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"You really don't have anything at all?"
Roxy's started to slur her words even when she's not intoxicated. You think it's habitual - the girl drinks so much and so often that the characteristics of the drunkard have wormed their way into her brief moments of sobriety. That's how you've pieced things together, anyway. Maybe she's just looking for attention. But you like her voice - it always cheers you up, oddly enough, no matter what she's talking about. It's light and fluffy like whipped cream, and you swear sometimes you can taste the sweetness of her words. On the odd occasion, you even get a little bit jealous of that sugary voice of hers - it seems an unfair cherry on top of the cake that is Roxy Lalonde. She's bursting at the seams with charisma and a quirky magnetism that you've yet to find in anyone else. Most of all, you're glad she's your best friend. All of this is so cheesy it would make anybody else cringe with embarrassment, but you've always been a sucker for cheesiness. You have an inkling that she is, too.
The sound of Roxy giggling to herself as she saunters over from the kitchen cabinets interrupts your train of thought. She kneels down to her bag that sits next to you on the couch and dips her hand in, producing one bottle, and then another. You take note that her pyjamas are the most adorable thing you've ever seen. They're pink with little white kittens printed on them, surrounded by the words 'purr' and 'meow' in cursive text.
"Good thing I remembered to cater for us, Janey," She inspects the label, tapping it with her index finger as she holds the bottle by the neck. "Especially when your fam is so straight-edge."
You pull a disapproving face. It's not as if you're surprised that she smuggled alcohol into your house, but you would never drink any of it yourself. You are going to be assertive, you tell yourself. You have an iron will, and there's a difference between putting up with 'drunky' and joining her ranks.
"Are you possibly hinting," You pause for a moment to point at the bottle of vodka, "That you expect me to drink that godawful swill?" You huff, frowning at her. In actuality, you just look even less threatening when you're angry, but you don't know that.
Lalonde says nothing; she just snickers and pulls a bottle opener from the side-pocket of her bag. She's always prepared for the worst situations, especially when they involve alcohol, or the looming threat of a lack of. With incessant giggling, she maneuvers the bottle opener in such a fashion that it looks like a man doing starjumps, and she appears to think that this is surely the funniest thing that anyone has ever done. You admit, it's not really that funny, but you laugh anyway - her happiness is simply intoxicating.
She eventually opens the bottle, handing it to you, and without even thinking, you take it, watching reproachfully yet curiously as she does the same with her own. Her black lips twist into a wide smile, and just as she's about to tip her bottle back, she throws you an expectant look.
"Come on, just try some. One teeny tiny sip. I promise you'll be fine." She snickers, seemingly at herself. "If you're not, loverboy is all yours."
"Stop!" Your expression quickly changes to a pout at the cue of her last few words. She raises her eyebrows and ruffles your hair in response, before lifting the bottle to her lips and drinking with gusto. You feel like you should follow suit. You know you shouldn't follow suit. But, regardless, you end up following suit, and regretting it immediately afterwards.
The stuff burns your mouth, tingling and bitter, but like any polite young lady, you swallow a gulp of the tart brew. Lalonde's already downed most of her bottle, but she's still drinking. She doesn't notice as you grimace and shudder, the aftertaste being one of the most unpleasant you have experienced, second only to an onion and cheddar cake you baked once, but said cake is akin to 'the brother that nobody talks' about of your baking family.
She's already opened another bottle in the time it took you to recover. Your tongue still feels betrayed as you watch her skull, giggling as she drinks; her lips seal the opening of the bottle, curved upwards in the smallest smile. How can she be so happy to have that stuff trickling down her throat? Doesn't it bother her in the slightest? You sit and contemplate having another sip, just to try. Maybe you'll grow accustomed to it. After a good 10 minutes, you gingerly lift the bottle to your lips and drink, forcing yourself to swallow quickly and painlessly. You try to convince yourself that you appreciate the taste, but you don't do a very good job.
And it's started. She staggers over to the couch and slumps down in the least graceful manner you've seen, her presence accompanied by a loud 'fwump' as the cushions give and the air rushes out. You coerce yourself mentally into tipping back the bottle and downing more of the drink. Lalonde looks over to you with half-lidded eyes, exhales deeply, and takes the bottle from you, her eyeliner smudged at the edges and a drowsy smile on her face. Thank god. You breathe a sigh of relief as she moves to set it down on the table in front of you. You don't want any of that disgusting stuff, you never did, and you're glad Lalonde is finally respecting your boundaries.
Or, so you think she is, until she leans back into the couch, shifting positions so she's lying on her side, her head resting on your shoulder. She sidles her body closer to you, and you freeze, her fingers trailing their way up from your side to your waist. You hear a giggle - soft, but close enough to your ear for it to be audible.
"Hey, baby," She murmurs, her voice a low, sensual drawl. It's quite clear by this point that your friend is very, very intoxicated, her drunken form making every attempt to get closer until it's far too close for comfort. Your body has completely seized up, and she nudges you, trying to instigate a reaction. You take a few deep breaths as she creeps her fingers up and around to knot them in your dark hair, and manage to turn to look at her.
"What are you doing?" You say, as calmly as you can muster, almost as if speaking to a child. She's inebriated, you tell yourself. You've given her some leeway when she's been in such a state before.
"Janey," She holds your face in both hands, and you can feel the slightest tug as she motions for you to lean in. "I love you,"
You sigh. It's another one of these episodes. You're used to her drunken dramatics by this point, and so you nod and say with the smallest crack of a smile, "I love you too."
"No, but," Her words are becoming slower and more drawn out the more she speaks, her tone wavering and her sentences interrupted by the occasional hiccup. Her expression changes to one of childlike desperation. "But I love you, I really love you, so much,"
"I know, drunky, now just relax. Don't stress!" You say, and you can feel the drink start to have a bit of an effect on you, too. You feel your muscles become loose and relaxed, a sensation that you can't quite put your finger on washing over your body.
She groans in what seems like frustration and does the unthinkable. She does something that makes your heart drop through your chest, leaving an empty cavity in its wake. Something that makes you feel like you're going to be sick - something that makes everything feel wrong, as if there's something biting at you from the inside, filling you with more guilt and uncertainty with every pulsating pang of conscience.
She kisses you, right on the lips. She smells nice, you note to yourself. And this feels kind of nice, ignoring the infelicitous nature of the situation. But she tastes like vodka. You're sure you do too, but your train of thought is quickly derailed as you realize what's actually talking place here.
You bring your arms to her chest and push her back by the shoulders, exclaiming loudly as you jerk backwards and away from her. She looks very disconcerted and worried, but not the sort of worried that she should look like. More like the perplexed look on a child's face when they don't quite understand something. There's a thick silence in the air, so thick you can almost hear ringing in your ears. The hum of the fridge and the soft sound of chatter on the TV is completely drowned out, almost as if an invisible wall is separating you and her from the rest of the world, encapsulating you both in a place where nothing makes any sense to either of you. You swear, for a moment, that you forget who you are. You never dreamt your first kiss would be like this, and in your semi-drunken stupor, you struggle to come to terms with the fact that it actually is.
Lalonde looks like she might cry, but she doesn't. She doesn't even make a move to kiss you again as you suspected, nor even to say anything - she just crawls up to you, and rests her head in your lap. You don't move an inch, you just watch her. You continue to watch, unmoving, as she falls asleep. It doesn't take long until you drift off, too, but you find it difficult to tell the difference between either state of being. All you know is that you have no idea where you stand. Not with Lalonde, and not with yourself.
---
Your name is Lalonde, and you are already used to the headache that greets you as you wake up. You've trained yourself to tune the hangover out, so you're able to cope. Of course it's not exactly pleasant, but you can live with it.
You look up. Jane is in exactly the same position: upright on the couch, her head drooping down and arms splayed out, asleep. Her glasses are situated on your chest, having fallen from her face last night. You have absolutely no idea how she was able to do that, but she doesn't give you much time to ponder the subject. Her eyes lazily flicker open, and she yawns, her curls falling over her face messily. She looks so innocent, and every pulsating reminder of last night between your temples only makes you feel worse. You think it through carefully: you're going to apologize. You're going to fix everything, and it'll be okay, and she'll feel fine. You'll be back to being best friends forever, and she won't have to worry, not in the slightest.
"Good morning," You hear from above you. Jane's voice is soft and shy, and she seems vulnerable. You've seen this side of her before, but never has it been brought about by your own actions.
"Morning," You say, cheerfully. Normally. The way you would say it, had you not done what you had did.
Jane pauses, thoughtfully touching her fingers to her lips, looking you up and down. Not in a judging way, but more a curious way. An interesting, iconically Jane-like way. You've always liked this about her. She's inquisitive, but not pushy, like you can be. It's a nice contrast.
"Do you...remember what happened?" She asks, slowly, annunciating every syllable very carefully, as if rehearsing lines to herself, picking apart the very structure of her sentences. In reality, you think she's just unsure.
You laugh, and it's a rather convincing act.
"Are you seriously asking me that, Janey?" You lift your head and sit upright, legs crossed, facing her. "When do I ever?"
She looks immensely relieved, and she lifts her hand to her chest, holding her heart and laughing - laughing the same way a person does after they've been given a fright by someone in a Halloween costume, or some other stupid comparison. You've never been much good at coming up with similes or metaphors that aren't plain useless.
"Okay, good," She breathes, in between giggles. "Let's just say it's for the best. I'm not sure I remember the whole ordeal either, but you were acting very strangely!"
You say nothing and force a smile.