The Girl On The Half Shell

by Susan Ward

  “Well, do you have anything I can change into in there?” I ask.

  Rene rummages through her junk. “No shoes, but this should be cute even with the UGGs.”

  She pulls out a gold blouse and a jean mini-skirt. She tosses them to me. They still have Saks Fifth Avenue tags on them. They are slightly wrinkled, but they’ll work better than what I have on.

  I change in the parking lot behind the car door. The blouse is too tight, Rene isn’t busty, but the skirt works even though I have to roll it once to make it short.

  “Stand still.”

  Rene has eyeliner, mascara and lip gloss in hand.

  “You should let me do your makeup more often,” Rene says. “I like it better when I do your eyes.”

  “You use too much mascara. The lashes fall out in the morning.”

  “It looks better.” She is putting the lip gloss on my lips. She reaches for a brush. “Toss your hair over.”

  The brush goes through my hair in a couple of hard jerks. She sprays it with hair spray. I toss my hair back. She sprays again.

  “I love your hair. It just sort of floats back into an ‘I’ve just been fucked’ kind of look.”

  I touch it. It feels stiff to me.

  Rene looks up as she shoves her junk back into her bag. “So now what?”

  We walk from the parking lot onto the sidewalk.

  Rene stops and throws her everything bag onto the concrete. “Well, this is a bust. We’ll never get in. Not tonight. It’s packed. What the heck is going on here?”

  There is a line down the street, turning the corner to the club entrance. It is the first Friday of spring break, so of course there is a line. I grab Rene’s hand and pull her along with me past all the pretty girls staring. The line is flush with rich, pretty girls and I can feel the stare, the stare that screams from their impeccably made-up faces that they think we are not the kind of girls who can line jump.

  For once, getting into a downtown club on Friday will be my problem. We won’t even have to drop Jack’s name, which is part of a bigger secret I haven’t shared with Rene. I spent a lot of time in this club in December during our winter break. Had a lot of my “gas station attendant” moments with the staff.

  I shake my head, not wanting to think of winter break. Jack was gone almost the entire month, one of his things, and Rene was in the Cayman’s with her mother. I hated being in the house alone with no one to hang out with. It made the hours drag painfully slow with no one to hang out with. So in the evenings I would pretend to Maria I was off on some super, Eliza-type plans and just come to Peppers alone.

  Nightclubs are good places to be alone. Always new people. Always laughter and music and other people alone so you don’t feel so pitiful that you are alone.

  At the front of the rope line, I am relieved. I know the bouncer. “Randy.” I shout over the blaring music from within to get his attention.

  Randy looks, does a thorough security type scan of the crowd, sees me, smiles, and the rope is pulled back. Rene and I are pulled quickly into the courtyard in front of the door. The front of the line is pissed.

  I can feel Rene watching me as if she wants this explained, but I ignore her. Randy keeps his eyes on the front of the line, but leans in to hear me.

  “It’s really packed.”

  “Some group from Seattle is booked tonight. It’s crazy inside, Chris. Crazy. Not cool at all. Not the usual scene.” He starts pushing back against the line. “Hey, behind the line or I boot you to the end.” He’s stressed. The crowd is enormous and I can feel the pulse in the air that this is a happening. I didn’t know there was a special event tonight, but I bet Eliza did and that’s why she had Daddy book her a private room.

  Randy grabs my arm. “Are you packing? I can’t let you in if you’re not packing. ABC has been a real pain in the ass lately.”

  I pull from my purse the fake ID Rene appropriated for me. She takes them from her father’s fembots under the pretense she has a right to check their age. There is an entire shoe box of stolen IDs in our dorm room. Rene is the go-to girl for ID, but I think the box means something else to her, though she hasn’t told me.

  I hold the New York license beneath Randy’s nose. He checks it, then Rene’s. “Any trouble, Chris, and you run out the back,” he whispers in a low, fierce tone. “A fight. Police. Anything. You run. You get caught in here tonight it’ll make the papers and we’ll lose our liquor license. That fucking whore with the band will make sure it makes press.”

  My entire face colors. I nod before Randy lets me walk into the club with Rene. The ground level bar is a crush of bodies. I fight my way to the railing above the dance floor below. The music is ear-splittingly loud. I can feel Rene watching.

  At the railing she leans in and stares at me. “Chris?”

  No one calls me that. I shrug. It’s the nickname I prefer, who I am here, in this little bit of bad. I’m glad Rene doesn’t probe further. She is caught up in the band on stage. A young, blond shoeless singer. He’s very hot, in that grunge sort of way Rene likes, loose jeans, bare feet, stringy hair, and lean body hopping on stage.

  “God, I’d love to go home with that tonight,” Rene purrs, fanning herself with a hand. She looks at me. “OK, now what? We didn’t come here just to watch Eliza, did we? That would be so pathetic, Chrissie.”

  Downstairs in the private party room with the mirrored window is Eliza and her mob. On the floor by the stage Tami is dancing with Johnny Ramirez, her public school boyfriend that she kept even after Eliza ended their year of oh, it’s so cool to date boys from the public school phase.

  The smart thing to do would be to leave before they see us, but I just want to do something and I don’t know what I want to do. Rene is waiting, trying to ignore the guy beside her, who is working really hard to get her attention.

  She shakes her head in aggravation and looks at the pest at her side. She arches a brow. “You’re—” heavy exaggeration on you’re—“talking to me?”

  She says it in a perfectly bitchy, rich girl sort of way, a superior put down well done, and the guy just stares at her. She shakes her head and grabs the cocktail waitress passing by. “Two Kamikazes.”

  I’m not really much of a drinker, I don’t know what’s in a Kamikaze, but it sounds like the right kind of drink for tonight. I grab the rail and pull myself up to see down below. It’s really packed in here. It’s easy to pick out the hot girls in the crowd. They are always dancing. Always laughing. Always drinking. Always tossing their hair.

  I take a hefty swallow of my Kamikaze and realize it’s just a fancy name for a vodka drink. Hmm… the drink isn’t bad at all. I scan the crowd, watching the hot girls. What would Eliza do if I were the hot girl in the private party room with her ex-boyfriend? I take another hefty sip of my drink, hoping some kind of inspiration will come.

  Rene is on her second Kamikaze. She can out drink a sailor. First, scotch at the beach, then two cocktails in under fifteen minutes. She stares at the glass. “How many of these do you think make a set? Six? Eight? They’re so cute. They’ll make a cute set in my apartment in Berkeley.”

  I frown. “What?”

  “The glasses.” She holds one up then slyly tucks it into her everything bag.

  “You’re stealing the glasses?”

  Rene nods and smiles. “I have to drink one more. You have to drink two. Or is eight a proper set? I am never sure how many of anything should be in a set. Perhaps I should call my mother. Mom would definitely know that.”

  I roll my eyes. I finish my drink, motion to the cocktail girl for another, which really pleases Rene since I hand her my glass, and now there are three rattling around in her everything bag.

  What would Eliza do to me? She’d want to make me feel small, insignificant. As if my party wasn’t the happening. As if her party was the happening, which is exactly how I feel now. How would she do it? How would she do it?

  I look at Rene. I know what Rene would do. “Who’s the hottest guy in
here?”

  Rene doesn’t answer. The pest is gone and there is a new guy beside her and this one she’s talking to. I tug on her shoulder. I repeat my question.

  She holds up a finger to her latest conquest, a superior gesture of be silent and wait. “Why, Chrissie? What are you going to do?”

  I give her a hard look. “Just answer me.”

  “You are not going to do anything stupid?”

  I give her another look. It takes Rene only a moment to zoom in on a guy standing on the other side of the upstairs bar. “Him, Chrissie. Him. Definitely hot and just the right amount older.”

  I look in the direction of her stare. I whirl to put my back to the bar and slouch down slightly. Oh no, not him! Another secret I haven’t told Rene: In December I had a near fuck experience. Jack flew off the day after Christmas, and it had made me really angry in that way I never handle well. I went to Peppers, got drunk, and before I knew it was with Mr. Incredibly Hot across the bar having a near fuck experience. I don’t even remember how I got to his house, I was that drunk.

  I can feel my face scrunching up tighter as my eyes tightly close to a foggy picture of ending up on a pool table with my shirt up and this guy snorting lines off my stomach. There is nothing attractive about a man who snorts coke, not even off your stomach, and I couldn’t seem to stop what was unfolding…and then the panic: How did I get here? What have I done? How do I get away? Is he just weird or dangerous?

  I still can’t believe I did it, let myself get fuzzy drunk, unable to figure out how to get out of the house with some guy I don’t know who wants to bathe me and shave me there. It was being drunk that saved me, because I was enough drunk to vomit all over his tile, but not so drunk as to pass out.

  As it was, he wasn’t dangerous, just weird, and pretty OK about everything in the morning. He gave me some sweats to change into, drove me back to my car and probably burned my number, which wouldn’t have matter because I didn’t give him my real number or name. Rule number one of Rene: never give your real name and number to a guy you meet in a bar.

  I cringe. Oh no, I am definitely not making contact with Mr. Near Fuck Experience. I’m beginning to feel nauseated, my head is spinning, but not from the alcohol because I really haven’t had that much. Please, don’t let it turn into a full blown panic attack.

  “Chrissie? What the hell’s wrong with you?”

  “Nothing! That guy is too old.”

  “Old for what?” Rene turns to her new guy friend. “Oh crap, I’ve got to get her out of here. I think she’s drunk. She doesn’t drink much. I can’t take her home drunk. It will be a total shitstorm if I do.”

  “Rene, I’m OK,” I reassure her rather feebly. When I turn to look at her I realize we are being watched by her latest male conquest and another guy who looks like he is with him. Jeez, he’s really cute. Maybe twenty, with blond streaked light brown hair and big green eyes. A really cute surfer/rocker sort of guy. Cute and probably clueless. He’ll do… just as I think that, something flashes in his eyes.

  “Hey Rene, is there something wrong with your friend,” he says, but his eyes never leave me.

  Rene frowns. “She’s a lightweight. Like I said she doesn’t drink much. Do you need to go outside for some air, Chrissie?”

  My cheeks burn. Can you embarrass me even more, Rene? I ignore her and lean over to speak to the cute stranger. “Hi. I’m Chris.”

  The guy stares at me, and then shrugs as if to say, OK I’ll play. “Hi. Neil. Neil Stanton.”

  I can feel Rene watching.

  “How would you like to be a really, really cool guy and do me a really, really big favor?” I ask.

  OK, what’s up with all the ‘really.’ So Valley Girl. How lame is that? Like, really, really lame. I take a steadying breath. This can go one of two ways. It can be a Breakfast at Tiffany’s moment or the last scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid: the firefight in Bolivia scene. Probably Bolivia. I pound the last of my drink and turn my head so I can lock eyes on Neil. He’s watching me, amused and a little wary in that way guys have when they are unsure if there is something wrong with a girl. I put the glass on the bar. Here goes nothing.

  “I want you to go downstairs to the dance floor and wait for me,” I say.

  “Wait for you?” He stares at me. OK, what did I say that was wrong? Those pleasant green eyes are staring at me really pissed. He takes a long drink from his beer. “Hey, if this is a brush off, it’s unnecessary. You don’t need to make a fool of me. I wasn’t trying to hit on you.”

  It takes me a moment to figure out why he is mad. He thinks I’m messing with him, in that bitchy rich girl way, and for some reason my confidence soars even knowing he’s thinking I’m a total bitch. I’m never the one who gets to experience the feel of pretty girl power and I certainly didn’t expect to with super-hot guy. He thinks I’m a bitch.

  I start to laugh.

  “Screw you,” Neil says. He turns to his friend. “We’re out of here, Josh.”

  His temper focuses me. I grab his arm. “No, no, no. It’s not like that, really. Please, let me explain. I’m not that kind of girl.”

  Now the look he gives me is just plain insulting. I look to Rene for help. Not a chance, her eyes scream at me. She’s going to leave me alone in this.

  This has gone from bad to worse. How do I dig out? The truth. Just tell him the truth. It can’t get worse than this. He already thinks you’re a bitch and probably a crazy bitch at that.

  I stare up into those angry green eyes waiting expectantly. “I wouldn’t mess with you because I’m the girl who usually gets messed with. You see, there’s a girl down there having a party and she invited me, but I know it’s just because she wants to do something to humiliate me. But at some point between dinner and now I just got pissed. You know, like when you’ve had enough of someone messing with you and you’re just angry. Fed up pissed, and I thought, what would piss her off more? Show up here, have a hot guy meet me and look like I don’t care about her stupid party. That would piss her off more, because she enjoys having people care when she’s really, really mean to them.”

  Damn. Really, really again. The whole speech makes me come off pathetic. The air in my lungs forces its way out in sharp, rattling spurts.

  Neil stares at me. “Are you telling me the truth or is this some other bitch game?”

  “The truth,” I insist, totally embarrassed now.

  After a few seconds I force myself to look at him. He’s frowning, but…is that a smile in his eyes?

  “You think I’m hot?”

  I refrain from rolling my eyes at him and start to laugh.

  “You’re OK.”

  He shakes his head. “You better not be messing with me.” He takes Josh’s beer and downs it. “You want me just to wait by the dance floor?”

  I nod. “All you’ve got to do is wait for me. Pretend like we’re together. Dance a dance and walk out with me. That’s all.”

  He looks undecided. Neil looks at his friend. Josh shrugs, but shifts his eyes to Rene who is too busy watching me to notice. His friend wants him to do this. He thinks it will get him hooked up with Rene for the rest of the night.

  Neil orders another round of drinks. When his beer comes, he grabs it. “Don’t keep me waiting or I walk.”

  I nod. Rene looks at me in a way that makes me a little less brave, like she thinks this is a childish stunt and pathetic and just plain not going to matter.

  I walk down the steps. It’s just bullshit, but knowing there’s this cute guy down there waiting for me gives me a little extra swagger in my step.

  Then I touch the bottom step and in a flash I know I’ve read this guy all wrong.

  Chapter Three

  The kiss is hard, fast and burningly intense. Neil is all around me, strong and unfamiliar and in command with his maleness. He forces my mouth apart and he fills me with his tongue. I feel panic, that shattering panic I felt in my near fuck experience. I don’t know this guy. I didn’t kno
w Mr. Near Fuck Experience. Neil is messing with me now that he thinks he’s in control.

  I struggle in his arms and try to break free. “Stop it. I didn’t say you could touch me.”

  Neil ignores me and his hands flatten against my back. He must still be pissed off and somehow I didn’t see it. Did Rene see? Is that why she gave me the look?

  I feel like I’m going to freak out and make a fool of myself in Peppers. Oh how Eliza would love it if I freaked out on the steps of Peppers.

  I jerk as his hand takes hold of my ass to lift me up into him and this time I use my hands to try to put a little space between us.

  “I thought you wanted this believable,” he whispers as his mouth moves to my neck.

  “Believable yes. Insulting no,” I snap, still struggling in his arms.

  “Haven’t you ever been kissed before? Stop wiggling. I’m only doing what I would do if you were really my girlfriend and I was waiting for you.”

  “That explains why you are alone,” I counter. “Stop mauling me.”

  He steps back and rakes an aggravated hand through his tousled waves. “God, you had better be at least eighteen. You feel like you’ve never been kissed before. You’re not thirteen or something, are you?”

  “Of course, I’m eighteen. I just don’t kiss perfect strangers.”

  “You don’t kiss anyone. I can feel a girl who doesn’t like to kiss. Why don’t you like to kiss?”

  This guy is just doing me a pathetic favor so why does he have to go all Dr. Ruth on me? Who would have thought this guy would be sensitive enough to pick up on anything? Neil’s got me all worked out in under five minutes.

  I ignore the question. He shrugs. “Forget it. You don’t owe me any explanations.”

  He takes my hand and starts pulling me through the crowd. I look over my shoulder and thankfully see that Rene has followed with Mr. New Conquest. Halfway across the room I realize lots of girls are looking at Neil, he is pretty hot, and he slaps hands here and there, stopping to talk when his name is called as he continues to work through the room. Neil is known in this crowd and popular. Most of the people don’t look local, but they know him, and it feels good to be pulled along with him in that “this girl’s with me” proprietary way and to feel unexpectedly a part of whatever is happening in this club tonight.