Page 112 of Off Pitch

“What’s your favorite color?”

“Blue. Just a standard blue.”

“Favorite food?”

“Chicken wings. Only really eat them during the offseason, but I still love them.”

“Last but not least, favorite Taylor Swift song?”

“Hmm…” Cole rubs his chin, thinking. “What has everyone else said to that?”

“Lane saidThe Very First Night.“ I decide to tease him a little bit. “But Rory said her favorite isDress.”

“Oh,” is all he can say before an unmistakable blush flushes across his cheeks. “Interesting.” He coughs now, trying to regain his composure. “My favorite would be…Shake It Off,I guess. That one’s fun.”

“So stereotypical,” I say as I laugh. “Going for one of her biggest singles.”

“I don’t know her entire discography front to back like you do, Lo.”

Cole and I dissolve into conversation now, enjoying a bit of downtime before he needs to warm up for the game. And it actually gets my mind off Knox for at least a bit.

This hurts, and it’s going to hurt for a while.

But I’m strong.

I’m going to be okay.

I know I am.

forty-two

Knox

The past three nights,I’ve slept like absolute fucking shit.

I know Harlow and I are in this situation right now because of me, but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m completely torn up over it. The last thing I wanted to do was hurt her.

But that’s exactly what I did.

I hurt her so much that the only times I’ve seen her since were Friday morning when we walked around The Battery and right now as we’re grabbing coffee on Sunday.

This is another prearranged outing that Harlow said we shouldn’t cancel. That we still need to “keep up appearances.”

Fuck appearances.

I just want to go back to the way things were.

I just fuckingmiss her.

I don’t care about the sex. I don’t care about the goddamn fake dating arrangement.

I just want her to really talk to me again.

The closest I can get to that right now is her making small talk during our public outings. She’s not speaking to me outside of that.

I hate this so fucking much, but I have no one to blame but myself for this situation.

“So,” Harlow says, grabbing my attention. “Ready for your start tonight?”

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