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Honestly, I’m starting to wonder, but I won’t say that out loud.
‘I love you,’ he reassures me.
‘More than Blake?’ I ask with a snap.
He laughs. ‘Different kinds of love, babe.’
‘If this Blake gets a ring first, Conner, I will be pissed.’
‘Don’t worry, babe. Soon you’ll wear a rock so big your hand will tire.’ He kisses my lips again and then goes for the doorknob. ‘I’ll call you when I land, alright? Shoot…’ He’s staring at the phone in his hand as it buzzes. ‘I better tell my mom I won’t be home for dinner too.’
He didn’t even tell his mother he’d moved up his flight? She’d planned a going away/last minute engagement dinner with his family. It would’ve been the first time I met them and now he’s going to blow her off like this? He pulls his suitcase into the hallway with him as he texts with one hand. Standing up his mother via text message is just wrong.
I linger at my door, lost for words considering I would do anything to talk to my mom again, but he’s preoccupied by his phone so he doesn’t even look back at me.
‘I guess I’ll talk to you later…’ I call after him, irritation filling my tone, but he doesn’t notice. He lifts a single hand, before the front door of the building slams shut behind him, stopping my heart in a way that’s painful.
Well, this feels just great. But what can I do? I don’t want to be that stage five clinger fiancée no one loves. He’s excited to get back to his friends. That’s normal. I just didn’t realize how excited he’d be to leave me behind – so much so that he requested to change his flight out of here.
After I go back into my apartment, I walk to Spike’s cage, letting him out before he starts swearing at me again. He flies to the top of his enclosure, looking out the window with me. We watch as Conner pulls his suitcase through the front locked security gate towards his car, never once looking back.
‘Spike, see dog. Bark. Bark. Bark,’ he chirps, bouncing around.
Sigh. ‘God, I hope you’re not right.’
4
RIVER
Well, I did it. I bravely showed up for a blind date with a woman my mom chose, and I’ve been waiting on her for an hour. I thought no one could do worse at picking women than me, but at this point, I doubt she’s showing.
‘River.’ My best friend, Dax, answers his phone the same way he always does when I call while he’s working – with the ‘hurry up, I’m busy’ tone.
‘You ever been stood up?’ I ask, moving from the table I was at to the line in front of the window of one of my favorite Portland food joints, the Dawg House. Gourmet hot dogs to die for. The place sits on the corner of a busy SE Portland road in a small A-frame building with a bright orange roof, no indoor seating but picnic tables for diners. It’s not precisely a primo first-date venue, taking a woman out for wieners, but I figured if she hates this, she’s not going to love me, and it’s best to know that early.
‘Nope. I’ve never been stood up,’ Dax says proudly.
I groan into the phone. ‘Read my mood, pretty boy. I need ya right now.’
He goes silent for a beat before speaking again. ‘Oh, then yeah, girls stand me up all the time. Fuckin’ women, am I right?’
There’s the best friend my sister stole from me.
‘Girls, what?’ Hollyn’s muffled voice echoes in the background.
The phone shuffles as Dax probably pulls it away from his mouth and to his chest. He’s doing his best to stay neutral in this relationship as my bestie and his fiancée being my sister. ‘It’s Riv. He needs – emotional support?’ he says, his voice muffled.
‘Oh, how the tables have turned,’ she laughs.
‘Can you tell my sister that if I wanted her stupid opinion, I’d have called her?’ I’m joking and they both know it. I adore Hollyn. She’s my favorite sister. He-he, another joke she hates considering she’s my only sister. We pick on one another out of love, I swear.
‘Never saying that,’ Dax says. ‘Did you really get stood up?’
‘Yep.’
‘You think maybe she showed, saw you, and fled?’ he asks, laughing into the phone.
I sigh heavily. ‘That’s something Hollyn would say. Congratulations, you two have officially morphed into one person. I knew you’d betray me at some point.’
