"Ah, no thanks. I don't drink."

"Suit yourself." He tosses Gabriel a beer and cracks one open for himself. "Make yourself at home, Treasa. Braai'll be ready soon as Pollock takes care of Tendulkar."

I know the names, just not their significance. I nod anyway as if it all makes sense. Gabriel rattles off more introductions as we pick our way past girls suntanning in barely there bikinis. They're more interested in soaking up the sun than meeting me, which doesn't bother me in the slightest. We settle on a picnic blanket at a safe distance from the pool, and one of the dogs trots over to lie down next to Gabriel, offering him its belly.

"You like dogs?" he asks.

"These aren't dogs. These are monsters."

"Nah, they just act all tough. Don't you, Tank?" Gabriel lies back, resting his head on the Rottweiler's shoulder. He looks so different with his hair gelled up-harder, older, not at all like the type of boy who can play Beethoven's Sonata Pathetique. He slips on his Ray-Bans, takes another sip of beer, and sighs in contentment.

"You always dress like this?" My gaze meanders from his mohawk down his torso where his shirt has pulled up, revealing a sliver of belly. His legs are fluffy, and I almost reach out to feel them, but I sit on my hand instead. Maybe I should let my leg hair grow, just to see what it would be like to be that hairy. Feminists and hippies don't shave, so why should I?

Somewhere inside, there's a celebratory roar, so I guess the right team is winning. I sip my drink and wonder what to talk about when two girls approach. They're like yin and yang: a pale white girl in a black bikini top and ripped-up skirt held together with safety pins, and a black girl in a white bikini with beaded sarong. They're both tall and beautiful and intimidating. They saunter over with a hookah already filled with water.

It takes me a moment to realize the white girl, Karla, I think, isn't deformed, and that what appear to be three nipples straining against the fabric of her bikini must in fact be nipple piercings. She has a silver bar skewering her navel too.

"Treasa, right?" Karla sits down beside us, and Nandi follows.

I nod and watch her long fingers as she shapes a piece of tinfoil and balances a single oval coal on top.

"You go to St. Bridget's?" Nandi asks.

"Yes. You all go to Stormhof?"

"They do, but I go to the NSA."

"Music?" I ask.

"Visual Arts."

"Nandi paints." Karla snaps her fingers, and Gabriel pulls a lighter out of his pocket. The stab of jealousy at their familiarity feels like a laser burning through my chest.

"Ever smoked hubbly?" Gabriel sits up as Tank goes bounding off to help Bullet demolish an old car tire.

"Nope."

"Oh, Gabe gets to pop your hubbly cherry." Karla grins, and Nandi rolls her eyes. Gabriel glares at her, and she bites her bottom lip, giving him a seductive smile. There's something going on between them; there must be. I'm the idiot-of course Gabriel isn't single. How could a guy like that not be taken?

"It's overrated." Nandi lies back and closes her eyes.

"Only try if you want to." Gabriel shuffles forward, his knee touching mine. "It's not like smoking. No tar or anything."

"This is strawberry vanilla." Karla taps the gla.s.s with a long fingernail. Gabriel detaches one of two pipes and takes a long pull as the water inside the pot bubbles. Karla does the same and exhales smoke rings at Gabriel.

"You used to be able to do really kif kif smoke rings with that tongue of yours." She gives him a look that shreds my insides. smoke rings with that tongue of yours." She gives him a look that shreds my insides.

"Karla, pasop pasop," Nandi says.

"What? It's true." She giggles, but Gabriel doesn't look impressed. He hands me his pipe, and I take a tentative slurp.

"You've got to really suck it, like this." Karla demonstrates.

"Are you done?" Gabriel's tone is venomous.

"Like this?" I wrap my lips around the pipe as suggestively as possible and suck in a deep breath. This time I taste the tang of strawberry and sweet vanilla. It's not half-bad and makes my head feel kind of buzzy. Karla scowls, clearly not amused as Gabriel pries the pipe from my fingers and takes another hit.

"So, Treasa, are the stories about St. Bridget's true?" Karla narrows her eyes.

"Karla," Nandi warns.

"It's a fair question. So?" She looks at me.

"Depends on the story." I take another slurp of hubbly. The buzz in my head turns to a consistent pressure, and the world seems to soften around the edges. I blink a few times to clear my vision. The haze remains.

"I've heard you take cuc.u.mbers to school to practice giving b.l.o.w.j.o.bs."

"Jesus, Karla. Enough already." Gabriel picks a leaf up from the gra.s.s and starts tearing it into tiny pieces.

"That's not what you used to say." She stares at him, her gaze nuclear.

"Honestly, I wouldn't know," I say before Gabriel gets annihilated. My arms feel heavy as lead. It feels like I've sprouted roots, and they're pulling me into the ground. Maybe this is what happens when an alien smokes hubbly.

"About b.l.o.w.j.o.bs or the cuc.u.mbers?" She takes another pull of hubbly.

"Either."

Karla chuckles. "You picked the wrong one, Gabe. You should ask for your money back. Unless you're into virgins now."

Is my lack of experience that obvious? I expect a verbal barrage from Gabriel, but he ignores her and studies the contents of the pot as I suck in another lungful of hubbly.

"s.h.i.t, you put weed in this?" His eyes burn with anger.

"Just a pinch. Picked it up in Mozambique last weekend. Isn't it great?"

He shouts at her in Afrikaans. The words have lost all meaning.

"Treasa, are you feeling okay?" He brushes the hair from my face.

"It's dagga, not crack. She'll live." Karla scowls.

Weed in the water? "Am I stoned?" I ask. My tongue feels thick and heavy.

"Very." Worry creases Gabriel's forehead.

"She only took two hits." Karla laughs. "Not a tough cookie, are you?"

"Hou jou bek," Gabriel snaps, and Karla stops laughing before gathering herself and the hubbly off the blanket. She stomps away, giving both of us a filthy look. Nandi gives us an apologetic shrug before following her friend.

"I think I just need a nap." I start lying down. Gabriel places his hands on my shoulders and keeps me upright.

"Not out here."

He stands and helps me to my feet. It's like I'm wading through mieliepap mieliepap, each step requiring more energy than the last. Faces blur around me as we traipse inside; their voices sound hollow and distant in the veil of mist descending over my brain. Gabriel's arm is all that keeps me from falling as I stumble up the stairs.

He sets me down on a bed, gently guiding my head toward a pillow. My eyes won't open, but I know he's still there. I feel his presence.

"You'll be okay," he says.

"Sorry," I mumble.

He chuckles, and the sound is a rustle of dry leaves.

"Don't apologize. I should've known better." He settles beside me and eases the Alice band off my head, dragging his fingers through my hair. His touch gives me goose b.u.mps and makes my toes curl in a good way.

"It's because I'm an alien," I whisper.

"That's the dagga talking." He sits next to me. I reach out with jelly fingers to trace his jaw, his lips, and end up poking him in the belly b.u.t.ton.

"Stay with me." Is that really my voice?

He hesitates, and after what might be hours of deliberation, he slides down to lie beside me. He folds my hand against his chest and an army of tingles march up and down my spine. I can feel his heartbeat beneath my fingers. The layer of fabric between us irritates me, and I wriggle free from his grip. After a few fumbles, I manage to slip my hand beneath his shirt, resting it on his chest above his heart. His whole body tenses, and I've probably crossed some line, but I don't have the energy to care.

"Treasa, we shouldn't." He inches away and I follow, wanting to feel his breath like b.u.t.terfly kisses on my closed eyelids. I fight the soporific tides threatening to pull me under. I'm losing the battle even as Gabriel changes position and places a tentative arm around me. I want to be conscious if he tries to kiss me or otherwise take advantage of me-not sure I'd even mind if he did right now. I need to stay awake; the rhythmic thumping of his heart and his steady breathing lulls me into sleep.

Gabriel

THE THC THC makes my thoughts as sticky as wet tar. It makes muddling through the chaos of my mind like trying to pry apart the strands of a colossal spider's web. d.a.m.n Karla. I should've known she'd do something spiteful. That's what happens when you accidentally break a girl's heart-or so Dirk says, who got it on good authority from Nandi that I was an idiot for ever thinking Karla didn't love me. Love-what is that, anyway? A chemical stew in the brain making us idiots. makes my thoughts as sticky as wet tar. It makes muddling through the chaos of my mind like trying to pry apart the strands of a colossal spider's web. d.a.m.n Karla. I should've known she'd do something spiteful. That's what happens when you accidentally break a girl's heart-or so Dirk says, who got it on good authority from Nandi that I was an idiot for ever thinking Karla didn't love me. Love-what is that, anyway? A chemical stew in the brain making us idiots.

Treasa's breath wuffs against my shirt as she snores, and it feels far too nice.

"She okay?" Dirk whispers from the doorway.

"Just pa.s.sed out."

"Don't let her upchuck on my duvet."

"She wasn't drinking."

"Greenies can still get you, man." He sidles up to the bed and stares down at her. "What you going to do about this?" He gestures to her hand still under my shirt. Her fingers are curled in sleep, her head resting on my chest. No denying the fact that I like the feel of her body pressed against mine, that our skin on skin makes my heart beat faster and the blood pump away from my brain into certain extremities.

"No idea."

"She'll be fine. You can leave her for a while."

"Don't want to. Karla might shave her head or something."

"Karla's just miffed." He sits on the edge of the bed.

"About what?"

"You using her and discarding her. I warned you that whole friends-with-benefits thing never works out for the guy."

"You could've told me that instead of encouraging me to sleep with her."

"Didn't think you'd be that dumb." Dirk shakes his head sadly.

"So if I listened to you constantly telling me to nail Treasa, that would make me dumb too?"

"An absolute idiot, but it would get you laid." He grins, and I thump him in the arm, not nearly hard enough for fear of waking Treasa.

"Come on, man. We're starting the braai."

"In a minute."

He shrugs and ambles out of the bedroom.

I run my hand through the spill of red hair across my chest. The curls are tight spirals around my fingers, soft and springy. She must use coconut shampoo, and I breathe deeply, savoring the scent before placing a kiss on her forehead. I'm not sure why I do it; it just seems right.

Extricating my limbs from her grasp takes a minute. She stirs, shuffles into the pillows, and doesn't wake up. At least I learn from mistakes; there's no way I'll do to Treasa what I did to Karla.

Treasa

THERE'S A A poster of a topless woman with pointed elf ears straddling a dragon on the wall. Where the h.e.l.l am I? My head throbs, and my mouth is as dry as the Karoo. My gaze drops from the poster to the figure beside the bed. His hair is wet and tousled. And he's shirtless. I count the k.n.o.bs of his spine visible above the bed frame. Old bruises mottle his ribs yellow and green. I wonder if any are a result from my takedowns in self-defense cla.s.s. poster of a topless woman with pointed elf ears straddling a dragon on the wall. Where the h.e.l.l am I? My head throbs, and my mouth is as dry as the Karoo. My gaze drops from the poster to the figure beside the bed. His hair is wet and tousled. And he's shirtless. I count the k.n.o.bs of his spine visible above the bed frame. Old bruises mottle his ribs yellow and green. I wonder if any are a result from my takedowns in self-defense cla.s.s.

I try saying hi. It comes out more like the dying croak of a bullfrog.

Gabriel turns and slides up onto the bed, ditching the Carl Sagan novel he was reading. "Feeling better?" he asks.

"Yup," I manage, although I can barely breathe with him so almost naked and close to me.

"You were asleep, so I went for a swim." He shakes his head, showering me in chlorinated water. I don't mind, even if it makes my hair go frizzy.