Page 114 of Always You

“I promise.” Her smile is audible, igniting one of my own, before we end the call. I hand Jason my phone for safekeeping.

“Charlotte?” He hands me a bottle of water, and I take a small sip out of it.

“Yeah.”

“You guys still talking?”

“Now and then.” Definitely not as much as I’d want us to be. We both do our best, but we seem to have a hard time catching each other at the right time. And when we do? The conversations are different, more strained. Like there isn’t just a giant elephant in the room; no, there’s a whole fucking herd.

“You cool with that?”

My gaze locks with his as I go over his words.

Am I cool with that?

No.

But I can’t seem to fix it. As easy as our relationship was back home, is as difficult as our relationship is now that we have a thousand miles between us, and neither of us knows what to do about it. We try to stay connected, but we’re growing apart.

“Hansen, it’sfuckingtime!” Gina pops her head in the door with a glare that speaks as loud as her telling me she’ll rip my balls off if I don’t walk out there within the next five minutes before she disappears again and her heels tap away down the hallway.

“Nothing I can do about it.” I shrug, getting up and walking past him, out of the room. “Showtime.”

43

Julie bursts through the door, slamming the door shut with a loud bang, making me jolt a bit as I look up from my desk.

“Dear Lord, Jules. I’m trying to study.”

“Well, you can stop trying, because once you’ve heard what I heard, your head will processnothing.” She bounces onto her bed, and I look up at her with a furrowed brow.

“Have you seen the news?”

I frown at her definition of news, pretty sure she hasn’t been watching CNN in the last hour. “US Today is not news, Julie. It’s gossip.”

“Yeah, well, the latest gossip is that Hunter ismoving inwith Laurie.”

My face falls, even though I do my best to keep it straight as my heart pounds out of my chest.

“Are you shitting me?”

She shakes her head, her eyes staying completely focused on mine for several moments, probably wondering why I’m not freaking out yet.

Truth is, I am.

There’s a weird sensation that brings every nerve in my body alive, but in a way that makes me want to go to bed and sleep it off, hoping it’s not there anymore when I wake up. Like some kind of stomachbug.

I slowly get up, walking toward my bed beside her, dropping my back on it as I stare up at the ceiling, hypnotized by the string of lights we hung up.

“Show me.” I reach out my hand for her phone.

She places it in my hand while I keep my gaze on the ceiling, swallowing hard, trying to find the courage to look at whatever shitty article will ruin the rest of my day. Or week.Or maybe even fucking year.Bringing the phone up, my eyes look at the screen, a picture of Hunter walking hand in hand with the most popular model in LA. They’ve been dating for months now, so I should be used to it right now.

But still, bile rises in the back of my throat as I soak up the discomfort that it’s giving me. Hunter is looking as good as always, his tattooed arms even more chiseled, his torso covered by a white t-shirt. A black snapback sits on his head, as if he’s been trying to stay incognito, but his boyish smirk gives his identity away. Laurie looks great, as always, in a dress that hugs all her curves, sparkling enough for a night of clubbing even though it’s broad daylight.

It doesn’t escape me that she’s everything I’m not. One of the most famous realtors in LA is standing next to them, as it looks like they enter a house that is listed for sale as said in the article. I keep scrolling down, torturing myself with every new picture that appears, until the last one feels like a knife cutting through my chest. I watch Hunter’s mouth covering hers, forming a pit in my stomach, making it almost impossible to not hurl up my lunch.

I knew this day would come.

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