Put me back on solid ground, please

I made it all the way to the outer doors of the station before I caught myself. It was my reflection in the window that did it. I’m no stranger to the walk of shame, and I’ll spit in anyone’s eye who complains about it. But I was… a mess. The makeup smeared all over my cheeks gave off that classic ‘terrified raccoon’ look. My dress, which was so sparkly and bold under the stars, looked like a teapot that hadn’t been cleaned in a decade. None of this should be new to anyone who likes a good night out. Except there was something else hanging around my head. The scene from last night seemed to be there, too, half formed like mist. I could see my own self in the background, and Rania’s body moving. And the door, opening. There was something else, bigger, but it wasn’t something I was prepared for.

What was I doing? This wasn’t the first time someone said something weird to me on public transit. If I tried to make every weirdo I bumped into in the street make sense I would go crazy myself.

This was not going to solve whatever was going wrong in my head. I took a few steps back from the window so I couldn’t see that reflection again and shut my eyes. There were images from last night imprinted on the back of my eyelids, as well as a hundred more. Not all of them I recognized. It didn’t matter. I needed to find someone who could help me sort up from down and left from right.

Every single gal who likes to party learns to sort out one type of friend from the other. I wouldn’t keep someone around at all if they were too judgy about how I spent my Friday nights, but there were still… shades of acceptance. A lot of people thought they were totally free spirits and then discovered they actually couldn’t run with that kind of pack at the end of a very long, very intense night. The only one of my friends from my hometown who lived in the city, Maisy, was a great girl, but she was a staunch monogamist and didn’t do substances harder than sangria. Anything more intense would scandalize her. So I’d learned to talk to her about specific things, bring her certain classes of problems. And I learned who was safe to talk to about anything.

I needed Eden.

My friend was dedicated to proving her name appropriate. She lost her chance at heaven a long time ago, not that I’m judging. Every once in a while she had a story that shocked even me. If there was anyone that could help me, or tell me about some new, hot drug among the roofie fanatics of the city, it was Eden.

I hailed a cab. This was no time to take a chance on public transportation.