Going Under by S. Walden

each other.”
    I wanted to strangle him. How dare he push
my hand away! Another insolent bastard. Was that a personality
requirement to get on the swim team?
    “Maybe some other time,” I said.
    “No,” Parker replied. “Maybe now.”
    We stood staring at each other. I learned
everything I needed to know about him in the few moments we locked
eyes. He always got his way, and he considered himself superior to
everyone. The problem was that he underestimated me. And that was a
mistake.
    “Gretchen’s coming with me now,” I said,
wrapping my hand around Gretchen’s wrist. I wasn’t about to let go
either. He’d have to slice my arm off. “Move.”
    I shoved him aside perhaps harder than I
meant to, but he got the point. He watched as I dragged Gretchen
behind me, ignoring her protests to stay in the basement.
    “You’re not staying in the basement!” I
hissed. “So get over it!”
    I chanced a backward glance at Parker. He
stood with his hands in his pockets, staring at me, deciding how he
would deal with me in the future. I’m quite sure he planned to
since I stole away his fuck toy for the evening.
    Stephanie did what she was told. She was
still in the bathroom when Gretchen and I returned upstairs.
    “I’ve got a lot of people pissed at me,” she
said, as I helped her wash her face and hands. She was successful
in making herself throw up—multiple times, I observed—but not so
much in cleaning it up. At least she was no longer slurring her
words and was slightly more coherent, or as coherent as Stephanie
could possibly be.
    “There are five hundred bathrooms in this
house,” I replied. “They’ll get over it.”
    Just then Gretchen decided she needed to get
sick, too, and I barely pulled her mass of brown hair away from her
face in time before she heaved into the toilet.
    “I’m really mad at you, Brookey,” she said
after the first round. She didn’t look at me when she said it. She
was wise enough to keep her head in the toilet.
    “Don’t talk,” I ordered. “Just keep
going.”
    I was annoyed, naturally, even though I
could recall Gretchen doing the same thing for me, and on many
occasions. I can’t believe I used to party like this. I can’t
believe I ever wanted to. What was the point? I wasted all of the
following day lying in bed with an herb-infused bean bag stuck to
my forehead surrounded by bottles of Gatorade. And if the hangover
was especially monstrous, I’d cry, which made it worse. Such a
waste of time. A waste of life.
    “He was cute,” Gretchen continued after the
second wave. “I wanted to kiss him.”
    “I know you did,” I replied. “But he’s a
dick.”
    “Who’s a dick?” Stephanie asked. She was
sitting on the sink counter, her already too-short dress hiked up
around her hips, long legs slightly spread and dangling off the
side.
    I turned around and looked at her. “You
don’t sit like that in public, do you?”
    She shrugged. “Who’s a dick?”
    “Just this swim guy at my school,” I
replied.
    “He’s not a dick!” Gretchen said, then
heaved again.
    “Good grief, Gretchen. How much did you
drink?”
    I patiently waited for the wave to subside.
She wiped her mouth with a bit of toilet paper and addressed me.
“How should I know?”
    I rolled my eyes. “Was he feeding you drinks
all night?”
    “He’s a gentleman,” she replied.
    “What the hell does that mean?” I asked.
    “He went to get me drinks,” she said. No
longer able to stand bent over, she fell on the bathroom floor. I
could have reached out and grabbed her arm to keep her from going
down, but I didn’t.
    “Yeah, I bet he did,” I said. “Stay away
from that guy, Gretchen. I mean it.”
    “You are soooo not fun right now,” Gretchen
pouted.
    True. I wasn’t being any fun. The real
purpose for coming to this lame party tonight was to do a bit of
sleuthing. Well, and to keep Gretchen from being violated. I
succeeded in the second, but not in the first. I didn’t know