Cold Pizza

How many people does it take to make a party? You can go to the greasy spoon up the street and they ask how many people are in your party. Usually she says one, and the waiter giggles when he says "Lorenza, party for one," because they're at the age where anything remotely sexual is hysterical, and their co-worker bussing tables laughs along. Some days she gets to say two, when Bridget tags along. 

She wishes that Bridget would tag along more often. Except she has this thing called a life, where she has after school clubs, swimming and chorus, and most of her meals are those prepackaged bags of cookies that come out of the vending machine. 

Lorenza can't swim. Technically speaking she can, but she's no fish in water. It goes up her nose, and everything is a blur with her glasses abandoned on the bench. As for singing, yikes. She was asked to whisper the words in church. God hears all, and loves to hear his praises, but her grandmother would prefer those praises be on key. The right key.

Her parents had gone out of town for the weekend. According to Bridget that meant it was time to throw a party. One with beverages, and cute boys. Cute boys that drank beverages to convince themselves that they were cute girls. 

They'd invited the entire lunchroom, passing the rumor around that there'd be no parents. Kids were suckers for that rule. 

"Did we get the date wrong?" Lorenza asked, checking the time. The party was supposed to start at eight. The time sounded late to her, but Bridget had insisted that was when high school parties happened. 

"Lo, you said 'tonight.' Tonight is the only tonight. Tomorrow it'll be yesterday." She too looked to the clock. Tomorrow would be in sixty five minutes. It was obvious that everyone had skipped out. 

She untwisted the tie on the bag of cups. "I'm going to put this stuff away and go to bed. Nobody is going to show up."

"I'm sorry."

Would it have been offensive to say ditto? Her friend had taken her to the store after chorus practice to drop forty dollars on supplies that were poured into a bowl for all the invisible guests.

She wished the invisible guests had a stronger appetite.

"I know," she said instead. She collected the liters of soda back into their bags. With the receipt at very least she could get a refund on the drinks. The chips were a lost cause. Not entirely, as they had spent the past three hours munching on them. 

But what the heck does a person do with an entire party sheet of pizza? It had gone cold, as had her heart. She sat on the edge of the couch, staring at the room. She'd taken care to take down all the family photos and hang mood lighting. She had stood on a ladder for these people.

Heights are terrifying.

Bridget's phone buzzed. Sitting next to her friend, who had let her head fall into her hands, she opened the text.

'Why did you send everybody to an abandoned building?'

'What are you talking about?'

'12 Third street. It's an abandoned house. Not cool Bridge.'

'We're at 3 Twelfth street.'

'Oh.'

This entire time, had everyone gone to the wrong address? Even if they had, why was this the first that she was hearing about it, three hours late? There was fashionably late, but this seemed a bit rude. She knew that Lorenza wasn't the most popular choice for Friday night plans. Yet she had asked a few friends to swing by, bribing them with free pizza.

Everyone loved pizza.

"I need to make a phone call. You going to be okay?" She set a hand on her friend's knee. She knocked it away, standing. 

"I'm going to get these chips squared away. I'll be fine."

Dialing, she took a look out the window. The porch light was still on, a beacon of hope. She flicked it off. It wasn't like anybody would come over this late for cold pizza and an already broken pinata. She had tried to convince her not to get it, because this was an adult party. One where she let it rain candy at ten thirty for a party of two. 

She took a piece of gum off the floor and unwrapped it.

"We can still come over if you want. I have to be home by midnight, but we can have a slice." There were a few of them sharing the phone, yet not one of them had the answer to the question she posed in response.

"If you only had an hour, why did you wait so long to come?"

She snapped her gum to squash the silence. Wedging her phone between her ear and shoulder, she knelt down to pick up the remains of the candy. The gum had already lost its flavor. Another piece stuffed her cheeks.

"We were at Michael's party." Judging by the noise in the background, they still were. She snagged Lorenza's phone, opening up the map app. 12 Third st didn't exist. The closest thing was 22 Third, and that was a drug store. Her friends had been caught off guard by her asking for their whereabouts, two hours ago, and when they finally responded, they hadn't even bothered to fact check their lies?

Lorenza re-entered the room. She was hanging pictures back on the wall.

"Jenna?"

"Yeah?"

"Get your own pizza." She ended the call and slammed her phone down on the table.

Surprised, Lorenza dropped the picture. It fell on her foot, and she whimpered at the pain.

"I changed my mind."

"About?"

"I'm not sorry that nobody showed up. I'm sorry that you're hurt, but I refuse to be sorry for not inflicting the jerk personalities of my friend group on you. And I refuse to be sorry that I don't have to share that pizza with anybody besides you."

There were tears coming down her face. She blamed the picture frame, cracked on the floor. Bridget sat her down.

Cleaning up their party of two could be finished in the morning. There were more important things to clean.

She had to pick up the broken pieces of her best friend.