Page 32 of Stuck With the Billionaire Grump

I say nothing.

“Guys, come on!” Lucy shouts through the door. “Just let us out!”

Nobody responds.

She huffs out a frustrated exhale. Pauses for a moment. Then, “We did it! We just kissed! You can let us out now!”

“We know you’re lying!” Katrina calls back.

Lucy grabs the door handle and throws her shoulder against the barrier. Despite how rundown Cabin B is, the door holds firm. She hisses in pain, then tries again.

“Don’t hurt yourself,” I murmur.

“Oh, so youdospeak.”

“I just…” I don’t know what the end of my sentence is supposed to be, so I fall silent.

“I know you hate me, but surely you can close your eyes and think of some pretty girl you like back in LA, can’t you?”

I swallow hard. “No.”

Not because I would have to picture someone else to kiss her. Not because it’s really that horrible to think of pressing my lips to hers for a handful of seconds.

It’s just that I’m pretty sure I’m about to vomit or faint or cry. Or die.

An anxiety attack. I’m having an anxiety attack. A silent one, thankfully, sans hyperventilation, but an anxiety attack nonetheless.

Lucy sighs loudly. The opposite wall groans quietly as she sinks against it.

“I hate this game anyway,” she admits.

Again, I say nothing.

And, for the next twenty minutes, I continue to say nothing. She, too, says nothing. We stay like that, trapped in the dark, until someone finally takes mercy on us. When the lock clicks and the door swings open, several faces peer in on us.

“Well?” Abby prompts us.

“A lady doesn’t kiss and tell,” Lucy replies breezily, walking out of the closet with her head held high. And because she is the sun around which the entire world spins, nobody even seems to remember I’m there. They float after her like mere dust particles caught in her breeze.

Even she doesn’t spare me a backwards glance. I should be offended, but it’s a small mercy, because it allows me to slip away into the night and recover from the remainder of my anxiety attack in peace.

***

I wake up the morning after the barbecue with a jolt, sitting upright in bed as if something physically yanked me out of sleep.

It takes me several minutes to reorder my mind around the present. To remember where I am. To recall that I am twenty-nine, not seventeen. That I am perfectly calm and well-medicated against my anxiety, not panicked and spiraling at every small trigger.

You are fine, I tell myself.

And then I think of Lucy. Twenty-eight-year-old Lucy. Pretty and smiling and dressed in blue, scowling at me from across the yard.

Whatever, Theo. It was twelve years ago.

Her words were defensive. That much was obvious. I hurt her feelings that summer and a small part of her has carried it with her this entire time. Which clearly embarrasses her. But I don’t think it’s something she should be ashamed of.

In fact, I’m the one who is ashamed. Regardless of my panic at the time, I rejected her about ten times in the span of ten minutes. It wasn’t kind.

I run my fingers through my hair and glance at the old analog clock on the wall. It’s barely six thirty in the morning. It’s the day before the wedding, and there aren’t any social engagements scheduled until later this evening. If I pretend to ignore the group chat that Harry added me to, I can have the entire day to myself.

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