Tom Perrotta - Nine Inches

In any case, the kitchen wasn’t the worst place to be. All sorts of people drifted in and out — there was a keg on the back patio — and I found myself hugging a whole bunch of them, including some I barely knew, and one or two I didn’t especially like. Most of us were seniors who’d already gotten our college acceptances — I was heading across the country to Pomona — and a generalized cloud of goodwill was in the air, that sense of connection that comes from having a shared past and one foot out the door.

One of the few people who didn’t hug me was Iris Leggett. She just sort of materialized by my side while I was recovering from shot number four, which had gone down easier than its predecessors and then detonated like a fireball in my stomach. I had to close my eyes and wait for the uproar to subside.

“You okay?” she said, tugging gently on my shirtsleeve.

“I think so.” I blinked a few times, getting the world back in focus. “Just a little wobbly.”

After that there was an awkward pause. Despite our promise to remain friends after the break-up, Iris and I had been avoiding each other for months, and now here she was, squinting up at me with an expression that seemed to hover somewhere between amusement and concern. I was also a bit distracted by her shirt, so tight and low-cut that it could barely contain her breasts. In school she always covered up, usually with an extra-large hoodie that hung down to her knees.

“I know.” She nodded ruefully, following my gaze down to her impressive cleavage. “ Holy shit, right?”

I winced and mumbled an apology. I still felt bad about blurting that out, making her cry the first time we had sex — the first time for both of us.

“It’s okay,” she told me. “I’m trying to own it, you know? I’m sick of hating my body.”

“That’s good,” I said. “That’s a really healthy attitude.”

“Fuck it, right?” There was something a little off about her smile, or maybe the tone of her voice. “If guys want to stare at my tits, who am I to stop them? I’m like, Here they are, dudes. Knock yourselves out. ”

“Are you drunk?”

She raised her red plastic cup, tilting it to show me the contents. It was pretty big, at least twenty-four ounces, and more than halfway full. “Turns out I like beer,” she said, shrugging in a who-woulda-thunk-it sort of way.

“You should try some tequila. That’s pretty good, too.”

“Maybe,” she said, but her attention had shifted from me to Sarabeth, who was taking a selfie by the sink, making a supermodel face for the camera. It seemed like everybody in the room was watching her.

“She’s pretty,” Iris observed. “But she’s such an exhibitionist.”

“She’s nice,” I said. “She’s in my art class.”

Casey joined Sarabeth for the next picture, the two of them posing with the tequila bottle. On the one after that, they gave each other a playful kiss. Some guys started cheering for more, but Casey pulled away and gave them the finger, telling them to dream on.

“I should’ve gone to more parties,” Iris said. “I used to act like they were stupid, but that was bullshit. I pretty much wasted the past four years pretending I was above it all. But the joke was on me, you know?”

“You didn’t waste it,” I told her. “You worked your ass off and got into a great college. I bet you’re gonna love it at Northwestern.”

“I’m gonna go to more parties, that’s for sure.” She swirled the beer in her cup as if it were fine wine. “I just wanna have some fun for once.”

There was a disturbance just then, a bunch of football players scuffling in the hallway. From the sound of it, I thought it might be a real fight, but they were just goofing around, Brendan and Chad Capaldo and Dontay Williamson tugging on one of their buddies, dragging him forcibly into the kitchen.

“Get this man a shot!” Brendan shouted as they spilled through the doorway. “It’s his birthday next week!”

Dontay was blocking my view of the birthday boy, but then he moved and I saw that it was Jake Harlowe. He looked sweaty and a little flustered, his blue oxford shirt rumpled and askew.

“I can’t drink tonight,” he said, realigning the buttons on shirt. “I have to take the SATs tomorrow.”

I was impressed by the smoothness of the lie, the note of regretful sincerity in his voice. And that look on his face, so anxious and innocent, like he didn’t want to be a party pooper, but couldn’t help it.

“Fuck the SATs!” Capaldo hauled off and punched him in the arm, pretty hard. “You only turn seventeen once!”

Jake frowned and rubbed his shoulder. Some guys started chanting, Birthday shot! Birthday shot! Birthday shot!

“Really,” he said. “I can’t.”

“Come on,” Dontay taunted. “Don’t be a pussy.”

I turned back to Iris, shaking my head like I couldn’t believe what a bunch of immature assholes they were, but she wasn’t even looking at them.

“Just so you know,” she said in this melancholy, thoughtful voice. “I don’t hate you anymore.”

I laughed, though it didn’t sound like she was joking.

“Why would you hate me?”

“Why wouldn’t I? You came to my house, you fucked me, and then you left. You never said anything nice, never took me out, never called to ask how I was doing. You acted like it was your job or something.”

“That’s not fair,” I said. “That was your idea. You wanted to keep it casual.”

“I know.” She nodded for a long time, accepting her responsibility. “But you weren’t even grateful.”

Drunk as I was, I knew she was right, knew that I owed her an apology. But for some reason I was looking at Jake again, watching as he accepted his birthday shot from Casey with an attitude of reluctant surrender, a good guy defeated by peer pressure. Smiling sheepishly, he toasted the onlookers and tossed it back to widespread applause.

“He really shouldn’t be doing that,” I said, but Iris was already slipping past me, shaking her head in disgust as she veered toward the hallway.

I WAS a conscientious employee, you have to give me that much. Even with a splitting headache and a broken heart, I managed to drag myself out of bed at six-fifteen the next morning, force down two Advil and a cup of black coffee, and drive out to the Brackett Academy, an exclusive prep school that had a nicer campus than some of the colleges I’d visited. I trudged into Winthrop Hall and joined a long line of nervous-looking kids waiting to take the most important test of their lives.

Getting through security wasn’t a problem. The proctor just made the usual cursory inspection of my ticket and ID before waving me inside. When the room was full, he passed out the test booklets, recited the rules and regulations, and told us to get started. My forehead was clammy and there was an ominous sloshing sensation in my stomach; I wasn’t sure I’d be able to make it through the next three hours without passing out or throwing up.

I’d known that fifth shot was a mistake even as I was bringing it to my lips, but by then I didn’t care. I’d already realized what was happening between Jake and Sarabeth, seen the way she’d chosen him, the way she pressed her body against his arm and whispered in his ear, the way he laughed at whatever it was she told him. All I could do was watch from across the room, my face burning with a rage that felt like shame, or a shame that felt like rage.

Fuck my life, I thought, and I swallowed that last gulp of poison.

At least it got me out of the kitchen. They had just started kissing when I rushed for the door and staggered out into the fresh night air. I wanted to make it to the grass, but it was too far away, so I barfed on the slate patio, right in front of a group of weed-smoking juniors who thought it was hilarious and couldn’t stop marveling at the amount of awfulness that was spewing out of me.