I was utterly, lustfully, morbidly drawn to him. I couldn't explain why. He was broken. I was enticed. The same way I'd been titillated by the escapism of something so daring and taboo as winning bracelets for sucking cock, I was seduced by the feeling of disaster that surrounded Spinner Mason. I wanted to step into his fallen world. To wade in his delicious misery.

I finally couldn't stand it any more. For days I'd been waiting, watching, deepening my obsession and fascination. I followed him out back that day. That day changed everything. I didn't know what I expected to find in the alleyway, but I knew that I wanted it. He asked me out that day, and I followed that first innocent invitation all the way to rock bottom.

And because, underneath it all, I am a huge bitch, I took Toby with me. I brought Toby to that party because he was my security blanket, the stooge who would stand beside me no matter how ridiculous I was acting. Toby had been in love with me since seventh grade. I knew it, I used it, and there's no excuse for it. I knew it was wrong, but he made it so easy.

In those days, those dark days haunted by Rick's ghost, I needed Toby more than ever. I couldn't stand to be alone with the nightmares. Only Toby understood, because only Toby had seen it, too. It all comes back to Toby, in the end.

I never should have brought him. Maybe what happened to Toby is my fault. It all started at that party in the ravine.

I was nervous and shy, and that made it easy to pour down the drinks that Spinner kept giving me. It was easy to lose count. It was easy to get lost in a wasted blur, to think Spinner's jokes were actually funny and that he was actually kind of cute. It was easy to ignore Toby, who sat like a sullen log and glared at me the whole time. It was easy not to notice when he walked away.

Everything felt easy. The easy life. I remember thinking I wanted to feel that way forever. Easy. I had never really been drunk before. The euphoria was exquisite, the poison in my blood dizzying my reality and melting my senses. It was practically the first time I'd laughed since the shooting. Who knew it was so easy to feel happy again?

Spinner whispered little sillies against my ear. They tickled and I giggled. His lips so close to my skin made me think of kissing, and the thought of kissing made my body tingle.

"Yo, Spin, my man. Our friend Tall Shorty hooked us up with some real sweet candy," announced Jay, pulling up a chair beside the one where I sat on Spinner's lap.

I watched, drunk and fascinated, as Jay procured a small rectangular mirror. He retrieved a tiny plastic bag from his pocket, a harmless-looking pouch of snow white dust, and emptied it onto the mirror. His movements were calculated and cautious. I'd never seen Jay treat anything so delicately before. He treated that powder like a queen.

With the mirror carefully perched on his lap, Jay used his driver's license to cut the powder into six neat, equally proportioned lines. Who knew Jay was so good at math?

It was cocaine. Drugs. Images I thought I would never see up close. To me, coke only existed in television shows and health textbooks. In that surreal moment, I didn't have the cognition to be concerned. I could only be amused. After all, I was drunk and I felt invincible.

It came so naturally. I barely paused to blink as I took the mirror that was passed to me. Fearlessly I snorted the sparkling powder through the ten-dollar bill. It was that simple. I was in it, now. I was in it.

My face went numb but my mind was alive. I felt like I could do anything, like I could run to the edge of Lake Superior and back. Like light was pouring from my finger tips. Reality was barely a glimmer in the periphery. There was nothing to stop me, nothing could touch me.

I felt bulletproof.

I was powerful and confident, an elegant empress. Even though in reality I was drunk and sloppy and sniffling like crazy. That's the thing about the easy life. You feel beautiful even when you look like shit.

I laughed and I laughed and we laughed and we laughed. The dancing flames of the fire were spinning and leaving streaks in the air. I could barely see or feel my body. My thoughts were moving so fast I couldn't keep up with them. I tried to chase them down but I only ended up falling out of the chair. Laughing and wrestling with Spinner.

"Let's go somewhere," I said to him dreamily. "Let's go somewhere, me and you."

He took me to the van. To the van. I don't know why I started taking my clothes off. It wasn't like he'd even asked me to. I jumped on top of him, kissing him fast and hard. I wanted it to happen fast and hard. I didn't want him to say stop.

From that night on, I never wanted to say stop.