Baby

"You sure you don't want to come?"

I did not turn my head to look at Charlie when he asked me this.

The clouds above looked just like the ones on the cottage tapestry in my bedroom. Bright pink, reflected in the lake water, surrounded by evergreens. Grant had bought it so I could cover up my picturesque view of the neighbouring condo building.

I thought of being home, resting beside my fake lakefront (fakefront?) property, clutching my plushies beneath my Care Bears duvet. Snoozing soundly.

"Yeah, I'm gonna pass. It's not my scene."

He smirked, shrugged, and took an extended pull of his white grape-flavoured vape, exhaling clouds thicker than the ones in the sky. "It wasn't my scene either at first. Just try it, Liz. You'll feel alive."

I sat myself up on the purple paisley picnic blanket and faced him. The humid evening air was tiring me out. I hoped he couldn't see my eyeball twitching. "I just don't have the energy. Today's been a lot."

"A lot? Dude, all we did today was lounge." He checked his smartwatch, flicking the last cheese cube from the charcuterie board into his mouth. "It's only 7 p.m."

I tried not to gag at the imagined pairing of artificial grape flavour and mozzarella. "7 is my bedtime. It's like you don't even know me."

"Yet sometimes you say I know you better than you know yourself." Charlie's eyes crinkled up as he rose, putting his bright red hair up in a tiny man bun. He smoothed out his black jean jacket, which was riddled with tears, buttons, and nu metal band patches. "Come on, try something new for a change. This one's gonna be entry level. If you hate it, just dip. I'll pay for your ride home."

I packed up the charcuterie board and shook my head "no" preemptively, knowing Charlie would keep pressing me.

"I'll buy you a drink."

I didn't want a drink nearly as much as I wanted to go home and stare at the ceiling.

"I'm not dressed for it." I motioned toward my blue jean shorts and my oversized tee. Originally Grant's, now mine.

"Nobody will care." His phone dinged and he peeked at the screen. "Miki literally just asked if you're coming. Can I tell her 'yes'?"

Fine, I thought. What could go wrong.

I stuffed the blanket into my backpack and winced at the tearing noise my zipper made when I sealed it up. The stitching was beginning to split. I sighed and made a peace sign with my fingers.

"Two whole-ass vodka crans. And I'm not doing any drugs."

He clapped a few times before clasping his hands, as if in prayer. "Sick. This is gonna be so sick. Just wait. You're gonna love it."

***

Charlie and I dismounted the streetcar at a stop just off Gold St. where the venue was. There were brick bungalows all around, SUVs and minivans in driveways, lawns peppered with signs advertising political candidates and window cleaning businesses and tax services.

I squinted. "Did we miss our stop?"

"Nope."

"We're, um, in the 'burbs."

"The place is crazy soundproofed. They go till 4 a.m."

I reeled. "How do people not get tired?"

He chuckled. "Drugs and alcohol, you boomer." Another vape hit. Schhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

The older I got, the more I didn't mind being called a boomer, despite me being less than half the age required to be one.

"Oh, forgot to tell you." He turned to face me and kept walking backwards. "They got a strict no-phone policy. And they tape your camera. Don't remove it, 'cos they'll take it serious if you do."

I stopped walking. "You're telling me I can't watch reels on the dance floor?"

"Ugh." Charlie rolled his eyes and turned back around to make out with his vape again. Schhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

***

Miki's after-work social had apparently run late, so she told Charlie she'd meet us at coat check. When she finally arrived, she enveloped me in her newly toned biceps, lifted my whole body up, and shook me.

"It's been so long! I'm so glad you came!"

I couldn't help but laugh. I looked her up and down once she set me to the floor, her body bathed in purple light. She was wearing platform boots, black thigh-highs, a short skirt, and a tight, sleeveless crop top with a small heart cut into the centre, revealing cleavage I never realized she had.

"Wow," I said. "That's a look."

"My go-to rave fit," she chirped, fluttering her comically large lash extensions.

Miki, once a self-professed introvert, now filled her evenings with group fitness classes, dates, and concerts. But she seemed happy, at least.

"Love it," I replied, fidgeting with the collar of my dumpy, oversized ex-boyfriend shirt.

My throat was dry and I couldn't hear my own thoughts. People kept piling into the venue. I yearned to jump the coat check counter and hide in a jacket until this whole thing was over.

"Do you have the stuff?" Miki asked Charlie, touching his arm.

"Yeah, we'll go do it after I get this girl juiced up." He cocked his head in my direction. I smiled and hoped neither of them noticed I'd been eyeing the exit. Charlie paid for our checked items, and I waved goodbye to my backpack for the night.

After the venue staff taped all our phone cameras, we took to the bar. It was loud and flashy. I sat atop the world's least comfortable bar stool, inhaling my drink through a small paper straw, staring into a wall as Charlie and Miki volleyed life updates at each other. It took me twenty-two seconds to finish my vodka cran.

"Jesus. You want the other one now?" Charlie asked, snapping me out of my daze.

I wasn't sure what came over me just then, but—

"Can I try some molly?"

***

The waiting area in the bathroom was packed with people doing the exact same thing we had just done, and then some.

The music — Miki had called it "hypnotic techno" — was quieter than it'd been at the bar. I could hear snippets from dozens of conversations.

Yeah, she did that for my birthday, too — you trying to quit? Good for you! — it was soooo fucking cool — I think she's a closet furry — the opener's actually from Denmark — bitch, I love your glasses!

With mine and Miki's hands in his, Charlie pushed us through the dense crowd as I gleaned bits of people's lives from all around me.

"You'll feel it in half an hour, max," Charlie said to me. "Ready to go on the floor?"

"I... think so," I stammered. "I'm nervous."

"It'll pass," Miki said. "You'll be making out with someone before you know it."

I thought to the time Miki called me a femcel thinking it'd be a funny bit of comic relief during what was otherwise a serious conversation. I must have internalized it, because I wanted nothing to do with anyone. I had to stop thinking about it because my thoughts always returned to Grant whenever I did.

Now's not the time.

We reached the floor, replete with people bathed in washes of blue and purple light, and almost instantly Charlie and Miki engaged in a semi-coordinated movement sequence with their arms held high in the air. It looked so easy for them, like it was automatic.

I half-heartedly shifted my weight from side to side, nodding my head along to the beat. I closed my eyes. Maybe I could move like they were moving if I just pretended to be invisible.

Some time passed. Soon enough, I felt some semblance of a rush, some level of heightened perception that I wasn't used to. I opened my eyes and everything seemed a lot more vivid than it had been before.

Stop dooming, I told myself. And try to have fun for a change.

***

I looked around me, at gangs of sunglass-clad girls wearing neon bikinis, at leather-clad women paired with men in baggy tees, at people wearing what I guessed was fetish attire, at lone middle-aged guys nodding along to the steadfast techno like they were metronomes.

Everyone looked as fluid as running water. It was like they came out of one of those giant OLED TV screens that used motion smoothing to make the frame rate look ten times higher than it was.

This was life. Life in a resolution that hadn't been invented yet.

Is this what life should feel like all the time?

I wasn't sure how much time had passed, only that I was moving around in ways that were foreign to me, and I kept looking at my own hands, then at Charlie and Miki, then back at my own hands, so in awe at the electricity in the air, in between us, marveling at how beautiful all these swaying, rolling bodies were. We were chest-deep in an ocean of love, all of us.

I felt a small tap on my shoulder.

"You want some?"

I turned to face a beautiful man with thick hair wearing purple sunglasses. He had cool spacers and wore a dozen gold necklaces and I couldn't even see his face, really, but he was beautiful. He was holding a really nice-smelling vape in my face.

"Um, yes. Wait. Nicotine or weed?" I tapped my straightened-out index fingers together, thinking it would be cute or something.

He laughed. "Nicotine."

"Then yes," I said, taking a comically long pull from the vape while it was still in his hand. It was sweet and cold and dry in my already-dry throat but I somehow didn't mind it. I took a giant swig of water from the bottle my beautiful friend Charlie had given me. I put the bottle to this random man's lips, and he drank.

"You're a baby, aren't ya?" he asked me. I could guess what he meant.

"It's my first time, yeah. I think I kinda like it."

"And I think you're kinda cute," he said. "You know that guy?" He pointed at Charlie, who was dancing with Miki.

"Yeah! That's my best friend from high school. Oh my God. We go way back. Miki too. We used to be nerdy drama kids. And now look at us. We're raving."

The stranger laughed and hurriedly took both my hands in his.

"Lemme steal you away for a bit."

He started nudging me toward the back of the dance floor, and I just followed him. I looked behind me again to tell Charlie and Miki I'd be right back.

They were making out.

Charlie was gay. Miki had a boyfriend. I wasn't quite sure what to say, so I just kept my mouth shut.

Okay. Interesting.

A tug on my wrist prompted me to keep walking in the opposite direction.

We stopped near a large pillar, and he turned around to look at me. Now, I saw him under the light. His sunglasses were off. I looked into his face. My heart rose up in my throat.

This guy was Grant.

"Oh my God," I breathed. I felt my smile broaden, my teeth gnashing together in the process.

He hadn't stopped smiling. "'Oh my God' what, baby?" He touched my cheek.

I stared into his eyes for a couple of seconds. The more I looked, the deeper my heart sank back into place. And it went deeper still, all the way down into my stomach.

His eyes were not the same shape as Grant's. He was missing the birthmark on his cheek. His nose was smaller. His lips were fuller than they should have been.

Fuck.

"Sorry. I'm so sorry. You look just like someone I know. Someone I knew," I corrected myself. I suddenly felt bile in my throat.

He smirked. "Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

He moved in closer to me and grabbed my waist. It felt like he was pressing into my guts, like his skin was merging with mine, like his callused fingers were kneading my organs and shifting them into each other.

The sensations were not good. My heart was beating very fast.

My eyes darted around until they fell on an exit sign to my left. "I don't know. Sorry. Um, I think I need to go outside."

I wrestled out of his grip and dashed for the door.

I could sense that he'd followed me, so I'm sure he caught at least a glimpse of me hurling into the trash can, which was overflowing with beer cans and plastic waterbottles, which made my puke splatter in a way that caused everyone to move far away from me.

"Jesus," he said. "You good?" The words sounded distant, but not long after I heard them, I could feel hot breath enveloping my neck. "I bet you'd like it if I took care of you." His whisper lilted with ugly, base desire.

I said nothing. I wanted nothing. Not from him. I didn't understand it. He was Adonis moments ago, and now he was — I don't know — Diogenes.

My body shuddered as I dry heaved above the garbage can, cranberry-tinted chunks of cheese and prosciutto staring me in the face.

I will never enjoy anything again. I am going to be like this forever. I miss Grant.

It struck me that these might not be normal thoughts to have while under the influence of this particular substance. I felt another hulking pang of nausea. I squatted and put my head between my knees, and the guy joined me down below.

"C'mon, come with me."

"Sorry, but please leave me alone for now," I said.

"Huh?"

"Just, uh. Fuck off. Please," I added hastily.

He grabbed my shaky, bony wrist and dug his nails into my skin, locking my right arm in place. "I'm trying to help you and that's how you treat me?" His whisper turned dark. I knew that darkness.

"Please let go."

"Come with me," he repeated, sliding his hand between my thighs with his free hand.

I didn't have to think about it. I pulled my phone from my pocket, and with my grimy, acidic teeth I yanked the tape off my rear camera and pointed it at the guy. I launched the camera app with a single side button press and hit the record button. He let go of me instantly.

"Hey," he said, standing and backing away. "It's all love, baby. I wasn't doing nothing."

"Yeah, you were," I spat.

He glared at me and tsked before marching back to the double doors. He exchanged some words with the security guard there while gesticulating in my direction. The guard nodded and patted the guy on the back, who then disappeared inside into the tinted blue-purple fog.

The guard came up to me. He motioned toward my phone. "Sorry, but you need to leave."

With the tape still caught in my teeth, I recalled what Charlie had said about the phone policy. I peeled it off and crumpled it.

"But he was—" my eyes were wet and snot was coming out of my nose. I didn't realize I'd been crying. I wiped it with my nail-marked wrist. I couldn't finish my sentence.

"Doesn't matter. You can't be recording people here. Especially not the venue owner."

"You mean the guy who just tried to—"

"I didn't see him do anything, and I was right there," the guard interrupted, deadpan. "And he told me you need to leave. Now."

I stared at him for a second, hoping some good Samaritan nearby would be able to vouch for me. Someone had to have seen, right?

I looked around. The smoking girls to my right were squealing about some TV show, the two guys to my left were both on their phones, and out of everyone in the smoking area there was only one girl looking at me, way back at the other side.

All she offered was a vacant, quasi-interested stare as she vaped against the fence in the white-orange glow of a street light. Her eyes shimmered when she blinked. She shook her head from side to side like I'd done something wrong, and then she looked away, blowing clouds into the night.

It was warm out, but I was shaking. Of course the night had gone like this. Of course I'd be in a situation like this. Again.

I looked at my phone screen and realized the recording was still running. Had it really only been a minute and four seconds? My battery was at 5%.

The nausea surged once again. I looked in glitter eyeshadow girl's direction again, but she was gone.

"I'm getting an Uber," I said to the guard, who motioned us to a locked gate near where we stood. He opened it.

I started speedrunning the app interface to confirm my ride home.

"Do you have anything in coat check?"

I paused, thinking about how my backpack zipper was starting to break, how Miki's wallet was in there, how she'd been kissing Charlie and I'd been kissing nobody, how I didn't really like the paisley blanket anyway and how I didn't like much of anything, either, except being alone and making myself sick over a man who didn't love me anymore.

So fuck the bag.

My driver would be arriving in two minutes.

I looked back up at the guard, who suddenly looked sorry for me.

I returned his pity with a big, bright smile.

"Nope."