Her head leaned back and smacked into the cold glass window. Not removing her head, she turned her body in a circle, her forehead now resting against the finger-smudged pane of glass. She closed her eyes, letting the cool temperature attempt to soften the blows in her head. Behind her, she could here Aiden in the kitchen, yelling, slurring, laughing that annoying frat boy laugh, followed by a “Yah, man!”

She suddenly felt a bit dizzy, letting the half empty cups drop from her fingers onto Aiden’s parent’s beige carpet. She pressed her whole body up against the glass, accepting its coolness, and reassuring stability. Voices without faces filled her head: meaningless conversations, false compliments, rampant insecurities, and complete and total bullshit.

Her eyes had trouble opening, as though icky sleep stuff had melded her eyelids shut after four hours of hard earned REM. The lights of the city twinkled like Xmas and she wondered how many parties where happening right this second, if somewhere out there, a girl just like herself stood in this very spot, thinking the exact same thing, and wondering if there was someone else out there who could save her. Rescue her from this abyss she was plummeting into, reach for her hand as she went under. Tears of anger filled her eyes, leaving tiny wet marks against the glass. She smiled, her teeth touching the pane; thankful she at least felt something. It had been awhile since she cried, since she had felt anything, anything at all.

It hit her at an odd angle, making her insides feel hot, and snapping her to attention. She felt the eyes on her just as it happened, as though someone had thrown hot knives at her and they struck her skin. The girl stared back at her, leaning against the railing outside, away from the others, as if waiting for something or someone.

She looked different tonight, but Spencer couldn’t place it. But it didn’t matter. She reached for the handle and slid the glass door open, the warm breeze hitting her face. The door shut behind her, shutting out the noise, the worry, the pain, the bullshit. She walked to the railing and took in the sight: it was honesty, conviction, something real.

“You dyed your hair…looks nice.”