Please Remain Calm by Courtney Summers

are so beautiful. I just really wanted to tell you that.
    The boy is beautiful.
    Thank you, he says.
    She reaches clumsily across the table and threads her fingers through his hair, enjoying the feel of his dark curls. Penny sees this happen somehow, sees through the wall of an entirely different room where she’s been wrapped around her boyfriend because suddenly, she’s there, saying, don’t let her drink anymore.
    I won’t, the boy promises.
    It makes her feel warm, being looked after, out for. She tries to articulate this with her numb tongue, but all that comes out: is this stupid? Am I stupid?
    You’re one drink away, Penny says, and laughs at the stricken expression this news inspires. Penny hugs her, tells her not to worry about it, whispers in her ear before disappearing back behind her wall, but he’s looking at you.
    Look at her.
    Drink.
    Six-seven-eight-nine shots later and she’s thinking oh no because she is going to puke. He walks her through his house, guides her away from the party.
    You want to get some air? You want to lie down?
    No, she wants her best friend because she worries she is so many drinks past stupid now and she doesn’t know what to do about that.
    It’s okay. I’ll get her. But first you should lie down.
    There’s a truck, a classic pick-up pride and joy. There’s the truck’s bed, and the cold shock of it against her back makes her shiver. The stars above move or maybe it’s the earth, that slow and sure turning of the earth. No. It’s the sky and it’s speaking to her.
    Close your eyes.
    He waits. He waits because he’s a nice boy. A blessed boy. His father is the sheriff and his mother sits at the top of a national auto supply chain and they are both so proud.
    He waits until he can’t wait anymore.
    She thinks he’s beautiful. That’s enough.
    The hard ridges of the truck bed never warm under her body but her body is warm. He feels everything under her shirt before he takes it off.
    Look at me, look at me, hey, look at me.
    He wants her to look at him.
    Her eyes open slowly. His tongue parts her lips. She’s never felt so sick. He explores the terrain of her body while he pretends to negotiate the terms.
    You want this, you’ve always wanted this and we’re not going that far, I promise.
    Really? His hands are everywhere and he’s a vicious weight on top of her that she can’t breathe against so she cries instead, and how do you get a girl to stop crying?
    You cover her mouth.
    But that was a long time ago, and that girl …
    I’m in the dirt. I’m on my hands and my knees and I’m crawling in it, what I came from. I don’t remember standing, don’t remember ever being a thing that could stand. Just this dirt, this road. I opened my mouth to it, tasted it. It’s under my fingernails. A night passed from the ground. Now it’s early morning and I’m thirsty.
    A dry wind moves through the trees off the road beside me, stirring their leaves. I dredge up spit to wet my swollen lips and lick my bloodstained teeth. It’s hot out, the kind of heat that creeps up on you and makes mirages on the road. The kind that shrivels the elderly and carries them into the waiting, open arms of death.
    I roll onto my back. My skirt rides up my legs. I pull at my shirt and find it open, feel my bra unclasped. I fumble buttons through holes, covering myself even though it is so. Hot. I can’t. I touch my fingertips to my throat. Breathe.
    My bones ache, have aged somehow in the last twenty-four hours. I press my palms against the grit and the bitter hurt of it startles me into semiawareness. They’re scraped, raw and pink, what happens when you crawl.
    A distant rumbling reaches my ears. A car. It passes and then slows, backs up, comes to a halt beside me. Its door opens and slams shut. I close my eyes and listen to the soft crunch of soft soles on rough gravel.
    Birds are singing.
    The footsteps stop but the birds are still singing, singing about a girl who wakes up on a dirt