She goes to a party and finds Lily in a guy's room

Chloe pushed the screen door open and stepped into a wall of heat, noise, and bodies. The living room was packed shoulder to shoulder, the air thick with the smell of spilled beer, weed, and cheap perfume. Bass from a speaker in the corner rattled the windows. Someone had pushed the furniture against the walls to make space for dancing, and the floor was sticky under her black pumps. A couple ground against each other near the kitchen doorway; three guys shouted over a drinking game at the dining table. Chloe’s heart kicked harder. She kept her clutch tight against her side and scanned faces, looking for Lily’s dark hair.

She moved through the crowd carefully, murmuring “excuse me” every few steps. A guy with a backward cap offered her a red cup without asking; she shook her head and kept going. In the kitchen she found only more strangers, a keg, and a counter covered in half-empty bottles. No Lily. She checked the backyard—more people, a fire pit, someone vomiting into the bushes—then came back inside, the music somehow louder than before. Chloe’s nerves were starting to fray. The little black dress felt thinner under the hungry looks she was collecting, and her pumps made every step deliberate and exposed.

She finally climbed the narrow staircase at the back of the house, one hand on the railing. The second floor was quieter but no less crowded. Doors stood open to bedrooms where people sat on beds or leaned against walls, laughing too loud. Chloe passed two rooms before she heard Lily’s unmistakable laugh—high, loose, a little wild. She followed it to the last door on the left and stepped inside.

The room was smaller than she expected and packed with at least eight guys, most of them standing or perched on the edges of a sagging mattress and a low couch. The air smelled of beer and cologne. Lily sat in the middle of the couch, cheeks flushed, eyes bright, a half-empty cup in her hand. When she saw Chloe her face lit up.

“Chloe! Oh my God, you came!” Lily jumped up, nearly spilling her drink, and threw her arms around her. The hug was enthusiastic and unsteady. “I was starting to think you weren’t gonna show. These are the guys—everybody, this is my best friend Chloe. Isn’t she gorgeous?”

Every pair of eyes in the room swung toward Chloe at once. The shift was immediate and obvious. Conversations dropped. Someone whistled low. A tall guy near the window grinned and muttered something to the guy next to him. Chloe felt the collective attention like a physical weight. She forced a polite smile, the same one she used when she was uncomfortable but didn’t want to be rude.

“Hi,” she said, voice smaller than she meant it to be. “Lily, are you okay? You sounded pretty out of it on the phone.”

Lily waved a hand. “I’m fine, I’m fine. Just having fun. Here—” She grabbed a fresh beer from a cooler on the floor and pressed it into Chloe’s hand. “Drink. You look tense.”

Chloe took the bottle because refusing felt more awkward than accepting. The glass was cold and wet against her palm. Someone shifted on the couch to make room, and Lily tugged her down between two guys. The space was tight. Chloe’s thighs pressed against both of them at once. The guy on her left was broad-shouldered, maybe mid-twenties, with a short beard and an easy smile that didn’t reach his eyes. The one on her right was leaner, darker-haired, and already looking at the way her dress had ridden up when she sat. The hem had slid high on her thighs; she tried to tug it down discreetly, but there wasn’t much fabric to work with and the movement only drew more attention.

Lily leaned across, still talking a mile a minute about the party, the music, how she’d lost her shoes somewhere downstairs. Chloe nodded and smiled at the right moments, but her mind was racing. The beer remained mostly untouched in her hand. Every time she shifted, the dress slipped higher. The guy on her left rested his arm along the back of the couch, his fingers brushing the bare skin of her shoulder. The one on her right let his knee press more firmly against hers. Neither moved away.

Chloe’s pulse was loud in her ears. She kept glancing at the door, calculating how many bodies stood between her and the hallway, how long it would take to get Lily on her feet and out of the house. The room felt smaller by the minute. Someone turned the music up from a phone on the dresser. Laughter erupted from the bed. Lily was laughing too, head tipped back, completely at ease. Chloe felt the opposite of at ease. She was hyper-aware of the heat of the two bodies sandwiching her, the way their eyes kept drifting to her legs, the fact that her dress was now barely covering anything when she sat.

She took a small sip of the beer just to have something to do with her hands, then set it on the floor by her feet. “Lily,” she said, keeping her voice light, “maybe we should head out soon? It’s getting late and you’re pretty drunk.”

Lily only grinned and leaned heavier against her. “Five more minutes. These guys are cool. Right, guys?”

A chorus of agreement answered. The guy on Chloe’s left chuckled and said, “Yeah, stay. We’re just getting started.” His hand settled more firmly on her shoulder. The one on her right let his fingers brush the outside of her thigh, light enough that it could have been accidental, firm enough that it wasn’t. Chloe’s stomach tightened. She smiled again, the polite, nervous smile that never quite reached her eyes, and started counting the exits in her head while the party roared on around her.