Page 15 of Exes That Puck
Don’t act like you didn’t laugh at that.
I hit send before I can second-guess myself.
The message delivers instantly. I stare at the screen, heart hammering against my ribs, waiting for those three dots to appear. Waiting for her to finally admit that she’s been thinking about me too.
Come on, Kare. Just give me something.
5
The meme’s actually funny. I agree that person is not ready for AP. I can picture Zeke scrolling through his feed, seeing it, and thinking of me. Knowing it would make me laugh.
My thumb hovers over the keyboard. Just a quicklolwould be harmless. Natural. The kind of response friends send each other.
Except we’re not friends.
“Are you seriously about to text him back?” Payton’s voice cuts through my smile.
I jump, phone slipping from my hands. Payton snatches it mid-air with athletic reflexes.
“It’s just a meme,” I say, reaching for my phone back.
She holds it out of reach, scrolling through his texts. Her expression shifts from curious to horrified. “Kara. He’s been texting you and you haven’t blocked him yet?”
“I—”
“Look at this.” She reads his messages aloud. “You make it home okay? You okay?Then this random meme like nothing happened.” Her eyes snap to mine. “Classic manipulation to get you to respond.”
“It’s not manipulation. He’s just—”
“Just what? Checking in? Being sweet?” Payton’s voice climbs higher. “This is exactly how it always starts. First the innocent check-ins, then the inside jokes, then suddenly you’re back in his bed crying about how he doesn’t trust you.”
The words hit hard because they’re true. Every reunion follows the same pattern. Sweet messages that remind me why I fell for him in the first place, followed by the slow slide back into the same toxic cycles that made me leave.
“You already broke up with him,” Payton continues, softer now. “You cried for three days after the last fight. Remember? You said you couldn’t keep drowning in his shit.”
I remember. I remember calling her at two in the morning because he’d accused me of flirting with his teammate’s brother at a party. Remember sobbing into my pillow because he’d looked at me like I was a stranger when I tried to explain.
“Every time you go back, it ends in tears,” Payton says. “And every time, you swear it’s the last time.”
My chest tightens. “But what if—”
“What if what? He’s changed?” She laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “In two weeks? Kara, come on.”
I want to argue. Want to tell her about the way he kissed me Saturday night, gentle and desperate like he was afraid I’d disappear. Want to explain that maybe we just needed space to remember why we work.
But the words die in my throat because I’ve had this conversation with myself a hundred times, and it always ends the same way.
“You have to stop letting him control the cycle,” Payton says. “Every time you break up, he gets to decide when you get back together. He waits until you’re getting your life back, then swoops in with just enough attention to pull you back in.”
The truth of it settles in my stomach like a stone.
“I’m blocking him,” she announces, fingers flying over my screen.
“Wait—” Panic flares in my chest. “Don’t—”
But it’s too late. She hands me back the phone, and Zeke’s contact is gone. Not just muted or hidden. Gone.
“There,” she says, satisfied. “Now you can actually move on.”
