Page 159 of Give Me Love

Kathrine

The dress I’m wearing may be too short, and the heels on my feet suck, but I don’t care tonight. The dance floor is full, the bar isn’t crowded, and I plan on taking advantage of both.

We stand at a tall table as I drink from my vodka and water.

“So, are you two over, over?” Austin asks me.

“Austin, that’s the last thing she wants to talk about,” Claire says, slapping his arm.

“Yeah, right,” he replies with an eye roll.

“Yes,” I reply, resting my elbow on the table and leaning into my beer. Its coolness feels good against my neck because it’s super hot in here. “I’m done.”

I take a drink from my glass to swallow my lies.

“Kat, his mom overdosed. Just give him some time.” He takes a sip from his beer.

“Give him time?” I ask bitterly. “I found him fucked up with a girl on top of him.”

Anger and pain collide in my chest like two well-formed armies ready to fight and kill.

My best guy friend looks at me with a nod. “Okay.”

I exhale and pick up my shot glass. “To not talking about my love life anymore.”

Claire clinks her glass with mine. “Hear, hear,” she replies with a stern head nod. I throw back the liquor and chase it with my beer as I look around the club.

For a few hours, you can hang out with strangers who don’t know your shit and drink until you have trouble remembering why you came here in the first place.

Bryce passed out on the way home, and Jace and I had to help him into his apartment. Having a grown man lean all his weight on you is a tough thing, especially when that grown man has hurt you in more ways than one, leaving you with no goddamn energy in the first place.

I have so much built-up anger in me right now I’m not sure what to do with it. I wanted to claw that girl’s eyes out when I saw her on top of Bryce.

“Let’s dance,” I say when a good song starts playing.

“You two go ahead. I’ve gotta piss,” Austin says.

We nod and head out to the floor.

My friends and I are four, oops, make that five, shots in, and I hold a beer by the neck while Claire and I move to the beating music. Sweat rolls down my back as the tension I felt earlier starts to melt away.

My eyes shut as I dance to the song, trying to vanish thoughts of Bryce, but then I smell his cologne. It surrounds me, and my heart aches and my blood simmers. I open my eyes, and there he is.

“Let’s go,” he says.

What? How did he know I was here?

“I’m not leaving,” I reply, shifting away from his body. What the actual fuck?

“K, I want to talk to you. Alone.”

I laugh under my breath. “This isn’t the place for talking.”

He thinks he can just come here and interrupt my night. He thinks he can say he wants to talk and I’ll just give in so easily? I tried to fucking talk to him. He ignored me for days. And then I find him fucked from hell and back with some piece of trash covering his body.

My anger comes back tenfold. Claire has stopped dancing, and I give her a look, which she returns with an I’m-not-sure-what-to-do-here expression.

“Fine,” he replies. I watch him disappear through the crowd, and I grab Claire’s hand.

---