Allyson Reed shapes her life to make her parents proud, but whenever she's with Daxson Winters, the star wide receiver with a troubled past, her perfectly-crafted existence crumbles at the seams.
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The longer I waited to leave the bed, the more painful the sharp ache in the back of my throat became. Thoughts of a cold glass of water tempted me, but my brain felt like it had swollen beyond the boundaries of my skull, creating a sharp pressure that gave way to a pounding headache. Waves of nausea added to my misery.
A groan escaped my lips as I rolled over and let my hand dangle off the side of the bed. My fingertips trailed along a familiar soft, fuzzy rug that always lay parallel to my bed because my feet got cold from the wooden floor.
"Damn, girl. You finally awake?"
Camila's voice sounded unusually high-pitched and wreaked havoc inside my mind. I squeezed my eyes shut and shoved my face deeper into the pillow.
"Madison should've known you were a lightweight. You've never drank before and you only weigh seventy pounds."
"I weigh more than seventy pounds," I mumbled into my pillow.
Camila laughed. "Fine, seventy-five. My bad. Either way, I wish I could've found you sooner so I could've taken care of you."
If Camila was at the party, she could piece together the parts of the night I couldn't bring my aching brain to remember. I pulled my face out of the pillow and turned in the bed to face her. The sunlight poured through the blinds of the window and forced me to squint.
I shaded my eyes with one hand and motioned to the window with the other. "Could you, uh, close that?"
Camila left her bed to close the blinds for me. "Hangovers are the worst." She fell back into her bed to type away on her phone. The constant clicking of her long nails against the screen echoed in the air between us.
"What happened last night?" I asked.
Camila raised one of her perfectly shaped eyebrows. "For the first time in your life, you had a good time." She gave me a satisfied smile.
"It doesn't feel like I had a good time. I feel like I got hit by a truck." My body ached like it used to after a grueling week of summer cheer camp.
Camila nodded as she put her phone against her stomach with the most serious look on her face. "You did almost get hit by a truck."
The events of last night invaded my mind in quick, foggy flashes.
"Were you there when it happened?" My hands worked to undo the braids Madison had woven into my hair.
Camila sat up in her bed and turned her attention solely on me. "Yeah, girl. Tessa and I got there late. You were drunk with a real panicked look on your face. I followed you down the stairs, but you wandered into the street right as a car came around the corner. If it wasn't for Daxson Winters, you'd be another statistic about underaged drinking." A small smile played along her lips at the mention of his name.
