ALIVE - R. BOWEN

six

The sun was shining through the window and Ricky instantly wished he could turn it off. The only bad part about getting completely and utterly wasted was the morning after. Ricky squinted and sat up, the pink walls registering in his brain.

Hold on was Ricky's first thought.

This isn't my room was Ricky's second thought.

He looked around slowly, had he accidentally broken and entered while he was blacked out? The walls were a soft pink, fairy lights adorned the walls, there were polaroid pictures taking up space on the wall, but they were too far away for Ricky to tell who was in the photos. There was a ukulele in one of the corners, it sat on a stand. "Where am I?" Ricky asked out loud.

The door to the room opened, and much to Ricky's surprise, Nini was the person to enter. She was wearing her pajamas and holding a mug of something. Probably coffee although he didn't peg Nini to be a coffee drinker. "Oh good, you're awake." she smiled and came over and sat on her bed. Her silky brown hair was pulled into a brain that came down over one shoulder.

"Holy shit! This is your room?"

Nini smiled, "Is that a problem?" she asked, almost offended.

Ricky raised his eyebrows, "I don't know, is it? You're the one with the boyfriend."

Nini held her breath for a moment, unsure of how the next words to come out of her mouth were wise. "Uh yeah, he doesn't exactly know that I brought you back here." She confessed.

Ricky rubbed his face. Was this actually happening right now. "Okay, well where does he think I am?"

Nini shrugged, "I don't know, your house, maybe Red's?"

"God, what even happened last night? I blacked out and I don't remember much." Ricky said, he looked at Nini and maybe he was mistaken, but she looked a little sad, "I mean, not much after we talked on the balcony." he added and he watched her perk up a little.

She handed him the mug, "Here before I go into the details, I made you this. I hope you like coffee." she handed him the mug and he raised his eyebrows a little and gladly accepted the mug.

Coffee was just what the doctor ordered.

Ricky took a sip and he swear he already felt better, "So," he said awkwardly.

"So last night." Nini wasted no time. "Ashlyn came over to find me because she was worried because you and Red were laughing and wouldn't stop. So EJ and I followed her over. By this time Howie had already taken Gina home which sucked because he was supposed to drive me home too but Gina really needed to get out of there." Nini pushed a few straw hairs away from her face, "So when we walked over to you guys you whispered something to Red and walked away and Red followed. And Ashlyn hit us with this little 'I told you so' look and it was really annoying." Nini paused and watched as Ricky tried to piece together what had happened last night. "Anyways we heard yelling and EJ ran over to see what was up and you had started a fight with someone. Do you have any idea why you would've done that?"

Ricky shook his head in shame.

"Okay because we couldn't figure it out either. Both you and the other guy were kinda far gone. So EJ said he'd take Levi, the guy you got into a fight with, upstairs and he told me to get you and Red home. Since Ashlyn had only had one drink at the beginning of the night she drove the four of us home and I told her to drop you off with me since I didn't know where you lived. The look she gave me wasn't pleasant, but I told her that nothing would happen considering the fact that you were basically passed out anyways."

Ricky wondered if that was the only reason nothing had happened, maybe if he had been awake something would've happened, or maybe Nini just worded that sentence poorly.