Sam's living room smelled like incense trying and failing to mask the persistent, skunky ghost of a thousand burnt bowls and the metallic tang of an old radiator. I sat on the edge of the couch in his living room, feeling like I was watching myself from outside of my body. Two pills—small, round, and the color of a summer sky—were currently doing the heavy lifting in my bloodstream. They provided a soft, synthetic floor for my thoughts to walk on, a buffer between me and reality. I felt stable. I felt manageable. I felt like a version of Aurora that people actually liked.
"You're staring again, Ror," Abigail murmured, nudging my knee with her combat boot. She was lounging next to me, her purple hair looking almost black in the dim light. She looked content, vibrating at a frequency of pure, uncomplicated excitement for the festival. I envied her for that—for the ability to just be without needing a chemical middleman.
"Just admiring the decor," I lied. "Jodi's really changed stuff around since Kent came back."
Across from us, Elliot was leaning back with a glass of red wine that looked suspiciously like the cheap stuff Pierre sold in the back corner of the store. He was mid-sentence, probably waxing poetic about the "liminality of the harvest season" or some other nonsense, while Penny sat beside him, her spine perfectly straight. She was the only one in the room who looked like she'd actually brushed her hair today. She wasn't drinking, and she definitely wasn't smoking.
When the glass hit my hands, it felt heavy—a cold, solid weight that demanded my attention. The water inside sloshed.
Don't overdo it. One hit. Keep the mask on. You're the sober success story, remember?
I took the hit anyway.
As I exhaled, the synergy between the pills and the weed was immediate—a chemical handshake that turned the world into a slow-motion playback. The edges of the furniture started to lag, leaving faint trails when I moved my head. It was a beautiful, suffocating fog that turned the conversation around me into background noise.
"Leah said she's pulling up and I think everyone else will be here soon too," Sam called out from the hallway, his voice cutting through the fog like a blunt instrument.
I felt the sudden urge to move, to be anywhere that wasn't this couch. My skin felt slightly too warm, the air in the room suddenly feeling used-up.
"I'm gonna grab some water," I muttered to Abigail, though I wasn't sure if the words actually made it out of my mouth. I stood up, my legs feeling like they belonged to a tall, uncoordinated stranger. I navigated the minefield of empty soda bottles, making a beeline for the kitchen. I needed a second of silence before the rest of the group arrived.
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I fumbled with a glass, the cabinet handles feeling like they were made of liquid as I tried to get a grip. Focus, Aurora. It's just a cup. Don't make it a metaphor for your entire life. I finally managed to press it against the fridge's water dispenser, the mechanical hum of the motor sounding like an industrial drill in the quiet of the room.
"You're going to overflow it if you don't keep your hand steady, Ro."
The voice startled me but I didn't have to look up to know it was Sam. I felt him move into the room, the familiar scent of laundry detergent and cheap hair wax cutting through the smell of stale pizza. He didn't come over to help; he just leaned against the fridge, his shoulder inches from mine, and started rummaging through a half-crushed bag of pretzels on the counter.
I pulled the glass away just as the water reached the brim, my movements jerky and uncoordinated. When I finally looked at him, I realized he wasn't looking at the pretzels. He was looking at me. It wasn't the worried, "Are you going to break?" look that Sebastian always had, or the desperate, "Please be okay" hope in Abigail's eyes. Sam looked at me like he was reading a book he'd already finished a dozen times.
He'd seen this version of me before. He was there when we were fourteen, tucked behind the rusted dumpsters of the town library, passing around a stolen bottle of gin and whatever pills Elliot had managed to lift from his mother's vanity. Sam had been the one to hold my hair back when the world started spinning, and I'd been the one to keep him from falling off the bridge when he thought he could fly. We were the architects of each other's earliest mistakes, and that kind of history didn't just wash away with a "sober" reboot.
"Thirsty?" he asked, his voice low and casual, stripped of the hyperactive, charismatic front he usually performed for the group.
"Dehydrated," I muttered, taking a long, desperate swallow of the water. "The weed was pretty strong."
"Yeah. It's some heavy stuff," he echoed, his eyes never leaving mine. He reached out, his fingers grazing the counter as he moved a stray bottle cap around in circles. He didn't have to state the obvious. I don't think he wanted to either.
"Sebastian thinks you're a saint. It's almost cute."
I looked at him, really looked at him, and felt a mild spark of something—tension, history, maybe just the drugs—pulse between us. He wasn't judging me; he was just acknowledging that I was off. He was the only person who knew that I wasn't a survivor—I was just a girl who had gotten really good at hiding the wreckage.
"He's happy, Sam," I said, my voice sounding defensive even to me. "I'm making him happy."
"I know," Sam said, finally looking away and shoving a pretzel into his mouth. He let out a dry chuckle. "Just don't forget to breathe while you're busy being his miracle. It's a long way down if you fall."
He pushed off the fridge, his arm brushing mine in a way that felt intentional and heavy, a brief moment of contact that made my heart hammer a frantic beat. He headed back toward the living room, leaving me alone under the flickering kitchen lights with a glass of water and the realization that the person I grew up with might be the one person I can never truly hide from.
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The front door opened, and in came Sebastian, Maru, and Shane.
Fuck.
Sebastian seemed to pick me out of the crowd before he'd even fully entered the house. My heart, already skipping a beat from the chemical cocktail in my veins, did a slow, heavy roll in my chest. He looked at me, and for a second, the rest of the room—the bong smoke, Sam's chatter, the flickering images on the TV in the back—just faded away.
He made his way over, moving with that intentional, slightly hunched slouch that usually made him look invisible. He stopped in front of me, his hands shoved deep into his pockets. "Hey," he said softly.
"Hey yourself," I replied, trying to keep my cool. I shifted over, making room on the couch.
He sat down and didn't jump straight into a kiss; instead, he just leaned his shoulder against mine, a shy, tentative contact that felt loaded with the weight of everything that had happened in his basement a couple days ago. I studied his face for a moment and wondered if he was replaying it, too—the way his skin had felt desperate and unarmored in the way he'd whispered my name against my throat. I wondered if he could feel the ghost of my hands on him, or if he was just as nervous as I was.
"You look... you didn't dress up," he noted, his gaze lingering on my face. There was a softness in his eyes that made my stomach flip—a look of genuine affection.
"I thought about going as a functioning human being, but the costume was too expensive," I teased.
If only you knew, Seb. I'm wearing the most expensive mask in the room right now.
He let out a quiet, huffy laugh and finally reached out, his thumb grazing the back of my hand. "Good. I'm really glad you're doing better, Aurora."
"Me too," I murmured, leaning my head against his shoulder. "I'm really happy being here with you, y'know."
The intimacy was building between us, creating a warm pressure in my chest that almost made me forget about the pills. We stayed like that for a few minutes, tucked into our own little world, until Shane decided the mood was a little too wholesome.
He didn't even have his jacket off before he reached into his pocket. He flicked a small, crinkling plastic baggie onto the coffee table. It landed right next to Sam's discarded pretzel bag, a splash of synthetic neon against the wood. Inside, the pills were small, stamped with logos that looked like ancient runes from a rave graveyard—electric blue, hot pink, and yellow. They looked like candy—the kind of sugary, high-stakes treats that promised a temporary heaven and a very permanent hell.
Fuck, I wanted one so bad. I could taste the chalkiness of the pill, I could feel the drip in the back of my throat, I could feel the come-up...
"Courtesy of Zuzu City," Shane muttered, his voice a gravelly rasp. "Happy Halloween, outcasts. Pick your poison."
The room went quiet for a moment.
Penny was the first to break the silence. She didn't yell—Penny never yelled—but her voice was tense. "Shane, are you serious?" she asked, her gaze flicking toward me for a split second before returning to him with a look of pure judgment. "Read the room. At least consider who's in it before you start acting like a pharmacy."
She didn't say the word sobriety, but she didn't have to. It hung in the air like a giant, neon-lit label she was trying to slap onto my forehead. I felt like the 'Recovering Addict' that everyone was supposed to tip-toe around so I didn't spontaneously combust.
"Look, I forgot," Shane began, his hands raised in a half-hearted apology. "I wasn't trying to—"
"I'm not made of glass, Penny. Relax." The lie slid out of my mouth with ease. I didn't even have to think about it; it was just a reflex now. "People are allowed to be high around me. I'm just not trying to rely on it tonight, that's all. It's fine."
Sebastian caught my eye. He didn't say anything, but he let out a slow, relieved breath, and then it happened—the gut-punch. He cracked a small, private smile, one that was overflowing with a quiet, devastating pride. He actually believed me. He thought I was winning. He thought his "miracle" was finally standing on her own two feet without a chemical crutch. It was the kind of look that makes you want to crawl out of your own skin and leave it behind in a heap on the floor.
The memory of Emily's voice rang in my head, "Junkie".
"I'll be right back," I murmured, standing up with a jerk.
I didn't wait for a response, I just navigated straight to the bathroom. I stood in the dark, my hands shaking as I reached into the hidden lining of my bag. I needed to erase the conversation. I took two more and by the time the pills hit the back of my throat, the guilt started to recede, replaced by a cold, shimmering confidence. I looked at myself in the mirror, catching a glimpse of a girl who looked perfectly, beautifully composed in the dim hallway light. I was ready for the festival.
I was ready to be the girl Sebastian loved, even if she only existed in the space between doses.
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The sky over Pelican Town turned dark as we moved in a loose, chaotic pack toward the Town Square—a collection of shadows and muffled laughter. Everyone was operating on a different levels of fucked up. Shane was trailing behind, too immersed in his sensory overload from the neon pills; Sam was walking with a peppy bounce in his step that suggested the weed, ecstasy, and alcohol had finally hit; and Abigail was leading the charge, her purple hair a dark smudge against the evening, with Penny gliding effortlessly by her side. Elliot and Leah trailed shortly behind us.
I, however, was somewhere else entirely. The second dose had kicked in with a cold, shimmering efficiency and I was detached from reality. I felt light.
Sebastian's hand was locked in mine. He was walking close—closer than usual—his shoulder constantly bumping into mine with a buzzed affection. Since he was floating on a cloud of Sam's weed and a few stolen beers, he looked at me and saw a mirror. He saw the glassy eyes and the slow, easy smiles and assumed we were on the same level, sharing the same haze..
It's almost impressive, he thinks we're vibing; and I'm stuck breathing on 'manual'.
As the orange glow of the festival lanterns began to bleed through the trees ahead, Sebastian slowed down, pulling me slightly away from the main group. He leaned in close, his breath warm against my ear.
"Hey," he whispered, his voice sounding smaller than usual. "My mom... Demetrius surprised her. Some weekend getaway in Zuzu City. They left about an hour ago."
I turned my head, squinting at him through the purple gloom. His silver-grey eyes were soft with a vulnerability that made the guilt in my chest flare up. He looked nervous—genuinely, nervous—the "Basement Ghost" finally stepping into the light.
"It's just me and Maru at the house," he continued, his thumb tracing a frantic, uneven path across my knuckles. "Until Monday. I was... I was wondering if you wanted to stay over. Tonight. Like, for real."
The unspoken weight of the sentence crashed into me. Tonight is the night. It wasn't just about a sleepover; it was about the final barrier between us, the one thing we hadn't let the world—or each other—touch yet. The nervous electricity of it cut straight through the blue haze, a sudden bolt of reality that made my fingers tingle.
"Yeah," I said, the word coming out a little breathless, a little too honest. "I'd like that, Seb."
He let out a long, shaky exhale, the tension in his shoulders finally snapping as he pulled me into his side. He squeezed my hand tighter, as if he were afraid I'd change my mind if he let go for even a second. We kept walking toward the festival, the "it" couple of the outcasts heading toward a night that felt like a promise and a threat all at once. I was terrified, and I was excited, and I was so, so high that I wasn't sure which feeling was actually mine.
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The Town Square was a Halloween fever dream. Mayor Lewis had clearly leaned into the seasonal capitalism, transforming the center of town into a temple of overpriced plastic and artificial fog. Neon-orange and purple glow sticks were everywhere—wrapped around wrists, tucked into jack-o'-lanterns, and bleeding a synthetic, radioactive light onto the cobblestones. It was the kind of aesthetic that felt curated for social media.
We drifted toward the cider stand. That's when I saw them—Alex, Haley, and Emily were illuminated by the harsh, yellow glare of a nearby stall. Haley was laughing at something Alex said but my eyes snagged on Emily.
She wasn't laughing. She was standing perfectly still, her colorful shawl wrapped tight, staring at the back of Sebastian's head. I felt a sudden heat on the side of my face and realized Alex was looking at me. It wasn't a friendly gaze; it was loaded with the weight of everything we'd broken between us, a reminder of the "Golden Boy" and the mess that didn't work out. I didn't look back for long. I couldn't. I just leaned harder into Sebastian, using his heat to drown out the sudden, cold spike of history.
"You okay?" Sebastian asked quietly, his hand tightening on mine.
"Just taking it all in," I lied.
"We're racing!" Sam suddenly barked, his voice cracking with the kind of invincible energy that only Sam could manifest. He pointed toward the entrance of the Haunted Maze, where a wall of artificial fog was pouring out like a slow-motion waterfall. "Last one to the Golden Pumpkin has to buy the first round at the Saloon!"
Sebastian looked at me, a playful grin breaking across his face. "You want in?"
"I think I'll sit this one out, Seb," I said, pulling a smile into place. "I want to look at the stalls. Breathe in some of this 'atmosphere' that Lewis is selling."
"You sure?" He looked hesitant for a second.
"Go," I laughed, pushing him gently toward Sam and Shane, who were already posturing at the start line. "Win me a plastic pumpkin or something."
He kissed me and then he was gone, disappearing into the fog with the others. I stood there for a moment, watching the orange haze swallow them whole. Suddenly, the world felt far away again.
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I was seated on a bench having a cigarette when I could feel the double dose of pills kicking in.I was drifting. My vision was running at a distorted frame rate, trailing Alex's movements as he stumbled into my personal space. He smelled like expensive bourbon. The "Golden Boy" was gone, replaced by a more vulnerable version of himself.
"Aurora," My name sounded foreign in his mouth.
I looked at him, and for a second, the pills did something cruel. They stripped away the toxicity and replaced it with a highlight reel. In the flickering, low-wattage glow of a nearby lantern, I didn't see the guy who had failed me. I saw the version of Alex who used to hold me until the world stopped spinning. I saw the boy who knew my anxiety and how to tune it out.
I'm pathetic.
"I'm a mess, Ror. I know I'm a mess," he continued, his voice cracking, sliding into that raw, unscripted desperation mixed with liquid courage. He reached out, his fingers hovering inches from my jaw, trembling with a heat I could feel even through the fog. "But you were the only thing that was ever real. Everyone else... You were just... different. I'm so sorry for everything. But I know you're probably happier now..." His voice trailed off.
The irony was a dagger to my throat. I looked at the way the orange light caught the moisture in his hazel eyes. My judgment felt like it was flickering in and out. For a moment, I felt bad for him.
"Alex..." I tried to think of a way to tell him the truth—it was always going to be Sebastian—when a voice interrupted us.
"Is there a problem here?"
Sebastian was standing there, a dark silhouette against the radioactive orange and purple glow of the maze. He wasn't the shy boy who had asked me to spend the night twenty minutes ago. He looked like something that had crawled out of a dark room—or basement—to claim what was his.
Sebastian stepped forward, but he didn't look at me; he kept his gaze locked on Alex, his presence a silent, suffocating threat that promised the night was about to get much, much darker.
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