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“Well, you’re still my sister. I don’t care if we’re in a nursing home and someone is an asshole to you then. I’ll still defend you.”
My brother has always been there for me. When we were young, our mother left our father and it made the two of us form a close bond. We moved to a brand-new town and didn’t know anyone. Austin is only a year older than me, but he doesn’t treat me like I am any different. He always treats me like his equal and always looks out for me.
“Did you really call me to tell me to snitch on your best friend if he’s mean to me?” I can’t help but laugh. “Please, Austin. You need to get a hobby or find something better to do.”
“Leo can be a dick sometimes.”
“And so can you. Like right now, interrupting my coffee date with Brynn.” I pull my phone away and glance at the time before holding it up to my ear again. “So, I’m going to go now.”
“How is she?” Austin asks with a hint of amusement in his voice. “I haven’t seen her in quite some time. Does her ass still look as good?—”
“I’m hanging up now.”
Austin laughs and I pull the phone away from my ear as I abruptly end the call. He’s absolutely ridiculous, but I love him all the same.
Brynn is staring out the window, like she’s lost in thought when I walk over to the table. On the other side of the glass, you can see people walking down the street. Idyll Cove isn't a very busy place. It's more of a sleepy little town where people move at their own pace.
It's comfortable. It's home.
Brynn and I met five years ago on the night we both turned twenty-one. I was living in Charleston at the time and we were both out with our separate group of friends. Brynn and I have the same birthday and we ran into each other outside of a bar when we both got separated from our friends. We ended up stumbling down the street, barhopping through a row of dive bars. Things got a little fuzzy by the end of the night. We ended up back at Brynn's apartment where she ended up getting sick. Brynn fell asleep on the bathroom floor, hugging the toilet, and I woke up in the bathtub.
It was quite the night, but it was what started our friendship. Brynn and I instantly hit it off that night and we've been close friends ever since.
"Okay, I need the details immediately," Brynn says as I sit down across from her. She props her elbows on the table and rests her chin on her balled-up fists. Her brunette hair hangs in curls past her shoulders and her bright blue eyes meet mine with an expectant look on her face.
I take a sip of my latte and set it down on the table. "There's not much to tell. We skated together this morning and agreed to be partners."
"But how was it?"
Brynn is my best friend, so naturally she knows everything there is to know about Leo Wells.
I shrug with indifference and adjust myself in my seat. My feet are planted on the floor and I shift and cross one leg over the other instead. If she wasn't my best friend, I would be embarrassed at how much I've talked to her about Leo. She knows that I'm not particularly fond of him, yet I still can't seem to keep my thoughts about him to myself. Thankfully, she's the only one I've confided in about him.
"It was good."
Brynn purses her lips and lifts her head as she folds her arms and rests them on the table. She doesn't look convinced. She looks like she doesn't believe a single word I said. "You're a terrible liar, Ari."
A sigh escapes me and I circle both of my hands around the warm cup. "It was like we had been skating together for years. I don't even know how to explain it. We were completely in sync." I pause for a moment, contemplating whether or not I should tell her the whole truth. "He almost kissed me after we finished."
Her eyes widen and her lips part slowly until her mouth forms an O and she covers it with her hand. She drops her hand and plants them both on the table. "No fucking way. What do you mean almost? What happened that he didn't kiss you?"
"One of the coaches came in while we were in the middle of skating and neither of us realized it. Leo's lips were literally about to touch mine when Coach Kincaid started clapping." I let out a deep exhale and shake my head as I play over the whole thing that happened a few hours ago. "I don't think he saw anything other than the two of us standing close. You know how some of the performances end, so I think it looked normal."
"Thank God," she lets out a breath of relief before her soft laughter floats through the air. Freckles cover the bridge of her nose and are peppered over the tops of her high cheekbones. "I told you, girl. He might act like he doesn't have a thing for you, but he totally does."
I shake my head in disagreement. With the exception of the one night we shared together, there's no way he feels anything for me other than dislike. “I promise you he doesn’t. We both got caught up in the moment, which is easy to do when you have adrenaline and emotion mixing together like that. I didn’t even attempt to stop him.”
Brynn laughs again and sits back in her seat as she picks up her drink and takes a sip. “You didn’t stop him because you wanted him to kiss you.”
I raise my eyebrows at her and I feel the heat prickling my skin as it threatens to travel across my cheeks. “Maybe,” I admit, dropping my voice to a quieter tone. “It doesn’t change the fact that he ignored me the past few months after we hooked up.”
“Oh, totally,” she agrees, nodding as she crosses her arms over her chest while holding her cup in one hand. “He’s a complete douchebag for ghosting you. Not cool and unforgivable, unless he does some apologizing and makes it up to you. Honestly, it's probably a good thing he didn't kiss you."
"You're right," I tell her as I have an enlightened moment, like a whole damn epiphany. "Who knows where it would have gone, and then that's just showing him he can do whatever he wants. Like I'm just here for whenever he wants something from me."
Brynn leans forward, setting down her coffee as she nods again eagerly. "We don't reward ghosting behavior with sexual favors. I swear to God, Ari, you better not give in to this man." She gives me a knowing look. "If you guys are going to skate together, you're going to have a lot of moments like this one. You cannot hook up with him or sleep with him until he makes it up to you. You're not just here for him to fuck around with when it pleases him. We only accept queen treatment here. He can go fuck himself with that fuck boy shit."
I can't help but laugh after she finishes her entire pep talk. I'll give it to her, she made some really good points. I don't know if I consider Leo a fuck boy, but I get what she's saying. And she's right. I can't let him think that any of this is okay. "The thing is, I don't even like him, Brynn. Like, he annoys me and pisses me off more than anyone else."
