Page 124 of Summertime Friends

“Need to turn around?” the driver asks me.

“No,” I tell him while I look out the window. Liam breaking down on the sidewalk, is finally out of view.

He didn’t stop calling my name. Through the tinted window, I saw the regret pour out of him, how he ran his hand nervously through his hair, and the small trembles in his body.

“He grafting?”

“I don’t know what that means?”

“Trying to win ya ova?” The driver’s accent is extremely brash, making it hard to understand him.

“Oh. No.”

“Shame.”

Shame. I feel ashamed. Humiliated. I can’t believe that’s how he spoke about me to his friends. Embarrassed that I even thought to show up.

After pacing around Cal and George’s place earlier, I decided to go and see him.

Callum had already left. He didn’t know I was coming.

I didn’t know the words I wanted to use, but I knew I wanted to tell him I loved him—in front of his friends. I love Liam so much that I was willing to say it publicly.

I was nervous when I showed up. I contemplated the decision a hundred times before grabbing the restaurant’s door handle and walking in.

Tuning out my inner voice and listening to my heart, I headed to their table.

His voice carried a comfortable distance that rang in my ears when I heard it. It was like smelling chocolate chip cookies and instantly being transported to a favorite memory of home. His voice is home to me and drove my certainty about being there.

The confidence to tell him I love him. I no longer loved the feeling of being with Liam. I’m wholeheartedly in love with him.

My ears were a radio, hearing his voice but not what he was saying, till they tuned in, finding the station that cleared out all the fuzz.

I could hear Liam. Loud and clear.

I didn’t believe it. I couldn’t. I kept walking toward the table. The closer I came to their table, the worse it got.

She’s fucked in the head.

I wish I had never met her.

I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t stand there with all of their eyes on me. Already an outsider to their group, I was curious if they, too, had thought this way about me.

As I walked out the doors, I had already called an Uber. I set the pickup for down the block just in case Liam came after me; I didn’t want it to be easy for him to find me right away. It was the rightdecision, for once, because he did come after me, but not quickly enough. It could have been quick enough if he hadn’t sat there like a coward who got caught.

I wish I could tell the driver that I agree with him. It is a shame.

“Best o’luck,” he calls to me as I get out of the car after not speaking for the past ten minutes. Luck doesn’t even come close to what I need.

Opening the door to his flat, my bags are at the bottom of the stairs.

LIAM

It’s the worst day to have decided to drive my car to brunch. I used the valet when I arrived and am now waiting for them to return with my car.

Minutes I don’t have being wasted. I need to get to my place.

That’s where I’m assuming she went. My gut is telling me that she’s there. And I’m going to trust my gut—I have to. Since the day I met Emerson, I had a gut feeling that she was the one, and I know I’m not wrong.

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