Page 37 of End Game
PS: Lucky Lady—we’re so jealous.
Forcing a swallow and trying to manage the feelings screeching through my head, I close the computer and stand. Poppy looks at me with a quirked brow.
“Gotta pee,” I mumble and make a quick exit from the porch.
Taking the steps two at a time, I’m in my bedroom in ten seconds flat. My computer goes skidding across the comforter.
I don’t sit. I pace. Back and forth I go in front of the window that overlooks the lake. The pale pink curtains that have hung in this room since I picked them out when I was seven years old flutter in the wind from the open window.
Before I can make sense of anything, the door flies open. I whirl around to see Poppy standing in the doorway.
“You didnothave to pee,” she says flatly. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong.”
“What did you see? Don’t tell me you were looking up Callum’s vacation,” she sighs. “Damn it, Layla.”
“I wasn’t looking up Callum or his fucking vacation. Here,” I say, thrusting the computer at her. “Open it. Passcode is ‘milkshake’ with a one instead of the i.”
“Chocolate or vanilla?”
“Just look,” I sigh, rolling my eyes.
The exact moment she gets to the “honey-haired” piece is obvious because her eyes bug out. “Ooohhh . . .”
“I’m not mad,” I say, more to myself than to her. “It’s not that at all. It’s expected. It’s the natural order of things. I just stupidly forgot that and thought he was all about me this weekend, which, I guess, is a part of his charm and I’m totally capable of understanding that because I’m an adult,” I say, throwing my hand through the air and knocking a candle off my dresser. It shatters on the floor and breaks into a handful of pieces. “Starting now.”
Poppy puts the computer carefully on the bed. “You can be mad.”
“I’m not mad!”
“You’re not mad,” she says, trying to not show her amusement. “You’re . . . irritated.”
“I’m not irritated either. I’m . . . I’m . . . I’m going home.”
Now she laughs. “Because we’re adults, right?”
“Yes,” I say, stomping to the closet and pulling out the few things I bothered to hang up. “I’m an adult and I can go home so I don’t have to look at his smug face for the next couple of days.”
“Maybe he’s not smug.”
“Maybe not,” I say simply, shoving my things into my suitcase. “But if you want the truth, I’m a little embarrassed.”
“At what?”
I fall onto the bed, the adrenaline from the last few minutes catching up with me. Looking at my best friend, I feel the fight wane. “I’m embarrassed at myself.”
My friend sits beside me. “Why would you be? It got you to stop thinking about Dickface and got you off—how many times? Five?”
“Five that time. I haven’t told you the rest,” I sigh. “But that’s not the point.”
“No, the point is there’s nothing for you to be embarrassed about.”
“I know that.I do. I’m a grown woman and he’s most definitely a man,” I whimper. “But maybe it would’ve been nice to think about this two weeks from now and not wonder who came before me and who came after.”
“You mean that figuratively, right?”
“Shut up,” I whine. “Was that girl texting him while we were at the Festival? Did he see her there? Will he see her when we leave?”
