Free Would I Lie To You by Cecily von Ziegesar Page B

looking at it this time. When he took a step back into the foyer, and then another, he realized that he had been staring at a life-size self-portrait of Greg, sitting on top of a tiny stepladder, completely naked. “Oh, right.” He tittered nervously. “Of course.Yeah. It’s you.”
    “In all my glory.” Greg noticed the rectangular-shaped bottle that Dan was gripping as though his life depended on it. “You brought something!”
    “Yeah, some absinthe.” It was the most literary thing he could find.The kind of thing Rimbaud or Shelley might have drunk. Plus, it was the only unopened bottle in the musty cracked-glass dentist’s cabinet his dad stored liquor in.
    “Awesome!” Greg took the bottle. “Should I fix us a drink before everyone gets here?”
    “Sure.” Dan followed his host down the bookshelf-lined hallway toward the living room. “I could use a little some-thing to loosen me up.”
    Just a little though, right? That stuff is so strong it’s like . . . illegal.
    “There’s shlomeone, I mean, someone, there’s . . .” Dan slurred. His tongue felt like it was the size of an eggplant. “Doorbell, dude. They’re here. It’s time!” he added, attempting to sit up.
    “It’s time!” Greg leapt up off the low brown leather couch that he and Dan had been sinking further and further into the more shots of absinthe they drank. They’d allotted an hour for planning their opening remarks, but they’d spent most of the time pouring absinthe over lumps of sugar, then swallowing the sticky, sweet mix in one gulp. Dan picked up the sterling absinthe spoon they’d been sharing and popped it into his mouth.
    Taste of metal on my tongue. Poison the color of envy—I’m delirious, you’re delicious, I’m deluded and delusional.I’m lost without you. I need you.
    Dan grinned. It was true—absinthe did inspire. He teetered a little as he crossed the living room’s shiny wood floors to retrieve his backpack, where his notebook waited for him. He had to get that fragment down on paper before he forgot it.
    “Look who’s here,” Greg called. Dan dropped the bag— poetic fragment already forgotten—and tried to focus on the faces of the people who were streaming into the room, which suddenly seemed to be spinning. Because they’d sent their pictures he felt like he’d met them already. There was the cute Charlotte Brontë girl. And the insane vampire-lover.
    “Everyone grab a drink.” Greg pointed: “Bar’s over there. Plenty more ice in the fridge. Then I guess we can all just sit in a circle and introduce ourselves. Sound good to you, Dan?”
    Dan nodded, suddenly unable to form a single word. Sit. Yes, that sounded like a good idea. He lurched through the surprisingly thick crowd—just how many people had been at the door? Or had the doorbell rung more than once? How long had he been digging around in his bag for that note-book, anyway? He collapsed back onto the leather couch.
    “How about another?” Greg pointed at the silver tray set with a tiny bottle of pale green liquid and a bowl of sugar cubes. Then he took off his glasses, and Dan noticed for the first time that Greg had millions of tiny freckles all over his face.
    “But ...my speech,” Dan murmured. “I need to—”
    “You need to calm down.” Greg gently pried the sterling spoon from Dan’s hand and balanced it on the rim of the glass. He deposited a sugar cube on the spoon and poured a thin stream of the potent green liquor over it.
    “That was in my mouth,” Dan protested.
    “Doesn’t bother me.” Greg grinned, and then used the spoon to give the liquor a quick stir before popping it between his lips. He pulled the spoon out of his mouth and slipped it back into Dan’s.
    Ew, thanks for the germs!
    Greg slipped off his beaten black leather Doc Martens, then stepped up onto the couch, almost stepping on Dan’s thigh as he did so. He shook the ice in his glass to get the attention of the assembled company. “Okay,