"Bit of this, bit of that." Clair said cheerfully. "I was feeling creative. Try it and tell me what you think."
Jessica took a swig from the bottle, eyes popping open when the potent mix of alcohol hit her tastebuds like liquid fire. She swallowed it as fast as she could, eager to get rid of the foul taste. "Ugh. This absolutely burns, Clair! How is every batch of rocket fuel you make, worse than the last? Did you mix bleach into this?"
Clair laughed. "Maybe I did. You know Lara May doesn't like to limit her options when it comes to the bottle. If you told her that drinking bleach would get her wasted faster, she'd probably give it an honest try."
Instead of replying, Jessica took another sip from the bottle. Despite the awful taste, the warmth it created in her chest was pleasant. She always felt tongue tied and awkward whenever the subject of Clair's mother came up. Luckily, it was pretty rare.
Lara May McKinley was what her daughter referred to as a high functioning alcoholic who doesn't really know how to function. Jessica could count on on one hand the number of times she'd seen Mrs McKinley out of bed and properly dressed, even though she'd been a frequent guest at Clair's house since she'd been six years old.
Clair sometimes liked to joke about her mother's general uselessness, but there was always a hard look in her eyes when she did. She never called her Mom, it was always Lara May.
Her father wasn't much more reliable. Greg McKinley was often away for his work as a well connected lawyer, or so he'd say. There were whispers around town that the nature of his work was… not quite on the legal side. Still, it brought a lot of money into the McKinley household.
Jessica could barely remember Clair's much older brother, who'd skipped town after graduating high school and had never bothered staying in touch.
Maybe that's why the two of us were fated to be best friends, she mused. We were two little girls with absent fathers and mothers that we couldn't really connect with.
So we became each other's family instead.
"Do you think we'll ever get out of here, Jess?" Clair's voice was soft as she looked out at the desert. She spun the empty soda bottle on the ground a couple of times.
"And go where? Where do you want to go?"
"Anywhere that isn't Abbot Springs, sounds pretty good to me." Clair's voice was a little slurred. The rocket fuel was clearly doing its work.
"Maybe we can head to Carson City after graduation and look for work." Jessica suggested. "If we can get jobs, we should be able to find an apartment we can rent together-"
Clair cut her off. "Screw that. Carson City would be like moving from one loser place to another, slightly less loser place. You need to dream bigger, bestie."
"Bigger like what? Like Las Vegas?" Jessica rubbed her forehead and yawned. Alcohol always made her feel more like napping, not socialising. "We can run off to be showgirls together in one of those fancy hotels."
"Yeah we'd be a total sight, wearing costumes made up completely from feathers." Clair grinned but her smile faded quickly. "Nah, not Vegas. We need to leave the entire state. I'm so sick of Nevada, so sick of the desert and the dust."
"Los Angeles, then?" Jessica asked tentatively. She'd never been out of the state. To her, California seemed as distant as travelling to the moon.
"New York City." Clair announced firmly. "Far enough away that we can leave all this behind and never look back. We can start again, build the kinds of lives we actually want."
"Now you're just being ridiculous."
"I'm not! I'm being completely serious." Clair narrowed her amber coloured eyes, the way she always did when she thought someone was challenging her. "Don't you want to escape this godawful place? Or are you happy being stuck here until you're too old to leave even if you wanted to?"
Her mother's lovely face swam in Jessica's mind, etched with disappointment from a life that had never lived up to its potential. "Of course I want to escape. But how would we ever do it? You know I don't have a dollar to my name. We can't just stick our thumbs out and hitchhike across the country."
"I think we could. If we had to. Where's your sense of adventure?"
"Come on, Clair. We have to be realistic about things." Jessica mumbled. "Talking about some impossible dream is just going to make us even more unhappy."
Clair was quiet for a few heartbeats, merely stretching her legs out in front of her and crossing them at the ankles. She was fond of wearing plaid miniskirts paired with combat boots.
And whatever Clair wore, almost every other girl at school would run out to copy the next day. She was the undisputed leader of Abbot Springs High School.
Maybe the two of us should swap families, Jess let herself think bitterly. Mom will finally be happy, knowing her new daughter has the Prom Queen title in the bag. And I can probably handle having Lara May as my mother if it means she'll leave me in peace.
I mean, how often is a woman who's permanently curled up in a hungover ball, going to really get in my business?
Clair gave her a small, devious smile. "I have money, actually. I've been making preparations for a while now."
"Money from your father? How'd you convince him to finally open his wallet?" Despite earning what looked like bucketloads of money, Greg McKinley had a definite miserly streak when it came to his wife and daughter.
One of the nastier rumours whispered by the locals was that he had a separate family in another town.
Clair pursed her lips. "It's not exactly from Dad. Well, I guess you could say it technically is. He just doesn't know I have it."