“How am I supposed to get her?” I’d done some ridiculous things when I was drunk, but I didn’t believe I could fit my whole body that far under the hedge.

The girl looked at me with a pouty, sad face. I rolled my eyes as though that definitely wouldn’t work on me. It was an eye roll of lies.

“Fine.” I sighed. “I suppose I can try and get in next door somehow.” I didn’t think the neighbors would appreciate a drunk teenager on their doorstep in the middle of the night slurring about a kitten, though.

We crawled backward out of the hedge. It took me a lot longer than it took her and my hair got tangled up on a branch. When I emerged, she was already upright, her hand extended to help me up.

I dusted myself off and walked along the wall, trailing my hand as though I thought I’d find a secret door into the garden, but I knew the only way I was getting in was by going over. I was really going to do this. Why was I doing this? I glanced over my shoulder. The girl was a few feet behind me, and I caught a flash of guilt before she grinned at me that made me wonder what she’d been looking at.

OK, so that was why.

Closing my eyes, I summoned any heretofore untapped athletic prowess. If I was sober this would be easier, I thought.

If I was sober I wouldn’t be doing it.

When I opened my eyes, I didn’t feel any different, but my head was swimming. I approached the tree next to the garden wall. The Loren Blake tree. The girl was still looking at me, I could feel it in the way my skin prickled. It was a good feeling. I resisted the urge to swing my hips or toss my hair. Then I spun on my heel.

“Turn around,” I said, gesturing in a twirling motion with my finger. “I’m not climbing up there with you watching.”

“Stage fright?” She smirked, but she covered her eyes and stuck her tongue out at me.

“Something like that,” I muttered. More like if I had to pant and puff my way up this tree, I wasn’t having a pretty girl watch me do it. It’d be like climbing up the rope in PE with Kristen Stewart at the bottom looking disappointed in you. I mean she’d look like that anyway, that’s just her face, but you know what I mean.