The cut on my leg hurts so badly that it hurts to wear pants over the cut. It's on the side of my thigh so I've gotten away with just wearing loose pants. Maybe it needed stitches but it's been a few days so it's too late for that now. I've cleaned it the best that I can so I'm careful that it's not getting infected.

After work, I have to take Zero on a walk so I take him back to the park, hoping and praying that it's safe to go back. I'd assume that Dex learned after last time that it's a bad idea to make this his hook up spot. I have my sketch pad with me so while I let Zero go run around to get some energy out, I lean against a tree and try to think of something to sketch.

I see the oceanic sketch that I started on Saturday for Amber's mural but I'm not loving it. It doesn't look like it's mine. Maybe Dex was right, that I should try to create something that I know.

The only thing that I know is the orchard behind my house but what kind of preschooler wants to look at some dead apple trees while they eat?

But then I realize that I don't have to make it the orchard now, I could paint it when it was thriving, back when my mom was alive and took care of the whole thing almost all by herself. The bright green leaves and the contrasting red apples peeking between the branches.

When the orchard was thriving, my favorite time of day was just after noon, when the sun was bright but starting to lean off to the side of the trees. It created some interesting shadows in the grass and I could help my mom pick off some of the ripe apples. The next morning, she'd take the ripe apples up to the market and sell them.

Sometimes, families and couples would come to the orchard to pick their own apples. Mostly tourists who wanted a cute way to spend their evening, picking apples under a sunset.

But right after noon was my favorite because I could help my mom pick the apples after the market closed. Robby would sometimes help too but he'd mostly hide behind the trees and jump out to scare me.

Without even realizing it, I'd started sketching the scene that I have in my head. The rows of apple trees, the wicker baskets that hold the ripe fruit, and the dog that we had when I was a kid. His name was Muffin and he was a fluffy sheepdog but he died when I was ten so I only vaguely remember him. He loved running through the trees with me and Robby when my mother was picking the apples.

My father would rarely ever help with the orchard because he had his own job but if he was home, he'd bring us lemonade or a snack or something. He'd kiss my mother under the shade of the trees but she'd laugh and push him away, scolding him because she had so much work to do. She smiled the whole time.

I throw the Frisbee for Zero when he gets bored of playing without my help so I try to throw it really far to get myself more time to sketch in between tosses of the Frisbee. I think that Amber will be okay with a switch in theme as long as I have a finished draft of the idea by Saturday so hopefully she likes this one better than the ocean idea.

When Zero is ready to leave the park, he starts groaning and resting his head on my knee so I pack up my stuff along with the Frisbee and we walk back down the sidewalk to the house. My father is home from work now with pizza for dinner so in the kitchen, I grab a few pieces before making my way toward my room.

"Robby called," My dad tells me when he sees me walking through the living room. "He's having a meeting with his lawyer on Tuesday in the city to talk about a plea deal."

"He's not going to take it," I say to him.

"You should go," He adds. "He might do it if you're there to talk him out of going to trial."

"He's pretty pissed at me right now, I don't think me being there will help," I mumble.

"He told me what you did," My dad says. "And he will get over it. You did the right thing by giving that money back to the family."

"They didn't want it, it didn't even matter," I add. "But sure, if you think that it'll help, I'll go."

"Good. I'm proud of you, Yaz," He tells me randomly. That takes me by surprise because he doesn't ever say things like that. I'm not sure what he has to be proud of me for though. I guess trying to give the money back? That's really the only thing that I've done that might be prideful.

"Thanks, Dad," I say because I don't know how else to respond to that. I then really do go back into my room to eat my pizza and finish sketching out the apple orchard drawing for the mural. When I'm in my room by myself, I take off my pants to air out the cut on my leg because it has started burning a little bit. I get the sketch pretty far along but I'm interrupted by Sage calling me at about ten o'clock at night.

"Hello?" I answer the phone, curious as to why she's calling so late at night.

"Hey sweet thaaang," She sings to me and I immediately get that she's very drunk. "What's up, buttercup?"

"How drunk are you?" I ask her with a small laugh.

"I may be a little inebriated," She admits in a slurred, high pitched voice. "But listen. We're lost and nobody's sober enough to drive. Can you come pick us up?"

"You have to find out where you are before I can come pick you up," I remind her slowly. "What do you see?"

"I see Tyson," She informs me.

"Okay, give me the phone," I hear somebody in the background.

"No, back off!" Sage yells obnoxiously loud at whoever is trying to take her phone. "She's my best friend."

"Nope, she's mine now. Give it," The other person says and then there's some shuffling and a lot of whining before things calm down and somebody comes back to the phone. "Hey, Yasmin. We're in the field just past Sam's Deli."

It's Dex—of course.

"Alright. I'm on my way," I say as I'm getting out of my bed and I put my loose pants back on with one hand.

"Right now, you're already on your way?" He wonders skeptically. "You're already in your car driving over here? That was fast."

"Alright, smartass, I'll be there soon," I rephrase myself and then I hang up so that I can get a jacket and shoes on. My dad is already asleep so I just take the car keys off of the hook that they stay on in the kitchen and I pat Zero's head a few times as he's lying on the couch.

When I arrive at the field, I see the group of people that are apparently supposed to fit in this car that only has four passenger seats. It's Sage and Ty, Dex, and then Ty's friends and a few girls that I don't recognize in the dark. I don't see Amber though.

I pull up and get out of the car to see how they plan on all fitting into the car with me. This is going to be a very long night.

"Yasmin is here!" Sage announces very loudly to her friends. "Yaz, thank you for coming. You've saved us! You're our hero!"

"Yeah, you realize that I can't fit all of these people in my car, right?" I ask her, hoping that maybe she's not too drunk to reason with that very logical point.

"What do you mean? Of course you can, Yasmin, we're best friends. Did you hear Dex say that he thinks that you're his best friend now? What a load of bullshit, he can't have you."

"I think that he just said that to mess with you, Sage," I assure her. "Come on, who am I taking?"

"Alright. Me, my boo, let's do Javier and Liz, oh and Dex. Derrek can call his sister to take the rest of them home," Sage finally decides, giving me a real answer for once, which I really appreciate.

"Good, okay, let's go."

"My bitches, listen up!" Sage shouts at the group of maybe ten or so people and then they all look at her. "My main bitches are going with me and my main-est bitch and we're ditching the rest of you. You and you and you, let's get this show on the road."

The three people that she pointed to follow us back to the car and Tyson follows without being pointed to because he knows that she meant him too.

Everybody gets in the car except for Sage and I because we lag behind and then Sage wobbles to the front seat window where Dex is already sitting. She leans down to look through the window at him and starts glaring. "Why are you sitting in the front?"

He points to the back and says, "It's full."

She points at him with her narrowed eyes and says, "If you try to steal my best friend, I'm going to kick you in the nuts. Do you understand me? She's mine, you need to get your own best friend."

"No promises," He responds sarcastically before Sage gets into the back seat on Ty's lap and I drive away to drop everybody off at their houses. I know where Ty and Sage live but I'm not sure about Javier or Liz which is bad because they're all too drunk to tell me anything.

"I'm just going to drop you all off at Ty's," I decide and I get no objections from that so I just head toward Ty's house. By the time that I get on the main road, Sage and Tyson are dry humping in the backseat with their loud kissing noises filling the entire car.

"Thanks for picking us up," Dex says on the ride over to Ty's. "Why don't you come out with us? I mean, I know that you don't drink but it's still probably fun."

"They're not my friends," I answer him. "And Jake creeps me out."

"Jake creeps everybody out," Liz explains from the back. I have no idea who Liz is.

"Seriously, how do you even relax?" He wonders.

"I don't."

Dex doesn't seem that drunk, he's still pretty calm. He's speaking a little bit weird and his voice is louder than normal but definitely not as drunk as everybody else.

"Yaz, can we bone in your car?" Sage asks me from the back. "Just a little bit."

"God, no," I say quickly. "Are you serious?"

"I said just a little bit," She reminds me as if that should make it okay to have sex in the backseat of the car while I'm driving and while there are four other people in the car other than Sage and Ty.

"If I see any genitalia, you're both walking," I threaten them but of course, I have to keep my eyes on the road but by the sounds of it, I think that they just keep making out.

Once we get to Ty's house, everybody from the back files out but then Sage falls back into the car after kissing her boyfriend goodnight.

"Why aren't you staying with him?" I ask her as I head for her house just because I remember Amber saying that Dex lives close to me so it'll just be easier to drop her off first.

"He has to work tomorrow," She mumbles softly. "You know what, Yaz? We need to get you laid."

"No, we don't," My face starts burning red.

"Yes, we do," She objects and then leans forward from the backseat so that her head is sticking up in between Dex and I. "We know a ton of cute guys. I bet Dex knows some guys too, right? And Tyson knows a bunch of guys. I think that you'd be a lot less strung out sometimes if you'd just get laid."

"Sage, please shut up," I plead with her because if she wants to have this conversation, I'd much rather that we talk about it without Dex right beside us. I could not be more humiliated.

"I do know some guys," Dex enters the conversation.

"See?" She says. "Did you know that Tyson was thirteen when he lost his virginity? And I was fifteen. Dex?"

"Fourteen," He answers and then he looks over at me, looking very curious now. "Are you a virgin, Yaz?"

I squeeze the steering wheel so tightly in my fists that my knuckles turn white and I'm feeling so embarrassed that my eyes are starting to swell up with tears. That's not saying much because my eyes get watery so easily and it's also so easy for me to get embarrassed but it's kind of getting hard to drive.

"She is," Sage answers for me. "And I don't know why. I mean, well, I know why, but it's not... I just mean that you should find somebody who will love you, you know? Not just fuck you but a real relationship. I know that you're great on your own, that you don't need no man but it's so fun. They buy you flowers, they complement you all of the time, they make you feel like a queen, they worry about you, they miss you when you're not around."

"Sage, seriously, shut up," I scold her again. "We can talk about this when there's nobody else around and when you're sober."

"Wait, why?" Dex asks before Sage can respond to me.

"Why what?"

"She said that she knows why you're a virgin. Are you waiting for marriage or something?" He must be more drunk than I thought that he was because there's no way in hell that a sober person could ask that question to somebody that they barely know. Maybe, if I'm really lucky, he'll just forget that this conversation even happened. I'm okay with being a virgin because I'm only eighteen but in this town, that's pretty strange. I feel like everybody that I went to high school with started having sex by sixteen max. I think that it's just a culture thing so by saying that I'm still a virgin at eighteen is pretty bizarre to them.

I don't dignify his invasive question with an answer but when I don't say anything, Sage decides that she should take over. "No, that's not it."

"Then what is it?" He asks again. "Because I could call at least ten guys right now and they'd be down."

"Yes!" She shouts from the back. "Yasmin, yes, let's get you laid. Dex knows people, he just said so."

"No," I tell both of them.

"You are so beautiful, you know," Sage assures me. "I know that you think that you're fat but you're totally not. You don't have a thigh gap but most human beings don't have thigh gaps, that's nothing to be ashamed of. Any guy would kill for the chance to be with you, Yaz."

"That's why?" Dex's eyes go wide. "Because you think that you're-"

"Both of you shut up," I interrupt him loudly so that they both stop talking. "The next person that talks is walking the rest of the way home."

That gets them both to be quiet until I get to Sage's house and I have to help her into her house so that she doesn't wake up her family.

"You don't have to be into guys, you know," She assures me when we're in her room. "It could be anybody."

"Just stop talking about it."

"But, best friend," She whines.

I get her into her bed and then say, "We're not best friends for the rest of the night, I'm really pissed at you right now. How can you be so drunk that you think that it's okay to bring that shit up around some guy that I barely even know? Whatever, just go to bed."

She whines something incoherent but I leave and she's already looking tired. When I go back outside, Dex is honking the horn in a pattern that's probably in the beat of a song or something.

When I get back in the car, I swat his hand away and start the car back up.

He's on his phone and stays quiet as I drive back toward my neighborhood, assuming that it's his neighborhood too. Just a few minutes later, he taps on my shoulder and when I look over at him, he's holding his phone up for me to read something on the screen.

Your really hot

"Wrong 'your'," I mumble irritably. "And texting is a form of talking so I should just kick you out now."

He just starts shaking his head at me.

"Alright. You can talk but only to tell me how to get to your house," I instruct him.

"Turn at the second light," He speaks and I'm glad that he's actually listening to what I'm asking him to do, to not talk about anything other than where he lives. But then he keeps talking, "That's really why you won't date?"

"How is it any of your business?" I ask him. I know that I sound rude but I'm so irritated both at him and at Sage for talking about this when it so clearly makes me uncomfortable. I guess that they're just too drunk to notice just how uncomfortable I am but I'm ready to punch him right in his perfectly beautiful face and break his chiseled jaw.

"It's not. I just think that it's crazy," He admits with a shrug. "And you know that I'm only talking about this because I'm drunk. And Sage started it. It's none of my business."

"So then drop it."

"Your pants are bleeding," Dex informs me, completely changing the subject. My first thought is that I started my period without realizing it but when I look down, I see that the cut on my outer thigh is bleeding through my gray sweat pants.

"Shit," I curse under my breath. These are the only pair of pants that I have that I can wear with this cut being so painful and now they're blood stained.

"What'd you do?" He asks me.

"I just cut my leg is all, it's fine," I promise him. I turn at the light that he told me to turn at.

"Take a left at the stop sign, it's the fifth house on the left," He instructs me after I've turned. "Would it help if I told you that I stare at your ass all of the time?"

"You think that I'm going to validate myself based on how often you stare at my ass?" I ask him with raised eyebrows although it does make me happy for some reason to know that he looks at me. But I'm more irritated than flattered right now so it's pretty easy to suppress a tugging smile. "Get off your high horse."

"I'm just saying," He says with a shrug.

"Bring up my lack of sex life, my butt, or any other part of my body one more time and I will call you Oliver forever. In front of everybody, no matter what. Maybe it'll be Olly, I can't decide yet."

"You can't hold this conversation against me when I'm sober, that's no fair," He protests.

"I don't care if it's fair or not, I'm doing it," I assure him.

"I'm sorry if we embarrassed you," He apologizes just as I'm turning at the stop sign and I start counting the houses to find his. "But you shouldn't be embarrassed. You should just be cool to live your life however you want to live it and just fucking own it."

"Thanks for that, Oliver," I respond because I had just told him not to bring it up again. "You know, I think that I actually like Olly better."

I pull into the driveway of the fifth house. "What? I was just trying to make you feel better."

"I told you to drop it."

"I hate the name Oliver," He informs me.

"Should have thought about that before, Olly."

"Stop it."

"Nope."

He groans and then starts getting out of the car. "Fine. Thanks for the ride."

"I would say 'anytime' but I'll probably never agree to do this again. So goodnight, Olly."