Nothing like a nice, long dry heave into the bowl to get the day started just right.
28
* * *
By the time I arrived at the sun-?drenched cafeteria, those girls who dared to risk their perfect figures were ready for seconds and it was my job to fill their orders. Although the last thing I wanted to do was look at food, I found myself piling two trays high with toast, doughnuts, fruit, and drinks.
“Eggs?” the man behind the counter offered, lifting a spoonful of yellow scrambled goo.
I winced. “No, thanks.”
I grabbed myself a bagel and added it to the growing pile, hoping I might be able to choke some of it down. Up ahead, a pair of freshman boys was chatting up a pretty freshman girl with dark, curly hair. She giggled and preened and I sneered. Oh, to be that carefree and awake. And clean.
“I heard that last year all the freshman girls who went came back with tattoos,” one of the boys said. “The virgins got Vs and the non-?virgins got lip prints. Right on their left cheeks,” he said, checking out the girl's butt in her pleated mini.
29
“I thought no one came back from the Legacy a virgin,” she said, dipping her spoon into her yogurt then sucking on it teasingly as the line edged forward.
Instantly my ears perked up. The Legacy. Hadn't Dash and those guys mentioned that last night? My memory of the previous evening was hazy, but I did remember them saying something about how Thomas would never miss it. How he'd be there no matter what. How did these kids know about it?
“Not that you have to worry about that, right, Gwen?” the other boy said, practically licking his lips.
“Maybe,” she said, lifting her tray and turning toward them. “Maybe not.”
She traipsed off, leaving the boys gaping behind her. “Dude, I am so gonna hit that at the Legacy. Just wait,” one of them said.
“I will,” the other said grumpily.
“Oh! That's right! You won't be there, will you, Mills!?” the first kid taunted. “Poor, poor frosh. Maybe your grandkids will get to go.”
With that, the kid laughed and sauntered toward his table, head thrown back all the way.
So the Legacy was an exclusive party. One that Gwen and Boy Toy #1 could go to but Boy Toy #2 could not. I would have to file this information away for later and try to process it when my brain was actually functioning again.
I took a deep breath and smelled the scent of fresh paint behind me an instant before I felt the warmth of a body. I turned around to find a bright-?eyed Josh Hollis smiling down at me.
30
Instantly my shoulder muscles coiled with tension. I couldn't look at Josh without thinking of Thomas and wondering whether or not Josh had heard from him.
“Ouch. You look like crudge,” Josh said.
“Crudge?”
“I make up words when no existing terms seem fit to rise to the occasion,” Josh said. “Therefore, crudge.”
“Well, I'm honored to have inspired a new word,” I lied. Not that I could blame him. My dirty-?ass hair was back in a slick from-?grease ponytail and I was sure there was a nice, green undertone to my waxy skin.
“Are you okay?” Josh asked as we moved forward in line. “I was a little worried about you last night.”
The dim memory of a stone-?faced Josh flitted through my mind. One more thing I had forgotten about until now. Come to think of it, though, why would Josh be worried about me? We barely knew each other. A hopeful thought occurred to me in a rush.
“Did Thomas ask you to look out for me or something?” I asked.
Josh blinked. “No. Thomas didn't say anything to me before he left, actually.”
“Oh. So you really have no idea where he is?” I asked.