Only If You're Lucky(36)

“Trevor has her. She’s fine.”

The circle settles back into a heavy, stoned silence, our limbs light and minds numb. The house is still thumping, still thrumming, still pulsing with the energy of hundreds of people still inside. I can practically feel the sweat dripping, the body heat radiating, and eventually Sloane and Lucas get up to grab another drink, leaving Lucy and me alone again.

I look over at her, blue eyes ablaze as she stares into the flames, feeling another rush of warmth in my chest.

“How was it complicated?”

It takes me a second to realize she’s talking to me. She’s still staring into the fire, completely entranced, her voice barely above a whisper. I look around, checking to see who else she could be directing the question to, but still, we’re alone.

“What?” I ask at last.

“Your friend,” she says. “You never said how she died. Only that it was an accident. That it was complicated.”

I feel a quick twinge in my chest like a popped guitar string, my insides buzzing. Remembering that conversation on my bed, the three of them staring as I started to talk.

“She fell,” I say at last, still staring at her profile. I wait for Lucy to turn and face me but she never does. “There was an argument, and she had been drinking … Honestly, it’s one of those things that doesn’t even feel real. Like I dreamed it or something.”

I’m quiet as I turn back toward the fire, my eyes getting lost in the glowing logs, the licking flames. Watching them travel up the pile of wood before transforming into curling black smoke and disappearing altogether.

“Where did it happen?” she asks.

“A party,” I respond. “I didn’t want to go, and she went with him.”

I swallow, close my eyes, remembering how it felt to be lying in bed that night, tapping through Instagram and seeing the videos of them together. Eliza and Levi. I knew she must have been drunk to be posting them like that, raw and unfiltered, one after the other in quick succession. Her eyes were glassy and unfocused, a vacant stare, and I could so perfectly picture her heavy fingers punching at her phone screen as Levi draped an arm around her shoulder, the weight of him heavy. Pulling her down.

I remember sitting up fast, my screen glowing in the dark and alarm growing in my chest. Watching the two of them giggle uncontrollably, stagger around. A bottle of vodka clutched in his hand that he lifted to her lips, tipping it back.

I open my mouth, ready to speak again, when the body of a boy comes out of nowhere and slams into the seat beside me, making me jump.

“Holy shit,” he says. “Lucy Sharpe?”

Maybe it’s because everything feels so detailed tonight, the edges razor-sharp like a freshly whetted blade, but I can’t help but register the way Lucy’s eyes swell at the sight of him, her face freezing for just a second before slipping back into that indifferent fa?ade.

“Jesus, we all thought you were dead or something,” the boy continues, laughing, missing the fact that Lucy is ignoring him. Or maybe he just doesn’t care. “Where have you been? Do you go here?”

I watch as she gives him her full attention, finally, a fair-faced blonde wearing a short blue dress slathered in blood. Even from behind, I can see his shoulders tense beneath her scrutiny, a self-conscious laugh escaping his lips.

“Yeah, I know, I didn’t pick the costume,” he says, grabbing the dress. “All the pledges had to wear something stupid. I’m one of the twins from The Shining. What year are you?”

“I’m sorry, I have no idea who you are,” Lucy says at last, crossing one leg over the other. “We’ve never met.”

“Yes, we have,” the boy says, shaking his head. He doesn’t seem drunk—in fact, compared to the rest of us, he seems shockingly sober.

“You said you’re a pledge?” she asks, leaning forward, the light from the fire making her eyes shine. “A freshman, then?”

“Yeah, I’m Danny, remember?”

“Then why aren’t you getting me a drink?”

She thrusts her cup in his direction, the liquid inside barely half gone, and I look back and forth between Lucy and the boy, her cold eyes trained on his, something heavy traveling between them. It isn’t like Lucy to be so casually cruel like this. Blunt? Sure. She gets off on making people uncomfortable, commanding them around, but it’s usually with an air of intimacy, like she’s teasing them because she loves them. People would kill to be bossed around by Lucy, wearing her attention like a badge of honor … but Danny looks concerned right now, uneasy, cataloging the way she’s staring at him. Like she doesn’t even know him at all.

“I … I was just going…”

He gestures behind us, farther into the backyard, before closing his mouth and shaking his head, like he’s suddenly thought better of whatever he was about to say.

“Yeah, sure,” he says at last, standing up and taking her cup. “Coming right up.”

We watch in silence as he walks away, nothing but the popping of the fire and the distant echo of music masking the utter stillness between us. I wonder if she’s going to bring it up again, Eliza, nudge me to continue, but instead she turns toward me and smiles like she only just realized I’m here.

“Terrible pickup line.”

“You really didn’t know him?” I ask, looking back at the house where the boy disappeared, my own voice suddenly sounding strange in my ears. “It seems like he knew you.”