More Happy Than Not

“You don’t worship Disney,” Baby Freddy says. “Who worships a guy who created princess movies?”

“Who worships another guy, period,” Brendan adds.

“You don’t worship Martin Scorsese,” I answer before anyone else can say something stupid. “You think he’s cool but you’re not hanging up posters of him around your room.” Thomas nods and raises his cup. “So it’s my turn now, right?” I ask Genevieve.

She throws back the rest of her drink. “Let’s see who knows you best, babe.”

I really wish we were playing kings or flip cup or even spin the bottle right now. “Uh . . . I’m great at tic-tac-toe. I love skateboarding. I hate a lot of Spanish music.”

“You’re Puerto Rican so you definitely love Spanish music,” Deon says.

“Yeah, and you probably shake your hips to it while skateboarding,” Skinny-Dave says.

“You’re not great at tic-tac-toe,” Genevieve agrees less offensively.

“You don’t skateboard. You skate on rollerblades,” Thomas says.

I point at him and click my tongue. “He’s right.” I turn to Skinny-Dave. “When the fuck have you seen me skateboard around the block?”

“No way you’re good at tic-tac-toe!” Genevieve shouts. “I beat you all the time.”

“He beat me every time we played the other night,” Thomas says.

Genevieve rakes her hand through her dark hair, and she looks super ill, like she could throw up any minute now. “I guess it’s your turn again, Thomas.”

“No, please. You go.”

She covers her face with her hand. I think she does this so we can’t detect any lie. Or she’s actually about to throw up on me. “I’m ready. I grew up wanting to be a ballerina and an actress and a nurse.” For a drunk girl, her tone remains so steady I think every single one can be true. Everyone’s about to start shooting guesses when she holds her hand out. “Let Aaron go first. Which is the lie, babe?”

“You never wanted to be a ballerina. Come on, that was easy.”

“Yeah,” she says to my relief. Bluffing FTW.

I’m about to offer my turn to someone else when Genevieve stands up, a little wobbly. She raises one arm above her head and trails one leg up the other until she kind of resembles a flamingo—a wasted flamingo. “I wanted to be a ballerina badly. Owned tights and everything.” She stumbles and Baby Freddy catches her. “I was never good enough so I mock the girls who are.” She sits down next to me and nudges my shoulder with hers. “I guess you forgot.”

Skinny-Dave and Fat-Dave hiss like something is sizzling, and Me-Crazy chimes in with, “You got burned!”

I glance at everyone clockwise . . .

Brendan unties his shoelaces so he can tie them again.

Thomas pulls out his phone and I bet anything he’s typing nonsense to no one.

And everyone else is just drinking or looking like they feel very fucking sorry for me. Maybe they feel sorry for her.

“It’s only a game,” Genevieve says, shrugging. “Thomas, you should totally open up Aaron’s present.”

Holy shit, my girlfriend has the biggest balls ever.

“Present time!” Thomas shouts, killing zero tension.

Crystal’s drunk friend tosses Thomas the gift-wrapped present.

“It’s nothing big,” I say.

Thomas unwraps it and rocks forward laughing. “This is awesome!”

“It’s a toy,” Genevieve says.