Page 114 of The Show

She turned and walked away, back down the corridor to the kitchen, leaving Beulah and me to follow her.

“Ooh,” cried Beulah, when we got there. “They’re great apology cupcakes. I bought them for Kit.”

I reached out and took the enormous box of cupcakes Lauren was holding out to me. Not just any cupcakes, my favorite cupcakes. “These are for me?”

She nodded with a soft smile. “Yes. I’m so sorry, Lowey. I really am so,sosorry. I know I was a dick, but I promise it’s not because I don’t want you and Penn to be together…”

“No?” I raised an eyebrow. “You seemed to have that objection last night.”

“No! No! Honestly, I promise! No, I was pissed that he’d somehow managed to con you into bed, and I didn’t want you to be added to the pile of women he leaves crying around the city. But seeing as he threatened to never speak to me again, I’m assuming he’s not planning to leave any time soon.”

“That’s quite the picture you’re painting,” I grumbled.

If I hadn’t felt foolish before I’d walked into my kitchen, I definitely was now. Foolish and sad. I opened the box of cupcakes and reached for the first of many I knew I’d have tonight, seeing as there were enough in here to put me in a diabetic coma.

“Beulah, you want a cupcake?”

“Hell, yeah.” She grabbed one with red frosting and bit into it.

“Thank you for my cupcakes,” I mumbled to Lauren through a mouthful of chocolate sponge, and waited for the sugar to hit. “You’re forgiven, though ironically I’ve been crying all afternoon and Penn is nowhere to be found.”

Her brow creased heavily. “What?”

I rounded the kitchen island and fetched three large wine goblets and a bottle of red wine from my pantry, then placed them on the counter and grabbed the corkscrew.

“He brought me lunch today, only my mom was there and she’d been on her usual rant. Then she started on Penn, asking him to give me some spare time for dating every day, and if he had any hot guys working at the club to introduce me to.”

Lauren snorted. “Ha! Bet Penny wasn’t too happy about that.”

I pulled the cork out with a loud pop and poured the wine, pushing one glass over to Lauren, and one to Beulah. “He wasn’t, no.”

“If I know anything about my brother, it’s that he doesn’t share.”

“Nope.” I took such a big gulp of wine I almost choked, but took another anyway, savoring the dark berry notes until they warmed my bloodstream. “It’s my fault.”

“What happened?”

Beulah reached for another cupcake, then pulled her hand back. “No, you know what? I’m ordering us all pizzas. I cannot live on sugar no matter how much I want to.”

“Excellent idea. Let’s get a twenty-inch pepperoni with extra cheese.”

“I like your thinking.”

While Beulah reached for her phone and pulled up the delivery app, Lauren turned back to me to continue.

“He’d been asking me to tell my mom about us, and I was planning to…” I took another sip, “but then you and I had a fight, and my mom was being her usual self, and…”

“Oh, Lowe, I’m so sorry. This isn’t your fault, it’s mine.” She reached across the island and tried to hug me, but it was too wide. I appreciated the effort though.

“Thanks.”

“So Penn got mad?”

I nodded. “And he stormed out. Last night I’d suggested we cool things off for a month…”

“Because of me?” she interrupted.

“Kind of. I was upset and panicking everything was going too fast. And Penn is… anyway, it felt like a lot… So today when he realized I hadn’t told my mom, he said I could have my month, and now he’s disappeared.” My wine had kicked in, but only enough that it kicked up my tears again, and not to the point where it had numbed all my emotions. “And I don’t want the month. I don’t need it. I just want Penn back.”

---