Page 98 of Back for Seconds

I wanted to enjoy every bite. I wanted seconds. And I wanted to lick the plate clean.

***

We lay beside each other on top of my ridiculous paisley duvet, sweat-slick and chests heaving with heavy, sleepy breaths. The sky was impenetrably dark—a flat cloak tossed over us, the moon too small to provide anything more than a sliver of milky light.

We lay suspended in the otherworldly peace that existed in the days between Christmas and New Years. Nowhere to go, no one to see. No emails to answer. Just our twin breathing as I laid my head over his heart. And for the first time in a long time, we stayed completely silent.

Chapter 34 June

New Year’s Eve

A thumping and banging on my bedroom door woke us both up around the time the marine layer had fully dispersed and the sun was sitting high and bright in a cloudless sky.

“Let me in,” Mimi called through the door. She did not sound good.

“We’re naked,” I warned her, tucking the duvet under Joey’s chin. He fluttered his eyes sleepily, long lashes batting as he murmured his thanks. “Pink’s your color,” I whispered against his temple before placing a kiss.

“Uh huh.” Joey yawned, snuggling back into his pillow—or I guess, the pillow on the side of the bed where I never slept. “Always has been.”

“You can come in,” I called out to Mimi, grabbing Joey’s T-shirt off the end of the bed and pulling it over my head.

The door banged open, and she shuffled forward like Frankenstein’s most beautiful monster. Mimi looked like she’d walked back from Nashville. Hair tousled, mascara smeared, sequin dress vaguely mangled. She lifted a long acrylic nail and pointed at Joey.

He blinked an eye open. “Hey, Mimi.”

“I,” she croaked, “fucked your brother.”

“Mimi!”

“Oh, no.” Joey seemed unfazed. I guess if you have enough brothers, eventually one of them is gonna get fucked. He pushed himself up to a sitting position, keeping the duvet tucked under his armpits. “Which one? Please let it be the age-appropriate one.”

“Luigi,” she sort of mumbled, like she was missing a tooth. Then she stumbled over to my desk and began chugging indiscriminately out of my water bottle.

“Mims, what the hell happened to your mouth?”

“Bit my rip,” she slurred, water dribbling down her chin. “Lip.”

“Who?”

She shook her head. “Not appropriate. Tonight, The Billiards. Party.”

“Another party?” My voice ratcheted up an octave with each new piece of information. “You need a break!”

“Me, sober party. You, normal party.” She pointed at Joey again, holding out her hand in the most ghoulish way. “Your Angel. DJ.”

“I heard. I wasn’t going to go…” Joey then gave me a sideways look. “But if you wanna go, we can party.”

It was New Year’s Eve. I should probably party. I smiled at him. “Let’s party.” A sentence I never thought I’d say ever again.

***

Mimi iced her mouth, took a long nap, and woke up around four in the afternoon looking and sounding like a brand-new woman. We made a pot of coffee—a necessary pregame tradition—and sat on the floor in front of her mirror, getting ready for the night. It reminded me of our early twenties, when we’d both very briefly lived together in New York. We’d met through mutual friends and hit it off in an unbelievable way. Just two polar opposites with everything in common.

“Question for you,” I said while painting my top lip a deep, vampy red. “What did you think of Brian?”

She dabbed some cream blush onto the high points of her cheeks, cracking her gum pensively. “Brian…is the type of guy who invites you to his house to watch a movie and you say yes because he has a projector and you’re sick of watching movies on your laptop. He puts on SLC Punk! and then is quiet the entire time. He makes you dinner. Like, a fancy mac and cheese. He lets you drink all his beer. Nothing about it is bad and your nervous system is so fried from listening to your parents scream at each other for the last twenty years that you think, this is love. But it’s not love; it’s just quiet.”

I stared at Miranda Levinson, my jaw slack.