“Out there?”I shook my head.“I don’t think so.”
“A friend told me about it.”Tip’s hand stuttered to a stop.“He said—he said the guy who owns that house, the guy who throws those parties, they’re wild.Like, anything goes.”
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.”
“Drugs?”
“I mean, people were—Jordan and I don’t—I never use any of that stuff.”
Which was interesting, considering a few minutes before, he’d been a connoisseur of getting stoned.
“Alcohol?”
His voice was sullen, verging on defiant.“I’ll be twenty-one in September.”
“Should I ask Jordan?”
“God, no.”But he went silent again.And then, his face flushing an even deeper red.“Like, sex stuff.”
“Hooking up?”
“Yeah, but, I mean, that’s anywhere.He said this guy has, like, you know.”And then—clearly about to die from embarrassment—he said, “A dungeon.”
It took me a moment to recalibrate.“You thought you were going to a BDSM party?”
He shrugged, but he still wouldn’t look at me.“It was all bull—” He glanced at me, calculating, and then continued, “—bullshit, anyway.Rory’s always full of shit.It was, like, mostly straights, but there were some cute guys, and you didn’t have to pay a cover, and they even had—” He seemed to remember, at the last minute, who he was talking to.“—other stuff.”
“And who’s Rory?”
“My roommate.”
“Where’s he?”
Tip shook his head as though he didn’t understand the question.Then he said, “God, he might not even know.”
That would have been quite the feat, I thought, since the party had fallen apart once the ambulance arrived.But it was possible that Rory hadn’t knownwhothe ambulance was coming for, so all I said was “And what happened at the party?”
“Nothing.”But as soon as he said it, Tip touched his neck, and his gaze moved toward the window.“I mean, we were just having fun.”
“How much fun?”
Tip shrugged again.
“And then?”
Outside the room, footsteps moved briskly down the hall, echoing off the linoleum.And then they moved past us, fading.
“I went outside,” Tip said.
“Why?”
“To get some air.I don’t know.I was just minding my own business.I walked around a little bit.”
“Were you on something?”
“No!No, I just—I was hot.And there were a lot of people and stuff.Anyway, I was walking around, you know, and I stayed pretty close to the house because I didn’t want to get lost.”His words picked up steam, coming faster.“Have you seen that place?That house is, like, in the middle of nowhere.Trees everywhere.And then this guy came up to me.”
