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I watched her take a small sip of her drink, her freshly lipsticked mouth puckering around the bright pink straw. Then another tiny sip. She looked up at him as she did, and I could see in her eyes how much she wanted him to like her.
I scooted closer to her and tried again, as loud as I could, desperately grabbing at the feelings of powerlessness and inevitability. Trying to somehow make the message go through.
“Stop. You don’t have to drink it. I know you don’t understand why, but stop. Stop drinking. Something is wrong. Something is very wrong.”
Above us, the lights flickered again, almost imperceptibly this time. Nicole wrinkled up her nose. “Are you trying to get me drunk?” she teased. “I’m a lightweight. I’m already kind of buzzed.” She reached for her water glass and drained nearly half of it.
“Yes, drink all the water!” I cheered. He chuckled in reply, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes.
I draped myself over the table until I was right in front of his face. “Fuck you.”
He shifted his body closer to me as if in response and nudged Nicole’s drink back in front of her. “I kind of want to see what ‘fully buzzed’ Nicole is like. Because ‘kind of buzzed’ Nicole is seriously adorable.”
Her smile stayed put, but she didn’t reach for the copper mug again. “So is sober Nicole,” she replied playfully, but I could see that he’d struck a nerve.
So could he.
He tried to backpedal. “Oh yeah, definitely.”
The change in the air was palpable.
At least, to me it was.
As a ghost—or whatever I was—I had lost the majority of my senses. I couldn’t feel the smooth surface of the table where my arms were resting lightly, I couldn’t smell the half-eaten plate of fries on the table, and I certainly couldn’t taste them. I could see. And I could hear. But what I had lost in physical senses I seemed to have gained in metaphysical ones. It was like a current, circling the table. And it had turned heavy and tense.
He didn’t try to push her into finishing her drink again.
And she didn’t take another sip.
He tried to coax back the flirtatious, eager energy. He tried asking her about her favorite movies, her family, her friends, even the sundress she was wearing. She smiled and answered. But when she didn’t giggle and lean into him like she had before, he stopped trying and started to pout. As if she was the one who had ruined this date.
I was ecstatic.
When the waitress brought the check, Nicole took a long drink of water then pulled out her phone. “Hey, I’m actually not feeling great. I’m going to get an Uber headed my way, okay? It was nice meeting you.”
No hug. No “let’s do this again.” No “do you want to come back to my place.”
I cheered. Loudly.
His jaw clenched slightly, and he shrugged. “Cool. I’ll just get the check, I guess.”
She smiled and stood up from the table. “Thanks. Looks like there’s somebody right outside, so I’d better hurry out there. Sorry to run!” I looked at her phone. She hadn’t even opened the Uber app; however, she had typed out a text to someone named Jen. “It was going really well, but I’m getting bad vibes. Headed home. Want to watch Criminal Minds?”
And then she left, while he waited impatiently for the waitress to return his card, then snapped at her for waiting until closing time to bring the check.
The waitress’s face crumpled. “Oh, I just—it looked like you guys were on a date, and I didn’t want to rush you—”
He gave her a withering look. “She was a bitch.” Then he signed the receipt, no tip, and walked to the parking lot.
15. SKYE
Kuna, Idaho
Now
Nobody saw anything.
And the blue Kia didn’t show up.
