Fly Until You Crash

Over the next few weeks, Addie started seeing more and more of Justin, and less of her friends than ever before. After a half-hearted apology and excuse from him, Addie quickly forgave Justin, much to the dismay of her best friend. Slade complained about the way Addie was acting to everyone else, but got the same response every time: “let her be, she’ll come around eventually.” After two months of unofficially dating Justin, Addie skipped her second-ever Anarbor show. She dropped the news to Slade the day before the gig, and his response was less than pleasant.

“What do you mean you’re not coming? You’re seriously ditching us for this guy, who seems to treat you like shit anyways?” Slade spat. He wouldn’t have gotten so worked up over this if Addie weren’t ditching to go to another party. Slade knew she was doing more than she let on, but couldn’t get her to talk about any of it. “I can’t believe this.”

“I don’t know why you’re so pissed off, if I told you I couldn’t make it because I had to study-“ Addie was quickly cut off.

“I wouldn’t care. It’s the fact that you’re going out with this kid that no one likes, to some stupid party, and not supporting your best friends. By the way, how are you doing in school right now?” Slade asked. He knew that Addie’s grades were slipping, he just didn’t know how she didn’t care or how she kept her parents from finding out.

“I-I’m having a hard time right now, no big deal,” she stammered. She couldn’t answer him, for fear of letting on to what she’d been doing.

After having to be picked up from the frat party, Slade would hear of nothing good with Justin. Whenever Addie tried talking about him, Slade would shut her down and change the subject. She knew that there weren’t fond feelings towards Justin from her friend’s side, but none of them expressed why this was so besides the fact that he ditched her one time, and she wouldn’t let them have a reason. This was why she didn’t tell any of them about her recent experiences. The very next party she attended with Justin, she did something she knew she’d later regret and beat herself up over.

Ever since she was a kid in elementary school and watched the police officers do their spiel on “drugs are bad,” she swore to never use any substance. She had obviously broken this vow when she smoked weed, but made a second vow to never do anything harder. At that party, Justin accepted one of the mysterious blue cups, warning Addie again to not drink out of them. After he finished his first and was halfway done with his second, she decided to have a sip herself. She assumed she was right about the substance it contained, but only tasted warm beer when she drank the cup she stole off a table. Twenty minutes after downing the cup, she felt something strange come over her. Scared, she found a seat and fell into it, unable to control her movements. She then realized that she had, in fact, consumed LSD and was now on one of the trips she had heard about from kids at her school.

For the rest of the night, alone, she sat on that same chair, unable to sleep, and watched the people around her. She witnessed things she wouldn’t be able to repeat, as they were only in her mind. When Justin finally found her, bug-eyed, the next morning, all he could do was laugh and say, “I told you so.” He left Addie sitting on the chair and went out to breakfast with one of his friends, coming back two hours later when he assumed she would have come down. Once she was home, Addie sat in her room, not doing anything, for the rest of the day, then cried herself to sleep that night. She was horrified that she’d been tempted to do something so stupid. When she told Justin about this, he told her to shrug it off, it was over and done with, and no one would have to know. She didn’t see or speak to him for the rest of that week, and that was when her grades started to fall. Because of her bad experience, she neglected to study for her Trig and AP Biology tests that were both taking place on Monday. She barely passed each, and felt more disappointed with herself as the week went on. She skipped a few homework assignments, telling herself that she’d make the points up with tests down the road. She still had this mindset when she told Slade about not being able to make the show, though now it had creeped its’ way into other aspects of her life.

“Whatever dude, if this guy has higher priority over us, so be it,” Slade spoke, shrugging and walking away. He didn’t want to hear what Addie had to say, so he finally decided to just let her be.