Page 29 of Texts From My Exes
You look familiar and fuckable,I thought.Just like I remember.Oops.
“Statistics!” I blurted.
His brows lifted. “Excuse me?”
I laughed. Too loud. “Ha, ha—math. Stats. You like numbers. Me too.”
What? What? What was that?
He leaned down, blocking my body from the view of my set-up phone. “You okay? You’re shaking.”
“Cold,” I lied. “Ice on my tits.”
And I wondered why I was in this predicament? With the dating? Well I need not look further thanice on my tits.
He snorted. “Why do I feel like that should be a song?”
“Because it should,” I whispered.
“Relax,” he murmured. “It’s just me.”
But it wasn’t. Not this version.
This wasn’t Ezra from my kitchen. This wassexiest man aliveEzra. The kind of man you climbed like a tree—not because you wanted to, but because biology demanded it.
I was still trying to remember how breathing worked when I heard it.
“Ezra?”
A woman’s voice—warm, lilting, and absolutely sure of itself.
He froze. Just for a second. Just long enough for me to notice before he turned toward her with a smile that was polite but… tight.
She was gorgeous in thateffortless, I don’t have to try because God just made me like thisway. Long, hair twisted into a glossy knot, a silk blouse tucked into tailored trousers, diamond studs flashing at her ears. She walked right up like she owned the oxygen between us. The hate I felt was immediate. I’d never been one of those girls, is this what it took to turn me into them? Just one girl looking at Ezra? What was mine? My best friend? My fake date? Vex?
“I thought that was you.” Her eyes skimmed him in a way that said she’s either seen him naked or wants to. “It’s been, what… since Yale?”
Yale.
I blinked in shock. Ezra went to Yale? Since when? I met him Freshman year, second semester, had he transferred then?
He didn’t even look at me—just smiled faintly at her. “Hey, Lila. Yeah. It’s been a while.”
“More than a while,” she said, her tone dipping intosomething happened between usand I’ve never forgotten it territory. “You disappeared. No calls, no texts. Next thing Iknew…” She trailed off, glancing at me like I was the world’s worst interruption. “Well. I guess you’ve been busy.”
My grip on the napkin tightened. My brain tried to connect dots—Ezra, Yale, Yale Girl,Vex—but the picture wouldn’t quite form. Wait, why did this version of him look so familiar?
“Oh, I’m sorry.” She gave me the kind of smile rich women give poor women in old movies. “I’m Lila. Ezra and I… go way back when he had his YouTube channel.”
Go. Way. Back. YouTube?
I smiled sweetly as haunting images of a guy named EZ Wyatt or Ezra Wyatt popped up into my head like a social media feeding frenzy. I’d been obsessed with him since age twelve then he just, stopped posting content. “I bet you do.”
Her eyes flicked to my phone on the table, angled perfectly at us. “Filming again? Good for you.”
“Something like that,” I interrupted.
For the first time, Ezra looked uncomfortable. His jaw flexed once before he cleared his throat. “Good to see you, Lila. We should?—”
