The Score (Off-Campus #3)(103)

Joanna told Coach Deluca that dinner was a ton of fun.

On the drive back, Beau’s father swerved to avoid hitting a deer that darted out in front of their car.

The car hit a patch of black ice. It flew off the road, flipping over twice.

Then it slammed into a tree.

Beau’s neck snapped on impact.

His father didn’t have a scratch on ’im.

I swallow another mouthful of whiskey. It burns my throat and sets my insides on fire. My eyes are on fire too. They’re hot and stinging, and when Garrett finishes speaking, I scrape my chair back and pick up the bottle.

“Going upstairs,” I mumble.

“Dean—” It’s Tucker, his voice rippling with sorrow.

Tuck barely knew Beau. Neither did Garrett, aside from chilling with him at parties. Logan was close to him, I guess. I know he went over to Beau’s place to hang out. But me…I was one of Maxwell’s best friends. He was one of mine.

Somehow, I make it up the stairs without falling over. My hand shakes so badly I nearly drop the whiskey bottle half a dozen times before I stumble into my room. I collapse on the bed and tip the bottle, pouring a stream of amber liquid into my mouth. It splashes my neck and soaks into the collar of my shirt. I don’t care. I just drink more.

So I guess Beau’s dead.

He was twenty-three.

I drink more. And some more. And then some more, until my vision is nothing but a fuzzy gray haze.

I’m wasted now. No, I’m beyond wasted. My brain don’t work so good anymore. Hands? Working? Fuggedaboutit. I try to set the bottle on the nightstand and it crashes to the floor. For some reason, that makes me laugh.

I think time passes. Or maybe it doesn’t. Maybe it’s standing f*cking still because Beau Maxwell’s neck snapped like a twig and now he’s dead. Dead. Dunzo. Dun-zo.

“Dean…?”

A voice whispers my name from far, far away. Jeez. Maybe I’m in the cave again. Maybe I never left it—how f*cked up would that be? If I died in some cave in Austria but didn’t know it? If the life I’ve been leading ever since that Europe trip is really a figment of my imagination, and my dead body is actually decomposing in an ice cave right now?

“That’s f*cking trippy,” I slur.

“Dean.” Warm hands cup my cheeks. There’s a soft curse. “Jesus. You’re drunk out of your mind.”

I’m bouncing. No, the mattress is. It’s shaking because someone is climbing on the bed with me, and my stomach starts to feel queasy. Nausea sticks to my throat. I swallow. I breathe deeply. I can smell the whiskey, but there’s another fragrance in the room too. Allie’s mysterious scent.

“Baby.” I feel my head moving. She’s tugging it into her lap, threading her fingers through my damp hair. I’m sweating bullets. Why is it so hot in here? “Logan just told me what happened. I…” Her hand trembles in my hair. “I’m so sorry, sweetie.”

“Broke…his neck.” My voice sounds far away, too. It doesn’t even sound like my voice, actually. Jesus, I’m so drunk. Disgustingly, pathetically, lost-in-oblivion drunk.

“I know,” Allie whispers. “And I’m so, so sorry. I know you’re hurting right now. I…” She strokes my hot forehead. “I’m here, okay? I’m here and I’m not going anywhere.”

I draw a ragged breath. “Babe,” I mumble.

“What is it?”

“I’m gonna…” I lift my head, but the simple act of doing so incites the very thing I was trying to warn her about.

The nausea spirals to the surface and I throw up on my girlfriend’s lap.

*

Allie

The memorial service for Beau is held in the football stadium. The entire team is there, along with the coaching staff, his friends, his family, hundreds of alumni, and thousands of people who probably never even met him.

One notable absence?

Dean.

Before I left the house, he was upstairs in his room, wearing a black suit and a somber expression. He told me to go on ahead with Hannah and Garrett, and that he’d meet me at the memorial.

When I get back to the house, he’s still in his room, still wearing the black suit and the somber expression. Except now he’s clutching a vodka bottle and his cheeks are flushed.

He’s drunk.

He’s been drunk every day this week. Well, either that or high. Two nights ago, I watched him smoke four joints, one after the other, before passing out on the living room couch. Logan had to haul him over his shoulder and carry him upstairs, and the two of us had stood in the doorway, looking at Dean passed out and spread-eagled on the bed. “People grieve in different ways,” Logan had mumbled.

I get that. Believe me, I get it. When I lost my mom, I went through the various stages of grief. Denial and depression mostly, until eventually I learned to accept that she was really gone. It took a while to reach that acceptance, but I got there. Dean will get there too, I know he will. But it’s been painful—no, unbearable—to watch him turn to alcohol and weed this week when he could’ve been turning to me.

“Couldn’t do it,” he mutters when he sees me in the doorway. He’d taken off his jacket and tie, and the collar of his white dress shirt is askew. His blond hair is mussed up, as if he’s been running his fingers through it repeatedly.