Falling into Place (3 page)

She flushed thе Pizzarito and brushed her teeth, but the taste was still there, so she went down to the basement and dug through her mother's enormous wine cabinet and swiped a skinny bottle of—actually, she wasn't really sure what it was, because the words weren't in English, but it was alcoholic and smelled like berries, and the label was pretty—and uncorked it on her way back upstairs. She drank it in bursts, quick head-thrown-back shots, as she went to her room and opened her closet to consider her collection of swimsuits.

The yellow, frilly bikini made her look like a daffodil in the worst way, the red one was a bit too slutty even for her, and the white bottoms had faded and stretched so much that they now vaguely resembled granny panties. Liz finally settled on the striped maroonish one she'd found on sale at Victoria's Secret a few months before, and she was scrutinizing her hips in the mirror when she caught sight of her fat, bald, hairy, leery, generally pedophilic neighbor standing on his lawn in his bathrobe, squinting at her window.

Liz flipped him off and went back down the hall.

Sometimes
, she thought,
this house really is depressing
. But tonight was not going to be one of those nights. It might have started out as one, but the—wine? She thought it was some sort of wine—was taking care of that nicely.

She went back to the living room and turned all of the couch cushions over before she flopped down. The wine sloshed and spilled, and new lavender stains splattered across the older splotches. Once upon a time, she had worried that her mother would discover the mess. She knew better now. Monica was not the type to relax on her overpriced couch. Liz wished she were—she wished that her mother would dig for the remote just once and find the bottoms of the cushions splotched with alcohol, because Liz didn't know how she would react. If she would be angry, if she would finally install a lock on the wine cabinet. If she would care.

Doesn't matter
, she thought as she tilted the bottle sharply.
Doesn't matter
.

The liquid spilled over her chin and down her neck and shoulders, and she thought suddenly of the first party she ever went to, the summer before freshman year, and all that had changed since then. She'd had her first beer that night, and her second, her third. She had gotten drunk for the first time, so there wasn't much that she still remembered, not much that she wanted to remember.

She thought of the lights, the bodies, the heavy and shattering music. The air, hot with sweat, humid with guilt.

Doesn't matter
.

By eight, half the wine was gone. She could feel the alcohol in her blood, making the world oddly delicate, as though everything had turned brittle and was on the verge of falling apart, and Liz Emerson was the only substantial thing on the planet.

And it was nice, being invincible.

“My god,” Julia said as she slid into the passenger seat. “Are you drunk already?”

“Of course,” Liz said. She caught a corner of the mailbox as she backed wildly out of Julia's driveway. Later she would find the scratch on the Mercedes, but she didn't care right now. There was something romantic about the idea of being young and tipsy and having somewhere to go on a Friday night.

She handed the berry alcohol stuff to Julia. Julia unstopped the bottle and tilted it back, and though Liz knew that Julia kept her lips tightly closed, she said nothing. It was easier to ignore it. Liz had her occasional trips to the bathroom after dinner, Julia had ziplock bags of illegal substances hidden around her room, and they had an unspoken contract to act as though their own secrets were still, in fact, secret.

“Kennie's riding with Kyle, so you don't need to pick her up,” said Julia, handing the bottle back.

Liz snorted. The car swerved as she took a swig, and she laughed as Julia yelped. “She's riding on Kyle, you mean.”

“That too.” Julia paused for a moment to tighten her seatbelt and then said, quieter, “I can't believe she didn't break up with him.”

Liz said nothing. Kennie, of course, was covered by the contract too, and this fell under the list of things Liz didn't want to talk about, things she especially didn't want to talk about tonight.

Stupid
, she thought. Four words, four for Kyle to convince her:
But I love you
. And of course they worked, because Kennie would do anything for love.

Stupid, stupid Kennie
.

But now Julia was quiet too, remembering that when it came to staying with cheating boyfriends, Liz had very little to preach about.

Liz pressed down on the gas pedal, then took a hairpin turn that threw a screaming Julia into the door, because tonight, they were unbreakable.

They arrived at the party nearly an hour late, and by then the bonfire was huge and the crowd could be heard from ten blocks away. People were already leaving, because a party of this size, with this much beer, would surely draw as many police officers as a donut buffet. Tyler Rainier was an idiot to throw such a party on a public beach, but Liz didn't care. She took another swig as she got out of the car to make sure she didn't.

Smoke was everywhere, a haze of bonfire and marijuana. There were strobe lights and colored spotlights, and it seemed as though the sky had descended and turned them all to hazy stars. The music made Liz's brain tremble. It was only a matter of time before everyone scattered, but it didn't matter. Not tonight.

Liz glanced at Julia, who was observing the entire thing with an expression that could almost be called disdainful. People called Julia stuck-up because she was quiet and rich and chic and had the posture of a ballerina and was something of a killjoy at parties. Julia was destined for a world of charity balls and pearls. She was a little too smart, a little too graceful, a little too conscientious for this hammered crowd.

And sometimes it made Liz jealous, but tonight was not one of those nights. Tonight, she looked over at Julia and had to fight down the urge to hug her, because Julia was uncomfortable and beautiful and hers.

“C'mon, killjoy,” Liz said cheerfully. Julia followed after a moment, and the lights swallowed them together.

“Liz!” Liz almost fell over as Kennie bowled into her. The bottle flew out of her hand and spilled all over Julia.

“Dammit.” Julia sighed, looking down at her soaked cover-up. Kennie giggled and licked a drop off her shoulder, ducking away as Julia slapped at her head.

“Get off, lesbo,” said Julia, but she was laughing too.

“It's good,” Kennie said, picking up the bottle off the sand. She squinted at it. “Oh, my god. I'm not that drunk already, am I? Why can't I read this?”

“Because it's not in English, stupid,” said Liz, and Kennie laughed and threw back the rest of the wine. Her hair tumbled down her back, then fanned away as she tossed the bottle at Liz.

“Come on!” Kennie said, grabbing their hands and dragging them into the smoke. The heat was unbelievable; it made Liz's throat itch, and she lifted the bottle again, but it was empty. She dropped it into the sand.

“Careful,” she shouted to Julia over the noise. “Don't get too close to the fire! That much alcohol on you—”

“Bitch,” Julia called back, shrugging off her soaked clothes. “God, I smell like—”

“Like a Russian!” Liz hollered. She slung an arm around Julia. “Like you're sexy!” She didn't know exactly what she was saying anymore, but who cared? She didn't. She also didn't care about whatever Kennie was babbling about—either Kellie Jensen's outrageous flab or Kyle Jordan's outrageous abs—or about the s'mores and beer that she was trying to pull them toward, so Liz broke away and let the crowd surround her.

Jake Derrick, Liz's official on-again-off-again, was out of state for the weekend at some football camp, most likely hooking up with whichever cheerleader had the biggest boobs, but she didn't care. She grabbed the nearest boy by the belt and he took her hips. It was too smoky and he was too tall for her to make out much of his face, and she didn't try very hard to get a good look. She wasn't here to make memories. She was here for the flashing lights and the sweat and the smoke and the feel of someone else's skin against hers. They were interchangeable, these boys. They didn't matter. They didn't matter at all.

While she was with Boy Number Four, Liz's phone vibrated in her pocket. She pulled it out to see a text from Julia, saying that she and Jem Hayden, her potentially gay boyfriend, were leaving to check out some indie bookstore. She hadn't seen Kennie for a while, but no doubt she was grinding with Kyle somewhere in the mob.

Doesn't matter
. There was too much marijuana in the air, and it was making Liz dizzy. Nothing mattered, not even the way Boy Number Four kept trying to kiss her. Why should it matter? Tomorrow she would wake up and this party would be a haze of lights. She wouldn't remember any of it. So she finally turned her face and let Boy Number Four press his pot-flavored lips to hers, and he wasn't bad.

They hadn't been on the beach for long—half an hour, maybe, and Liz knew this because she had grinded with seven boys so far, one for each song—when they heard the sirens over the music, and then, of course, it was over. As the crowd scattered and someone desperately tried to bury the last keg in the sand, Liz ran. Secretly, she loved when parties were busted. The night wasn't complete without a climax. The sirens, the swirl of red and blue lights—now that was a climax.

So, with a rush of adrenaline, Liz ran, slipping in and out of the crowd. Maybe, in a distant part of her mind, she remembered the games we played together when we were little, pretending to be spies and heroes, always escaping, always invincible.

She jumped into her car and shoved the keys into the ignition, and backed out of the sand so quickly that she nearly flattened a police officer. She heard him shouting for her to stop, but she didn't listen, and he didn't chase her. Her heart was racing and she was laughing, and she rolled down the windows as she zoomed away so that the night could rush into her car and surround her.

Liz briefly considered going home, but she missed the turn and it was too late to swerve, so she kept going. She pressed down on the gas and soon found herself on the interstate, taking an exit she hadn't taken in a decade. She drove along the beach until the trees grew taller and the night grew darker, and she turned in to the entrance of the state park. She parked messily by the ranger station, right next to the sign that said
PARK CLOSED
.
VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED
.

She laughed to herself, thinking of seventh grade, when she, Kennie, and Julia had taken over a janitor's closet and claimed it for themselves. They had made signs like that,
VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED
. Or at least, she and Julia had. Kennie's had read
PROSECUTORS WILL BE VIOLATED
. After thoroughly teasing her for the mistake, they had made that their new motto.

Liz turned off the car and was surprised by the silence. It always surprised her, somehow. She grabbed her iPod and turned it on, breaking the night wide open with shouting and drums, something angry—and then she changed the song, because she was alone, and she didn't have to listen to what other people liked when she was alone.

She forgot, sometimes, that she could make her own choices.

Liz walked into the trees, knowing that she was probably being an idiot and she should at least turn on her flashlight app, but not caring, not caring about anything at all. She hadn't been here since they moved, but her feet still seemed to know the way. She wasn't entirely sure why she'd come at all, now that she thought about it, but that didn't stop her. Liz was beginning to realize that she was drunker than she wanted to admit—enough to be wobbly and careless, and content with being stupid.

She walked in time to some indie singer, who called her beautiful and stronger, stronger, stronger. Liz liked hearing it. She tried to remember the last time she'd heard something like that in real life, and she couldn't. People didn't talk like that anymore, did they?

Liz walked for so long that she was almost entirely certain that she had taken a wrong turn somewhere in the dark, that a bear would be along momentarily to maul her to pieces, eat her left hand, and leave her to bleed to death on the grass just off the trail where no one would find her until she was nothing but a skeleton, which they would ultimately hang up in the science room so that the human anatomy and physiology classes could study her—when, suddenly the trees ended and she saw the tower.

It wasn't as tall as she remembered.

When she was younger, her father would bring her here on the first Wednesday of each month. Her father didn't work on Wednesdays and she didn't have preschool on Wednesdays. Wednesdays were important to them, Wednesdays were
theirs
. They came to make wishes on whatever was around—dandelions in the summer, red and falling leaves in autumn, snowflakes in the winter, sunshine in the spring. Sure, she had been a short four-year-old, but now, staring up at the tower that had once seemed to reach heaven, she finally began to understand how much had changed.

Still, she climbed it. The stairs were steep and creaking. She didn't run up like she used to, because there was no one to race her.

She was more wobbly than ever by the time she got to the top, but she told herself that it was the adrenaline and the height making her sway. When she threw her head back, she could see the sky bending away from her, and it seemed closer than usual. As though if she tried, she could snag a star on her fingernail, but she didn't move.

It hurt, hurt to hold still, so she leaned against the railing with the metal pushing against her lungs, and she closed her eyes.

“Well, hello, darling with the ocean eyes
,

How many secrets keep us apart
?

A sea of poems, a field of sighs
,