Now I shoved people aside and stumbled onward. Many people protested as I slammed into them but I didn’t care. After vomiting on a girl in public, jostling a few people here and there didn’t seem so reprehensible.
I finally reached the entrance of the house and flew out through the door like I had been shot out of a cannon. I stumbled down the steps and then had to stop to regain my balance on the lawn.
“Nate,” someone yelled. I didn’t want to see anyone. I stumbled onward down the driveway.
A moment later someone appeared in front of me. It was a small girl. Worried for a moment that it was Carly, I pushed past her.
“Nate, wait!” the girl cried.
I glanced around and did my best to focus my eyes. The girl was Faith Reagan.
“Are you okay?” she asked in a concerned voice.
“Fine,” I mumbled. At that moment all I wanted to do was lie down in my bed and fall asleep so I wouldn’t have to deal with my tumultuous stomach. Faith was too young to drive and her sympathy wasn’t going to get me home. I stumbled on. “Just fine,” I mumbled again.
“David!” Faith called. I wondered idly if she had forgotten my name and then suddenly a hand seized my shoulder. I tried to brush it off but it wouldn’t move.
“Hang on there, buddy,” a male voice said. Then I was spun around and came face to face with a tall blond-haired guy. Who was this? I looked at Faith in confusion but she was looking back at me with concern. Then I vaguely recalled the moment in the parking lot when I parted from her. She had run over to meet her brother, David, who had given me a strange look. It was the same guy. What was he doing?
“Hey, what’s going on?” another voice called out. I grunted in annoyance. This crowd was exactly what I wanted to avoid. I looked around and saw Dylan run up to us.
“He’s drunk,” Faith said. “He threw up back in the backyard and then stumbled out here. He looks pretty far gone.”
Dylan sighed and rolled his eyes. “That’s just great,” he said. “Well, we better get you out of here. I brought my car around. Do you think you can make it home without yakking all over or do we need to get you a pail or something?”
“No!” Faith said fiercely. “You can’t take him to his house.”
“Uh, why not?” Dylan asked in confusion.
“Yeah, why not?” David asked. He seemed much more frustrated than confused.
Faith bit her lip. “His dad has some issues,” she finally said. “I’m worried that if we bring him back like this it’s going to make his dad mad.”
I was too surprised to respond. She was worried that Jerry was going to hit me or something? Well, I guess that made sense, the only thing she knew about him was that he had hit me before. Come to think of it, he probably wouldn’t be very happy if I stumbled into the house completely intoxicated. It might be enough to drive him over the edge. Well, I wasn’t a kid anymore. I could take care of myself.
“I’ll be fine,” I said.
They ignored me. “What do you want us to do?” David asked his sister. “If we don’t take him home his parents are going to wonder where he is. You know our own dad is going to be waiting up for us to get home. I’m sure his parents will be doing the same thing.”
That comment made me laugh. My parents sure as hell weren’t going to be waiting up for me this late. It was almost midnight. They wouldn’t even be that surprised if I didn’t come home. Maybe I should give some thought to finding a nice lawn to sleep on. My room was in the hallway by the front door so maybe I could even sneak into my room in the morning and pretend like I had been there the whole night.
“What’s so funny?” David asked.
“My parents don’t care whether or not I come home,” I said. “They’ll just be pissed if I come home drunk and make a mess.” I paused to let a hiccup escape. “Thanks for everything, guys, but I’m fine.” I started to stumble off into the darkness.
“Hang on,” David said. He grabbed my shoulder again and pulled me back.
“What are you proposing?” Dylan asked. “He can’t come over to my place. I live with my mom now and she’s got an apartment. I’ve got no place to hide him there and she’s a social worker. If she finds out he’s at our place because he’s afraid to go home she’s going look into that. Of course, that might not be a bad thing if he does have a problem at home.”
I shook my head no emphatically. There was no way I was going to turn this into a big issue and hurt my mom and air my private life publicly.
“David, what if we took Nate back to our place?” Faith asked.
David snorted. “You’ve got to be kidding,” he said. “Dad would go ballistic if we bring back some drunk stranger.”
“He’s not a stranger, he’s my friend,” Faith said. “Listen. I could go in first and distract Dad while you take Nate to your room. Then you can come back out and say goodnight to Dad. Nate could sleep on the floor for the night and then we could sneak him out tomorrow morning. He can go pick up his car and then drive home. His parents might not even notice that he’s been gone.”
“Really, I’m fine,” I said and I tried to escape again. David’s grip on my shoulder just tightened. The guy’s hand was like a metal clamp.
“What’s up with you and this kid?” David asked Faith, his eyes narrowing. “Why are you soon keen to help him? Do you like him or something?”
I belched.
“Ew, not like that,” Faith said. “He just needs help. Please, David? Can we please help him? Please?”
David looked at her for a long moment and then rolled his eyes. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s get him in the car.”
“Look, I appreciate everything you’re trying to do,” I said, “but I don’t want or need help. I...”
The last part of my speech was cut off because just then David grabbed me firmly by the shoulders and propelled me forward. I felt a bit like a drunk about to be thrown out of a bar by a bouncer but instead of that David brought me right up to a small green car. Faith opened the door to the back seat quickly and before I could stop it David shoved me inside. I heard the sound of a door slamming shut behind me.
The back seat was remarkably comfortable. I closed my eyes for a moment and I must have drifted off because the next thing I knew we were lurching to a stop. “Where are we?” I asked.
“Hush,” David said. I heard one of the car doors open and then slam shut. I realized it was Faith getting out of the car.
This wasn’t right. I didn’t want to intrude and put Faith and David at risk of getting in trouble from their parents. I just couldn’t seem to get myself up and out the door. All my strength seemed to have been sapped from my body. Worst of all, I felt like if I moved I would throw up again.
“Okay, let’s go,” I heard David say.
A moment later one of the passenger doors opened and then I felt myself being dragged out of the back seat of the car. David pulled me to my feet and slung my arm around his neck. I leaned on him heavily. I began to rethink my plan to run off and find some lawn to sleep on. If I could be lying down and sleeping this off indoors in a matter of minutes, well, that sounded pretty good.
“Thanks for this,” I mumbled. I was so tired. “I really appreciate it. I promise, I’ll pay you back.”
“No problem, buddy,” David said. “Just be quiet, okay?”
He opened the front door slowly and pulled me inside. I heard voices coming from the kitchen. David quickly led me to a spiral staircase that led downstairs. Bracing me as best he could, he hurried down the stairs. I stumbled a few times but David caught me and steadied me before continuing.
I didn’t get to see much of David’s basement because he hustled me right into his bedroom. He brought me to the other side of his bed and dumped me on the floor. “Stay here and don’t say a word,” he said. Then he ran back to the door and closed it behind him. I could hear thumps on the stairs as he bounded up to greet his dad in the kitchen.
It felt so good to be lying down. I closed my
eyes again and sighed in pleasure. I didn’t even mind not having a pillow; this was far more comfortable than a lawn would have been. Now I could just sleep this horrible feeling off.
“Nate... Nate,” someone was saying as a hand shook my shoulder. I opened my eyes a crack.
“Mmm... what?” I croaked. Why couldn’t they just let me sleep?
“You need to drink this water,” David said. “I don’t want you getting sick in the morning. It’ll also help you not get such a bad headache.”
With great effort I propped myself up on my elbows and took the glass of water from David. I forced the down but tipped the glass a bit too high so that water spilled around my lips and rolled down my face.
“Sorry,” I said as water dripped onto the carpet.
“Don’t worry about it,” David said. “Here’s a bucket in case you get sick during the night.” He handed me a large plastic bucket. “You’ve got some puke on your shirt,” he said. “Do ya mind taking that off? It’s going to stink if we keep it in here and if you turn over I don’t want you rubbing it into my carpet.”
I looked down at my shirt. David was right; there was a trail of vomit down my shirt. I fumbled with the buttons but couldn’t seem to get them. The effort of holding my body upright was hard enough.
David shook his head and knelt down in front of me. “Just sit still,” he said. He started to undo the buttons. I felt like a little kid again who wasn’t able to dress himself. “You know, when I imagined undressing someone in my room, I sort of hoped it would be a chick,” David said.
“Well, I’m not one, so don’t get any ideas,” I muttered.
David laughed and pulled my shirt off. He walked to the bedroom door and disappeared. A moment later he returned. “I chucked your shirt into a spare room we have,” he said. “You can take it with you when you leave in the morning.” He came over and sat down on the ground beside me. “Now before you fall asleep we’re going to have a little chat.” He said. “What happened tonight? Did you just forget how many drinks you had already put away?”
I shook my head. “Nah man,” I said. “A bunch of girls spiked my drink.”
Why had I told him that? I had promised myself that I wouldn’t advertise the fact. There was something about Faith and David that seemed to make me talk more than I should.
David looked thoughtful. “They didn’t handcuff you to a pole, did they?”
Geez, this guy’s mind was in the gutter. Come to think of it, though, they sort of had. “They tied me to a workout bench,” I said.
David didn’t even look surprised. He just shook his head. “Girls at this school are frickin nuts,” he said.
I eyed him up. What was it that Carly had told me? My abs were “maybe even as good as David Reagan’s”? “It seems like you’ve got a story to tell as well,” I said.
David smiled. “Maybe,” he said, “but it sounds like my story had a happier ending than yours did.”
I looked around David’s room. It was covered in medals and trophies. Most of them seemed to have something to do with wrestling. I cringed. The idea of rolling around on a mat with another sweaty guy had always struck me as a bit awkward, though other aspects of the sport were undeniably cool. Wrestlers certainly seemed to get pretty ripped. I looked at David. He wasn’t one of those bulky weight-lifter type of dudes but he seemed pretty strong in a lean type of way. Ridiculously strong, actually. His forearms rippled with muscles and he certainly wasn’t sporting any fat. Based on what Carly had said, I was guessing that David was also probably pretty popular with the ladies. That might explain his earlier comment about being handcuffed to a pole.
“You like to wrestle?” I asked, nodding up at all the trophies.
“Love it,” David said. “I’m the captain of the team this year. Hey,” he said as though an idea had just come to him, “what sport do you play in the winter?”
I laughed but it was interrupted by another hiccup. “I don’t usually play a winter sport but I don’t really think wrestling is my thing,” I said.
“You should think about it,” David insisted. “Chicks love coming to watch guys in singlets and it’s great cross-training. Plus, you really learn how to defend yourself.”
He was talking about my dad, I sensed it immediately. Great. Now people thought my dad abused me. It was just one time long ago. “Really, I’m fine,” I said. “I don’t have any reason to need to protect myself but I can if I need to.”
“Uh-huh,” David said skeptically. “Well, maybe we’ll get you out on the mat later when you’re feeling better and see. In the meantime, you can call me if you ever need help, okay?”
What was with this family? Why were David and Faith so concerned about me? It shouldn’t matter to them how I was doing but yet it seemed to.
“And if I hear you’re taking drinks from strange girls or getting my sister into trouble, I’m going to kick you ass,” David said. He put a hand on my head and ruffled my hair fiercely. I tried to slap his hand away but my reactions were too slow and he had already jumped into his bed. He threw a blanket and a pillow to me.
“Night, kid,” he said.
“Yeah, night.” I replied. I stopped myself just as I was about to say “Aaron.” Dangit. For a moment there I had felt like I was talking to my brother and he was giving me his usual combination of sympathy, support, advice, and threats for what would happen if I didn’t take care of myself. I had forgotten how much I missed Aaron. I hadn’t talked to him since before school had started. I supposed college, soccer, and keeping in touch with his girlfriend were keeping him plenty distracted. I wished I could have talked to him more, though.
I fell asleep. I slept so deeply and dreamlessly that I might as well have been dead.
It was a ray of light that finally woke me up. I opened my eyes a crack and then groaned as a pounding headache and a sickening feeling in the pit of my stomach overwhelmed me. I covered my eyes with my hands and tried to recall where I was. What had happened last night? I remembered a flurry of female bodies and then going to a party. What had happened after that? I wracked my brain but only brief snapshots came back to me. Where was I? And why did my balls feel like they had been pulverized for the past 10 hours? The dull, throbbing sensation between my legs didn’t help my stomach. I suddenly needed to throw up.
I grabbed the bucket beside me and vomited into it. I heard David say, “What’s going on? You okay... oh shit.”
I vomited again and then looked up. David was staring up at a tall grey-haired man. I knew instantly that it was David’s father and from the outraged look on his face, he wasn’t at all happy that a stranger had just thrown up in his house.
Chapter 12 – Recovering
“Someone better tell me right now what this boy is doing in my house,” Mr. Reagan seethed.
David and Faith exchanged unsettled looks. This was not going well. I would have said something but it was all I could do to avoid vomiting again. I rested my arms on the kitchen table and buried my head in them. This was going to be an awkward conversation.
As soon as Mr. Reagan had seen me throw up he stormed upstairs and told David to bring me up to the kitchen when I could control my stomach. David had tossed me one of his tee-shirts and dragged me upstairs. The shirt smelled different than I was used to, I guess as a result of David laundry detergent. It was weird to smell like a different dude, though I supposed anything that covered up the stench of vomit was a good thing.
“Well?” Mr. Reagan prompted.
“It was all my fault,” I said, summoning the strength to look up a little and speaking quickly so I could go back to focusing on not puking as soon as possible. “I had too much to drink so your children decided to bring me home instead of letting me drive drunk or sleep on the street.”
“Uh-huh, and why didn’t my children tell me that last night?” Mr. Reagan responded, glaring at his David and Faith. “Why didn’t they just take you back to your own home?”
“We didn’t want to get
Nate in trouble with his parents,” Faith said. “I’m sorry we didn’t tell you, Dad.”
“Well I’m sorry too,” he responded. “Nate, I’m going to have to call your parents. You’re too young to be drinking and if you were my kid I’d want to know about it. What are their names? I’ve got a lot of parents from the school on the directory in my phone.” Mr. Reagan picked up his cell phone and looked at me expectantly.
At that point I was willing to do anything – including braving my mom and Jerry – to get out of the uncomfortably warm kitchen and away from Mr. Reagan’s icy stare. “Jerry and Nancy. Our last name is Caldwell,” I said.
Mr. Reagan stared at the phone for a moment and then looked at me. Some sort of peculiar look passed across his face and then he said, “I don’t know them.” He put the phone down. “Alright, I’ll let you off with a warning this time. We can talk about this more over breakfast. Faith, do you want to set the table? David, if you make the eggs I’ll get the bacon. Your mom stocked us up before she left on her business trip.”
The thought of breakfast made my stomach churn. “No thank you, sir,” I said. “I really should be going.” I just wanted to get out of that house.
I said my goodbyes to David and Faith and promised to wash and return David’s shirt. I turned down Mr. Reagan’s offer to drive me to my car at Carly’s house as I didn’t want to risk throwing up in his vehicle. I gathered up my own shirt, holding it at arm’s length to try to avoid the smell of old vomit, and left.
Luckily, the Reagans did not live far from Carly’s house. I slowly made my way there. Unfortunately, I didn’t remember that I was wearing the forsaken thong until I started walking down the street. I looked around for some place to take it off but there didn’t seem to be any convenient place for me to drop my pants in the residential neighborhood. I gritted my teeth and tried to walk as upright as possible to minimize the discomfort of the thin fabric squeezing my family jewels. I was just thankful that none of my friends from Southcrest could see me now. I could see D-Man and Zach rolling on the floor with laughter. I’d never live it down. Those girls were truly monsters.
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