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The next sound either of us makes is when Olivia breathes out, “Wow.”
I don’t know how long we’ve been lying here since I pulled out of her. Time’s lost all meaning. Twenty seconds? Fifteen minutes? Three hours? Beats the hell out of me.
All I know is, I wish we could stay like this forever. Naked, together, totally spent and satisfied.
That’s not reality, though. We need to get back home. And we also need to figure out what the hell this means.
I know what I want it to mean. I want to be with Olivia. Not just a fling. Not just a series of hookups. I want her to be mine, and I want to be hers.
But there’ll be time to think about that later. Right now, I just want to enjoy this moment for as long as I possibly can.
I curl my arm around Olivia and pull her against my side. She leans into it, nuzzling against me, her hair feathering over my chest and sending notes of the strawberry-citrus scent I savored last night floating up to me.
For a moment, I just let myself imagine that Olivia wants the same thing I do.
25
OLIVIA
Iclick on the Instagram notification alerting me to a new DM.
At first, when I read it, I don’t feel anything. What I’m looking at doesn’t register.
For a while, time ticks by as I sit at my computer, looking dumbly at the message. Then, the emotions start.
First is surprise.
Then disbelief. Is this some kind of cat-fishing deal? A prank? But that doesn’t make any sense.
Then annoyance. I’m annoyed that he’s reached his grubby hand back into my life, which he was supposed to be out of for good.
Then anger—anger that he thought he had the right to do so. Anger that he thought I would even consider agreeing to what he’s proposing.
My piece of shit ex-boyfriend Ryan messaged me a couple hours ago, telling me that he and his college hockey team are coming to Cedar Shade to play the Black Bears in a couple weeks, and suggesting that we hang out while he’s here.
Hang out.
I grind my teeth. My eyes narrow on his profile picture, as if staring daggers at an arrangement of pixels could do anything.
In a flash of anger, I delete the message and block his profile. The latter I should’ve done a long time ago. I guess I never expected him to contact me again. The last time we talked, he sure as hell didn’t make it seem like reaching out to me would ever be on his to-do list.
Be serious, Olivia, he said, casually, like it was the smallest deal in the world, you’re just one girl and you’re two hundred miles away. You couldn’t think that would be enough for me.
I’d driven from Cedar Shade to his college in Massachusetts, to surprise him. This was the first semester of freshman year. We’d decided to stay together after leaving high school and going off to different colleges, though I was soon to learn just how different a definition of together we’d both had.
I was walking towards his dorm room, when I passed the common area on his floor. And there he was, with a girl sitting on his lap, making out with her.
It’s been like this since we’ve been together, he said, gaslighting me to high heaven, acting like it was absurd I didn’t already know this. Come on, you see how many girls throw themselves at me. Sure, we’re dating, but this relationship was always a little bit open.
A little bit open …
The anger burning inside me dissolves into a weak sadness.
I’ve worked hard to never again be the girl I was when I was with him. A girl who actually felt gratitude that some handsome, popular guy would pick her. A girl who put so much more into a relationship than she got out of it, hoping that maybe if she put in twenty times the effort he did rather than just ten times the effort he did, he’d show her he loved her as much as she wished he would.
A girl who had no defenses around her heart, so it hurt that much more when he stuck a knife in and twisted.
I heave myself up from the chair at my desk. I stand in front of my window and look out to the street in front of our house. It’s a grey, cloudy day.
