Consciousness and Confidence

"I can't do this." I muttered for the third time, smushed in the back seat of Brian's truck. JayJay was to my left, and Jimmy to my right. Johnny was seated in the passengers seat next to Brian. He had yet to look at me once since I set foot in the car.

Jimmy adjusted his seatbelt a bit, and elbowed me in the ribs. "Ow!" I complained. "Remind me again why the tall person is sitting back here while the smaller person is in the passenger's seat?"

"Because I called shot-gun." Johnny said simply. I huffed.

"I'll show you shot-gun." I muttered, and both JayJay and Jimmy chuckled. Brian, for the first time all night, glanced back in my direction. The smile that had appeared when my friends laughter began never faded, even when he looked at me. Was that confusing him?

I shook off the thought and looked out the front window to see Matt's car slow down in front of a house with many cars parked out front. Nervousness swept through my body. This was it. Time to put my self-control to the test.

"I can't do this." I insisted again, a bit louder. Everyone in the car seemed to put their attention on me. I assumed they had all been informed of what was going on. "I don't want to go in there."

JayJay placed her hand comfortingly on my arm. "Don't worry about it, Ry. One of us is going to stay nice and sober with you the entire time." Her words made me a little less uneasy.

"Who?"

She scrunched up her face in though. "Jimmy, who picked the short straw?"

They left up the choice of who would ultimately be my shoulder to lean on when things got tough up to straws?! I was offended, to say the least. If the person who got chosen really didn't care about me -cough-Brian-cough- then what would stop them from abandoning me?

Jimmy looked over at her in thought for a moment. "Uhm, I think it was Zacky." I breathed in a sigh of relief. As long as it wasn't Brian. "He wasn't too happy about it though."

I shrugged. "Zacky's never liked me much. We've never really spoken to eachother a lot." Once again, this recieved another glance in the mirror from Brian. "Hey, that made me think of something!" I mused out loud. "Why are you guys hanging with JayJay and I? We never do normally."

Looking around at all the guys in the car, they just shrugged. "Eh, it was a mutual agreement that you needed to get out of the house yet, you also needed someone to lean on." I nodded in understanding at Jimmy's words.

At that moment, the car stopped and Brian shut off the engine. "Ready?" JayJay asked, looking directly at me. She seemed a bit anxious herself, which was not helping my nervousness. I gave a half-convincing smile and soon everyone was bustling out of the car.

I kept repeating 'I can do this.' over and over in my head as we took steps towards the house. I could hear the music pumping and through the windows I could see the bodies swaying back and forth to the beat of the bass that reverberated off my body.

I can do this.

I can do this.

We were now at the front door. Just as Matt was about to twist the knob of the door, a body flew threw the bay window next to us. Who ever it was landed in the bushes uncomfortably. My eyes bulged as the boy stood, dusted himself off and casually walked right past us and back into the party.

"That's it! I'm out of here!" I yelled, turning on my heal and walking back down away from the house. I walked with a swift pace, and was making good progress down the street. But, I didn't get very far before there was a hand on my shoulder. It stopped me ubruptly.

I slowly turned around to come face to face with Brian, his hand still placed on my shoulder. The look he was giving me was more intense than any he's ever given me before. I opened my mouth to speak, but I couldn't. All I could do was stare back at him. Since when have his eyes been so pretty?

"They wouldn't have brought you here if they didn't think you could handle it." His voice was extremely soft at the same time stern. I nodded once, not knowing how to respond.

"I'm afraid I can't." I muttered, glancing down the road to see the head of Jimmy looking over at us. From the distance, I swear I could see a smile.

Brian, acting oblivious to my statement, moved his hand from my shoulder down to my hand slowly, as if asking if it was okay. "It's alright." he spoke softly. "We believe in you."

With those words, I looked back into his eyes and nodded once more. He took a few steps backwards, always looking into my eyes, before turning around and pulling me by the hand back to the few people in the group who had decided to wait to see if I would come back. As we neared I saw Jimmy, JayJay, Zacky.

"Zacky, you're off the hook tonight. Go get drunk." Brian said, still pulling me up to the door. Zacky fist-pumped the air and walked inside, not saying another word to us. The minute I reached the door, Brian let go of my hand. I felt a bit cold.

"You alright now, Ryyan?" JayJay asked, looking worried. I nodded, because it seemed to be all I could do lately. "Alright, we'll all have fun then. Right Jim?" Her gaze set upon Jimmy caused me to raise an eyebrow. Was something going on here between my friends?

Before I could think anymore, a hand on my back pushed me through the front door and into the now raging party.