Monstrato by Christopher Ganey
Chapter 8
On Sunday, Lori called and apologized for not texting me back the day before. I thought for sure she was gonna start asking a bunch of questions about me and Calvin's brother, but she didn't. All she asked was, "Hey, you wanna get fucked up tonight over at Alley's?" I told her I did, and we made plans for me to sneak out of the house. When she picked me up at the gas station around eight, she already had a bottle of vodka in her trunk. We went over to Alley's place, made vodka and orange juices, smoked some of Alley's weed, and started getting wasted.
It was like a little party, just for me, and it was fun for a while because it'd been weeks since I'd hung out with Alley and Lori. But then they started talking about Corena and Calvin, something I really didn't want to do. Lori said it was horrible of Calvin to be getting with Corena and that he was only doing it for revenge. I told her I wasn't sure about that. She said, "Oh yeah, I think so. I mean, do you think he really likes Corena? Do they seem like a couple to you? No," she shook her head, "if it weren't for what happened between you and his brother, he wouldn't have anything to do with that bitch." She went on, "What's he thinking anyway? I mean, you and him were broken up, right? And he was having sex with Cassidy along with the rest of those guys. And didn't he go out with Hailey for a while? And she's your friend. I don't see why it should make a difference just because you had sex with his brother." Well I could, and I knew it made a difference to Calvin, but I didn't try explaining it to them. Lori said, "Now Corena, on the other hand, is an evil bitch, and I bet she was planning that all along…" Lori stopped for a moment to swallow like she was trying to keep puke from coming up. Then she yelled, "Maaaannnnn, that's got to be the lowest thing anyone can do to somebody else, spread rumors about them and then steal their boyfriend. I bet you wanna kill her right now." Well, right then, I didn't want to kill her because I was drunk. I didn't even want to think about her. I was trying to forget about the whole thing. And it wasn't a rumor Corena was spreading, it was the truth. Lori and Alley kept tripping on Corena, talking about all the mean things she'd done to other people. They talked about how she'd treated Hope in the past, and Makayla, and how when they were in junior high, Corena was so mean to some girls that they had to transfer to other schools. They both felt that what she'd done to me was the worst, and maybe it was. What they didn't understand was that I didn't want to sit around thinking about Corena. I'd just lost my boyfriend—forever—and I could never get him back.
They kept talking and talking until, finally, I got up and went to the bathroom and stayed in there for a while. I did it partly to get away from them, and partly because I'd drank so much vodka, I was feeling a little sick. I sat down on the bathroom floor with my back against the tub and thought about what they were saying. At that moment, I couldn't feel anything for Corena. It seemed like the alcohol had washed away my anger. I wasn't surprised by what Corena had done—shocked, but not surprised. There was a selfish reason for everything she did, and she never tried to hide what those reasons were. As I sat there with my arms crossed on my knees and my head resting on my arms, I thought that in a weird, twisted way, I had respect for Corena. Because if she decided to start talking behind someone's back, she didn't care if everyone knew she was doing it. And that's when I realized I probably wouldn't go through with kicking her ass. I still wanted to, and I spent the next couple of days trying to convince myself I would. But that night, sitting in Alley's bathroom, I saw clearly what the real outcome would be. Corena did whatever she wanted at our school, and everyone accepted the situation whether they liked it or not. And even though she broke my trust and stole my boyfriend outright, I ended up giving her a pass I wouldn't have given anyone else. I hated her, that's for sure, and I swore to myself I'd never speak to her again. But after I got over the rage I felt towards her, another part of me decided it just wasn't worth it—that beating her up wouldn't accomplish anything.
After a while, my stomach started to settle. Lori and Alley were asking me what I was doing in the bathroom, wondering if I was all right. I went back out and sat on the couch with them, and we vegged out on the TV for a couple of hours watching Comedy Central and eating potato chips. My mom yelled at me when I got home, but I ignored her and went to bed.