I collapsed into the scratched up office chair, my head lolling back to stare at the ceiling. I continued to gaze blankly at the ceiling even when I heard Danny’s footsteps, and then a moment later, his voice: “Macey?”

“Hi.” I wasn’t looking at him- I still had my face to the ceiling.

“Are you drunk?”

“Aw, man, how’d you know?” I laughed, leaning forwards in the chair to look at him, his arms crossed and his greasy brown-black hair disheveled and down to his shoulders.

“You know I can tell.”

“Yeah…” I sighed, spinning the office chair in a 360 with my sock’d foot on the floor. “They never shoulda let me turn twenty-one.” I paused, then changed the topic to the one that had been weighing on my mind the whole day: “Remember when we used to live together?”

“You’re still sleeping on my couch, you know that, right?”

“No, I mean, when I was a kid. In Snoqualmie. Remember…?” I tilted my head to one side, blinking slowly. I tried to recall exactly the layout of his parent’s old house, but couldn’t.

“Yeah. Why?” Danny sat down on the couch across from the crusty office chair that had somehow found its way into his living room.

“Dunno. I’ve just been thinkin’ about it.” I reached into the depths of my memory and pulled out the summer of 1977- two short months that practically changed my life. I was ten, and sleeping on Danny’s parents’ couch-bed, after I’d found myself alone and homeless after Julie had abruptly left my life. At that thought, I drunkenly decided to nearly shout out, “Remember her? Remember Julie?”

“Julie?” His eyebrows leapt up in surprise, until realization dawned on his face and he said, “Oh. Oh, yeah.”

My head spun, but I thought nostalgically about that summer. I recalled the time I’d really been drunk- it was during that summers…

Danny was about twelve or thirteen then, but he could pass for sixteen or even seventeen- mostly because he was very tall- and if the right cashier was working at the store, you could buy alcohol if you were about three years old. We’d bought a fifth of whatever and sat at the edge of the forest, drinking. We’d gotten stinking drunk and staggered all around town in the dark, kicking over everybody’s trash cans on the sidewalks. I remember very clearly, I was wearing one of his mom’s old fugly dresses, because I owned hardly a single outfit. It was one of those 1950’s looking dresses, pink and black, and it was way too big for me, since I was four foot eleven and weighed about ninety pounds, and the skirt went down to around my ankles. It was hilarious to think about.

I realized I had laughed out loud when Danny interrupted my nostalgia: “Macey? All good?”

I giggled manically again, and explained, rather poorly, “I was just thinking about your mom’s dumb old dresses that I had to wear. Remember…?”

“What?”

“The first time we got drunk. In 1977. And I was wearing one of your mom’s old dresses that was way too big for me. Remember?” I pulled myself up to sit with my legs crisscrossed, and grinned. “Remember?”

His face broke out into a smile, instantly remembering that day. “Yeah, I remember. We didn’t get home till, what? Four in the morning?” Danny laughed, and added, “My parents were so pissed.”

“It was worth it, though…” A sudden sadness hit me along with the nostalgia, mixed with the alcohol in my blood. I frowned, and remembered the first sip, and how horrible it tasted- like nail polish and fire. I wondered why I didn’t just stop there, but did it really matter anyway?