“I’ll pass,” Allie says, her spine stiffening, her eyes locked straight ahead, every trace of joviality wiped from her face. “A beer please, Becky.”

Char smacks my arse.

“C’mon. You’ll like this surprise. Promise,” she purrs.

“Go ahead,” Allie says without looking at me. “I’ll get a table.”

“Wanna hold my baby for me?” Char asks her, clearly knocking Allie off guard enough to make her eyes widen and look down at the baby clinging to Char’s chest.

“No.” Allie’s cold composure is quickly restored.

“Dammit,” Char mutters, her eyes suddenly speed-­scanning the room. I grab her by the arm and usher her out to the park-ing lot.

The surprise in the car is a bottle of top-shelf tequila and a big fat joint being rolled up by none other than Willy Gimp.

“Hey, stranger,” he says, sticking his head out the passenger side window. “Quite the haircut ya got there.”

“It’s her fault.” I shoot a look at Char as she slides up beside me, having at least put away the boob that Daktari Christ MacIsaac wasn’t using before sharply nudging me toward the driver side door.

“Most shit is her fault,” Willy Gimp chuckles.

“Well, you two kids have fun.” Char turns on the heels of her snakeskin stilettos. Which do not go with her hot pink peasant blouse and the Daisy Dukes.

I watch her prance away and wonder if I shouldn’t go back inside, apologize to Becky Chickenshit, convince Char to leave before things get out of hand, sit and have a drink with Allie, smile and make small talk with a few fellow Class of ’95ers, and then go home. Maybe stop and buy a pink Snuggie and some nice club soda at the drugstore on the way.

Gimp lights the joint and hands me a shot glass full of tequila, a lemon slice, and a salt shaker.

“If you play your cards right, maybe we’ll hide in the boys’ locker room and do body shots off each other after the dance starts,” he says. “You can do one off my magically twisted arm.” I can’t tell if he’s kidding or not.

An hour later, we waltz into the gym to see that Becky Chickenshit and the party squad have jacked things up to another level. The lights are dimmed, the fiddle tunes have temporarily given way to some quasi-country folksy stuff, and people are gathered around clapping and stomping and watching Becky fake step dance. I find Allie sitting alone at a table. I teeter to her side and start to apologize.

“It’s fine. I get it,” she says, glancing at Gimp.

“We were just hanging out.”

“Whatever,” she says. “No big deal.”

But it is. She always did get pissy when she thought I’d ditched her for a guy. Because I’ve ditched her for guys more times than I care to admit. I’m too buzzed and baked to argue with her, though, and the transition from the hallway fluorescents to the strobe-lit dance floor in the gym has set my eyes on a trip. I can’t very well argue with Allie about the “no big deals” that clearly are and the “fines” that clearly aren’t when she’s got some kinda grey-blue dustball of pall parked over her head. I miss being able to focus on actually seeing people when I talk to them.