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“This is so good,” I say around a mouthful of beef. “I’ve died and gone to meat heaven.”
“I know I should be a vegetarian but oh my god.” Cat moans as she takes another bite.
We plow through at least six tacos each and then end up sprawled on the couch with our pants unbuttoned, glasses of wine in hand.
“So,” she says, swirling her wine like a pro and looking over the rim at me. “I’m dying here, Ange.”
“Ughhhh,” I say. “Fine. But if I’m going to tell you about this you have to promise me you won’t talk to Jamie about it.” The thought of the two of them matching up the pieces of what Carter and I have told them respectively makes me cringe.
“Fair enough,” she says.
I take a deep breath and launch into the story, starting at the very beginning: the crush I had on Carter in high school. Then I tell her about that one week we spent together years ago, which has her cursing and screeching.
“How come you never told me?!”
“Because…” I trail off, trying to think of how best to put this. “I guess I was ashamed? Of the fact that he ended things between us so silently. And of being left behind. And of the fact that I clearly felt so much more for him than he did for me.”
Cat’s big brown eyes go sad and dark, her brow furrowing. “Ange, I never would have judged you. Hated Carter, forever, yes. But I wouldn’t have thought anything badly about you.”
“I didn’t want to be pitied,” I say.
“I wouldn’t have pitied you. Back then, I was deep in denying my feelings for Jamie at all costs. If anything, I was the one worth pitying,” she says, though I can tell she’s joking.
“I’m so happy you have Jamie. Seeing you two together, and even just my moms’ relationship makes me wish…” I trail off, unable to finish that thought.
“That you had Carter?” Cat supplies.
“Maybe. But maybe not. I don’t know.”
“Tell me about the island,” she says softly.
And so I do—sparing no detail, except for some of the most explicit ones. Though what I do tell her has us both blushing and shrieking and Cat saying, “I never knew Carter had a daddy inside of him all along!” Which in turn has me bursting intopeals of laughter so strong I nearly cry. It makes me feel like we’re back in high school again, trading stories about guys we hooked up with and asking one another the type of intimate questions that only curious teenagers can ask.
When I get to the part at the end, and tell her what Carter said to me on the boat, and how I told him I wasn’t sure if I forgave him, she gets somber and reaches out to grip my hand.
“I wouldn’t have been sure either,” she reassures me.
“I just don’t know what to do now. I don’t even know what’s going on. Look at this.” I pull my phone out of my pocket and show her my text conversation with Carter.
Cat takes the phone, scrolls for a moment, reads every text, and then says, “Angela, I think what’s going on is that you and Carter are dating.”
I grab my phone out of her hands. “No we are not.”
“He kissed you, you hooked up with him a few times, he told you he’s going to want you forever, and he’s texting you telling you that he’s thinking of you. And you responded! With an equally cute text. If that’s not dating, then what else would you call it?”
“Stumbling my way through the dark?”
Cat scrunches her nose up at that and shakes her head.
“I told him I wasn’t sure, and I meant it.”
“But maybe dating him is the only way you canbecomesure,” she tells me.
“What happened to hating Carter forever?”
“That was before you told me about your romantic week on Isle North. But seriously, if you don’t want to be with him, then don’t. I just want you to be happy.”
“It’s not that I don’t want to be with him,” I admit. “It’s that I can’t imagine being with him and also feeling safe and happy in that relationship. I mean you know a bit about the other guys I’ve dated.”
