noticing and when you could score yourself some drugs instead.”
“So what?” He shrugs, indifferent. “Rye, you’re being a brat.”
“I’m being a brat? Are you kidding me right now? Do any of your friends know about me? Do any of your friends know about you?”
“Fuck, Rye, who cares about any of that?” He pulls back from me. “What do you even want from me?”
We both glower at each other.
I’m not angry that he isn’t out to his friends yet. I’m angry that I have to play along with a charade I really didn’t sign up for.
“I . . . Nothing. I’m gonna go.”
“Rye, come on. Give me another chance.”
I stare up at him and for the first time all night he seems sincere. The drunken glaze in his eyes seems to have gone and it’s like the real Eric is looking back at me for a second.
I nod my silent agreement and we leave the bathroom together and head for the kitchen where the commotion has died down slightly.
I head to the bench and pour myself a soda water. I’m not remotely interested in drinking anymore. I’d much rather leave with Eric and go and hang out just the two of us, but I doubt that’s going to happen. My scene is more hot chocolate on the couch watching a movie than a chocolate-fondue sliding scrum on a rich person’s kitchen floor.
When I turn around Eric is talking animatedly to Dan and I head over and stand awkwardly near them both.
“Having fun?” Dan says, looking me up and down.
“Yeah. Love the house. Very cool.”
“Nah, this is nothing. Our holiday house in Lake Miracle is dope as hell.”
I can’t begin to imagine what it must be like to think that the house we are in right now is “nothing”.
I turn to catch Eric’s eye and notice that he’s gone all weird. He’s chewing the inside of his lip and his eyes dart around the room like he’s trying to find something he’s lost.
“You okay?” I ask. He’s in his own world, looking around like a lunatic meerkat.
Dan glances at Eric and something clicks in his eyes and he’s suddenly smiling.
The song changes and a track with heavy bass blasts through the
speakers dotted around the house.
The red-haired girl with the green nails shows up out of nowhere, her face and dress covered in chocolate from rolling around like an idiot, and she grabs Eric’s hand and leads him to the dance floor.
Dan looks at me and bounces his eyebrows up and down a few times.
“Looks like someone’s getting lucky tonight,” Dan says before clinking my cup with his and downing it in one go.
My stomach clenches and I have this overwhelming sensation of wanting to cry, right here in the middle of this ridiculous kitchen.
Dan wanders off and I head outside to where a bunch of people are smoking and talking.
A guy wearing a giant trench coat and a mustard yellow scarf is holding forth about his internship at some art gallery. By the sound of it, it’s going “amazingly” and he will be “absolutely hired” by the time he’s done. A girl standing nearby rolls her eyes at me in recognition of the spectacle Mr Mustard Scarf is making of himself. She smiles before offering me a cigarette.
“I’m fine, thanks,” I say. Then as she turns to leave: “Um, actually, yeah I will. Thanks.”
I don’t smoke at all, but I’m feeling like crap and I couldn’t care less right now.
I light mine off of the end of hers and we stand huddled together.
“I’m Lily,” she says.
She’s very pretty. Her green eyes and porcelain white skin look almost unnatural, like she’s had fifteen thousand chemical peels.
“Who are you here with?” she asks, taking a drag of her cigarette.
“My b– My friend Eric.” I nod inside to where he is dancing with the redhead, spinning her around like a maniac.
Lily smiles. “Great party, huh?”
“Yeah,” I say, taking a shallow drag and exhaling quickly.
“I haven’t seen you at many of these get-togethers. Are you new here?”
“Nope. No, I’m just poor,” I say and Lily bursts out laughing.
I smile, unsure of whether she thinks I was joking or whether the truth was really that funny.
Lily starts to say something, but the music inside stops and I hear a bunch of hollering from the dance floor.
Eric is dancing to music only he can hear and shaking his fists above his head like a gladiator at a rave. A few of his cronies are cheering him on, but mostly people are looking on confused.
“I’m gonna head inside,” I say. “It was nice to meet you, Lily.”
“Likewise,” Lily says.
The smell of vodka and Red Bull lingers in the air. Someone has put another track on and now Eric is going at it harder than ever.
“Hey babe,” I say in his ear. “You okay?”
“Yep yep yep yep.”
“I was thinking maybe we could head home soon? Just us two? I’d –”
“But the party, man. The party is just getting gooooood. We’re just getting going, you know?”
He can’t seem to keep any part of his body still and there’s something about his eyes that’s a lot more than vodka. Also, did he just call me “man”?
“Sure, but maybe we could go chill for a bit before I have to go home.”
No answer. He simply dances erratically some more, his eyes darting around and refusing to engage with me.
Then it hits me. “Eric… did you… did you take that pill?”
He stops his unpredictable head twisting thing and turns to stare at me. “Nooooo.”
I don’t believe him. His pupils are dilated. His face is glazed with sweat and he looks like he’s just had a shot of adrenaline to the heart.
Then he leans in close to me.
“I took both.” He grins like the Joker, like he’s single-handedly solved the most complex maths equation known to mankind.
I feel my throat dry up. “Are you serious?”
He throws me one last grin, swivels around and bounces back to take his spot on the dance floor.
My vision blurs and my heart speeds up. I don’t feel as if I’m a part of my body anymore. I know I’m having a panic attack because my entire body is trembling and I feel like I’m going to pass out. The music is too much and the people are pressing too close to me and the air seems thinner and my throat is closing up.
Nothing makes sense.
I make my way through the house to the front door and fumble with the handle. I’m in complete overwhelming panic. Finally, I open it and head out and I don’t know what to do so I walk. I walk to the ridiculous lake in their front yard where the swans are gliding about and I breathe like my lungs are collapsing. My mind is a blur and however much I try to rationalise things, it only makes them all the more confusing.
Flashes of life with my dad bounce around my brain.
Unpredictable. Frightening. Toxic.
Glasses shattering against walls. Storms of tears and angry yelling.
I take a few more shallow breaths and then feel my feet go numb and my knees buckle and then nothing but black.
15
Rye
I’m lying face down in the grass, cold air blowing over me. I feel sick and tired and terrified all at once. I sit up and spit some dirt from my mouth, wipe my forehead and instantly want to throw up. I crawl to a bush and heave up the Belvedere vodka then lie on my back and try to breathe.
I don’t bother to go and find Eric. His family is so different from mine, but still I told him about what happened with my dad. And then, after all that, after every conversation where I explained how terrified I was as a kid growing up, he does this. I guess he wasn’t listening, not really.
My hands are over my eyes, blocking everything out, when my phone buzzes. It’s Mum. I swear that woman actually is psychic.
Mum: How’s the party going?
I rub my head. Send back a thumbs-up emoji and an ‘x’.
I then dial Poppy’s number. She answers after the first ring.
“Rye-bread!” Her voice is full of energy.
I breathe and realise I’m not saying anything.
“Hun, you okay?”
“Yeah.” Breathe. “I . . . um.” Breathe.
“You having a picnic?”
“Uh huh.” Breathe.
We call my panic attacks picnics because we were on a picnic the first time Poppy saw me have one and she thought I was having a heart attack and called an ambulance. Looking back, it was dramatic and kind of hilarious, but it felt nice to know she cared and the term has stuck.
“Head between your knees and put me on speaker.”
I do as I’m told and feel my arms and legs trembling.
“Breathe in with me . . . two, three, four,” Poppy says.
I breathe when she tells me to and exhale when she tells me to. Within ten minutes I’m quiet but feel as battered and exhausted as if I’ve just done ten rounds with King Kong.
“You okay, mister?” Poppy asks and I can hear her keys jingle in the background. “Where are you? I’m on my way.”
*
Before I know it, I’m safely in Poppy’s car and we’re working our way through a slurpee each. She really is a legend.
“You wanna talk about what happened, or?” Poppy is being completely genuine and I know that if I say no, she will let it go. Yet I hear myself retelling the events of the past couple of hours and I’m beyond relieved to lift this anchor off my chest.
Poppy sits and nods at all the right moments and when I’m done she takes my hand and rests her head on my shoulder.
“What are we gonna do with you, Rye-bread?”
We stay like that for a while. Eventually Poppy sits up, sends a text and then starts her car. Ten minutes later we pull into the Pancake Parlour. From the giant clock above the entrance, I realise it’s nearly eleven o’clock.
“Nah, I’m not feeling pancakes right now,” I say.
“Good, neither am I. Waffles, on the other hand, are calling my name.”
We get out and head inside and Poppy leads us to a table at the back where, oddly enough, June and Fin are si
tting.
“Scoot over,” Poppy says to Fin and then gestures for me to sit, which I do.
“This is an inter-friend-sion,” Poppy says.
June and Fin look at one another like this is news to them.
“It is?” June says.
“Yes.” Poppy signals the waiter and orders us a round of raspberry cola and waffles.
Fin looks uncomfortable, like he didn’t realise this was what he was stepping into when he came out for a diner experience on a Friday night. I stare at the table and try to breathe. The last thing I need after a panic attack is a random arbitration conference at the Pancake Parlour.
I want to cry. No, I want my dog and my boat and I want to go to Kettle Lake to watch the fireflies. Anywhere but here right now. This is not what I need.
“Poppy, I’m leaving.”
She grabs my arm as I go to stand. “Nope, no you’re not.”
I sit down obediently and our food arrives, but I don’t even bother trying to eat anything. I’m not hungry and still feel slightly sick from blacking out.
But Poppy has switched to her military mode and her calm and compassionate side seems to have evaporated into the ceiling. She’s about business and she means it.
“Rye, Eric is garbage. The sooner you realise that, the easier you can move on, find someone decent – hell, don’t find anyone at all, be single, do whatever you want – but this is ridiculous.” Poppy slowly emphasises each syllable of “ri-dic-u-lous” so the point is driven home.
I sit there and take it. I have no defence against what she’s saying. Even though I know she has a point, it stings. I still can’t admit it. Not yet.
“Poppy, just . . . Let’s give Rye some time. You know, to think things over?” June says, looking at her directly and not blinking.
Poppy seems to have not heard. Either that or she’s blatantly ignoring her. She disregards the food and drink in front of her and doesn’t even take a breath before she’s back in the saddle and tearing me up.
