Police Officer: Sunny fainted. Why was she unconscious? What happened?
Me: She didn't faint. She was drugged.
***
Sunny, still mildly bewildered, noticed a difference in her ways this morning. Instead of going straight to school, she lingered, slightly irresolute, and went over to Selena's.
When she arrived, Selena was fiddling with a shipment of new candies in her lap. The pile was impressive; a beautiful array of blues and greens and reds and yellows.
"Your pick," she said softly and radiantly. Selena's eyes were dreamily bright, her cheeks a genuine peach glow. She looked happy. It was all so inviting.
"I'll just have a lollipop," said Sunny, modestly.
"Lollipops?" Selena turned too quickly to mask the surprise on her face.
"I mean, sure," said Sunny. Selena looked sad, as if she had expected more of Sunny— expected her to act in accordance with whatever norms this situation contained. To understand that these were Selena's candies, and to allow her the honor of choice.
"They ain't as good as these," said Selena, pointing at the red strips. "You're going to have these." Sunny nodded, gave her a sturdy glance, and grabbed a handful.
"I wish they gave these out on Halloween," she said, mid-chew.
"Ha-ha-ha, if they did, the whole neighborhood would be on their backs. Literally." That threw Sunny off just slightly but didn't think twice. Sunny peeled away the packaging, barely noticing that the brand was different. And by the time she did notice, the entire twister was jammed all up into the gums of her teeth, and she could care less about any sort of difference.
"This is SO good. Where'd you get them?"
"I was hoping you'd say that, have another one," Selena said, dodging the question. Selena fed Sunny, who played the role of a little puppy begging for treats until she became jittery. At some point mid-chew, she started coming up with all sorts of wacky ideas. The two girls, tripping, did absurd things. In the minus thirty-degree weather, they walked down the street naked, to which they asked me to record. The time was two o'clock in the morning; the outlook stretch of cold, drizzling, unsociable blackness until the dawn. Fuck school, they would yell into the frozen air, and then laugh, and then laugh some more until their tears froze on their cheeks, and their bodies burned of frostbite.
They went into the house and vowed to delete those photos and never show a single soul. They ate some more. They didn't stop until the whites of their eyes turned red. For the girls, their friendship was at a pinnacle.
"Told you, candy can cure trauma."
Sometime later, Sunny felt highly relaxed. So relaxed that her words started to blur together. Her mind began wearing into blankness, and however much she wanted to come into conscience to eat another twister, she could not.
"Why do I feel like this?"
"Ha-ha," said Selena. "Feels great right."
"I feel heavy. Dangerously heavy." The reality was slowly fading away just as a burning sensation rose in her body, a hyped-up intriguing relaxation that took her up into the clouds of deep sleep. Before the curtains closed Sunny made out the last words, "Selena what were in those Twislers?"
***
Sunny woke up and glared at the digital clock on her lock screen.
"Late!" It read. Beside her, lay a red twisted candy wrapper that carefully enveloped a bitten twisler. Sunny blinked twice. Suddenly her hatred for Selena developed to great depths. Sunny was not going to let things stay this way anymore. Things were going to change for her. Soon.
She went to the bathroom, dunk her face in ice-cold water, and watched the water swirl down the drain. Her head pained as if she had just fallen from the peak of a rollercoaster without warning. She fumbled her hair. Then her pockets. She checked the date. A scream. She had missed her test.
***
Sunny wasn't aware of what had happened. But her body was acting up. She chewed her pencil in class and tapped her toes on the cement when she was waiting for the bus. Sunny just couldn't get that feeling out of her mind. It was such a rare feeling, such a good feeling. The next day at school, she reached out.
"Hey," she said, pulling Selena off to the side.
"What's up hoe."
"You know the candies we had?"
"The twists."
"I need more."
"Ha-ha took you long enough," she said with a wicked smile as if expecting that Sunny would come back. "I've got plenty. But that's going to cost you."
"H-How much?"
"Well, you know. It's hard for us underage kids to get them."
"Stop going in circles, just tell me how much." Sunny couldn't even stand still.
"Forty a pack." Sunny reached into the depths of her bag and pulled out a fifty. Selena looked around, and when she thought the coast was clear, tucked the treats into the palm of Sunny's hand.
"If the teachers get to you, I had nothing to do with this," said Selena. Sunny nodded, surrendering. It awed her, not only Selena's proximity to weed but the casual way she manipulated her friends into dealing with her. The next day, Sunny emptied the last hundred from Lyssa's cash drawer.
***
Lyssa commanded Sunny to stay after school every day for extra help from teachers. Sunny left the house with textbooks but made a curve to Selena's. She talked to Demanda, and finished Selena's science homework, per request. She convinced herself that all would be worth it as probation ended and wondered when that would be.
"I never liked your Mom," said Selena. "She's too serious all the time and she has no life." She blew out the smoke and coughed. "And she didn't let me stay for dinner. What a bitch." It was not the first time Selena had spoken of her mother in such a vulgar tone. But it was the first time Sunny tended to agree.
The two families were antithesis, and Sunny was stuck not knowing which was better. Sunny's family had esteem in terms of ability while Selena's family in terms of culture. The Whites were 'perfect' and had the byword, "Be kind whenever possible, and it is always possible", while Lyssa was only capable of a frown here and there, and more than occasionally had a bad temper.
"Let's smoke weed," said Selena.
"Are you nuts? We're already high from the candy thing."
"Let's go double high. I'm bored of this."
Whenever they hung out, it would be a scene roped off with yellow tape, shot by a security camera for an episode of crime TV. The gravity of Sunny's feelings suggested she knew this was wrong, but still proceed because such an act signaling one singular fact: they had become best friends. The best, most renowned duo in all of the high school. They wore the same clothes. Smoked from the same vape. They talked to the same people. And even had the same initials.
For weeks afterward, Sunny's fellow friends fuelled her self-esteem. People began to smile when they saw her coming, and by the time they had met her, she generally had trained her wit to broaden the smile into a laugh. She did possess a considerable ability to adapt and this gift she cultivated improved by practice. By degrees, her fame spread, and she became a local "celebrity."
At social gatherings, Sunny was indispensable. Sunny had suddenly broken the wall that separated pre-puberty child to sexy young adult and her glow up was astonishing. Though she was the average height at best, her hips were a touch wide, or else voluptuous, depending on your point of view; dark hair, dark eyes, and a look in those eyes that was vaguely seductive. She wore a tight black dress, a bra that pushed up way too far, and purple lipstick. And she a growing star. And the rest of the Kitties were pushed into the backseat of irrelevancy.
***
Sunny's parents weren't home, but she knew that when got home, she would be in big trouble. She had been slipping in school. She had missed a few tests. Maybe a more than few. The part of her that didn't study was almost satisfied by the reality, but the other part of her that was afraid of letting her parents down was crumbling in distress.
Now and then, when her nerves got the better of her, she would stand up and pace about the house, thinking of absurd excuses. She switched from soda to vodka. Sitting in the dark, clutching a cocktail, she told herself it was no big deal, in the grand scheme of things. But she knew that it was enough to get her disowned.
On the fourth ring of the doorbell, Sunny opened the door.
"Hi, mom." Lyssa didn't even look her in the eye, walked right past her.
"Mom, it's not what you think. I—"
"Enough with your explanations!" Lyssa swallowed hard. "You are grounded until you get those grades back up."
"That's IMPOSSIBLE. They don't allow retakes."
"I don't care how you do it. But my daughter will not be failing classes." To Lyssa, this was a slap in the face, the definition of bad parenting. She stomped her right foot as if she were in a tantrum, and shut her bedroom door behind her. Her mother didn't come out of that room until the next day. Dinner that night was not served.
Sunny resorted to doing Selena's biology homework. But it was a challenge because she didn't take the course. And because Selena started blasting music. Every question tickled her mind, and she started to get frustrated.
"Gosh. Is there even a difference between mitosis and meiosis?" Sunny said.
"WTF. You're the Asian. Don't ask me." Selena said, sucking a lollipop. Sunny dropped her pencil but didn't bother to pick it up.
"I'm done," she said.
"What do you mean you're done. It's due tomorrow. Hurry up and get it done so we can smoke."
"I can't,' said Sunny. "I don't know that shit."
"Fine whatever I don't give a shit about the school," she said. "But I need your help with something."
"Spill."
"I'm not doing it for attention," she said with a hollow voice. "I'm struggling." There are dark purple indents that guard her eyes.
"I'm here for you." There was a lot of emotion attached to being with Selena, even if that just meant doing her duties and paying her fees.
"It's all so meaningless."
"You mean school?"
"I mean everything," she said. "Sometimes I just want to go to the sketchy part of town where the streets are empty, decorated with broken shops and dusty garbage."
"Stop it. You don't belong in that low-toned society," said Sunny. "Don't think about it. Sad thoughts vanish eventually." Inside the bedroom, the light was harsh. Voices of Demanda and Atlas filtered into the room: who's mom was doing who's dad this weekend. A burst of laughter.
"You can always talk to her," said Sunny, with a clogged throat and raw lips.
"You mean her, her?"
"She's gotta help right?"
"I mean, that's why we have them right."
"But what are they going to say, I mean."
"Advice? I mean it's confidential."
"You mean they can't tell anyone."
"I think," said Sunny.
"Alright. I'll go. Will you come with me tomorrow?"
"I don't know."
"You gotta come. I can't go in there alone."
"You make it sound like she's going to punch you in the gut," replied Sunny. "She's there to repair everything that is broken."
"Ugh. Can you just be there?"
"It won't make a difference if I go in or not." Sunny was trying to be calm, but it came out petulant, more accusing than wry. Sunny paused and watched as Selena's face frown into the burning pain and humiliation of rejection.
"Fine. I'll go," she said. "But only if you return the favor."
"Fine, whatever you want."
"It's Lyssa's birthday soon."
"Mhm."
"This can't be happening. My grades suck and she's going to kill me on report day."
"I see." Selena smiled and there was something dignified and moth in all of her movements that gave Sunny the satisfaction that she had a solution.
"There's always a way around things," she said with a musical voice.