Chapter 6

As soon as Tyler had shoved through the crowd of bodies, I followed behind with the small gap he had created for me. I was still stumbling, falling behind slightly but eventually catching up when my face pressed into his back.

"Jesus." The word left Tyler's lips before he ran towards the commotion, allowing me to see what was happening despite the blur of my vision from the drinks.

Harvey's hands were tightly gripping an unfamiliar guy, holding him up against a wall by the shirt whilst Josh had pinned down another, hooking his fist into the guy's cheek continuously.

A couple of people had helped to pull them apart with Tyler grabbing hold of Josh and pushing his back into a wall, allowing the anger to somehow dissipate, but I couldn't see that happening with the murderous look in his eyes.

With the continuing cliché of a fight happening in the middle of a party, the faint sound of sirens interrupted the short silence around the party. "Someone called the cops!" The muscular guy from earlier had shouted, forcing the crowd into various directions, most heading to the front door.

I attempted to run until my orientation fell and I slipped back down onto the staircase, holding a hand over my mouth to prevent the vomit drawing its way up my throat.

My eyes struggled to see anyone I knew around me, although I was only really able to recognise a handful of people that were here. I pressed my hand into my forehead and rested against the wall, forgetting what was happening and simply moving slightly to allow teenagers to sprint past me with the sirens growing in volume.

"Savannah?" The familiar voice caused a smile to appear on my lips except that my one hand was still pressing down on my mouth, obscuring their vision of my expression, "come on, let's go."

"An adventure?" I heard the kind laugh from his throat before Tyler lifted my body into a standing position, allowing me to lean against him and follow him out of the house at a faster pace than I was used to.

"Yes, an adventure."

Before I was able to register the shift in temperature from the house to where I was now, Tyler pulled me up with him into a dark car, one I'm sure I had seen before, most likely in the school parking lot. "I like your car," I shifted inside, smiling at my surroundings of the overcast interior with two people sitting in the front.

"It's not mine," Tyler appeared beside me with an uneasy smile. Both people in the front remained silent before one of them turned and the vomit threatened its way up my throat again.

"Why is she with us?"

Harvey's angered look had caused my eyes to switch between my hands and Tyler, hoping for any type of reassurance with being in a car with him. He wiped his moderately bloody nose with the back of his hand and glared at Tyler. "Did you expect me to leave her there when she's like this?"

I wasn't entirely sure about what he was talking about until I realised how drunk I actually was, and I'd suddenly forgotten that Harvey was sitting so near. A small grin worked its way onto my lips, and I stared out the window, taking in the huge houses around as we sped off, faster than I'd expected.

"As long as she doesn't vomit," a third voice sounded from the driver's seat, their face being out of my view, "it was cleaned last week."

"Someone's precious about their car," the words left my mouth before I could stop them. Tyler glared over at my expression, to which I shrugged my shoulders until my body was thrust forwards as the car came to a screeching halt.

"I'm making sure, because you seem to have a habit of causing a mess," the rough voice spoke again, and I scoffed, knowing that I was most likely just making things worse for myself, judging by Tyler's unpleasant frown.

The driver finally turned in his seat and I prepared myself fully to give him a piece of my mind once our eyes met, but that was the very opposite of what I did.

Josh's penetrating eyes caught mine and I pressed myself hard into the seat I was positioned in. A small smirk appeared on his velvety lips with the sudden fear that he had created inside of me again. This was already my third encounter with Josh in less than a week and this had been the only conversation, when I was too drunk to register what I was saying.

"Shut up and drive, man," Tyler interrupted our sudden glaring contest, attempting to make a joke out of a situation I could never imagine laughing at, "she's had a lot to drink."

"I can tell," Josh's small whisper was audible as he started the car again, the four of us remaining in a deadly silence that I desperately wanted to pull myself away from. I wondered how much it would hurt if I tucked and rolled from the car, there would hopefully be a chance that I could land on someone's front yard.

"Good luck," Harvey's voice registered before the door opened and he stepped out, leaving the three of us alone.

Tyler and Josh continued with light conversation whilst I stared out of the window, attempting to make out what part of town we were in. "See you tomorrow," Tyler spoke first to Josh before registering his sights back onto me, "see you Monday."

He left the car with a wink in my direction before I realised where he'd left me.

Josh tightened his grip on the wheel, and I couldn't help but not feel as terrified as I should've been, mostly because I was too drunk to fully understand what was happening. "You're really great at making conversation."

The sarcastic tone in my voice would surely catch up to me tomorrow morning when I realised how I had spoken to him, but at this very moment, I was frustrated with lack of effort to actually speak to me, despite fully understanding why he wouldn't want to.

"If it makes you feel any better, I'm sorry for the ketchup thing," it angered me that I was the only person speaking and that I was apologising instead of kicking his butt to start being a nicer human being, "oh, and about the bathroom thing—"

"Do you ever just shut up?" His hostile tone took me by surprise, yet I continued to speak, asking varying questions that I probably shouldn't have. I dreaded to think how sober Savannah would feel in the morning when she struggled to remember this.

Thankfully, we soon arrived on my street, right next to my house in the next couple minutes, silencing the very little exchange between us.

"Well, as fun as this has been. I think it's time that I get to bed," I wanted to mentally hit myself for how juvenile that had sounded when it had left my lips. I held myself up slightly, feeling my stomach churn once again.

"You do that," when my one foot hit the concrete of the side walk from opening the door, I stumbled a little, not having realised how unstable I really was.

Unfortunately, my foot suddenly slipped from beneath me, pulling me hastily from the car and surely to where I'd have a bruise in the morning. "Do you have two left feet or something?" It had only now dawned on me that two arms were now holding me up, grasping delicately with one hand on my waist and one positioned under my arm.

"You don't need to help me if I'm that much of an inconvenience," I bit back, attempting to hold myself up and walk, yet failing with every step I tried to take, causing Josh to continue holding me up on the way to my house.

"I know I don't," the bitterness in his voice had passed through me like a sharp needle, and I wanted nothing more than to push him off of me, "but I'm not cruel enough to leave your drunk ass on your front lawn."

"What a true gentleman," I stuck my tongue out at him as he pressed down on my door handle, only for it to be locked. He chuckled deeply, something I'd never imagine him doing before I dug into my pocket and pulled out a key. "Jackpot!"

"Where's your room?" He mumbled grimly, turning his voice into a passive whisper. I pointed up the stairs to the first room in front of us as he helped me up the stairs and through the door.

It hadn't yet dawned on me what was happening. Only three days ago was I throwing up at the mere mention of his name, and now he was in my bedroom, lugging my drunk self through the silent house I'd grown to hate.

He practically shoved me from him, although it may have been my sudden sluggishness at finally seeing my bed and throwing myself on top of it.

"Wait!" I lifted my head from the pillow, unbothered with the fact that I still had make up on whilst laying my face down on a white pillow, "how did you know where I lived?"

However, once I turned, I was met with the emptiness of my room again, attempting to recall if Josh had even been here in the first place.