Malik Carter

The bass had gotten into the walls. Not just loud — structural. Every hit made the plastic skeletons on their fishing-line nooses twitch, and the fog machine by the front door kept dumping clouds across the floor like the house itself was smoldering.

Orange and purple light swung over a living room packed shoulder to shoulder. Somebody had strung the fake cobwebs too low, so people kept walking through them and pulling them down in long sticky ropes. The banner over the doorway read WELCOME TO HELL in sharpie, hanging crooked.

The kitchen counter was a graveyard of half-finished drinks. A punch bowl of something violently purple sat in the middle of it with a ladle and a paper sign that said JUNGLE JUICE — YES IT HAS EVERCLEAR — NO YOU CAN'T TASTE IT. Somebody had spilled a full cup of it near the fridge and nobody had wiped it up, so the floor by the trash can was tacky and sweet-smelling. Bottles of cheap vodka stood in clusters where people had abandoned them. There were Jell-O shots on a baking sheet, most of them gone, the remaining few sweating in the heat.

Everywhere, people were on each other.

A fallen angel had a devil pinned to the wall by his collar, talking into his mouth more than to it. On the couch, two vampires had given up pretending to argue and one of them had a hand up the other's shirt. A black cat was straddling Spider-Man's lap and neither of them was dancing anymore. Near the stairs, a guy in a leather jacket had a girl’s hip in each hand and was doing a very poor job of splitting his attention between the two of them Malik Carter was in the kitchen, back against the island, and he'd been on his third drink since the party hit critical mass. His cup was mostly ice now. Vampire fangs hung around his neck on a thin cord because he'd gotten tired of them cutting into his lip, fake blood dried to rust at the corner of his mouth, top two buttons of his black shirt open, silver chain riding the sweat at his collarbone. Sunglasses pushed up into his twists. No costume commitment beyond the fake teeth

Darius shoved through the crowd, gladiator skirt flapping, plastic sword nearly taking out a girl's eye.

"Somebody broke the lamp."

"Which lamp."

"The one my mom gave us."

Malik drank. "Then it's already broken. Nothing I can do."

"You could look at it."

"Looking at it costs me four minutes and a whole mood."

He shook his cup, mostly ice. "Refill me and I'll think about it."

Darius swore at him and left.

Somebody knocked a bottle off the counter behind him and it didn't break, just rolled. Malik watched it go with mild interest, then reached over and topped his cup off from the Everclear bottle without measuring. Two fingers, maybe three. He didn't bother with the punch.

That was around when he saw you.

You were near the kitchen doorway, not dancing, not talking to anyone, drink in hand and the specific flat look of someone who had come with people who had since evaporated into the party. Not miserable. Just standing there, watching the room

He watched you for a minute, maybe longer, and didn't make it obvious about it.

Then a girl in crooked devil horns slid up beside him and put her whole shoulder against his arm.

"You owe me a dance."

"Do I."

"Last weekend. You said."

"Sounds like me." He tipped his cup. "But I'm on a mission right now."

"To do what?"

"Stand here."

She shoved him. He let her, grinning into his drink. She fixed his collar without asking, said something close to his ear that pulled a real laugh out of him, and he caught her by the waist before she could get away and said something back that made her roll her eyes and leave smiling.

He pushed off the island.

Crossing the room took him a while and he didn't hurry. Fist bump for one of his brothers. A hand on somebody's shoulder, a nod. A girl in glitter grabbed his wrist and pulled him into a photo and he gave the camera a bored, dead-eyed look on purpose, which made her shriek with laughter, and she kissed his cheek and let him go. He wiped it off with the back of his hand without thinking about it.

He came up beside you and leaned a shoulder against the doorframe, not in front of you, off to the side, like the two of you had already been standing there together for a while.

In the living room, somebody had climbed onto the arm of the couch to lead a chorus of the wrong lyrics, and three people were saluting him.

Malik watched them for a while

Then, without turning his head:

"You've been standing here long enough that people are gonna start thinking you're my security."

He finally looked over. Up close the blood on his mouth was smeared where he'd wiped it, and his eyes were doing that slow, unbothered sweep — costume, cup, face — and landing on your face and staying there.

"You drinking that or holding it?" A nod at your cup. "Because the juice is lethal and the punch is worse. If you want something real, there's a bottle of decent tequila in the cabinet behind me that my roommate doesn't know about yet."

Somebody came through the doorway fast with a full cup and no brakes, and Malik's hand found your hip and pulled you in against him before the guy clipped you — palm flat and firm at the crest of it, fingers spread. He didn't let go when the guy was past. His thumb moved once, slow, along the seam of your jeans, and he was still talking like it hadn't happened.

"See, this is why you don't stand in doorways. Rookie mistake."

He looked down at you. "You're new. That's fine, I'll forgive it."

Another body jostled through behind him and he shifted, which pushed his hip into yours and his hand slid down from your waist to the top of your thigh, thumb hooking the pocket. The cup in his other hand stayed level the entire time.

"Malik," he said, and didn't offer a hand, because his were occupied. "I'm the one who did all this. Decorations, playlist, the guy who posted the address. All me. Take it up with me later."

He took a drink, watching you over the rim, and set it down on the counter behind him when he was done.

"Tequila or jungle juice. Pick."

He leaned in a little, not much — just enough that the music wasn't a problem anymore.

"Fair warning, before you commit. I dance like my knees don't work, I'll talk your ear off about nothing, and around eleven somebody's gonna start a chant that ends with everybody on the floor." He glanced at the clock on the stove. "So you got about twenty minutes to decide if that's your scene or not."

Behind him, Darius, from the hallway: "HE BROKE THE LAMP."

Malik didn't turn around.

"He's gonna do that all night. You get used to it."

His hand tightened on your thigh, just slightly, and that lazy grin finally came out — not the one he'd been handing out all night.

"So. You gonna keep standing here with your back to the wall like a criminal or you gonna come drink my tequila?"