text: I scanned the crowd and saw her. She didn’t blend in with anyone at that party, but that’s part of what made her so mesmerizing. It was mostly boys that she got stares from, they noticed how close her breasts were to fall out of her red tank top. But when I looked at her, I saw her perfectly curled hair falling so gently on her freckled shoulders. I noticed how her smile seems contagious to anyone she’s near. I noticed the faint scar on her upper left arm, and think of the bike accident from fourth grade. Her hand on my shoulder interrupted my internal monologue, “Hey!” she shouted. “What’s up?” I attempted to yell over the music, but my voice was drowned out by the hundred-something teenagers screaming nonsense at each other. She waved her hand, motioning for me to follow her. She grabbed my hand as we slithered through the crowd of sweaty bodies, trying to find a pocket of quieter air. I watched all the jock boys stare her down, absorbing every last second of the view that they could before she disappeared back into the sea of stench. Eventually, we made it to the bathroom. She locked the door and let out a loud sigh while playing with her hair in the mirror. “I’m happy you came tonight,” she grinned, “you make shit like this better”. I just laughed and stared down at the broken tile floor, covered with empty beer cans. “I mean it! I really like hanging out with you Mya,” she said as she plopped herself beside me on the edge of the bathtub. I smirked and continued to stare at the floor scared of what would happen if I looked up. “Yeah, I like hanging out with you too, Case”. Her neatly painted blue fingernails lightly scratched along my thigh, then moved up towards my face. She turned my face towards hers, and as I stared into her hazy green eyes I couldn’t help but smile. “Case,” I started, but before I could finish my thought, her lips were on mine. The familiar taste of vodka filled my mouth, and with the number of times we’ve done this, the taste alone makes my brain spin out of control. She pulled away for just a moment, giving herself enough time to pull the pills out of her pocket and wash them down her throat with more vodka. I pulled away. “You know it scares me when you do that, especially because of what they did to you last summer” She rolled her eyes playfully as she grabbed my hand, pulling me off the edge of the tub and towards the door. She blindly unlocked the door with one hand as the other caressed my face. The door swung open as we melted into the sweaty hallway once again. We trailed along the side of the hallway with our hands against the wall, feeling around for the next door handle. The next room we found was a bedroom, and before I had a second to think she pushed me onto the edge of the bed. She climbed on top of my lap and started kissing my neck. I fell onto my back, letting her soft curls dance around my face and neck, and she kissed me deeper and deeper. I pushed her hips off of me to stop her, “Case I’m sorry but I told you I can’t do this anymore.” “But you like this, you know you do, and nobody needs to know.” she tried to lean in again. “No that’s just it. No one knows we do this. Last summer when you were in the hospital, I couldn’t come to see you, because your parents don’t know who I am. MY parents don’t know who I am. Do you understand how hard it was to sit back and do nothing, alone? Not being able to see someone I love?” “Mya c'mon I love you, you know I do.” “I- I can’t Case.” I turned my head away from her as I stood up off the bed. I quickly scrambled to the door so that she wouldn’t try to convince me to stay. I took a deep breath before I whipped open the door, letting the music and stench surround me once again. I struggled to get to the front door, stumbling over passed-out bodies and empty bottles on the way. I hopped on my bike and started down the dimly lit road. I was probably 20 minutes out when I realized *fuck.* My phone. I turned my bike around and headed back to the house party. The road seemed a little less blurry now. My mind wandered. Thinking about Casey, about us, and if I made the right choice in leaving. Flashes of red, white, and blue snapped me back into reality. Groups of drunk slobs wandered out of the house and into the street, leaving me to swerve around them, dragging out my trip even more. My heart sank when I saw a stretcher being carried down the front steps of the house. My feet couldn’t pedal fast enough as I watched the paramedics lift a body into the ambulance. I got stuck on the outside of the crowd and threw my bike to the ground. I pushed through to the front of the audience, and my heart sank. My eyes filling with tears as I saw the blue, neatly painted fingernails, hanging lifelessly off the edge of the stretcher.