They Wish They Were Us(61)

We stayed silent.

Just then, Shaila turned to one side and in one long burp, she vomited a sticky beige stream onto the hardwood floor.

“Aw, gross,” Jake said, kicking his leg out in front of him. “She puked on my limited editions!”

Shaila slumped forward and onto her other side. She was passed out.

“Um, guys,” I said, my voice shaking. “I think we need to do something.”

“Oh shit,” Nikki slurred. “We need to take her to the hospital.”

The junior boys groaned. “Ugh, this happens every year,” one said. I think it was Reid Jefferson, the star of the debate team. “She needs her stomach pumped. I can take her.” He started putting on his jacket.

“Are you an idiot?” Jake said. “We’re all underage.” His eyes were wide with fury. Maybe fear. “Get out of my house. Everyone. Figure it out on your own.”

“What?” Henry said. “Are you serious?”

“Do I not sound serious?” Jake asked. “I’m not going to Princeton if they find out I almost killed some idiot freshman girl.”

The boys around him nodded as if that seemed like a legit excuse.

I froze, seeing no clear path away from disaster. But Marla took charge. “Come on, guys. I’ll call my brothers.” She wrapped Shaila’s arm around her shoulder. “Graham, take her other side. Make sure she keeps breathing. Jill, grab her stuff.”

I followed orders silently, grateful for something to do with my hands, and gathered Shaila’s jacket and backpack. I scurried up the stairs, following Marla’s lead. Nikki whimpered softly behind me, terrified and drunk. “Come on,” I said, grabbing her.

When we stepped outside, the cold shocked us all into reality and the air turned sour with dread. It was so dark, too dark, not a star in sight.

“Those assholes,” Graham muttered. Everyone else huddled in silence, waiting for Marla’s brothers’ truck to come barreling down the pitch-black road. Finally, a pair of headlights careened toward us.

“What the hell, Mar?” James, the oldest, was in the passenger seat and rolled down the window to see what was up. “Are you guys total dummies or what?”

“Not tonight,” she said. “Please. Just help me, okay? We’ve got to get her home.” Her eyes pleaded with them as they mumbled their disapproval. Marla turned to me. “Are her parents there?”

I shook my head. “They’re in the Hamptons.”

“Good. Help me get her up.”

Graham, Marla, and I heaved Shaila’s dead weight into the back seat as she tried to say something incoherent. I let out a rush of air. She was awake.

“Not enough room for all of us,” Marla said. “Nikki, Jill, come with me. We can all stay at Shaila’s tonight.”

We piled into the back seat and left the boys standing in the frigid darkness. I shoved myself into the far side, so Shaila was propped up in between Marla and me. As soon as we buckled in, Cody, Marla’s second-oldest brother, started driving. James turned up the radio and no one said a word as we barreled down the wooded, winding roads toward the Arnold estate.

When we got to Shaila’s, we spent the next few hours in her bathroom, as she puked and puked until there was only green bile left. Marla brought her cold compresses, Advil, and Gatorade she found in the Arnolds’ downstairs pantry. Nikki rubbed her back and held her hair in a tight ponytail as Shay lurched forward over the toilet again and again.

By the time morning broke, I finally left.

“It’s fine,” Marla said. “Go. I’d be the same if we had field hockey championships today.” Nikki was still sleeping.

“Thank you,” I said, trying not to cry.

“You’d do it for me,” she said. “We all take care of each other.”

I was in awe of her calm, how she kept her fear hidden. I always swore I would thank her again and come to her rescue if the time ever came. But it never did. Marla was always the steady one. She never lost her composure. She was the one we could count on. And we never spoke about that night again. None of us.

The fact that Nikki brings this up now, when the last thing I want to do is think about how I let Shaila protect me when I never tried to save her, means she’s out for blood.

Nikki bares her teeth and I step back, plastering my spine against the wall. “I thought you were my best friend,” she whispers. “I already lost one.”

My shoulders fall. It’s so exhausting to fight. I just want to wrap her in my arms and remind her that we are the survivors. We need to band together. But there’s an anger inside me I just can’t let go. I don’t know if she gets it. If she understands the damage we could cause . . . have caused.

“Jared’s already changed,” I say. “They all have. Even you. Running around as Toastmaster like you own Gold Coast.” I want to breathe fire. I want to make her burn, to feel the hurt. “You know I’m right. What I said at Road Rally. That spot would have been Shaila’s if she were here. But she’s not and it’s yours. That makes you happy, doesn’t it? That you took her place. Doesn’t it?” Nikki’s eyes are red and bulging but I keep pushing, tapping into her deepest insecurities. “Doesn’t it?” I say again, louder.

“Shut up!” she yells, covering her ears with her hands. Nikki shakes her head and her eyes grow watery. “Stop saying that!”