Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 103109 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103109 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
I don’t take the bait. If she wants to judge me for lasting less than ten minutes when I’ve wanted her for years, she can fucking judge me. That’s not the part of her little speech that bothers me. “We still need to talk.” It sounds so ridiculous now with a used condom hanging off my dick and my ex-wife in the next room. Grabbing a tissue from the desk, I clean up the condom and zip up my pants.
When I turn back to her, she’s frozen by the door, like she’s torn between running away and chewing me out.
“Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“I’m thinking I was the most obvious person to warm your bed since you’re back in this tiny town, but now she’s here, so I can go.”
I press a palm flat to the wall to steady myself. “That’s fucking unfair, and you know it. I never assumed you’d climb back into bed with me. I want what we had.”
“We talked. Then we fucked.” She cocks her head to the side, ice-cold Shay returning so quickly I have whiplash. “Don’t you remember how it goes? Next, you walk away.”
“Shay—” I reach for her, but she shakes out of my grasp and pushes past me and out the door. I see her run for the back exit and watch the door shut behind her.
Shay
June 3rd, ten years ago
I’m exhausted. I got home yesterday from my month in Paris. Mom drove to Chicago because she wanted to be the one to pick me up from the airport and the first to hear all about my trip. We spent the evening hanging out at one of her favorite lakeside restaurants as she regaled me with questions and demanded to know every detail.
I couldn’t bring myself to tell her about Easton. My memories of our night and day together are so precious, and I want to keep them locked away like rare, ancient tomes whose pages can disintegrate with human touch.
Then last night I fell into bed, convinced I’d fall comatose for twelve hours, but I could barely sleep. After tossing and turning for six hours, I gave up, made a pot of coffee, and wished I didn’t have this horrible, aching worry in my chest regarding Easton’s silence.
When I can’t handle it anymore, I text him.
Me: Are you free? I need to talk.
Easton: Give me two minutes and I’ll call.
I set my phone down on the coffee table and squeeze my eyes shut. Just two minutes.
Another wave of exhaustion washes over me, and I lean back on the couch and put my hand flat against my chest. I just want to go home—my Jackson Harbor home, not this Chicago rental I share with three other girls. I want to curl up in my own bed and hide under my own blankets. I want Easton to find me there, crawl in bed beside me, and tell me it’s going to be okay. Tell me he hasn’t been avoiding me.
Easton texted me when he got home, but then his messages became . . . sparse. He said we’d talk when I got home from Paris, that he didn’t want to bother me during my trip, but something felt off.
My phone buzzes, and I jerk upright, reaching for it. Easton’s face grins back at me from the screen. It’s a picture I took of him when we were eating gelato in Montmartre. He’s grinning and has a smudge of chocolate on the corner of his mouth. The picture fills me with conflicting emotions so intense that I feel like I might be torn in two. Joy, because that was the best day of my life. And longing, because whatever we had in Paris is already slipping away.
It vibrates again, and I swipe the screen to accept the call. “Hello?”
“Hey, Shay. What’s up?” His voice is all gravelly from sleep.
“I’m sorry. Are you awake?” Idiotic questions for five hundred, Alex. I flinch when I look at the clock. It’s before eight here, which means it’s not even five in the morning in L.A. “I mean, obviously you are now, but I . . .”
“No, it’s fine. I normally get up at five anyway. Are you okay?”
No. You’ve barely talked to me since you left Paris. “I just wanted to hear your voice.” I hate the sound of the sob in my throat.
“Yeah. Listen, I’m sorry I haven’t called. I came back to a mess here and I just had to deal with everything. I’m glad you texted. I was planning to make this call today.”
This call. Like it’s one very specific conversation he needed to check off a list and not one of hundreds he plans to have with me. “Wha—why? What’s going on?” But I already know. I hear it in his voice. We can’t be together in the real world.