prometí no enamorarme

“Call me a pendejo again, you know I love being insulted. Really gets me going,” he says distractedly, letting out a defeated sigh when he couldn’t easily spot his lighter anywhere, and tossing a rolled up pair of her socks at her from the dresser. “Sounds like fun, let’s do that,” he walks over to flop down on the bed beside her, lifting himself up with his forearm. “Ladies first.”

Bradley’s eyes gave a brief flit as Azul sat besides her, mentally logging the distance. It was an instinctive reaction, in any situation that she was placed into: clocking how far a person was sat, the estimated time it might take them to reach out a hand and grab something. She didn’t even notice it, any more, or gauge that it wasn’t normal. That was what happened, when childhood was a balancing act, wobbling with your arms extended on the tip of a knife’s point. There wasn’t room for errors, or relaxing the tension in your shoulders. Every house was just a building with hastily memorised escape routes. “It’s not as dramatic as people say,” Bradley offered, palming two of the tabs and thumbing the seal to a close, baggy tossed aside to be swallowed by the duvet’s rumples. “It’s like, erm… I guess the first time I did it, I kept thinking about bacon.” Pause falling, imaginary audience leaning forwards in their seats with a captive breath, trying to anticipate whether the theatre curtain was about to fall out of nowhere, it wasn’t obvious that she was going to continue. It wasn’t often obvious that she was about to do anything. “The edges of shit went kind of fuzzy, I guess, and it made me hear this sizzling. You know, like a breakfast pan. Grease, with the heat turned high.” A vignetted memory, in which her mother finally mustered the energy to get out of bed. Her father was out, and Bradley blinked awake to the sound of pots in the kitchen. The hum of a nursery rhyme, as snowflakes stacked against the window ledge, a globe settling into peace again after an violent shake. Bacon. “Just shit like that, really.” Lifting one of the tabs, Bradley dropped her mouth open, casually setting it onto her tongue. It was print with a half peeled banana, cartoon and irritatingly yellow – she’d never liked the colour, since she’d always found it far too happy. An ugly smile, without the teeth to prove it. She held out her open palm, other one waiting for Azul post swallow. The disintegration tasted rancid, but she didn’t react. “You jump, I jump, Jack.”

“No, no problem. Just — I’ve got funny associations with Florida, I guess. I went when I was ten with my parents and ended up in police custody,” he said, chuckling at the memory despite it likely being absurd to laugh at something like that. Nodding his head, Benji glanced at Azul. “Maybe she did? I mean, I do learn visually and she smokes, so…” trailing off with a shrug of his shoulders, he leaned against the side of the window. “Sketchy?” he asked, brows raising. “How so? I mean, Rochester had a malicious app that essentially killed people. Is it that bad?”

“Florida?” he questioned, brows raised as if she’d revealed she was a member of the Yakuza. “Huh… I can see it,” he finished, shifting in his spot so he could glance out the window more freely. “I don’t really smoke tobacco,” he admitted. “Makes me a bit woozy.” Nose wrinkling, he shook his head. “Don’t really watch television, or at least, TV like that,” he continued, foot scuffing at the floor for something to busy himself with. “But I have no doubt it’s, uh, good or whatever. Um — Help me how?” 

If he’d bet money on it, Leo would put everything down on already knowing Azul - the much more likely case was that he’d seen her while getting used to the beach homes he now was a resident at. He remembered waving at several of his new neighbours, some responding with enthusiasm and others rolling their eyes - obviously nowhere near as excited or welcoming as Azul was for the New Yorkers to take over the area, “Totally makes sense. Think they’re accidentally high all the time? Like, when huffing gasoline was the biggest thing, I’m sure they were the first ones to try it out, y’know? And if it didn’t kill them, they must’ve learned how to do it perfectly. I respect the risk,” Reaching out with the hand that wasn’t clutching onto a fruit-shaped cup, Leo took Azul’s hand into his own and gave it a hearty shake, despite the fact that she hadn’t even offered hers in the first place, “Azul. That’s pretty - isn’t that, like, a colour? Pretty sure Dora the Explorer taught me that one. I’m Leo, greetings, salutations, whatever, you want a drink?”

His second drag making it alarmingly clear that he didn’t smoke when he began to choke, he placed his arm over his mouth to cover it, moving to the window as he attempted to revive himself. “Where from?” he questioned, taking a seat beside her hesitantly. “Don’t really miss it, no. I mean, my grandma’s there and I feel weird leaving her, but… I also kind of miss my van, which is — Ow!” he shouted, shaking out his arm when he’d accidentally rested the cherry of the cigarette against it, handing it over to her. “All yours. Bad idea — Who’s Marissa Cooper?”

“Weird, hot girls do that for me all the time,” Lottie found herself teasing as she watched Azul closely, hoping that the drugs would be completely forgotten, and she’d give in to her other vices. Luckily, that’s exactly what she did for her, Charlotte letting out a little relieved breath before pressing her lips to Azul’s in return, her hand resting on the girl’s slender neck, and thumb moving to stroke her jaw as she leaned up more, putting more into the drunken kiss. The touch seemed to do the trick, Azul’s mouth was soft and had a familiar taste, vodka and something she couldn’t quite remember, and it was enough to dull her stimulated senses, enough to calm the itching under her skin and bring her back into her body, “Yeah, this is definitely helping,” Lottie found herself saying with a soft laugh, hand sliding down the girl’s shoulder and to her arm, shifting herself up more so she could press closer to the other.

the day i say i’m scared of a college student, that’s when you’ll know i’ve been abducted by aliens and replace by a less cool version of myself.

“Shame.” Bradley benched whatever it was that had barely claimed her interest in the first place, swivelling to face Azul fully. Closing their distance further, Bradley reached out and plucked at the baggy with all the authority of a sheriff confiscating illegal recreational’s off a minor, so assured in the gesture that anyone would expect a shiny badge to be pinned to her lapel. She flipped the bag, flicking to rearrange the party favours inside. “Acid tabs,” she quoted, eyes flitting up to catch Azul’s in amusement. “As opposed to fucking… armpit tabs, I guess? Aspirin tabs?” Lips tugged with a faint smile to confirm there wasn’t malice in it – not much, anyway, by Bradley’s standards – she moved to take a seat on the edge of Azul’s bed, apparently making herself right at home. “You haven’t done acid, before?” As self destructive as she was, Bradley had a phase where she tried to tick most drugs she could get her hands on off a mental bucket list, daring each to be the one that dragged her beneath the undergrowth, disappearing with a hand clawing around the soil, disturbing the worms. It wasn’t that she wanted something to, per say, she just didn’t care. She hadn’t cared, since she was twelve. After prying open the Ziploc seal, she darted a glance up towards Azul. “Wanna?”

“Really just emphasizes the differences between East and West Coast when you put us all together like this,” he remarked, thanking her as she extended the cigarette out to him. He found it a little strange she chose to smoke it inside, but maybe California was different. “I’ve never really — really been in this side of the country before,” he said for no reason really, stuttering before finally revealing his own name. “Benji… Nice, uh, nice name.”

         the outfit is ruined. merlot on linen that rolls off her collarbone in beads to her shoes, her legs, the front of her dress, she’s carrie white in pig’s blood. the look on her face completes it all, really, as ivy boggles at herself in the mirror on the far side of the room to assess the damage. ‘ kind of. ’ in a brief shrug her shoulders rise and fall, an arm extended to the floor to pick up a towel from the bathroom. ‘ i just need a new dress. shoes too, but i can go barefoot. no one will notice. ’ at the end of the night she’ll walk home with blackened soles as she always does, straps of her heels clasped between her fingers. ‘ do you have something i can borrow? i’ll wash it and return it to you later. oh, ’ a solitary finger raises to press against her lips. ‘ i won’t tell either. lips are sealed. deal? ’

There was a familiar sensation to the moment. A seemingly innocent proposition from her peer, a night of easy fun, a tiny window of possibility that one could be laced, could bring her that peace that she’d been longing for. Lottie’s hand went to her eyes, too drunk now to care much about the smearing of her thick eyeliner as she sat up, verdant green eyes meeting the mahogany brown of Azul’s… “You wanna keep my blood flowing?” She found herself teasing, deciding the best thing for her sanity, for her sobriety, was to test down a different path, her head tilting as she leaned back on one of her hands, “Because I can think of at least a dozen other ways for you to do that,” Lottie muttered suggestively, giving her a slight smile as she reached over to brush Azul’s hair from her shoulder, “if you’re interested in anything like that I mean.”

Taking a soccer ball to his backyard - which was literally just the beach - was so much fun. He could so get used to being here. He might not even go home - but he missed his dog too much, he would have to eventually. Still, it was beautiful here and he loved the sense of freedom and relaxation he got, and all it took was some extra degrees of warmth and a week where there were more sunny days than cloudy ones; a nice change of scenery. He idly dribbled the ball back and forth, before a heel kick strayed a little too far out of his control. It let gravity take over and it rolled towards a tanning girl, knocking into her beach chair with a tiny thud, stopping easily as Tomislav scrambled over to get it. “Sorry about that!” he chuckled. “Got away from me, won’t happen again!” *// @azulmonterrey​

Simply put, Bradley wasn’t fond of people. She hadn’t been, since she was young, and she couldn’t work out whether it was something instilled in her, or something she’d been born with. In high school, it was far more prominent, wearing all black everything and sticking anyone within a six foot distance with a knife and fork, cutting them into little, bite sized pieces that she only wanted to spit back out again, and that had carried with her into adulthood, albeit sieved of all it’s chunks until it was easier to swallow, but it was still there. Definitely still there. Azul’s room was a brief reprieve from wanting to bark a laugh in the face of anyone brave enough to talk to her, picking over odd trinkets like she had any business conducting an investigation. She’d never cared for boundaries. “Just looking. That allowed? Can pop my eyes out, like marbles, and hand them right over, if you want,” Bradley answered, off-the-bat and seamless, a connoisseur of thinking on her toes. Anyone would think she’d never been caught off guard by anything. Blinking down at the baggy – all calculating and cat-like, spotting a mouse with it’s whiskers quivering – Bradley’s lips tweaked. Interest snagged. “What’ve you got?”