Up the stairs, into her room. Sky held Luke's hand and led him through the house. They left behind the party, the hammering beat of the music, Joey who looked after them with large, disappointed doe eyes, the backyard where Jess was talking to Cody, her blood-red lips so close to his ear.

The sickening mess of emotions was making Sky's hands tremble as she slammed the door of her room and turned the key in the lock. The music quieted down into steady background noise, and suddenly the room felt eerily silent, the loudest sound was her own too-fast heartbeat in her ears, an anxious, agonized rhythm.

"Luke—" her voice came out weak. "Luke, I need something. Please. What do you have?"

"Jesus Christ, Sky—" Luke groaned and leaned heavily on the wall, running a nervous hand through her pink mane.

"Don't. Just— don't. Who are you to tell me no? You're high!"

"Yeah, and because of that I know it's a fucking stupid idea." Luke snapped. "What the fuck happened? You were the one who told me to go back to rehab, because - I quote you there's no happy ending for an addict."

"And you told me that you lasted two days. I've lasted for a month, a fucking month, and I'm done!"

Tears were burning in her eyes, she tasted them at the back of her throat, the salty, desperate taste. The world was spinning, but alcohol was only making her feel worse, not better, it wasn't enough, it did nothing to silence the screaming anxiety in her head. She couldn't stop thinking about Cody and Jess in the backyard, the way Jess had looked over her shoulder and slid her hand down Cody's arm. Was he cheating on her? Sky's heart was breaking, the pain took her breath away. And then Hawk—

Why the fuck did I text him? Am I just gonna forget everything he did, how he fucking almost killed me with his lies, and forgive him because I've been having some dreams?

"Come on, Sky—" Luke sighed. "I know that things are shitty. And yeah, I get it— but does it have to be me?"

She was fighting tears with all her might but her lower lip trembled when she spoke.

"Yeah. There's no one else. Please, Luke. What— what do you have?"

Luke's jawline went tight, but then he let out a resigned sigh. His hands were slow as he pulled a small bottle from one of the numerous pockets of his black cargo pants and showed it to her. Sky's mouth went dry with need, her ears started ringing.

"Oxy?" she breathed. "You've got oxy?"

"Yeah. It's… easier to get than heroin."

Sky swallowed hard and forced her eyes off the bottle back at Luke's pale face.

"You inject it?"

"Yeah. That way the high is… just crazy. But shooting drugs— Sky, if you start that, there's no going back."

"How… how does it feel?"

Luke let out a laugh, but the sound was strained, sad, exhausted. He leaned his lanky frame on the wall and kept fidgeting the bottle in his long, thin fingers. The pills rattled inside, that sound full of whispers of peace, quiet, love, acceptance. Home. She knew how it would feel to take one of those pills - shooting, snorting, swallowing, it didn't matter. It would feel like coming home after being lost in the darkness, starving for light.

"First— it feels cold. Like there's ice in your veins… but then— you're flying. But I'm not going to let you shoot it. If you've never— I don't want to be the one… the one to show you how it's done."

Sky's stomach was so tight with anxiety that it felt like she had swallowed a lump of ice. She had never wanted anything as much as she wanted to try injecting Oxy, but—

Under the long, black sleeves, Luke's arms were a map of infected needle marks. His parents clearly didn't give a shit, but Sky knew Dad would freak out if she had arms like that. He would send her back to rehab without a second thought. And Cody—

Sky's heart thumped painfully against her ribs at the thought of him. He had quit selling drugs for her, had given up all that money he could be making. And he had been so fucking proud of her, so supportive every step of the way. He had come with her to the outpatient clinic the days Dad had been too busy. He had waited in the lobby while she went to AA teens. He had told her a million times that she could do this, that he was proud of her, that she was so strong, stronger than anyone he knew. He would lose it if he found out she had taken something. And there was no way to hide the bloody needle marks on her arms. She was planning to get naked in front of him today, after all - considering he wasn't fucking Jess at this very moment.

That thought felt like a punch in the face. She couldn't go down, she couldn't walk out to the backyard, she would die if she had to see Jess again, the triumph in her eyes as she ran her fingers down Cody's arm as if she owned him. This reality sucked, and she was fucking done with it.

"I— I just want a little bit. Like one pill, you know? Not too much. Just something— to cut the edge."

Luke let out a sigh but didn't protest further. He opened the bottle and picked up one, small white pill with his long, bony fingers.

"You wanna swallow or snort?"

"Kicks in faster by snorting, right? But I've never— I've never done that either. Will you show me?"

Without a word, Luke walked to her desk, placed the pill on it - and suddenly a memory from last summer entered Sky's mind - the row of small, white pills on this very same desk, and herself sitting in that chair, taking one pill after another, swallowing them down with water—

Was it really less than six months ago? It felt like a fucking lifetime. In that time she had lost Hawk, almost died in the school fight, gotten back together with Hawk, then lost him again, started doing drugs, met Cody, went to rehab—

Too much. It was too much. She hadn't asked for any of that crap, and yet the pain and the drama always found her. The tears were an ocean inside of her, taking her breath away. She had just wanted this night to be beautiful, but now everything was ruined, she was a mess and she was losing Cody too, losing the one thing that was kind and good and perfect, the one thing that felt right in her life.

Sky glanced over her shoulder to make sure she had closed the door, as Luke found a spoon from his pocket and crushed the pill into fine, white powder. His pink hair partly covered his water-color eyes when he turned to look at Sky, the strands kissed his sharp cheekbones.

"You've got a piece of paper, or a bill or something?"

"Yeah, just— wait a sec." Sky rummaged the drawer of the desk, found a ten-dollar bill, and rolled it up while Luke arranged the crushed pill into a line, using a Christsmas card Paulo had sent her from Boston.

Sky turned her eyes away. She didn't want to think about Paulo. He knew nothing of her drug addiction, of her time in rehab. Sky hadn't told him, and now—

Well, she was about to disappoint everyone, so why did it suddenly hurt so much to think about Paulo's disappointment if he ever found out? Yet another thing Sky didn't want to feel, yet another thought she wanted gone, gone, gone.

"How do I do it?" she asked, her voice barely audible.

Luke shrugged, he looked down at his black boots, as he took a step back. "You just… snort it. And try not to sneeze it all out."

For a couple of heartbeats, Sky hesitated, holding the makeshift draw in her fingers. She didn't have to do this. No one was forcing her. She could still walk away from here, go and find Cody, have another beer, but—

The pill was a line of tiny molecules ready to enter her bloodstream and take away this horrible, sickening mess of shame and guilt and love and lust. Just one deep inhale, and it would all go away.

She wouldn't have to drown tonight - she could fucking fly instead.

Bending over the table, Sky snorted the powder into her nose with one, desperate inhale.