Page 42 of Love JD

Sometimes, I felt like I’d teleported. One second, I was somewhere completely logical, and then I blinked, and I was somewhere else entirely. In this case, I found myself lying on my side facing the maple tree, and as far as I could tell, I had landed in one piece. The paved stone under the bench was hard, though, and I sat up rubbing my shoulder and wincing at the soreness. Then I realized I was naked.

“What?” I gusted out, looking down at myself. I’d been stripped from the waist-down, and although I still wore my overall shorts, they had been shoved down my body along with my bra, so my breasts were exposed.

Shaking, I replaced the bra over my breasts and looked around. How could my clothing have fallen off when I fainted? It didn’t make any sense. My bra straps were still on, and my arms were still through my sleeves. It had all been shimmied down like a straw wrapper down an opened straw.

I wiggled my clothing back up, still shaking and confused. The movement pulled at a pain in the fleshy underside of my forearm, and I bent my elbow to peer at it.

“Ah,” I cried out, pressing my lips together in derision. I had a rapidly spreading bruise in the shape of a bench arm, and the impact had torn a small gash in the skin. “Gross,” I groaned.

I pulled myself to my feet, sighing, and fetched my phone, which thankfully hadn’t cracked when it had fallen to the gray stone. Tristan had hung up, and I suddenly wasn’t in the mood for the panicked, self-blaming conversation that would likely happen when Tristan confirmed that I’d fallen, and he magically hadn’t been there to save me. Like he’d ever been there to save me. I texted him instead.

Isla:

I’m fine. Sorry. Anyway, I was just

telling you I’m at Zev’s bc the paparazzi are annoying.

Tristan:

I know where you are.

Zev asked me first.

Isla:

You do realize this is the 21st century

Tristan:

He just didn’t want to piss off his sister’s fiancée.

Isla:

Wait… fiancée???

Tristan:

Yeah I asked her last night.

Isla:

Hopefully she let you down easy.

Tristan:

?? Hilarious. What happened?

You passed out? You should drink more water.

Isla:

You should mind yo

Three dots bounced on the screen, but I shut it off and slipped the phone in my pocket. I really wasn’t in the mood. Plus, my arm was bleeding and was about to stain my favorite jumper.

Warily, I looked around the backyard with the hair on my arms standing up and turning my skin into a bumpy, orange-peel texture. I didn’t notice anything amiss, but my clothes falling off felt distinctly wrong. I couldn’t think of a logical way it would have happened, but I didn’t see anyone around, either. Shaking it off, I hurried through the doorway and across the sunroom before I got blood on Zev’s floors.

I rinsed the gash under the kitchen faucet, sucking in through my teeth as the cold water stung the gash. “Mother fucker,” I gritted out. The cold felt good on the spreading bruise, which more and more looked like it would take on a circular shape, but it stung the open cut. At least it wasn’t my head. Silver linings.

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