"Your band tonight was amazing! The sound was so together, so tight! You blew it out of the water!" Wendy lay on her side facing Robbie, her eyes wide open and her head propped up with her hand. She spoke enthusiastically and genuinely, causing Robbie to blush. He immediately appreciated the dark night; he might die of embarrassment if she saw how crimson his cheeks had gotten.

"You really liked it?" Robbie smiled back at her, taking in her excitement. He loved seeing her happy, loved that he had helped make her happy, loved that he was the one who got to enjoy her happiness.

"Yeah, man! Tonight was awesome!" Without warning, she leaned forward and gave him a quick kiss.

The two smiled at each other, then leaned casually back on the van's hood, gazing at the stars. The kiss lingered on Robbie's lips; he felt the warmth and tenderness of the gesture. He knew the quickness of it reflected her mood; she was still excited and full of energy, in that wonderful mindset of, Fuck it, let's run away and listen to some awesome music at 90 miles an hour! And secretly, Robbie hoped that one day he would have enough money to do just that.

After a time—Robbie could never really keep track of how much time had passed when he was with her—Wendy slid off the hood and sat at the edge of the cliff, dangling her feet into the abyss and looking out at the town below. Robbie soon followed, first reaching into the back of the van and grabbing a bottle.

"Want a nip?" he asked, pulling the Jack Daniel's from his mouth and handing it to her.

She took it, eyeing the brown liquor and smiling. "Been sipping on it without me, have you?"

Robbie rustled his hair, chuckling nervously. "Yeah…guilty as charged," he stammered out. If she had known about the bottle before this one, and then the half-bottle he had shared with her two weeks before…

Thankfully, Wendy seemed to pay no heed to his little hesitation, and he plopped down comfortably beside her, pulling her close with one hand and accepting the bottle with the other. They passed it in silence for a while, enjoying each other's touch, smell, warmth.

"They're all blinded, aren't they, Robbie?" Wendy said suddenly, gesturing towards the town.

Robbie gently brushed her hair out of her eyes and kissed her forehead. "I'm afraid so. But we're awake, and that's all that matters."

She looked up at him, smiling a small, slightly burdened smile. Her eyes, still glistening, looked tired and heavy, yet not without hope. She leaned on his arm, not noticing his slight wince as some of her weight settled onto the crook of his elbow. He had clumsily injected the night before…

After a few more sips, they began a game of throwing rocks at the nearest building. Of course, the town was too far away for the rocks to even remotely come close, but it felt good to do something—anything—to defy the town that insisted on sleeping while the forest around it vibrated with oddities.

"It's getting late; do you want me to drive you home?" Robbie hated to have the night end, but he knew her dad would break him to bits if she were late.

Wendy said nothing, pulling her legs to her chest and resting her chin on her knees. She kept staring at the town.

Robbie knelt down beside her, knowing this mood, hating this mood. He pushed the bottle towards her feet. She grabbed it immediately, tipped it back aggressively, then handed it back to him. "He's at me again, Robbie," she mumbled. "Dad. He's always asking questions: where I'm at, what I'm doing, who I'm with. It's like he doesn't trust me, doesn't believe me when I tell him! And he expects me to have my life together, to have a plan. But whenever I try to talk to him about it, it's never good enough, and he pushes his stupid ideas about logging camp so hard!" This last sentence she said with passion, spitting out fire along with the words. Then she sighed. "He'll be waiting when I get home, ready to badger me with stupid questions. I told him where I'd be; he always thinks I've been somewhere else, though. Especially when he's in his cups." Her face vanished behind a veil of red hair.

Oh, how he wanted to tell her! He knew she was burdened; she was the only girl in a house of four guys and had taken on so many responsibilities to care for her brothers. Her father, a big, bumbling idiot—but strong—failed to see all she did, and never even considered to glance at what she wanted for herself. Wendy was strong.

And that's why he wanted to tell her! To show it to her, so that she might have a few hours' relief, so her father's idiocy would seem hilarious rather than tiresome, so she could let go for a few moments. But he knew she would never agree. She was too strong to turn to needles; she wasn't like him in that way. She was better…

"We don't have to go. I'll take the blame for your being late." Robbie embraced her, hugging her strongly, wanting her to know that he felt her pain, understood her pain.

She looked at him, her eyes full of agony and trouble, her cheeks red and tearstained. Her nose dribbled; her hair had frizzed.

She looked beautiful.

"Don't do that. You don't need to do that," she whispered.

Suddenly they were kissing, pressed against each other as if trying to fuse together. Robbie vaguely remembered leaning downwards, then the clink of the empty bottle as it tumbled down the cliff—his foot had knocked it over when she had rolled on top of him.

It was a flurry of tongue, breath, hair, hands—hands exploring cheeks and neck and hair. She tasted so sweet—sweeter than any liquor—and her smell made his head swim much more than any drug he had ever experienced. It was she he felt, she he was falling for.

All too soon it was over. They both sat up, brushing the wrinkles out of their clothes and ruffling their tangled hair. Robbie shyly stole a glance at her only to find that she was staring back, smiling. "That was better than any liquor," she said, playfully cocking her head to the side and adorning her wonderful crooked smile.

Robbie felt himself smile back, and they simultaneously walked to the van without speaking. Robbie slid into the driver's side and turned the key.

He drove the five miles or so to her home, good music playing in the background. When he pulled up to her door, she leaned in and kissed him—a sweet, gentle, reassuring kiss. "I had fun tonight."

"Me, too," Robbie replied. "See you tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow," she answered, opening the door. "Later, Robbie!"

With a slam of the door, she was gone.

. . .

He sat in his room, slowly turning the needle in his fingers. He couldn't keep doing this; he knew one day soon he would have to choose.

She made him feel so alive! But it made him feel so at ease. She brought out the best in him; it made him forget about his worst.

Would she want to inject with him? If he explained how it helped, would she be okay with it?

"No, she wouldn't," Robbie said aloud. He shook his head, sticking his vein and pushing down the plunger. "This isn't Wendy. I'm not even sure this is me…"

His parents' moronic smiles began to fade, their cheery apathy over death becoming comical and ironic. The scowling critic at the concert contorted into nothing but a shadow. The restless itch in his soul slowed its gnawing; it never stopped, but to slow it down was such a relief. And then there was Wendy, her bright and excited face taking up his entire brain.

But she, too, began to fade. Somehow Robbie ended up on his knees, begging for her to return. "Wendy, Wendy! Don't go! Don't leave!" His fists hit the grimy carpet, littered with soda cans and dirty socks. "Wendy, I'm sorry!" His hand stretched out, trying to grab her, to pull her back, but too late! She had shaken her head, had turned away, had left.

His body crumpled, exhausted. Vaguely, he felt his fists clench tightly to his heart, trying, trying to capture any part of his soul that hadn't yet succumbed to the drug.