you are in love · luke hemmings

It was easy for Cierra not to think about her dad when Luke was back in her life.

But now, Luke wasn't in her life, and she couldn't use him as a constant distraction. So, she was back to thinking about how upset she was that her dad came to visit her. And, on top of that, she was upset at Luke for what he had done.

She kept telling herself she was being unreasonable. Luke had forgiven her for calling their kiss a mistake and saying they should stay friends. Cierra should be able to forgive him for this.

She wanted to, so bad. And she knew at some point, she would. Because Cierra couldn't lose Luke, either. I can't lose you, she'd think about him saying that to her.

But the more Cierra thought about it, the weirder she felt.

She thought about how it felt like Luke was lying to her. How he could so easily pretend everything was okay when it clearly wasn't.

She thought about how when Luke had kissed her, his lips had been on someone else's just days before. She really hated thinking about that.

It made her feel reminiscent of the way it felt when Matt cheated on her. Luke didn't cheat on her, obviously, but it still made her feel shitty. There was some girl, at that moment, who was better than her. And that was the same reason Matt left her.

And she couldn't help but think that this was all her fault.

If she wasn't so paranoid and didn't freak out after kissing Luke, this never would have happened.

Cierra tried to have a normal week. She went to school and work. She did her homework and babysat her sister. She went to her therapy session. She hung out with Vicky and Emma. But everything kept creeping back into her mind, especially the image of Luke and some random girl in a bed. And she couldn't get rid of it, no matter how hard she tried.

There was a party on Friday. There was always a party on Friday. Cierra, for once in her life, was the one convincing Em to go, not the other way around. Emma claimed she was planning to stay in.

"Stay in?" Cierra questioned when Emma told her this. "Since when do you stay in? You need to come with me. If I'm home and bored I'll just mope around and feel sorry for myself."

So Cierra convinced Emma to go to this party. She even tried to convince Vicky to go, but it wasn't really her scene, so Cierra knew the chances were slim. But she just needed to get out of her house so badly. And drink. She needed to drink.

She never thought she would fully understand the urge to drink, but now she did. Cierra wanted to blame most of it on her dad, but she knew deep down it was Luke that was driving her to drink.

That's how she found herself at Emma's house, before the party, taking shots of something that was so gross it was hard to keep down. How did people drink this every week? Cierra asked herself. It tasted like what she thought nail polish remover would taste like.

When they got to the party, Cierra had taken six shots. By the third one, the taste had gotten so bad she thought she would have to stop. But by shot six, it barely tasted like anything at all.

And she was definitely already drunk. She had never drank this much alcohol before, ever. Cierra thought she was fine when she was at Emma's house, but once they got into their designated driver's car, that's when she realized that the alcohol was hitting. She felt warm. And she kept saying stupid things. And giggling. It was all leaving her mouth before she could control it.

At the party, there was some punch in a giant cooler that Cierra immediately poured herself a cup of. On a normal night, Emma may have stopped Cierra from drinking this much. But Emma had taken just as many shots as her, so she was just happy Cierra was on the same level as her.