“I know that look. Tell me! I need to live vicariously through someone else. Lex is boring as hell when it comes to talking about his past. Eric, well… forget that. I don’t need a re-enactment of sucking dick.”
Ahh, the blissful memories of last night. “Not much to tell. Last night was the first time in a while. They were sexy—”
“They?” He cuts me off, eyes practically bulging out of their sockets.
I don’t respond. Instead, I remain quiet. I’m not one to talk openly about my sex life despite how nasty it was last night.
“Dude, fuck, did they eat each other out? Fuck, no, wait, did they finger each other’s asses?”
I almost spit out my drink because they did, I just didn’t think he’d ask.
“Let’s just say, whatever your imagination thinks, it was done.”
Fuck, I’m a cocky motherfucker when I’m wasted.
He lets out the loudest, “Fuck,” I have ever heard and then mentions something about needing to find his wife or a bathroom pronto. Either one, he vanishes, and I’m left alone once again.
It’s not for long, though.
The conga line finds me, Eric front of the train, and the night becomes one massive blur after that.
“What the hell is this?”
I stare at the drink Tristan hands me. The color is dark green, the texture thick with something floating near the brim. I feel the bile rise in my throat, and I struggle to swallow, wrestling with the vomit which is fast bubbling to the surface. I push the glass away, but his strength overpowers me. I’m weak.
Fucking Eric and that fucking conga line!
He pushes it back my way. “Drink it. I promise you won’t have a hangover if you drink this.”
I’m short-fused, my head is pounding like a jackhammer, and I want nothing more than to feel the coolness of the bathroom tiles caress my face. Oh, and pour that rancid-looking drink all over Tristan’s head.
“Kid, fuck off. I’m not drinking that.”
He continues to stand over me and doesn’t let up. For fuckin’ fuck’s sakes. I grab the stupid drink off him and down it in one go.
Oh, mother of fucking.
I run for the bathroom, certain the contents of my stomach will soon be saying hi-de-ho to the toilet bowl. I wait, but as minutes pass, the feeling subsides, the headache eases.
“What the hell was in that?”
“It’s best you don’t know. You feel better, though, don’t you?” He appears pleased with himself.
I nod, then motion for him to get the fuck out of the bathroom, and take the longest shower in the history of mankind.
The magical drink gets me out of bed and in the mood to write. Tristan goes out with Claudia, leaving me with the peace and quiet I so desperately need to finish my manuscript. Mr. Grimmer sent me an email wanting to see an update, so I was hauling major ass trying to get it done. I’d had tighter deadlines than this before, to the point where I didn’t eat or sleep for seventy-two hours straight in the middle of a third-world country, just so I could get a small section printed in the newspaper. It’s all part of the journalism game.
But this isn’t the journalism game.
This is my heart and soul turned into words and poured into this manuscript. It’s a dream, my ambition, my future all riding on this publishing deal.
Come Monday, I’m a ball of nerves again.
Sitting in my office, I’m finishing off a piece I’m doing for the newspaper when Nyree calls.
I switch on my sultry voice. “Good morning, Nyree.”