“Forty seven, forty eight, forty nine… fifty,” Brains counted out, accepting the wad of cash Pearce had handed over. He deposited it into the house’s beer fund, a ceramic piggy bank with a plugged hole in the bottom. “That’s everything.”

“I can’t believe you didn’t notice,” Grace said, smirking at him. She’d been changed and dressed in a fairly plain outfit, by Pearce’s standard–just a baby blue dress that came down to her knees, something from her actual normal wardrobe. “I was practically dripping when I got home.”

“But–” Pearce said. He would have sworn on a bible that she’d barely been damp. He’d noticed it, and thought to himself that it was strange, and–there’s no way I missed that, right?

“What, I should have warned you and gotten myself a time out?” Grace asked, incredulous. “Yeah, right, get myself in trouble to keep you safe. This is all on you.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, genuinely. His heart had started to beat a little faster, and he felt trapped by the eyes on him–Brains, Melody, who was mostly down to just use the kitchen, and Grace, whose smug smile burned a hole in his thoughts. “I…”

Seriously, how stupid am I?

Shaking his head, he silently berated himself for missing something so obvious. The discomfort made him squirm, made him want to–

“You were seriously close to leaking?” he asked. Desperate for an answer other than the truth, some indicator that he hadn’t missed something so obvious. He felt like an idiot.

“You seriously missed it?” Grace shot back. “My diaper was almost falling off. Do you really think you’re qualified to take care of anyone if you don’t notice something that obvious?”

Pearce looked between her, and Brains, and Melody–who was minding her own business, waiting for the microwave to stop whirring. He’d find no comfort there.

Retreating, he said, “Pff, whatever.”

Turning on his heels, he started walking away.

“What about dinner?” Grace demanded.

“Later,” Pearce replied. “Before bed. Just–later. I’m not hungry.”

“I am,” Grace said.

“Then whine about it. Later.” He rolled his eyes, threw up his hands, slumped his shoulders. His classic, ‘I don’t care, leave me alone’ posture.

Only he had historically used it on teachers and his parents, not on anyone in the waster’s club.

He shuffled up to his room and locked the door, found his headphones from his desk, and started blasting music. Loud enough to shut out the world.

It wasn’t that he’d made a mistake. It was that he’d forgotten about it. Normally he spaced things off, sure. Time slipped away. He was forgetful. But when he tried, really tried to think about it, he could remember what he’d forgotten, or at least find a vague hazy memory because he hadn’t properly looked.

It hadn’t been since highschool that he genuinely had a memory he couldn’t trust, and that’d been because the cloud of weed that followed him around whispered rumors in his ears that he’d made up on his own time.

Anxiety spiking, Pearce began to dig in his desk for an old friend.

…

“Jeez,” Skip said, pinching their nose as they stepped into the kitchen. “Dank up there, isn’t it?”

“Who’s smoking?” Grace asked, leaning against the kitchen counter, still basking in her small victory. Pearce’d had no idea she’d tricked him, and by the look on his face, he’d been just about to surrender right there. Victory was moments away, practically in her grasp. Maybe one or two more accidents, tops, and she didn’t mind trading a couple puddles for triumph.

“Pearce, I think,” Skip said, “There was almost a fog machine under the door.”

Grace began to grin. That could probably be used as proof of her victory even further–it wasn’t against the rules, per say, but getting baked while on caretaker duty was horribly irresponsible. Heck, even if she didn’t press that, it was a sure thing that Pearce would forget something.

But then her grin wavered, as a few thoughts hit her.

There wasn’t a person in the house who didn’t get high occasionally, but Pearce had somewhat a different relationship with pot than the rest of them. It’d very much been a coping tool for him more than just a recreational bit of fun. It’d been difficult to find him sober after turning in a report card, or having to explain why he’d gotten detention this time, or just generally stressed…after a failure.

Shit.

Shit.

His expression a moment prior reframed itself in real time while Grace stood there. She’d meant to push him into defeat, not into a panic attack.

“What’s wrong?” Skip asked. “You look, eh…horrified.”

“I’ll explain later,” Grace said, pushing away from the counter and walking towards the stairs.

She swallowed. There was only one ethical choice of action that she could see, and it made her feel stupid that she’d have to take it. She’d thought her plan through all the way to the end, and never once wondered how it might impact Pearce beyond victory.

That was going to take some self reflecting, later. For now, she had a mess to clean up.

First, she had to dig through her purse. Then, she knocked on Pearce’s door. The smell of old pot was pretty strong–he wasn’t going easy. This wasn’t ‘having fun’, it was trying to fix something.

“Later,” he said immediately.

“I’m coming in,” Grace said. “Sorry.”

She pushed open the door. He hadn’t locked it. A thick haze assaulted her, enough that she’d be hotboxed if she stayed in the room for too long, but she shut the door behind her and crossed the room, tiptoeing over piles of laundry and snack detritus.

Pearce lay on his bed, eyes bloodshot. She extended her hand, offering a wad of cash to him. “Here.”

He glanced up. “What’s that?”

“Fifty dollars,” Grace explained. “I–I fucked up. I’m sorry.”

Pearce just looked confused. Grace didn’t wait for him to ask, ‘huh’, or ‘what’, she just pressed on.

“I didn’t leak because you weren’t paying attention,” she explained. “I wasn’t very wet when I got home, I just held it and then kind of…made the leak happen on purpose. It was my fault. Not yours.”

He stared at her, brow furrowed, trying to figure out what she was saying. She wasn’t sure where the confusion lay, but she let him puzzle it out.

Finally, Pearce said, “I didn’t screw it up?”

Grace had expected anger, or disbelief, but all she saw in his face was pure, placid relief. A man offered a stay of execution minutes before the gallows. “Yeah,” she said.

She thought he might cry, his face was such a mask of solace. “Why?”

“I–” Grace started. “Can I sit down?”

“Sure,” he said, pulling up his legs so there was room at the end of the bed. She wiped some crumbs off the sheet and sat, thinking how to explain. “I wanted to trick you, to make you give up by, I guess, forcing mistakes to happen. I was just thinking that you’d give up because it got expensive when I kept leaking, but, like…I didn’t know you’d react this way.”

He stared at the ceiling. “I was gonna, you know.”

“I know,” Grace said, resting a hand on his leg, a little gesture of comfort.

“You could have won,” he said. “I thought it was all me. I believed it. I never would have known.”

“I know,” Grace repeated. “But it wasn’t supposed to hurt you like this. You know I’m not that much of an asshole, right? I’m like… something less intense than an asshole.”

He chuckled. “Butthole.”

The word, out of the blue, made Grace giggle. Maybe it was the sheer density of smoke in the air, too, filtering into her lungs, or the endorphin wave of relief that Pearce wasn’t mad. “Okay, that’s a better word, right. Butthole.”

Pearce laughed again, snorting and sitting up. “Hole in a butt, butt in a hole.”

Grace fell back onto the bed, laughing. She didn’t feel high, but she did feel relief, and that rush was similar in intensity. “I know it’s up to you, but can we order burgers for dinner? I’d kill for a burger right now.”

“Sure, but you have to go downstairs and grab it,” Pearce said, reaching for his phone.

“What, me, the baby?” Grace put a hand on her chest, feigning offense. “I do believe that’s your job.”

He rolled his eyes. “Okay, fine, but I’m stealing your fries.”

“Get your own fries!”

“They taste better stolen.”

“Really?”

“It’s the crime. Best seasoning there is for fries.”

They both laughed, and Grace scooted to a half seated position, her back against the wall. She eyed his bowl, sitting on his cluttered night stand, smoke still billowing off it like incense. “Ah, screw it. Can I get a hit off that?”

Pearce sat up and shook his head. “No.” Grace frowned, but he added, “Butthole babies don’t get to feed herself, remember?”

“Themselves, would be the word,” she said.

“Butthole babies don’t get to feed herself, themselves,” Pearce repeated, picking up the bowl. He held it up for her, and she had to lean forward, puffing off it in his clumsy fingers. She inhaled too much, coughed for a second, and then the two of them fell into fits of giggling.

After ordering, Pearce opened up Right Round, the popular short-form video app, holding up his phone so Grace could see.

Grace expected to cast a little judgment on his feed, but the algorithm largely seemed to bless him with exclusively funny videos, and before long the two of them were bursting into regular fits of giggles, passing the bowl back and forth, sitting close to one another and sharing the screen like a campfire.

Eventually, food arrived, and Pearce left briefly to go get it. While he was gone, Grace pulled the covers over herself, nestling into his bed like a bird in a nest, all warm and cozy. Pearce returned a moment later with two paper sacks, and when he returned, he pulled the blankets over himself, too, distributing the food. Sitting next to each other, draped in sheets and duvets, he passed her a ridiculously jumbo carton of fries, produced one for himself, and then stole one from her.

Grace snickered, and took one from his carton. It was delicious, in the way that only greasy food seasoned by the munchies could be.

“See?” Pearce grinned. “Theft. The best seasoning.”

“Salt helps,” Grace snickered, stealing another fry.

The supply of starchy, salty potato seemed endless, but they chowed down on each other’s food, burgers languishing in the bag, watching funny videos and giggling like fiends, snuggled next to each other on Pearce’s bed. Grace had completely lost track of the passage of time, she just shared the moment, enjoying the company until her eyes started to grow heavy and her thoughts so fuzzy that she couldn’t follow the jokes, giggling simply because Pearce was giggling.

The transition to unconsciousness was a gradual one. They moved from sitting cross legged to laying, and then Grace rolled on her side, shut her eyes, giggling just from the sounds.

She wasn’t exactly planning to sleep, but she wasn’t not planning to sleep either, and when it claimed her, she was smiling broadly, her limbs entangled with Pearce.