[b]Lynn[/b]

Lynn was not sure if her thoughts or her body or her eyes or her head started spinning first, but they all followed one after the other in a drunken shuffle. Somewhere, vaguely, the memory of fumbling with the pill bottle cap earlier in the day came to mind, and Lynn couldn't remember eating today, and she hadn't slept, she didn't think. She had bad dreams when she did sleep. She was in a restaurant, most of the time, or sometimes she was back in juvy, or sometimes just in grade school. So she stayed awake.

Amelia was talking. Leather jacket. Lynn blinked and opened her mouth, looking for words a minute before they came to her. She wanted to know why she drank at ten. [i]He said it'd make you not afraid,[/i] Lynn wanted to say, but the last fumbling sober neurons were able to wrangle her mouth shut before she could talk. They wouldn't get it, Lynn realized. They'd just have questions and Lynn didn't want to answer questions, she didn't have the answers, they'd want to know who was Che and why she did stuff and why she was ten. Around her the music was loud and everything was picking up, movement and conversations Lynn couldn't keep track of. "'Cause I flinched," Lynn mumbled, not sure who she was speaking to. "I broke the bottle, I wasn't supposed to..." she blinked. [i]Quiet.[/i] one half of her said. [i]But it's true,[/i] the other half of her said back, blearily. [i]I was supposed to throw the bottle but I got scared when I saw it light up.[/i]

Rolex came over. He was tick-tocking along. That was how you knew he was a fake. Lynn giggled at that. No, he didn't seem fake. Lynn swayed back and forth a bit, eyeing him over. [i]He's fidgety,[/i] Lynn thought. [i]Maybe it's his first party.[/i] But that didn't seem right. Lynn had a few instincts ingrained so deeply not even her drunkenness could make her forget them. She'd learned in a number of less-than-safe environments to look and see the way somebody carried themselves. You could see someone's tolerance for taking shit and their capability to dish it out and whether or not they'd ever seen something so fucked up it left scars on their eyes you could see every time they blinked. Lynn could see all that on him. [i]He probably needs the party...he should get drunk too.[/i] Lynn felt Eli's eyes on her and she smiled, giggling again. The part of Lynn that would've noticed Eli was looking at her scars and counting them off in her head was struggling to keep its head above the alcohol that flooded her brain. Lynn just saw Eli smiling at her. Then she was introducing Fish and setting Fish up with Cara. She said some other words that Lynn missed, her eyes were closed and she thought her ears closed off for a second, too. When she opened them both Eli had called Lynn her friend, which made her turn back and stare, confused as the cigarette curled smoke up out of her mouth.

[i]Friends?[/i] Lynn thought, and suddenly it was there again, that visegrip around her gut and throat that seemed to curl up around her, tighter and tighter. [i]No,[/i] Lynn wanted to say. [i]We can't be friends, that's bad, that's not it[/i] but Eli was also smiling and Lynn's brain couldn't put those two things together and make them fit. 

Lynn's head swiveled over to Lucy and her denim jacket, which looked really snug and cozy. Lucy did two more jello shots and Lynn grinned wider, happy that she looked so happy, because they never looked happy, not with all the investigating and everything else that was going on. Lynn could see that she was wearing masks, though, because she got serious when Amelia asked about the story, and she was looking at Fish but it was a different smile than the ones she'd seen before. Lynn started to ask why she was smiling so differently, and she could smile just one way if she just drank more. Lynn turned and saw Archie and Nat and felt her stomach twist like the knotted ends in her hair and wrinkle like the ones in her shirt she couldn't seem to press flat. Archie looked good. He was tall and broad and Lynn wondered how strong you got working on boats because Archie looked strong. Her eyes swam over to Natalie who looked beautiful, awfully terribly beautiful. Something in Lynn wanted to shake and rage, wanted to scream. [i]I got my shoulder fucked for you,[/i] Lynn wanted to shout. [i]And almost got the needle when you called or the freezer or...[/i] 

There was a part of Lynn that could still function competently and it dragged her eyes back to Archie, the light burns on his hand [i]why did you grab me why the fuck did you grab me from behind i didn't know i wouldn't have done it[/i] and his eyes, very blue eyes [i]mine are blue sometimes too, just not now[/i]. His eyes were looking everywhere, and Lynn followed them to the curves on Eli's jeans and the dimples on Lucy's face and Natalie's stupid fucking beautiful dress and not...they didn't...[i]I can't help it,[/i] Lynn wanted to say, looking up. [i]I was supposed to be tall and pretty but I'm not. I could keep you safe, they can't do that, I wouldn't let...she's wearing heels it's not fair...nobody taught me how to do makeup like hers or I would...I'm a good fucking person you shouldn't have grabbed me, why did you grab me, I don't want to burn you...[/i] Lynn's thoughts seemed to bounce and ripple apart like someone had dropped a rock into a pond, hitting the curve of the inside of her skull and bouncing back looking like something new.

Lynn fumbled to get the cigarette from her mouth to take a drink but her cup was empty. "Fuck," she murmured, blinking. She turned and Archie's heart rate monitor was beeping and before Lynn could drop her things and grab him, and keep the lizard from coming out like she had when they found the body, Rolex was there, stepping up. Lynn opened her mouth to ask if he was okay, if she could help, but she closed it. 

Lynn turned back to Keaton, grabbing the tequila bottle firmly. Amelia was still there. 

[i]Do you wanna know?[/i] Lynn wanted to say, but she couldn't screw open the bottle and talk at once, she didn't spill bottles any more. You had to focus and hold them tight. [i]There was a house across the street from where they parked, but they weren't where they'd parked. They were in a little alley off to the side and Lynn was shivering, grabbing at her face, at the bridge of her nose.

"Che...Che did I...am I gonna be ugly? Am I gonna be..."

"Shut her the fuck up."

"Che I didn't mean to - "

Che kneeled down, hushing the man next to him. Lynn didn't know who he was, but she'd heard he was from Out West, and that maybe he was a Fire Wyrm. Che cursed, holding the last bottle in his hands, stuffing the rag further down into the opening. The smells were strong and harsh, kerosene and alcohol and of course iron, but that last one was from her. "You told me you could do this," he said, and even then Lynn could tell there was iron in his voice, too, and it was because the other man had more iron in his voice, and there was going to be something bad if Che couldn't do what he said he would do, and it was because Lynn couldn't do it. Lynn didn't want to be the one who couldn't do things. She was gonna get transferred because she couldn't read as good, but Che was still her friend. But if she fucked this up then maybe he wouldn't be.

"I thought I could," Lynn said, reaching up for the glass wedged at the bridge of her nose but Che pushed her hand aside. "I thought...you didn't say there were people inside...that it was..."

"Shut her up before one of them hears," the other man muttered. Half the hair on his face was singed off, and both his eyebrows. Che had only lost the hair on his arms, and gotten a nasty gash from part of the glass. [sub]amelia called me molotov that day at the bench when nat was reading her stupid book before we found the dead body and i was in the hospital [/sub] 

Che turned back to her and pressed the bottle into her hands. He pulled out a flask from his back pocket and handed it to her. "She can fucking do it." He turned to Lynn. "Drink this. It makes you not scared. After, you go home and it's just like a bad dream."

Lynn nodded and did, coughing and wheezing at the taste, but Che cupped a hand over her mouth and she didn't spit any out. "It hurts," Lynn said, her back to the brick wall.

"It has to be you to throw it," Che said. He stared into her eyes and when he did that sometimes she couldn't look away no matter how badly she wanted to. She knew it had to be her to throw it, because she could make things burn, like the house last year, she hadn't meant to, she'd just tried to play with one of the Christmas candles and it had gotten so big so fast, but this was diferent. This wasn't playing. "If you don't, Clarita and Megan are gonna die. I'm gonna die too. And then you're gonna die. Is that what you want?"

"No," Lynn said sniffling, because the glass hurt, it hurt really bad, but she knew you weren't supposed to cry, because then people knew it was easy to make you cry and they did it more, and Che wouldn't like her, "I...I don't want anybody to..." [/i]

Lynn jerked the bottle back. She'd poured too much into Keaton's glass. She could feel Archie standing there, just a few feet away, and maybe the lizard would come out and maybe he wouldn't, Lynn didn't care, she was just small, smaller than everybody else here, and she couldn't - fuck. Fuck all of this. She shouldn't have come. "I gotta go, uh," Lynn said, the words refusing to come together smoothly. Fuck, she just needed an excuse, a simple excuse, "Piss, yeah. Hold it for me," Lynn said, handing it off to someone, she couldn't remember their name - Jack? Fish? - and she stepped away from the circle, feeling the campfire grow smaller and lonely behind her as she stumbled off into the woods. Lynn kept herself steady until she was a good ten or twelve yards into the treeline then she picked up the pace, tripping over roots and branches and every other fucking thing in these stupid woods. Lynn kept going until she couldn't hear the sounds of the party, stopping at a tree.

Lynn grabbed onto the trunk and retched, and retched, and retched. She held herself there for a minute or two, gasping and wheezing, then stepped back. The dirt under her feet felt soft and shifted under her feet. Then again, everything was shifting. Lynn found a different tree and sat/fell down, leaning back against the trunk and feeling her whole body anchor steady to that solidity. She was on something soft. Flowers. Lynn picked some up, rolling them over in her hands. They were pretty for a moment or two, until she remembered. [i]Flowers just cover up the smell of how full of shit some people are,[/i] Lynn thought, lifting one up to her eyes. She grunted and let the light and heat dance back across her hair and down her arms and legs, and watched smoke curl up off the petals. She'd have to hurl again in a minute, but this was fine for now.