THE THIRD TIME

SATURDAY. 12. FEBRUARY. 2022. IT WAS SOME time between two and three in the morning and Cal's party- as Cal's parties often did- had gotten out of hand. The noise- mostly music and screaming- had been the catalyst that had triggered the neighbour's phone call to police, but the noise wasn't what had kept them around. What had kept them around was the white powder spilling onto colored tables, and the empty vodka bottles littering the kitchen counters the ziplock bags that had been lost on the floor and the pastel colored tablets, the wailing girls, and the bruised up boys. That was what had kept them around. People poured out of the house, shoving each other out of the way of the front door and running towards their cars, complaining about forgotten jackets or pills that they would refuse to claim now that the cops were roaming around. When they had first arrived, my first instinct- like everyone else's- was to admit defeat without a fight and head right towards the front door as the music abruptly halted and all the lights Lickered on. I didn't care about keeping the party going- I was already o-er it- but, before I could make it to the door, Finn grabbed my arm and yanked me back into the house.