I groan to myself. That shouldn’t make me so happy. “K,” I grumble before focusing back on the make up box. I find the eyeshadow and get started on doing myself up. I used to do my make up quite a bit in the hopes of impressing a certain somebody, but after all that shit, I stuck with just using mascara, and that’s if I can remember to put it on. Standing here beside Tully, doing such a typical girl thing is so damn refreshing. I’ve missed this.
“Hey,” I say as I apply a little bronzer. Tully looks to me with a strange curiosity and I realize that my tone came across way too suspicious, but I might as well go for it. The question has been bugging me all week. “Does Noah actually put chili powder in everything?”
“What?” she barks out with a sharp laugh. “No, he can’t stand the stuff.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“Why?” she says, getting back to adding a well-practiced wing to her eyeliner.
“Don’t worry,” I tell her. “I get the feeling the moron was messing with me.”
“I wouldn’t put it past him,” she laughs. “Now, hurry up. I feel like dancing.”
Twenty minutes later, Tully and I are climbing up into her Jeep before she jams the keys in the ignition and turns. Her car starts up and along with it comes the deafening sound from the sound systems that Noah had insisted he install for her. Apparently, it was some kind of eighteenth birthday present. I can just imagine what their eighteenth birthday would have looked like. Crazy, epic, and intense probably doesn’t even start to cover it.
We pull up at a party a few minutes later and I find myself curiously looking around. Call me nosey, but I’ve never been here before and I’ve always found it fascinating to see how others live. Hell, maybe as the party gets going, I’ll even snoop around a little.
This place belongs to one of the many cheerleaders of Haven Falls and is one of the bigger places around here. Most of the houses in this part of the world are cramped and don’t offer much space. I’m fortunate enough that it’s only me and dad living at my place, so the whole ‘cramped’ thing doesn’t bother me, but for a bigger family, it would probably be an issue.
Tully grabs my hand and practically hauls me towards the front door. There are people littering the street and already a couple getting nasty in the bushes. “What’s your poison?” Tully asks, glancing across at me with a curious smirk.
“I’m definitely a Vodka girl,” I tell her. “Though, it’s been a while.”
“Well, it’s time to get reacquainted,” she laughs, grabbing the door and hauling it open as though she’s been here a million times. Tully Cage isn’t a stranger to a good party and I have a feeling I’m in for a wild night. “Tonight is going to get messy.”
Hell yes. That’s exactly what I need.
Kaylah and I used to come to this shit all the time. We lived for it. It was one party after another despite the bitches who tried to make those parties a living hell. We loved it. It was our way of letting off steam from another shitty week. But tonight, this isn’t letting off steam, more like celebrating feeling human again.
Speaking of…I wonder if Noah will be coming tonight?
I walk with Tully through the house and can’t help but glance at the bodies all around me as the cigarette smoke begins to sting my eyes. These are the people who have teased and tormented me for the past few years, and no doubt, the ones who have tried to tear me down over the past few months are probably hiding here somewhere too, just waiting for me to show my face so they can do it all over again.
As I make my way through the house with Tully dragging me along, those eyes fall on me and I brace myself for a verbal smackdown, yet it never comes. They simply look away and mind their own damn business as though me walking into this party was a non-event. I mean, what? That is not the kind of shit I am used to, but I could definitely get used to it.
Not being called out for not belonging was actually kind of nice.
Maybe it has something to do with the fact that Tully’s hand is wrapped around mine and Noah has been glued to my side all week with Rivers never too far away. Maybe that deems me socially acceptable. Who the hell knows?
Tully and I break through the grinding bodies and find a table filled to the brim with drinks. I usually bring my own to these kinds of things. You know, you can never be too sure when it comes to alcohol, especially in Haven Falls. We’re not particularly known for being the safest community. There are definitely some major douchebags around here, all of whom are either into some heavy shit or into dealing that heavy shit. No doubt, that will be going on in some discreet corner of this house tonight. It’s inevitable in Haven Falls.