[b]LYNN[/b]

[quote]DENEM: Campground by the forest. Eli’s waiting [/quote]

Lynn snapped the phone shut, leaning back against the door of her room. Something about her was prickled by that, something she could not fully identify. A part of her thought this might be a set-up - after all, the no cameras of the woods cut both ways, and with the commotion of Homecoming, it would be a while before anyone noticed two missing teenagers. A part of Lynn considered not going, of barring the door shut with her desk chair and enjoying a small lake's reserve of tequila by herself, not risking any mutilation by lizard claws or elbows to the nose or having to blow herself through the wall of a kitchen again. 

But the rest of her knew the opposite was true - if she squirreled away and this wasn't a sting, she was going to look like a bitch, especially after she gave her word she'd be there. And looking like a bitch was worse than looking dead. Lynn dropped her bag on the bed and reread the message one more time. Eli - well, Lynn called her Denzel - was alright, but she was a bit confused. Why were they out there? This had to be some kind of party? That tracked. Lynn ran herself through the scenarios and was able to talk herself down from the nerve-jump jitters she'd worked herself up to a moment ago. [i]It's just a party,[/i] Lynn told herself. [i]And if it's a sting, you will turn that campground into fucking Nagasaki with all the liquor in your bag.[/i]

Lynn took off her work clothes, markedly turning away from the Promise-issued mirror in her room as she did so. Lynn threw the apron, black jeans and t-shirt into the corner, yanking the no-slip tennis shoes off and throwing them still tied to the other side. Lynn went to throw on normal clothes but paused for a moment. Through the window (which Lynn kept shuttered, and slathered with a thin film of vaseline, so as to detect intrusion) she could hear the roaring music of the whole station set to party. The pretty dresses. The make-up. The glimpse of the patrons in the front of house she'd seen had all been dolled up too. 

Lynn walked over to her dresser and opened it up with a grunt. Of course they'd given her the one that jammed. It had only been a week and a half ago she had actually put her clothes away in the dresser as opposed to living out of her duffel bag. Excepting the last year and a half of her life, it had been a while since she'd been in one spot long enough to really really settle. Lynn rummaged through her things. "Fuck," she muttered, remembering. The mall. [i]Damn him,[/i] she thought, thinking of Archie inviting them, Archie grabbing her, Archie making a butcher's fuckery of the whole afternoon. She'd meant to get clothes and hadn't. She had thought she might...well Keaton was always put together, and...

Lynn kicked the dresser and rubbed at her forehead for a moment. Then she glanced back in and pulled out one of her two pairs of jeans, electing the one which had the most material still intact. She grabbed a t-shirt and turned -

There was a woman in the corner of her room.

"Bitch!" Lynn screamed, cocking back.

She blinked. There was nothing. She walked over, throwing her arms to catch someone invisible. Nothing. No noise. She rubbed at her eyes and looked again, her heart thundering in her ears. It - fuck. It was a shadow. She'd - her hair, it glowed, it cast shadows sometimes, and she'd thought it...it for sure was...

Lynn leaned back against the dresser for a moment, breathing, her hair and skin glowing like the bellows of a forge as she did so. Lynn threw her clothes to the ground and sat down at her backpack, fumbling with the zipper for a full thirty seconds. "Motherfucker," she muttered, finally managing to grasp it firmly and pull it apart. She wasn't going to lose her shit the day she got told the funniest joke of her life. She unscrewed the bottle and took a deep, long pull. The tequila burned running down her throat - one of the few times Lynn had ever felt something burn, and oh if she didn't [i]love[/i] it - and gurgle in her empty stomach. She screwed the cap back on tight, not wanting to dowse her bag in Jose Cuervo. Lynn stood back up and grabbed her jeans up off the floor, sliding into them with utter ease, back pointedly to the mirror. She threaded her belt through the loops and cinched it tight before looking back at her other clothes. She had like three workout tanktops, a handful of ratty t-shirts, her hoodie. Lynn elected for the most presentable of the t-shirts - a black and yellow Wu Tang Clan shirt, and wriggled into it, slinging her backpack over her shoulder. She left her hoodie on her bed - Lynn had no intention of fighting anyone tonight, and if someone vomited all over it, she'd have to. Lynn walked into the bathroom and washed her mouth out with water and mouthwash for a moment before heading out, hair still bound back in its work-required ponytail. She locked the door behind her and made her way toward the campgrounds.

Lynn kept reminding herself of the Gary news, which was just beautiful, but it seemed like the gold-happy feeling that had filled her up a few minutes ago was shaken. Lynn wasn't sure why, and it was pissing her off. She was just trying to get trashed, and somehow that was proving too complicated. Along the way, Lynn passed a few roaming packs of would-be Homecoming kings and queens, whose photo ops she interrupted with no semblance of remorse. [i]Rich fuckers,[/i] Lynn thought. Still, Lynn buried how annoying all their stupid shit was, and when she saw ATVs of cops roll past she buried the cold twisting feeling in her spine she got each time she saw the Promise's security, and when she passed the people sitting on the patios of restaurants she buried how hungry she felt. Lynn had blown her cash on the liquor, and figured that she was going to be hungry regardless, so she might as well be hungry and drunk.

After a few minutes of buoying herself with the mental image of Gary trying to talk his way out of an ultimately fatal ass-beating, Lynn stepped into the trees, letting one hand fall back to her backpack, fingers gripping the zipper. The woods were quiet, and Lynn was all to aware of how close she was to where she'd found the doll. She listened intently. The light was from firelight, something Lynn knew instinctively even before her eyes could pick up on the flickering campfire, and she could hear people talking about schoolwork, which wound her down. "Thank God," Lynn muttered, more relieved she got to just party than relieved it wasn't a set-up. That would've just been a headache. Lynn walked through the trees, the lantern next to her head flaring briefly as she stepped into the campfire. Lynn recognized a grand total of two people there, which was something of a mixed blessing, but it felt a little more mixed than blessing at the moment.

"What's up," Lynn said, reaching into her bag and, for the first time in her life, doing something that was unambiguously going to win people over and make them like her. She pulled out two full handles of tequila. She had limes and salt in her backpack, and even some beers, too. Lynn felt it was discourteous to not have a 40 oz, even if it had been two years since she'd had one. "Who wants tequila?"

Eli and Keaton were both standing next to each other, like some kind of denim Voltron. She was going to need a better nicknaming system. Lynn walked up, getting a read on the group. Eli was grabbing onto her literally and figuratively. Eli looked like she knew everyone here; Keaton knew only Eli. It made Lynn like Keaton a smidge more, but that may have been the warm cloud that was starting to seep into her mind. "'Sup sluts," Lynn said. She blinked. Maybe Eli's friends were squares. Eh. Oh well.