Ecstasy

And they let you try shit for free, like right now.

“What is it?” I ask, holding back, but my palms are sweaty. I’m ready to get fucked up before any of the people he invited come over.

He scratches his neck again and smiles. “I’d rather not say yet.”

I give him the look. What kind of bullshit is that? Even I’m not that stupid. Or willing, I don’t think.

He laughs, swatting away my concern with a lazy flick of his hand. “Nah, nothing crazy. It’s kinda like K, kinda like coke. You get that kinda spacey feeling but like, a little hype too.”

My eyes widen. “A dissociative and a stimulant? Count me the fuck in.” See Kylie, I could be a pharmacist too.

He smiles, rolling his eyes. “Knew you’d be down.” Then he pulls his wallet out of his pocket, tightly rolls up a twenty and hands it to me. “You can take ‘em all.”

He doesn’t need to tell me twice. The lines are gone in no time.

And it tastes like shit, dripping down the back of my throat. I can’t help the snorting sound I make, coughing and rubbing the back of my hand over my nose

“What the fuck?” I say, the taste like a mix of chemicals and tar. I swallow as Jax gets up, taking the rolled up twenty and spoon back into the kitchen. “Need to work on your taste testing,” I call out to him, massaging my throat. “Shit tastes terrible.”

He laughs and comes back into the living room with an unopened sports drink. I twist off the cap, gulp the red liquid down until I can’t taste whatever the fuck I just snorted.

I massage my throat again, then twist the cap on the bottle. I can’t feel shit yet, but I’m just glad that taste is out of the back of my throat. The drip is awful.

Jax lights up a cigarette, sitting back down on the floor at the table, beside me. He pulls the ashtray in the center of the table closer to him. “That bad?” he asks after he exhales a cloud of smoke.

I cough, making a show of it. “That bad,” I tell him truthfully. I drum my fingers on the table. “But I don’t taste it now. That drink works wonders.” I nod toward the half-empty bottle on the table between us. “How long ‘til I start feeling…” I trail off, because I can see the smoke from Jax’s cigarette in the air in front of me and it looks green.

I blink, and it’s back to white and grey but I blink again and it’s green, almost shimmering. The music, the table, Jax himself, they’re all in the background of what I’m seeing.

I lift my hand to touch the smoke and my hand feels heavy. I catch sight of it, and it seems like it’s not quite mine. But that’s my black polish and the freckle on the back of my hand. But it still looks like it belongs to someone else.

I clamp my fingers around my wrist, holding my hand up, and it looks like my hands are just holding themselves. Detached from me.

Jax laughs. “Yeah. Not long.”

I drop my hands and turn to stare at him.

He’s watching me with mild amusement. “You all right?”

I nod, staring at his mouth. When he spoke, it wasn’t with that same lazy drawl. It was musical.

“Say it again.” I clamp a hand over my mouth. My voice is music too.

He laughs. “You all right?” He smiles, then asks, “You wa

I smile at him and nod slowly, then reach for my phone, tucked into my bra. My fingers seem like they belong to someone else, but strangely enough, they do what I will them to do.

They move with my thoughts.

My fingers move with my thoughts. Holy shit.

Distracting me from music and the insanity of that revelation, I’ve got a text from Alex. Asking if he could come over. Then several more after that.

Alex: Come on, Zara. Don’t be fucking shady.

Alex: I’ve had a long day.

Alex: I just want to talk.

A grin spreads across my face, and I wonder what my smile looks like. For a moment, I wish I could just pluck it off my head, hold it up like a Mr. Potato Head smile and look at it.

I ask Jax what his address is because I highly doubt Alex remembers this house, and the numbers and words he shoots back are full of soft, lilting music.

Lilting.

That reminds me of Eli.

But this isn’t Eli.

This is Alex Cardi.

I say his name out loud and Jax snorts. “Your ex, the great, beloved, champion quarterback asshole?” He laughs again. “Damn, Za. Get off his dick.”

I don’t let his words jar me. My fingers are already flying across the keyboard on my phone of their own accord with Jax’s address and then: Come find me.

I open my music app, put on IKnowI’mNotAHero by The Virus and Antidote, then put my phone down on the table and meet Jax’s eyes.

He frowns at me. “I’ve been meaning to tell you. I heard he got into some trouble last year at some house party,” Jax says. He shrugs. “Almost got caught up in a rape scandal.”

I know this should be disturbing news to me, but I can’t really feel it. “Rape?” I mouth the word and it explodes with music, coming out like a musical refrain with an echo. Kind of disturbing, such a nasty word sounding so magical.

Jax raises a brow. “Yeah. I don’t know the details. Just some gossip or shit. You good with sleeping with him or should I make sure he stays off you since you two broke up?”

I see he’s shuffling a deck of cards on the table. I have no idea where they came from. Maybe out of thin fucking air. The cigarette is in the ash tray. I don’t remember watching him put it out.

I think about his question, and I can’t stop the slow grin spreading on my face as I think about Alex and Eli both almost fucking me.

“I’m good,” I answer him. It comes out like “goooOooooOoood” and I giggle, my hand over my mouth.

I think I need to ask him about this rape, but I don’t really want to. It kind of just floats away into the back of my mind. Instead, I lift my hands in front of my face, twisting and twirling my fingers. Jax keeps shuffling the cards and then I notice my phone light up like a Christmas tree.

A Christmas tree.

Mom always put a white one up every year, dragged her husband (whichever number) to a little decoration party with me as the sullen stepdaughter. Her husbands have all been pretty decent to me—save for my own father, who I have very few memories of and get a birthday card once a year from and nothing more—but one of them really hated Christmas. He refused to decorate, and Mom called him Scrooge as he pouted in a corner while we hung the ornaments.

I laugh out loud at that random memory as I read the text from Alex.

Be there soon, princess.

My heart flutters with those words.

“He’s so tall,” I say out loud.

Jax starts dealing the cards between us, even though I have no idea what he’s trying to play.

“Yeah, fucker is huge,” he says.

I giggle again.