Page 95 of Romance Languages

Anger rose in me. Anger at Greg for not understanding, for thinking things could be this cut and dried. Anger at myself for perpetually not having my shit together and hurting good people. Years later, and my actions were still continuing to derail Lauren’s life.

“You wouldn’t understand,” I muttered and left.

I stalked to the bathroom, cutting a path between bargoers enjoying their Friday night without heartache. The sinks had automatic sensors that seemed to be taking the night off. It took waving my hand like a lunatic under two of them until one of them gave me water to splash on my face. The cool water refreshed me.

I looked at the man in the mirror.

“I did the right thing.” I loved Julian, but I couldn’t risk derailing his life. Because no matter how many bad things I might do because of my gambling addiction, he’d always search for the good in me, and that simple fact broke my heart.

I swung open the bathroom door and came face-to-face with Raleigh and Hutch, arms crossed and glaring like they were bouncers prepared to toss me on my ass.

“Evening, fellas.” I laughed nervously. Had Julian’s friends sent them to beat me up?

“What the hell?” Hutch asked.

“Correction. What the fuck?” Raleigh said.

“It wasn’t me who clogged the toilet in there.” I gave them a weak smile, but they weren’t in a joking mood. “How did you know I was here?”

“Greg told us. He said you’ve been moping in bed. Come with us,” Hutch said.

“Uh, if you’re going to shove me in a dumpster, then forget it.”

“We’re going back to your table.” Raleigh hustled me through the crowd.

Unless I could learn Kung Fu super quick, like the file that downloaded to Keanu’s brain inThe Matrix, then I had no choice but to do as they said. They were taller and more jacked than I was.

In silence, we marched up the narrow staircase that led back to the rooftop balcony. Greg had no reaction to seeing me return with two new guys, who now that I thought about it, he’d never met before.

“Gentlemen,” Greg said to my South Rock friends. “Thanks for coming.”

They nodded back.

“Nice to meet you, by the way.” Hutch shook his hand. Raleigh followed.

“What is going on? How do you guys know each other?” My Browerton and South Rock lives had remained separate. Not by some master plan, but more of a work/life balance.

“We don’t,” Greg said. “Raleigh messaged me on Instagram.”

“You’d talked about Greg before. I knew he was a close friend of yours. I put my masterful social media sleuthing skills to work,” Raleigh said.

“Masterful.” Hutch rolled his eyes. “Seamus is friends with only one Greg. Don’t apply to work at the NSA anytime soon, pal.”

Raleigh gave him the talk to the hand sign, straight out of the ‘90s. Hutch responded by high-fiving it.

I turned to Greg for some clarity.

“They reached out, rightly worried that you weren’t doing too well. They told me what happened with Julian.”

I whipped my head to Hutch and Raleigh. Of course their boyfriends had given them the scoop. And then they’d relayed the details of my devastating Friday to Greg.

I turned to my frat brother. “So this whole time, you’ve been playing me? Getting me to talk about what happened when you already knew?”

“Talking it out is good. I told them we’d be here tonight.” He shrugged, as if it were all that easy. I appreciated that my friends had coordinated to check up on me, even if in the moment, I wanted to be left alone.

“We were going to sneak in wearing fake mustaches,” Raleigh said.

“No,weweren’t.Youwere going to. I talked you out of it,” Hutch said.

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