Boring Girls(19)

Josephine turned to me and touched my arm. “Rachel, you’re wonderful. And I promise I will leave with you if you want to go. Just give it a chance.”

She smiled, and I appreciated her so much in that moment. “You promise?”

“I won’t abandon you,” she said.

We smiled at each other and then walked up to the door. She flung it open and strolled in as if she owned the place.

I knew immediately it was a bad idea that I had come. The music was f*cking annoying, too loud and it was some kind of bullshit you’d hear on the radio. There were people everywhere. Just hanging out and laughing it up, all of them holding beer bottles or drinks, smoking cigarettes, and all of them looked like *s. I expected to see Brandi. A bunch of people looked over as they noticed us walk in. Mostly they just went back to their conversations, but two girls came running over.

Squealing, they embraced Josephine and launched into immediate chatting bullshit. I squeezed in behind her so I could close the front door, trapping us in that awkward living room.

“This is my friend Rachel,” Josephine said, gesturing to me. “Rachel, these are my friends Erica and Heather.”

“Hi,” I said.

“Hey, Josie’s told us all about you,” Erica said. “Nice to meet you.”

“This is my house, just so you know,” Heather said. “So you can grab a drink from the kitchen, whatever you want. It’s nice to meet you.”

They were both really nice, but I couldn’t help but feel how superficial it was. They were only interested in hanging out with Josephine, of course. The three of them lapsed back into familiar conversation as we moved further into the room. And there it was. The moment I knew would happen. Josephine talking to her friends, and a room full of disinterested morons jabbering away, and me, standing there like a f*cking outcast, pretending like I was fine with it.

I stood close to the three of them so it would at least look like I was included, and finally Heather said, “Rachel, why don’t you go get yourself a drink?”

Nice. I hadn’t noticed that the two girls had brought Josephine a drink when we came in, so the three of them all had beer bottles.

“Uh, sure, thanks,” I said. At least going to the kitchen would give me something to do; it would look like I was either on my way to a conversation or coming from one. I weaved around the people, none of whom noticed me, into the kitchen. It was also filled with people, some of them sitting on the kitchen counter, some of them sitting around the table, which had bowls filled with chips and stuff on it. The music was loud in here too, and everyone was just blabbering away about god-knows-what, and I couldn’t see drinks anywhere. I guessed the fridge would be a good place to start.

I squeezed through the people and opened it. There was a lot of beer in there. I didn’t want one, but I figured I’d try it anyway.

“Yo, grab me one too,” some guy said, pushing up behind me. “There’s too many people in here.”

“Uh, sure,” I said, taking two bottles out and handing one to him.

“Thanks. Let me open that for you.” Using a bottle opener he had on his keychain, the guy opened them. “Hey, cheers,” he said and took a swig.

Gamely, I took a swig too. It tasted like filthy shit, absolutely horrible. I couldn’t keep the wince from my face, and the guy laughed.

“Yeah, this beer sucks. Hey, my name’s Mark,” he said, holding out his hand. “I’m Robbie’s friend.”

I shook it, still marvelling at how foul the beer tasted. “I’m Rachel. I’m here with Josephine.”

“I don’t know who that is.” He gulped down some more beer. “So what school do you go to?”

“Glen Park.”

“Ah, f*ck! Do you know Danny Bastin?”

“Nope.”

“Oh. Well, he’s my buddy. I go to Our Lady. It f*cking sucks.”

I nodded amiably. He and I stood there awkwardly for a minute, and then he noticed someone on the other side of the room he wanted to talk to. Or maybe he didn’t, and it was his way of making an excuse to get away from me. “Well, hey, it was nice meeting you, Rachel.”

“Yeah, you too,” I said, and he disappeared into the kitchen-herd, and I was left standing alone again, now with a disgusting drink in my hand. I didn’t want to go back to the living room and stand awkwardly with Josephine and her friends. Walking to the kitchen had made me feel more comfortable, so I decided to take a stroll around the house. It seemed like a better idea to walk around alone than to stand alone.