Chapter Text
Jackie Taylor was never a jealous girl. Never cared what people did, or didn’t do. Except, when it came to her sister. Claire.
Her hair, a much lighter shade of blonde than Jackie’s, was like silk woven from the gods and infused with gold and sunlight. Her eyes, instead of being midway between swamp green and shit brown, were a clear ocean blue. Her smile, white and wide. Genuine, but practiced all the same. Her boyfriend, plucked straight out of a fairy-tale book (or a Taylor Swift music video).
Jackie was never a jealous girl, but oftentimes she wished she was her sister.
Her five-year relationship with her high school sweetheart had crumbled apart like a castle built on sand, washed away by waves of unspoken truths. That she had never really loved Jeff. That he had been a placeholder for something she hadn’t realized she truly wanted.
Not a man, but a woman.
That particular revelation had sunk her entire self-worth, or maybe she simply never had any in the first place.
Who was she now? Without Jeff. Without the perfect little fantasy she had pre-planned for her entire fucking life? Since she’d been young enough to have her own thoughts?
A white canvas was a far scarier endeavour than painting by numbers where everything was already decided for her. What size brushes would she use? What type of color palette would suit her?
Jackie had no clue where to start. At the beginning of who she should be, or at the end of who she was?
Wind tussled her hair as she took a sip of her cappuccino. Mug warm, sun threatening to become warmer as it slowly rose in the background of a towering skyline of buildings.
This breakfast restaurant wasn’t distinct in any exceptional way. The coffee wasn’t addictive, although the food was perhaps a little more seasoned than most big-chain restaurants. Its defining feature, the one that always managed to make Jackie and her sister come back time and time again, was the rooftop terrasse.
Jackie sat across from her, their table round and just big enough for two plates and two mugs. Anything more would have made it feel overcrowded.
She was lost in thought, her mind stuck on what-ifs and things that may have never happened, when Claire uttered a single sentence that made her freeze in place.
“I actually have something to tell you,” she said, excitement clear in her tone.
Jackie’s hand stilled, coffee halfway to her mouth. She ripped her eyes away from the city skyline to her sister’s bright blues. Her mug made a loud clink as she set it down on the table. Her heart kicked up a notch.
“We’re getting married!”
Jackie’s shock wore off as soon as Claire’s squeal pierced her eardrums and slapped (or stabbed) her back to reality.
Claire rummaged through her purse and slid the ring on. It was beautiful. The diamond wasn’t shy about taking up sunlight, and neither was the gold the band was forged with.
Right. She should have been happy. Excited. Should she have, like, screamed? Nah. Too much. Tenants at the table behind them were already staring, whispering.
“Holy shit,” Jackie breathed out, reaching for her sister’s hand and pulled it closer. “That thing is fucking huge.”
“Do you really have to swear so much?” Claire asked, pulling her usual face. The exact same one their mother used to make.
Disapproval tangled with judgment.
“It’s how I show my excitement,” Jackie replied, lips pressed into a thin line, voice dry and flat. As if her personality switch was flipped off.
Claire changed her demeanor, too. Must be Taylor genetics, or something. She gently slid her hand away from Jackie’s and turned the ring on her finger with her thumb and index. Back and forth. Again and again.
Jackie’s eyes were glued on the motion. Taunting.
Claire wasn’t staring at her sister when she spoke. “It’s just the engagement ring.”
Right. The real thing absolutely had to be bigger. Better. More diamonds. More gold. This is just a simple peasant ring.
Jackie barely stopped herself from rolling her eyes. She should have brought sunglasses, just to have the privacy to do so.
“When—”
Claire cut her off, like she’d been hoping Jackie would ask. “In six months. On Mom and Dad’s anniversary.”
Jackie lifted her coffee to her lips, holding back whatever smart-ass remark might offend her sister and landed her with the bill after Claire would inevitably storm out.
“Are you sure?” Jackie asked, after a careful moment’s consideration.
“I asked Dad.”
Claire’s eyes snapped up, landing right on Jackie’s. A hint of dampened excitement lingered in them. And whether it was for her sake or Jackie’s, she couldn’t tell. Jackie felt ridiculously foolish for letting petty jealousy ruin the moment.
“And you?”
Jackie’s brow creased. “It’s your wedding.”
Her wedding, her choice. Could be symbolic. Could be just another way for Claire to make everything about her. To prove how much she had always been - and would always be - the favorite child.
Claire shook her head, as if clearing unwanted thoughts away. Her smile returned as her hand reached for Jackie’s across the table.
“Good. I’m just so happy, Jack. I can’t wait.”
Jack.
God, she hated it when people called her that. Far from cute and endearing.
“Me too,” Jackie lied straight to her face, forcing out her brightest smile. The one she mastered over the years of expertly masking.
It always worked, too.
“Congratulations, Claire,” she said in a steady voice. “You deserve it.”
More than Jackie ever would. Jackie was acting like a petty asshole (at least in her own head), rather than celebrating Claire’s engagement to her high school sweetheart.
Maybe it felt especially personal since Jackie had just ended things with hers.
“Are you bringing Jeff?”
Jackie wanted to wretch when his name left her sister’s mouth. Like she’d dug her hand into her garbage and pulled something out that should have stayed there. The stench remained, imprinted in the air around her, stitched into her memory.
“We broke up,” Jackie reminded her with a clipped tone that she barely managed to temper.
Claire let out a soft chuckle, like it was all a joke to her. “You always do. And you always get back together.”
“No, not this time,” Jackie responded, eyes sliding towards the skyline once more. The sun was nearly peaking over the buildings now. “It’s for real this time.”
Claire simply hummed as she sipped her drink. A Mimosa. This was perhaps a cause for a bigger celebration, indicated by Claire's beverage, though Jackie decided that she’d rather have caffeine to get through it.
“Come on, Jackie,” she prodded, a prominent pout on her lips.
Jackie knew, better than anyone, how it worked on her parents. On her soon to be husband. And how it used to work on her.
Used to. Not anymore.
“You can’t come to my wedding without a hot date.”
Jackie shrugged, one shoulder. “I might.”
Silence fell for a beat. Thick like a cloak masking things unspoken.
Claire finally acquiesced, letting out a sigh of dramatic proportions. “Female solidarity and all that,” she tried to joke, raising her hand like her statement stood for a greater cause.
Jackie snorted a laugh.
Claire thought her joke had landed, her blue eyes mirrored delight in having successfully lightened the mood (she thought).
But the laugh Jackie let out wasn’t the one Claire had intended to earn.
Jackie’s smile was tight, head tilted as she clinked her mug against her sister’s thin glass.
“Yay, women,” she mumbled, lips against the rim of her mug.
Sarcasm at its peak. She was simply not enthused.
Jackie was never a jealous person, but she sure as fuck felt like shit for acting like one.
Jackie wasn’t sitting at home, sifting through the recent photos she’d taken, sitting under the cool breeze of an air conditioning unit. No, Jackie was unfortunately stuck in the hot Austin sun, accumulating sweat in places she’d rather not dwell on.
Camera around her neck, too-large sunglasses covering her eyes, and her bangs curling from the sweat at her brow, and this climate’s truly fantastic humidity factor.
It had been her fault, really, having been fathered by UT Austin’s soccer coach. Women’s division, his pride and joy. The Austin Longhorns. He’d always hounded her to join, but Jackie was never the athletic type. He should have known, his daughter being a fashion major at this very campus.
Jackie sat smack-dab in the middle of the bleachers. Her father had wanted her to take “action shots” for the school paper. Something about recruiting poor girls into sweating it out with the lot of them, out in this arid, fucking desert of a state.
Pure torture.
Masochistic, even.
The rest of the bleachers were mostly empty. The Longhorns were warming up (as if simply walking outside hadn’t been enough) before their game. Jackie lifted her camera, scrolling through the shots she’d taken earlier. Her eyes grew wide with embarrassment as a certain star player seemed to be in every frame.
Shauna Shipman.
Number 6.
Truth be told, Jackie had been nursing this totally unrealistic crush on the girl for a long time. And the most distressing part of it all? They’d never actually spoken. Sure, they’d seen each other a lot, considering Jackie’s father was the coach and Jackie had been roped into being their unofficial, disgruntled photographer.
But, their interactions were never anything more than a head nod or a small “hey”.
What the hell would she even talk to Shauna fucking Shipman about, anyway?
‘Wowza, Shipman, you sure can handle slippery balls.’
Not only would Jackie probably have said something equally mortifying (if not fucking worse), she also hadn’t told anyone that she was, you know, oh-so-very gay.
Except for one person.
“Still taking pictures of sweaty women, loser?”
Charlotte Matthews, better known as Lottie. Her best friend.
The tall woman slumped into the empty seat next to Jackie, eyes peeking at the tiny screen on her camera.
Jackie quickly turned it away, as if she hadn’t just been deciding which twelve pictures of Shauna to keep for the school paper.
“Just talk to her already.”
“Easy for you to say.”
Lottie smiled, shrugging like the heat didn’t bother her. Bangs didn’t lie, though, and hers were also stuck to her forehead.
“I do have extensive knowledge of dating a soccer jock.”
Jackie snorted a laugh and deleted more photos. A particularly egregious close-up of Shauna, mid-kick, mouth parted, sweat beading on her face and throat.
Yeah, fuck it, she’ll keep that one.
Lottie turned back to her suddenly. “Wait, I could get Nat to—”
“No,” Jackie interrupted without looking up. She paused her deletion spree, and turned to witness Lottie’s bothersome smirk. “Let me be melodramatic about it. Maybe we’ll run into each other in the most absurd way, fall in love, get married.”
“Maybe she’ll kick the ball right in your face, and—”
The ball did, in fact, come soaring their way, but it landed just shy of their feet.
Jackie shot Lottie a glare hotter than the sun itself.
Lottie was too lost in her full-belly laughter to notice it.
Jackie watched as Shauna jogged toward them, then hopped onto the first row of the blue-colored benches and waved one arm around.
She was looking straight at Jackie.
Jackie remained still. Like a statue. Like a statue-shaped moron.
“Throw it!”
Shauna shouted further instructions, as her hand wave had seemingly not been enough of a prompt for Jackie. It was. Should have been, really, had Jackie not been frozen in place. Inexplicably.
Lottie eventually elbowed her, and Jackie moved like a woman on a mission. She bent to grab the ball, gripped it with both hands, raised it over her head, and threw it with all her might.
It landed, pathetically, halfway between them.
Shauna stared as it bounced between two benches, before bursting out laughing.
Great. Fantastic.
Jackie truly hoped red looked good on her.
“I’ll get it!” Shauna yelled back as she quickly jogged up the steps and threw it to her teammate. The one with the blonde hair who’s always wearing that awful backwards cap. Hat or something. Whatever, it didn’t matter.
Jackie watched Shauna pause before heading back down. She shot Jackie the most egregiously crooked grin over her shoulder.
“Nice throw.”
And then she was gone, like nothing had happened. As if the simple, off-handed comment hadn’t just made Jackie’s heartrate shoot up.
Jackie’s jaw tightened as she flipped Shauna off for the cheap shot at her expense, middle finger raised high and unapologetic. At least she still had the coordination for that much. A fact Shauna clearly caught when she glanced back over her shoulder.
Smiling.
Wide and toothy. Dopey enough to make it irksome.
Jackie was still flushed when she sat back down, arms folded across her chest.
Lottie leaned over to laugh into her shoulder.
“You almost had your rom-com moment.”
It was, at that very moment, that Jackie wished the ball had hit her in the head and caused a severe concussion. It would have been far less humiliating than whatever the hell that was.
“Fuck you,” Jackie replied with a huff.
Lottie only laughed louder. What a rotten friend she was.
The rest of the bleachers eventually filled out with enthused partisans, drunk or otherwise, and the game was well on its way.
Jackie wasn’t much of a conspiracy theorist, but she swears that she caught Shauna throwing furtive little glances her way throughout the game.
Once, right after she scored a goal.
Jackie had stared right back.
Jackie was lying on her bed, head at an awkward angle as she stared down at her phone, mindlessly swiping like some robot. The air conditioning unit worked overtime to keep the room cool and the desert heat and humidity outside where it belonged.
Too tall. Swipe.
Too blonde. Swipe.
Too…dopey. Swipe.
Jackie was in full crisis mode. She needed a date for her sister’s wedding, and sure, she had six months (minus the past two weeks that had already gone by). But, shopping for arm candy was a far more complex endeavour than she’d initially thought.
UT men really didn’t have that much to offer. And it had, in fact, occurred to her that men were not her preference, but for the purposes of a wedding date? It would have to do.
Right?
Besides, who came out to their family just before their sibling’s wedding? It would give attention seeker. Jackie might not be perfect, she might be a kind of an uptight bitch, but hell, she wasn’t one of those.
And if anything, Jackie was, for once, happy she hadn’t inherited that particular trait from Claire.
From her perch on Jackie’s desk chair, Lottie finally tore her eyes from her sketch long enough to level her friend with a perfectly judgmental look.
“Don’t tell me you’re done with the assignment already.”
Instead of answering, Jackie simply lifted her sketch pad. She’d been told she was gifted at designing clothes, which really was kind of convenient because that was, in fact, her major. Fashion had always interested her. She loved putting outfits together for herself and for others.
She also loved judging people’s lack of style, too. Jackie wished she could claim she kept that part to herself, but she was pretty vocal about it.
Isn’t it ironic that Jackie Taylor, fashion aficionado, was currently slouched on her bed in a beat-up pair of joggers and a baggy white T-shirt, scrolling through dating profiles like she was window-shopping for a new purse?
Joggers were sort of indoor chic. And she allowed herself to look like a hobo when no one but Lottie was around.
“I hate you,” Lottie sighed, and turned back to her own drawing.
“Don’t hate the player, baby,” Jackie replied with a sly wink, the exact kind she’d find repulsive if it had been directed at her. “Hate the game.”
An eraser was thrown her way.
Jackie swatted it out of the air.
Maybe she should have joined the school’s martial arts club when Quigley had asked her to. She had told Jackie her hips were wide, which meant she’d probably have really strong kicks. And frankly, Jackie wasn’t sure if that had been an insult or a complement.
She still didn’t.
“Are you Scrolling through your endless Shipman folder, perv?”
Jackie decided, for her sanity, to ignore her completely. “I’m trying to find a date for my sister’s wedding.”
“Any luck?”
“Nope.”
Lottie stood and stretched, arms reaching high before she dropped onto the bed beside Jackie without warning. One moment Jackie’s phone was in her hand, the next it was in Lottie’s. The smile on her face feel as soon as she peered at the screen.
“You’re looking at men?” she asked, brow knitting together in some overly dramatic concern.
Jackie flicked at Lottie’s nose, using this as a well-planned distraction to rip her phone away from her nosy (pun intended) best-friend’s unyielding grasp.
“I’m,” Jackie corrected, dragging out the word to make her point, whatever that was, “looking at men.”
“Jackie…”
“It’s just for a wedding, Lot,” she waved off the concern as she settled her phone back onto her stomach and continued with her boring courting ritual.
“So you’re going to pretend to date some guy you don’t even like just so your family thinks you’re a perfectly well-adjusted member of society?”
“Yep.”
“Isn’t that what you promised me you’d stop doing when you broke up with Jeff?”
Jackie winced. She sure had promised Lottie exactly that. But, in her defence, she was fairly wasted at the time.
“Yep.”
No use lying to her.
Lottie moved with the rapidity of a cheetah, ripping Jackie’s phone from her limp grip. She then swiftly turned her back to Jackie, shoulders hunched as she shielded the screen.
“No, don’t!” Jackie managed to wheeze through her laughter. She put up a half-hearted fight, draping herself over Lottie’s frame.
“This Benny guy was going to send me pictures of his horses!”
“We’re in Austin,” Lottie replied, deadpan. “Everyone has horses.”
Even if Lottie was right with her gross generalization, it didn’t mean she had to use that knowledge against her best friend.
Treason is what this was.
Try as she might, Jackie couldn’t wrestle her phone back. Lottie was a tall, lanky, immovable object. Like Superman, only with better hair, smoother skin, and, frankly, way prettier.
“I’m contractually obliged to save you from yourself,” Lottie said.
Jackie watched in mild horror as her finger tapped the delete button. Not on the app, but on her actual account.
Oh well. It was probably for the sake of both their sanities.
With a heavy sigh, Jackie let go of Lottie’s shirt and flopped onto her. Moments later, a hand began gently threading through her hair.
“I can’t go alone,” Jackie whined, sounding every bit like the spoiled child she currently felt like.
“I’ll go with you.”
Jackie’s head shot up, her voice embarrassingly small. “Seriously?”
Lottie smiled down at her.
“Yeah.”
Jackie’s excitement, however, wouldn’t last very long.
“Or,” Lottie started. Slowly. Teasing.
Jackie hated the way Lottie’s voice sounded, or how she could hear the evil voice smile that pulled at her lips.
“You could just grow some balls and ask—”
Jackie pushed herself up, and slapped her hand down on Lottie’s mouth.
“Absolutely not. I will not, under any circumstance, sober or otherwise, ask the idiot jock I’ve had a crush on since my dad started coaching that stupid fucking team to come to my sister’s wedding as my fake girlfriend.”
Jackie let out a huff, finally realizing how drawn-out and oversharing that rant had gotten.
“You’re so embarrassing.” A slight pause. “I love you.”
Jackie smacked Lottie’s stomach with the back of her hand. It hit her mark, true and sure.
“I don’t know, Jackie. It kinda seems like the perfect set-up for a cute rom-com.”
“Shut your stupid face,” Jackie retorted, using a pillow to smother Lottie’s grin.
Their ‘homework’ hangout rapidly devolved into a pillow fight. Soon enough, Jackie’s bed doubled as a wrestling ring.
No work was done after that.
Lottie won the world heavyweight championship belt. Self-proclaimed and totally unfairly, as far as Jackie was concerned.
It was late evening on a Friday, the very same week Jackie had embarrassed herself in front of her father’s entire soccer team.
She slowly closed her bedroom door behind her. Shoes on, phone safely stowed away in the pocket of her cherry-red jumpsuit. Sleeveless with a rounded neckline to show off both of her best assets: shoulders and cleavage.
Going to a party without a boyfriend wasn’t an excuse to become a total fashion crime scene.
Jeff had, unfortunately, been more of an accessory than a person during their time together. Not because he was an asshole, and not because she hated him. She’d just never felt anything deeper for him.
Jackie realized she’d been more in love with the idea of being in love than with Jeff himself.
And, in retrospect, Jackie really should have thought about putting her shoes by the front door. Even if she had remembered to step over the creaking floorboards - A path she’d mapped out since middle school - seeing as her father was waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs.
He flicked the light on.
Jackie bristled, her hand flying to her chest. She could feel her heart thumping underneath.
“What the hell, Dad?” she hissed under her breath, for absolutely reason. The only other person in the house she’d tried not to wake was, well, very much standing in front of her.
Arms crossed and broad-shouldered, muscles defined but not quite chiseled like an athlete. Her father had slowly descended into the “used to work out” look over the years and now seemed committed to staying there.
His greying mustache twitched as he fought off a smile, like he already knew the excuse she was about to blurt out (as well as his own answer).
“I’m just going… out,” she offered. Meekly.
Her outfit certainly wasn’t something Jackie would wear for a late-night grocery run.
“Party night, huh? Charlotte’s house?”
His accent had far more of that southern twang than hers. Rough and gravelly, like he should own a farm and yell at ranch hands all day. But alas, Wade Taylor just happened to love yelling at girls who kicked balls instead.
A tragedy.
He probably heard about the party from the girls on his team, too. Van being the likely culprit.
“Shoot me a call if any of y’all need a lift.”
He knew better than to keep a young woman in her mid-twenties from a Friday night party.
Still, Jackie felt guilty that he’d probably stay up late waiting for her. Sometimes he’d even cook when she’d get back. They’d sit outside, chat, eat bacon and eggs, and watch the sunrise together.
“Sure, Dad.”
She gave him a quick peck on the cheek, stubble prickly against her skin. Jackie glared at him for a brief moment when she pulled back.
“What’s with the stink-eye all of a sudden?”
“You scared the shit out of me,” Jackie replied, attempting (and failing) to look genuinely peeved at her father.
He let out a gruff chuckle and smiled.
“My bad, kiddo.”
He wasn’t sorry. Not one bit.
Jackie slid into the Uber already waiting for her, only to be met with a familiar face in the backseat. Vanessa Palmer, rarely called by her full name. Goalie for the Longhorns, and one of the few players Jackie might even call a friend.
Other than Natalie, of course.
“Single and ready to mingle, are we?” Van said, instead of offering a normal greeting. They were beneath her, or something.
“Gross.” Jackie let out a chuckle as she sat down. “The very diverse dating pool featuring Longhorn jocks and my best friend? Pass.”
“Come on,” Van lamented. “You and I both know that generalization is deeply hurtful.”
“Good,” Jackie replied, tone dry, and fished her buzzing phone from her pocket.
A text from Lottie lit up her screen. Several, actually.
[Lottie] when tf are you getting here??
[Lottie] Hello????
[Lottie] Hi???
“Some of us have personalities outside of sports, you know,” Van defended.
Jackie let out a noncommittal hum, nowhere near agreement, then typed a quick reply and hit send.
[Jackie] Are you sloshed already??
When Jackie looked up, Van was grinning at her, arm hanging out of the car window, breeze rolling in.
“Does discussing how many concussions you’ve had count as a hobby?”
“If you’ve had more than ten? Sure,” Van threw out with a shrug.
Jackie laughed, carefree. She felt weightless. Maybe at the sheer absurdity of two worlds colliding because Jackie’s best friend was dating a Longhorn. Or maybe it was the first night Jackie actually felt like she didn’t have to perform at all.
No Jeff. No one to keep up appearances for.
This was nice. Too nice.
Jackie’s phone buzzed again.
[Lottie] Just making sure the Uber driver didn’t kidnap you.
[Jackie] How chivalrous.
[Jackie] I’m with Van, safe and sound.
[Lottie] Honestly? That’s even more cause for alarm.
“What?” Van asked, her curiosity piqued by the sound Jackie made.
“Lottie thinks you’d be a horrible bodyguard.”
Jackie angled her phone’s screen toward Van.
“Does she know I stop balls that come at me at 70 miles per hour? For fun? And I’m not even getting paid… yet.”
Jackie pulled a face. Repulsed, annoyed, confused as to how this could possibly make any sense.
“And how does that particular skillset help you stop a full-grown human, not ball-shaped by the way, from kidnapping me?”
Van stared at Jackie for a long moment, lips pressed thin, a blank expression on her face.
“You’ve never taken one of Shipman’s balls to the face, and it shows.”
“You’ve had way too many concussions, and it shows.”
They were silent for a beat before the back of the Uber erupted with full-bellied laughter.
As soon as Jackie crossed the very familiar threshold of the Matthews residence, ‘Midnight Cit’y by M83 assaulted her senses. Not only had that song been played on repeat by everyone she’d had the misfortune of hanging out with for the past month, but it was currently being blasted straight into her eardrums.
Worse yet, as she swung the door open and traversed the foyer, moving between the already slightly overwhelming crowd, Jackie had the displeasure of barreling straight into Shauna Shipman.
Fucking hell.
Shauna was known to quite literally never hang out at these parties. She and her self-titled ‘bash bro’, Melissa, usually partied with the men’s soccer team. Oftentimes alongside the football morons, including one Jeff Sadeki.
Which brought Jackie to her next question currently triggering a very real mental breakdown: why the fuck was Shauna Shipman in her personal space, grinning down at her, while various sweaty individuals pushed them even closer together?
“Hey,” Shauna said, smirk pulling at the corner of her lip in the most irritating way. Whatever drink she was nursing definitely wasn’t her first.
“Hi,” Jackie replied, for lack of a better response.
Great. This was already getting super awkward. And not the cute rom-com kind (as much as Lottie claimed it would be). Because, one, Jackie was utterly incapable of having a conversation with her crush. And two, said crush was currently staring at her, expecting some form of conversational skill from Jackie.
“Hey back,” Shauna repeated.
Jackie scoffed, something that most likely came off as extremely bitchy rather than what she actually felt like, which was a deer caught in fucking headlights.
“You already said that.”
Shauna shrugged, bringing the red cup to her lips and taking a slow sip. Her other hand stayed stuffed deep inside the pocket of the jogger shorts she’d opted to wear. Out in public. And was (apparently) not embarrassed by that very fact.
Jackie couldn’t help it. Her eyes scanned the outfit, taking in every unfortunate detail presented to her. Her lips refused to feign a smile. What she saw disgusted her immensely.
Jogger shorts. Grey, not that any color would have made them better, paired with bright orange Crocs. The entire look was finished with a very baggy, faded football jersey. Navy blue. The Texans’ colors.
“I know,” Shauna finally replied, her smile genuinely arrogant. As if Jackie’s appraisal had been positive in any way. As if Jackie wasn’t completely repulsed by Shauna’s total disregard for personal style.
“You look ridiculous,” Jackie blurted out before she could stop that thought from morphing into words and subsequently tumbling out of her mouth.
Fuck.
Shit.
Shauna erupted in a loud, delighted laugh, like Jackie had just delivered the funniest joke on earth. Jackie was certain she hadn’t.
The crowd pressed them even closer together. Whether it was the shuffle of bodies or some cruel gravitational force, Jackie found herself inhaling the sharp sting of Shauna’s cheap cologne.
A headache blossomed at her temple. Who even wore body spray anymore?
Jocks, apparently. Another tragic revelation, courtesy of yours truly.
Shauna’s eyes, she noticed, were a deep, rich whiskey brown. Easy to get lost in. Easy to fall for. And yet, somehow, they belonged to someone whose fashion sense barely surpassed ninety percent of the school. Tragic.
Jackie would have loved an explanation for why her brain had chosen to crush on this particular disaster. Maybe she should do well to blame her heart. Or something even lower.
Maybe spending more time around Shauna would scrub this dalliance from her brain, but a party was probably a terrible time to test that theory.
Out of the corner of her eye, Jackie caught sight of a tall, lanky blur she immediately recognized as Lottie. She reached for her, hand outstretched through the crowd, and was subsequently rescued from her predicament.
She was knocked against a few bodies, shouting “sorry!” over the music, even if no one was listening. They were all far too intoxicated to care.
Lottie pressed a suspiciously sticky red cup into Jackie’s chest once they entered the far less suffocating kitchen.
“You look like you needed a drink,” she said, practically yelling over the bassline thudding through the walls. “And a rescue.”
“I needed ten of these five minutes ago,” Jackie hissed, voice low, words sharp with irritation. She didn’t even examine the cup before downing half of it.
“Ew.” Jackie’s face scrunched up in pure disgust as the mystery liquid made its way down her throat. “What the hell is that?”
“Jungle juice.” Lottie leaned casually against the counter, her vague answer far from satisfying. She then took a second to examine the context of her own drink, before her eyes flicked back to Jackie’s.
“I think.”
“You invited her on purpose, didn’t you?” Jackie accused before rational thought could catch up.
“She literally just came with the team,” Lottie said, far too calm for someone whose best friend was in the middle of a catastrophic emotional implosion.
Jackie narrowed her eyes, unconvinced.
“The team she’s the captain of,” Lottie continued.
Jackie crossed one arm over her chest, the other still holding her drink, eyes sharp and scowl unimpressed.
Lottie sighed, long-suffering. Still, she pressed on with her farce of an explanation.
“The team that my girlfriend of two years is also on.”
“I just find it interesting,” Jackie said, head tilted like a detective poking holes in an alibi. “That you happen to host the one party where my crush shows up looking like she rolled herself in a dumpster and somehow thought that counted as appropriate attire for a public appearance”
Lottie chuckled, her smile effortless as always. “You actually caught her on a good day,” she said. “You should see her in her Corona cowboy hat.”
Jackie took a deep breath, trying to stop her mind from picturing Shauna in that, and drained the rest of her drink in one gulp, immediately regretting it.
“Cool. Well, I’m gonna go die in your bathroom now.”
Jackie made a step to turn away, but Lottie caught her, fingers curled around her forearm.
“Come on. It couldn’t have been that bad.”
“I told her straight to her face that she looked ridiculous.”
Lottie’s face stayed blank for half a second before she burst out laughing.
“You’re such a mess.”
Jackie’s brows furrowed as she backhanded Lottie’s shoulder with a satisfying, playful swat. It didn’t faze her.
So Jackie started pacing. Uncharacteristically so.
“I can’t even talk to her like a human being. I can barely get one sentence out,” she said, arms gesturing wildly. “And she laughed at me, Lot. She laughed.”
Lottie’s demeanor didn’t change. She didn’t seem to grasp the gravity of the situation.
“Shauna laughs at everything,” Lottie’s expression was a little too knowing, a little too cocksure for Jackie’s liking. “Maybe because she thinks you’re funny.”
Jackie froze, cup still in her hand.
“Don’t,” she said flatly.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t make this worse by being optimistic. I can’t handle optimism right now. I need, like, shame, and maybe more of this toxic waste you call a drink m.”
Lottie was already turning to refill her cup. “Coming right up.”
Some guy Jackie was pretty sure she’d never seen before elbowed past her on his way to the counter, and the large bowl of mystery punch.
One of Jackie’s hands snapped to her hip.
“Excuse you,” she drawled, making sure her disgust at his proximity came through loud and clear.
The guy turned, wobbly and grinning, one brow cocked at her glare. Then his eyes slid to Lottie, like he was hoping for an explanation.
Lottie lifted her hand and traced an invisible square in the air around Jackie, as if outlining her with neon tape.
“This is a danger zone,” she explained. “Do not enter. Do not look. Don’t even question.”
He gave a single thumbs up and continued on his way, the liquid in his cup nearly sloshing out as he turned.
“God,” Jackie groaned, hiding her face in both hands. “I am a fucking mess.”
She felt herself drawn into a hug, Lottie’s chin settling gently atop her head.
“Yeah, but you’re a funny mess.”
Jackie pinched her side lightly.
“Fuck you.”
The night went on, and Jackie was spared the misfortune of embarrassing herself in front of Shauna any further. She got absolutely hammered. Enough that Lottie eventually decided to drag her outside. They ended up sitting on the front porch steps.
Jackie was pretty damn sure the cool air did nothing but make her drunker.
She slumped into Lottie’s side, the world rocking back and forth like she was stuck on some rickety little boat. The crunch of tires on gravel pulled her attention away. With bleary, unfocused eyes, she watched Shauna fireman-carry a passed out Melissa from the front lawn to the back of an Uber.
“Don’t take turns too tight. You should’ve seen the crap she put away tonight. Trust me, you don’t wanna be the one scrubbing that out.”
Those were Shauna’s ‘wise’ parting words before she shut the door. She even waved goodbye, like a total dork. And she lingered a moment, hands stuffed in her jogger pockets, watching the Uber pull away.
“Aw, you’re so sweet,” Lottie teased as Shauna walked back toward them, steps perfectly steady.
Not much of a drinker, huh?
“Amongst other things,” Shauna said, voice low, eyes locked on Jackie’s.
Amongst other things.
Really?
What an idiot.
Jackie bit her lip and turned her head away before she could give Shauna the satisfaction of seeing her smile.
Somewhere in the middle of her drunken haze, she was pretty sure she heard Lottie laugh at her expense.
Again.