Love Her Madly by M. Elizabeth Lee Read Free Book Online

door if they could hear us knock. If not, we’d let ourselves in, the partynoise wrapping around us like a protective spell. We’d saunter through rooms thick with cigarette and weed smoke, hunting our familiars from the forms sprawled across sofas and pillows strewn on the floor. We’d find the kitchen, find the plastic cups, find vodka, find cranberry juice (or anything sweet, but it was almost always a VC), and then we’d find the room with the loudest music.
    Unless the party was really good, with dancing and lunacy, Cyn would start to get this look in her eye that meant she wanted to find some drugs. Parties unearthed the worst of Cyn’s drug seekiness because, despite the veneer of good times, they were frustratingly predictable. Getting drunk and horsing around was still pretty tops for me on the entertainment spectrum, but Cyn wasn’t all that into alcohol. She also wasn’t satisfied, as I would have been, with passing a few hours trying out tipsy come-ons on cute guys. Partly this was because a cute, straight, single fellow was a rare beast at Tiny U, and when one did appear, he was quickly spotted and surrounded by haughty-­looking girls with well-presented cleavage. My faded Mr. Bubble tee did not give me much of an edge, so instead of hunting guys, I trailed Cyn.
    Cyn wasn’t looking for weed. We had that back in the dorms. If the good party drugs weren’t immediately apparent, we’d flip into search mode, in which I’d follow Cyn into bedrooms, bathrooms, and backyards. When we busted in on things we shouldn’t, like sweaty couplings or the very wasted, we’d hastily retreat with a few words about looking for a missing friend. The subterfuge was hardly necessary. The users, when we found them, were quick to make space for Cyn on the rug, their eyes widening as they took in her bright smile and great length of leg. She was careful to always engage the ladies of the room first, so they knew she came in peace and wasn’t after their fellas. Only in these strange moments did I ever see Cyn acknowledge herpull on the opposite sex. She downplayed her feminine charms to the point that she seemed oblivious to them, but other women didn’t forget it. They shot me suspicious glances, their eyes warning of problems to come if Cyn created an attention vortex. Competition. Fear. Hate. But even when high, Cyn was too smooth and controlled to inspire any dustups. It was only when she couldn’t find what she wanted that I had to look out.
    On those nights, she’d become an unguided missile. Nothing could get her mind off the theoretical fun trip she wasn’t having, so irritable and jonesey, she’d begin to monologue. She’d get so lost in her rants that I’d have to monitor her like a Seeing Eye dog, lest she step off the curb into the path of an oncoming truck. But by the next morning, she’d snap back to her normal self. If I reminded her of how obsessed and seeky she’d been the night before, she’d laugh it off. She said college was the time to experiment, and despite my reservations, I found it tough to disagree.

    It was a typical class day when everything changed. I’d just finished lunch, a real bulge-inducer from the make-your-own-sub-sandwich bar, and I wanted to see if Cyn would join me for a repentance swim. Inside Cyn’s room, I discovered Joan shoveling clothing out of her drawers and into a pair of black garbage bags.
    â€œHey, Joan,” I said when she didn’t respond to the sound of the door shutting.
    Joan glared over her shoulder at me. Her porcelain cheeks were unusually red and blotchy.
    â€œI thought I’d locked that,” she snarled.
    â€œNope.” I sat on Cyn’s bed. “Open, just like always.”
    â€œExactly!” she shouted. “I’ve fucking had it!”
    â€œSomething wrong?” I offered blandly as I stooped to lift abook of photography from the