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James has just taken his shirt off when the door to the apartment slams shut. The bedroom door rattles in its frame, and James gives it a leery glance.
“‘S probably Tasha,” says Steve from the bed. He hooks his thumbs into the waistband of his heart-print boxers. “That’s usually her calling card, isn’t if?”
“Yeah...” James finishes disrobing, then lets Steve talk him into the other pair of heart-print boxers left atop the dresser. James doesn’t quite see the point when all their clothes will wind up on the floor, but the whole day is meant to be an indulgence.
James’s mind is still floating when a second door slams, this one much closer. His hearing isn’t what it used to be before he went overseas, but he’s pretty sure he hears Tasha’s voice scream ‘fuck’ under her breath.
“She probably had a rough day,” Steve says decisively. He can tell James is concerned, but obviously doesn’t want him to be. “Wanna let her blow off some steam for a minute?”
“Sure...” James tears his eyes from the wall that divides the rooms and looks into his boyfriend’s eyes. Steve grins and lifts the bedcovers and gestures inside as if he were a chauffeur inviting James into the backseat of his car.
James obliges, and within a minute Steve’s breath is hot on his neck as his hands explore the front of James’s pants.
Then suddenly there’s a clatter, a small scream, and a sound like jellybeans bouncing off the hardwood floor in Tasha’s room.
“I’m sorry,” James mutters, turning away and offering Steve his hand instead. “I don’t know if she’s ok.”
“You owe me a do over.”
James grins. “Of course.”
He finds Steve’s t-shirt, which helpfully falls below his hips, and throws it over his head, then tiptoes out into the hall and knocks carefully on Tasha’s door.
“Hey, Tash? You alright?”
“Fine...” But Tasha’s voice sounds muffled and strange. James puts his ear to the door, and as he listens, he hears a shuffling sound, then ‘ow.’
“I’m gonna come in, just to check on you,” James announces before turning the knob.
Tasha’s lying on her stomach on the floor, a small pile of red pills swept up near her shoulder, and a few more in the valley between the baseboard and the paneled flooring, just out of her reach.
“What’cha doing?” James asks, noting the upturned white bottle on the rug beside her bed. “Did you lose some pills?”
“No shit, Sherlock,” Tasha says savagely. She’s slurring a bit, and James wonders what substance came before this. For something must’ve.
“Ok.” James drops to his knees and carefully catches the last few pesky pills. Then he goes to return the to their bottle, but Tasha takes his wrist.
“No, I want them.” She sits up enough to shakily take the water bottle off her bedside table and start gulping down capsules from their pile on the floor. Then she holds her hand out to James.
James sighs. As much as he hates to give in, three more won’t kill her. “Hm.” James bites his lip and closes his fist. “If I give you these, will you tell me?”
“Tell you what?”
“You know perfectly well what.” James smiles patiently. “What happened, and what did you take?”
“Fuck you, you know that?”
“Yeah, you and Steve are gonna have to confer...”
Tasha looks at him sideways, and James cracks a grin.
Once she’s finished glaring, Tasha digs in her pocket, coming up with a small metallic object. She roughly passes it to James, then crosses her arms over her chest.
“Ok...” James examines the item, which appears to be one half of a cheaply made best friends necklace. “Where’d you get it?”
“Fuckin’ Maria.”
“Well, that was sweet of her,” James says blandly.
“She’s my goddamn dealer,” Tasha blurts out. “Sometimes a fuckbuddy. Definitely not my best friend.”
“Maybe she was just being nice,” James says, hating himself for repeating the line the therapists and foster mothers used to tell them all the time.
“We were just gonna get drinks at Dave and Busters ‘cause she knows the server and we wouldn’t get ID’d,” Tasha tearfully explains. “But then she went and played ski ball, and won fucking tickets, and gave me that piece of shit.”
“See, she wasn’t thinking,” James says. “She was hammered, and she just wanted to tell you she kinda thinks you’re ok to be around.”
“Then why didn’t she just say it?” Tasha swallows the last of the pills in her mound and reaches for the ones in James’s hand.
“Because it does’t come out so nice when you do. It doesn’t seem so meaningful.”
“And that’s better?” Tasha inclines her head toward the necklace.
“She does’t know how many foster sisters you had to be fake friends with, does she?”
Tasha hiccups and shakes her head.
“Well, you could talk to her about it,” James suggests. “Or...” He already knows Tasha will take the alternative without even hearing what it is. He loosens his grip on the last few pills and holds them out. Tasha eagerly snatches the up and swallows them quickly.
“So, just out of curiosity,” James says, reaching up to cup Tasha’s pale cheek. “How many drinks before this...” he quickly calculates based on the approximate visuals. “Full bottle of pills?”
Tasha pauses. “Three?” she guesses. “Four?”
They both seem low estimates, seeing as she handles her liquor well for one so small, and that she’s shook up enough to talk to James without much prodding.
“Or five or six?” James translates.
Tasha shrugs. “I won’t puke.”
“Liar."
“For a while, at least.”
“Right.” James takes the empty water bottle from Tasha’s hands and scoops her up round the waist. “Come on. You’re sleeping in the big bed tonight.”
“But... Steve...” Tasha drunkenly complains. “And your special night.”
“We’ll reschedule,” James says, leading her across the hall. Then, “Sorry, Stevie. We’ve got a guest. Please tell me you have clothes on.”
Steve looks like a ghost in the corner, yanking his head through the neck of James’s slightly too tight t shirt. “Yeah, I’m good,” he mutters.
“Ooh,” Tasha sighs as James lays her down in the center of the bed, then stretches out beside her.
“What, you seasick, or seeing stars?” James reaches for the trash bin under the nightstand, prepared either way.
“Pretty...”
“Ah, well, that’s nice.”
“Sure is,” Steve says grumpily from the pillow on Tasha’s other side.
“Hey, another day, another dollar,” James says. “We’ll try again once she’s well enough to sleep it off on her own.”
“Promise?”
“Of course.” James throws his arm across Tasha, hugging her to his side, then entwines his fingers with Steve’s. “Thanks for putting up with all this, you know.”
“Our little family is so weird,” Steve says quietly. “But I kind of love it.”
“I really love it,” James replies. “And I’m glad that you do.”
Tasha nuzzles the back of her head into the pillow as she looks back and forth between James and Steve. “And,” she coos. “I love you.”