Im Sorry, Bri

“The parties this saturday, MY NEW YEAR’S PARTY! Everyone's welcome.” 

….Exactly. I was thinking the same thing when I heard that sentence come out of Sasha Grean's mouth. The last time Sasha threw a party it didn't go quite well. A man had us all scared inside the house while he was banging on the window in a Ghostface mask with a knife– I mean the police showed up and it was just the angry neighbor next door who hated the parties Sasha would throw but as a 16 year old teen, it was traumatizing. Now I’m 18 and a senior, I haven't been to a party ever since, PLUS I don’t know if I'm ready to get back into that stuff just yet. My best friend ran up behind me and yelled “BRI BRI BRI” 

Geez girl I heard you the first time– I thought to myself. 

“I know you heard about the party! You’re going right?” I look at Michelle so confused, 

“Did you forget the la-” 

“NO of COURSE I didn't forget. But come onnn. You can't say that night wasn't a little fun”

“Yes I can, because I was so scared I had to throw out the underwear I was wearing that night.”

“HAHA ok girl we’ll see. Your coming to this party”

Then she walks away. As you can tell- Michelle is very… How do I word this? ENERGETIC. Sometimes I don't even think she notices she shakes when she talks– I mean, it is senior year and we are already halfway through, a party wouldn't be that bad. I thought so I went home and slept on it, figured I'd wake up knowing what I was gonna do. 

Ok I didn't expect time to go that fast. The parties tonight and for the past two days I haven't thought about it. I see Michelle at the end of the hall, right before we make eye contact I try to walk the other way– “OOH BrI how’d you know I was looking for you???”

“I- I didn't Chelle”

“Oh sure you did… have you thought about the party? IT'S TONIGHTTT”

She gives me this big smile with a baby face no one can resist. If you guys could see her you'd understand. 

“FINE fine. I’ll go.” 

“Ok see you tonight at 8” she skips away. 

Why did I do that? Now I HAVE to go. I mean.… it can't be that bad considering the fact that the crazy neighbor got evicted for the harassment of teens. You know I think I can find peace in going to this party. 

Alright. It's 7:55 PM and I'm leaving for the party soon. I just have to make one call. I called Michelle and asked if she needed a ride, turns out she went early. She was just that excited she helped the girl prepare for her party. I guess I kind of understand because this is her first party back too. She’s excited to go back, I'm scared, Ha.

When I arrive, it's packed. There's drinks everywhere, party lights, loud music, I can barely hear my thoughts. After 30 minutes I realize I still have not seen Michelle so I go searching for her. I was checking all the upstairs rooms finding nothing but drunk teens doing what drunk teens do. As I'm going back downstairs I bump into this guy going up– this strange guy, I mean I only say that because i've never seen him before. He dropped his hat and as I went to pick it up for him he looks at me nods his head, and continues his journey up the stairs. That was weird. I thought I knew everybody in this small town. I just shrugged it off, I didn't expect anything more to come from it. When I go downstairs I see Michelle– drunk dancing on the front room table, I quickly run to her and pull her down

“HEY, HOW MANY DRINKS HAVE YOU HAD” I said loudly so she could hear over the music

“UH I DON'T KNOW I LOST TRACK AFTER I CHUGGED THAT BOTTLE”

She pointed to the empty tequila on the floor

“A BOTTLE????-- COME ON WE ARE LEAVING” I tell her

“NOOO I'M STAYING WITH MY BOYFRIEND”

Her boyfriend is a 6 '2 Football player named Chant, they've been dating long enough for me to know that Chant was never known as a party guy, he was always the one staying in the house watching snapchat stories. So I said back to her “CHANT? I DON'T SEE CHANT” 

“HE'S RIGHT THERE” she says as she's leaning on me spilling her cup everywhere, but when she points. She points to the guy I bumped into on the stairs. That's not Chant. I let go of her and she runs to him and hugs him. I get confusingly scared so I ask around. Nobody knows him… I go out the backdoor where it's quiet and call Chant. Chelle needs his help. I start hearing a ringtone but it's not just any ringtone. Chant is such a star wars guy, he has their theme song as his ringtone. But it was weird because… It was coming from the shed. 

I'm not dumb enough to walk into a shed all alone during a party because if something were to happen no one would hear me scream. So I went back inside to find Michelle. I walked in and I saw her going up the stairs with this stranger. She's in trouble. I ran up to her. “MICHELLE? MICHELLE!” When I get upstairs all the doors are shut. “This is gonna be tricky” as I open all the doors, again, traumatizing myself. There's one more room left. I open the door, the windows wide open. Michelles shoe is just on the floor… Man we are on the second floor no way they would have jumped from here, I look out the window to check the height and there's a ladder? That's when I realized. THIS WAS PLANNED. I don't know who that guy is but he's trying to kidnap my best friend. I run downstairs, stop the music, pause the lights. I get everyone quiet and jump on the couch. “OK, this is going to sound crazy— But the unknown guy who was here a few minutes ago, you might've seen him with Michelle or just wandering around. He kidnapped Michelle and did something with her boyfriend, Chant. We have to organize a search party and call the cops. They cannot be that far because they just snuck out of the upstairs window. Now Someone ANYONE, comes out to the shed with me to check it out.” Silence rings, everyone looks scared, I didn't think they'd actually hel- “I’ll go”.... “Journey?” Journey was my ex. I forget the reason we broke up but it was definitely junior year around Sasha’s last party. “Journey? Um ok, let's go. Someone call the cops and everyone else find a buddy and go find my best friend.” I definitely thought we had a good chance at finding this weirdo creep.

Me and Journey are walking out to the shed, He’s using his phone light. We open the door you won't believe what we found- “POLICE DROP YOUR WEAPONS! GET ON THE FLOOR NOW” im confused. “WE WERE CALLED ABOUT A MAN WITH DARK HAIR MAKING A KIDNAP OF A GIRL WHO HAD CURLY LONG BLACK HAIR WEARING A BLUE TANK TOP” we get handcuffed. I try to tell the police there's someone in the shed they don't even let me get a word out. “THE SHED LOOK IN THE SHED” yells a random girl from the party, people start to circle around. “Chant?” 

He’s dead. 

The people from the party were able to confirm me and Journey were all clear but my best friend was still out there with this psycho. We were out all night looking for her. Right before the police are going to call off the search for the night I get a notification. ‘Life 360 - SOS’ Michelle sent an SOS to my phone. I quickly got an officer's attention. The location that she sent was an hour away but she was still driving. The police transferred the SOS to the nearest department and told us to trust in the process. I went home that night. I mean, I couldn't sleep knowing my best friend was with a serial killer. I could've stopped it. When she told me he was Chant, I should've taken her home. My phone dings. Its Journey “I stole my moms car, im outside. Let's go get Michelle.” I quickly grab a jacket and sneak out the back. I get in the car and thank him and thank him and thank him again. I look at my phone to give him directions, my phone dies. I ask if he has a car charger of course he doesn't. I tell him there's a gas station down the street, but none of us have any money, he stole the car so he can't go back yet, and I snuck out the back. It was already loud. No way I would be able to sneak back in and out without getting caught. It's ok. We can just steal one. We used to always steal at 16, but now that we are 18 and can get serious charges, it's scary. But we had to do it for Michelle, So when we pulled up to the gas station I quickly jumped out and ran inside to try to play it cool, and surprisingly I successfully got the charger, so on the road finally we are going to save Michelle. 

By this time whoever she was with stopped driving but they were 2 hours away, with all the driving we've been doing we've now made it to be 20 minutes away when I realize, we have no weapons, we have to stop again. Journey didn't seem so sure the next gas station would be so lenient so I pointed out, there's a walmart that's open 24 hours. We stop there instead. I got some pepper spray and a pocket knife. On the road again, we had no idea what to expect. 

When we finally arrived it was just a normal house in a normal neighborhood, and did not look suspicious. We parked the car down the street from the house and walked the rest. We went around the back of the house to look in any windows we could. All the lights were off but one, the bathroom light. It was a little higher than the other ones so I had Journey lift me on his shoulders. “Michelle?” Journey looks up and asks me what I see. “I see Michelle! But.. she passed out in a bath with all her clothes on” I try knocking on the window, Journey quickly gets me down, “are you crazy? What if someone hears you”

“She needs to wake up” I said

“We can handle this way better. Now that we know were she is for real we need to call the co-”

He passed out. 

WAIT! No- he got hit with a PAAAAN! I start running because whoever came up behind him with the pan is now trying to get me. I try to get my pepper spray out to use it and see who's following me, it drops. Oh man, the pocket knife over a pan has no power. I need to see if this is the guy from the party chasing me, we are still in his backyard when we’re running so I start to scream. I need the neighborhood to wake up. “HELPPP– CALL THE POL-”

“Bri?” 

“Michelle?” I stop running and I turn around. “Bri, why are you here?’ she asks. “I go to explain everything to her and I'm honestly confused. “Bri, I live here,” she says. I'm so confused. “BrI your having a episode” 

“No, no, I'm not really look! The guy knocked out Journey look” I point over to where Journey was, he's not there. “Journey? Bri, journey died of an asthma attack the night of Sasha's party junior year. We went to his funeral?" I'm so confused. “Wait, so what about Chant?” 

“Chant and I broke up when he cheated on me with you! Are you serious right now? What is wrong with you? You're the reason I moved beginning of senior year. I moved with my dad because you ruined my mental health with all your issues, and when you kissed Chant you kept denying it saying you kissed Journey, but Bri, Journey was dead.” wait. I start to really think back, the party I went to tonight, Michelle was never there, the police were only there to shut the party down and the ride here were Journey was supposedly the one driving, he wasn't even there and I stole my moms car– I don't even have a license or a phone. “SCHIZOPHRENIA BRI, IT'S CALLED SCHIZOPHRENIA, I didnt even know they'd ever let you out after your last episode. I'm calling the cops, you're going home.” 

Everything that happened tonight was not real? I was fake, Journey was fake, Chant was fake, even Michelle was fake. 

When I got home I was admitted to the Psych ward. Nobody wanted to speak to me. I truly believed I just ruined my life in an unfixable way because of my illness. Then the nurse came in and told me I had a visitor. It was Michelle. 

“I know I'm probably the last person you want to see right now, but I just wanted to say I was sorry. With Everything going on I knew you were sick,I knew you were off your meds, and I knew you couldn't control it. It's just, before Journey died he tried to kiss me, I pushed him away for you, you were my best friend. So when I heard I just couldn't let it go, so I moved away, I should have stayed with you, checked up on you, ensured you would be ok. Now you are in the psych ward and all our time is gone. I'm sorry.”