Page 29 of The Boss' Pet

“I’m sorry. I know this is weird.” I rush to her and help her pick her stuff up. “I came in the fire escape. I remembered you saying that the window didn’t latch properly. That’s weirder, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” she says. “It is a little weird. But I don’t mind weird. I wouldn’t be your friend if I did, would I?”

I knew Sasha was the best choice. She’s open-minded and up for anything. She’s the only one of my friends who probably genuinely wouldn’t care that I broke into her house. I’m so glad I judged her accurately that way.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, lifting her serious brown eyes to me. “You wouldn’t have broken into my place if there wasn’t something wrong.”

“I met someone,” I say. “And I’ve moved out of my place. It’s a bit weird. I just needed to talk, and I lost my phone.”

“Let’s talk then.”

“I can’t talk,” I say, remembering the fact that there’s that tracking chip in my neck and odds are, someone’s going to be coming for me.

“You broke into my place to tell me that you can’t talk? What’s going on?”

“Okay. I admit it. I’m on drugs.”

“No, you’re not,” she says. “Your pupils look completely normal, you’re wearing clean clothing, and you’re not grinding or clenching your teeth, or doing anything other than being completely weird.”

This is the problem with having a smart friend. She’s hard to lie to.

“Okay, I’m not on drugs. I just… I slept with someone I probably shouldn’t have, and now I’m trying to clear my head. But the second you started talking about talking, I realized I’m not actually up for talking.”

“I get it,” she says. “But I am worried about you. You’ve been strange lately. I wanted to talk to you anyway.”

“Oh? About what?”

“Lately you’ve been talking about some disturbing things. The obsession with corrupt rich people. It’s become a fixation, and it won’t lead anywhere good. You should go back to school, finish your degree, and get a job.”

I bite my lower lip. I wasn’t going to tell her about Marcus Waterstone anyway, but now I’m extra doubly not going to do that. I know in the past I’ve probably sounded a little unhinged in some of my social media stories, but that’s the point of having them, isn’t it?

“What’s the worst that will happen?”

“The worst that will happen is everybody will think you’re obsessed and stop talking to you, and you’ll never have any romantic experiences that last any longer than you starting to talk about your favorite subject. Everybody knows rich people are bad. It’s not interesting. I’m saying this because I love you, and because people are starting to talk. Mandy is saying she might not have you in the bridal party.”

That last piece of news really catches me off-guard. “I might not be at her wedding?”

“Not if you don’t stop talking about capitalism every two seconds.”

“I haven’t mentioned capitalism this whole conversation.”

“No. You haven’t, and that’s weird too. For you.”

“Listen, I’m sorry. I know we need to catch up properly. I have so much to tell you. Some of it might even be interesting to you.”

Sasha smirks. “I love you, Charlie, but you have to get your life together. We all wanted to be revolutionaries once upon a time, but that’s not how the world works.”

She’s baiting me to go into an absolute fucking tirade about how the world works, and why it works that way. I avoid that conversational bear-trap though.

“If anybody comes looking for me, just tell them you didn’t see me.”

“Why would anybody come looking for you? What have you been doing, Charlie? Are the cops looking for you? We always said you’d end up in jail. I can’t believe we were right.”

“Who is we?”

“Me and the girls. You know. You were there. Maybe you were too drunk or high to remember. You’re always on something, or doing something. It’s time to grow out of that.”

Sasha was cooler back before she decided to take herself seriously and go back to school to become… whatever it is she’s becoming. She’s convinced she knows what is best for everyone, including me.

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