Holding Up the Universe(74)

“Why don’t you want me?” She sounds small, like she’s folded herself in half and then another half and then another. “What is it about me?” And now I go even more stupid because here is a side of Caroline I never knew existed. Is it possible she’s as insecure as the rest of us?

I say, “You’re beautiful. You’re Caroline Amelia Lushamp.” But this isn’t what she’s asking me. Tell her you want her. But I can’t because I don’t, not like that. I start to scramble. I give it my all. I tell her over and over again who she is and how beautiful she is, even as she’s pulling on her clothes, even as she’s grabbing her phone. Even as she says, “I can’t do this anymore,” and throws the door open, letting the light in. I’m temporarily blinded, and by the time I can see again, she’s gone.





We kiss for what feels like hours.

We kiss even when someone stumbles into the room and blinds us with the overhead lights and then stumbles out again.

We kiss until he has many, many hands and a tongue in my ear, and I think, I don’t want to be Pauline Potter. I don’t want him to be my first. I don’t want him to be my anything.

So I pull away and say, “I’m sorry, Mick, from Copenhagen. I’m not Pauline Potter.”

And he sits back and says, “Who?”

“Never mind. I think I need a drink. I’m sorry, but I don’t want to make out anymore.”

And I kind of expect him to be devastated, but he just shrugs and smiles at me. “Okay.”

He helps me up, and we walk out as I smooth my hair and shirt. I walk behind him, and even though I don’t want to make out with him, Mick from Copenhagen is so cute I can’t help thinking, Girl, you ARE wanted. And it feels pretty damn good.





I find Kam in the kitchen, knocking back shots. His white hair is plastered to his head and he’s got one arm thrown around a girl who may be Kendra Wu (small, Asian, long black hair in a braid). I say, “What are we drinking?” The Girl Who May Be Kendra hands me something brown that doesn’t look like beer.

I throw it down my throat. My esophagus burns like I just inhaled gasoline. I say, “Another.”

And then they’re all handing me shots.

Kam empties his own glass and slams it onto the counter. He pumps both fists into the air and howls.

A while later, I work my way through the party, searching for a black Mohawk because I am too fucked up to drive home, and suddenly I want to go home. I want to go home right now. I find the Mohawk attached to someone who is probably Seth outside by the pool. At this point, I don’t bother lurking, trying to make sure it’s him. I walk right up to the Someone Who Is Probably Seth and say, “I need a ride home.”

He’s like, “Sure, sure, Mass. Just wait till we finish.” And he holds up a joint, takes a drag, and then starts laughing for no good reason.

I grab the joint out of his hand and take a drag, because maybe this is the secret of life right here. Maybe this will give me answers. Instead, I end up coughing like an old man for a good five minutes. Someone hands me a drink to wash it down, and then the pool tilts and the ground tilts and suddenly the sky is where the ground should be, and a boy with a Mohawk is leaning over me going, “Are you okay, man?”

I close my eyes because no, I’m not. I want to keep them closed and go to sleep here in the sky where the ground should be, but the world tilts worse with them closed. I open them again, and somehow I get on my feet. My only hope is that maybe Bailey Bishop is here, because she won’t be drinking. But she doesn’t always come to parties, and besides I’ll never find her in this crowd of blond girls. I go back inside, and it seems like the house is even more packed with people, like the student bodies of three more high schools arrived while I was out by the pool.

I don’t know anyone.

I shove my way through the kitchen, the dining room, the living room. People are hollering at me, and one girl makes a grab for me, holding on to my arm like it’s a life raft. She smells like Caroline, but she isn’t Caroline—she’s skinny and white and has curly hair the color of margarine. She goes, “Oh my God, Jack Masselin!” And plants a kiss right on my mouth.

She tastes like cigarettes, and I push her away. “Masshole.” She turns and dances with the people standing next to her.

I’m breaking every rule I’ve ever created for this exact kind of situation—I don’t smile or nod or say “Hey, what’s up.” I don’t flirt with every girl. I make eye contact, as if suddenly I’ll be able to recognize who everyone is. (I don’t.) I stare at one guy so long, he goes, “What the fuck are you looking at?” But I don’t care. I’m amped as all hell because it feels like I’m doing something dangerous, like any second they might figure me out.

The room I’m in now has tripled in size and the walls are miles away. It is just people from here to the moon, and I will never make it through all of them. I feel like a rock star, complete strangers yanking at my shirt, at my arms, at me. I push through harder because the door must be there somewhere, and what I need right now is air. My lungs are filling with the fumes of smoke and booze and my ears are filling with the boom boom boom of the music and my brain is filling with all this information that I can’t process.

I could drive myself home. Except that I’m wasted and I can’t won’t shouldn’t will not drive.