Page 58 of Just Friends
I took a moment or two to compose myself, then called her back on FaceTime.
She answered right away. She was in her loft bedroom in the yurt we shared, looking comfy as she sat on her bed. “Pip! Are you okay?! I saw you fall on your live-stream!”
“I’m fine, Paulie,” I said sheepishly. “You’ve seen me take a spill like that a million times before.”
Before I was diagnosed with cataplexy, randomly falling was just one of my weird quirks—and it happened most often when I was laughing really hard, which made the problem seem more comical than concerning. That’s one of the reasons why I never went to see a doctor until Jax told me I should—I didn’t think my falls could be related to an actual medical issue.
“Yeah,” she said, “but it’s different when I’m not there in person. What triggered it this time?”
I rolled my eyes. “Really? Isn’t it obvious?”
“Obvious that you and Jax are a perfect match? Yes, duh!” She laughed at her own joke, but once she saw the serious look on my face, she stopped laughing and cautiously bit her lip. “Er, sorry. Take it easy, sis; it was just a joke.”
“Well, what’snota joke is that Soulmate is ruined. The promotion was a disaster.”
Paulina waved her hand at me. “Oh, come on. You’re being dramatic. What happened on stream wascute,not a disaster.”
“Did you see what people were saying in the chat? Because they didn’t seem to think it was very cute.”
She bobbed her head. “I did. And those people are totaldickbags, by the way.”
“Yeah, but if Soulmate’s going to be a success, I needthose total dickbags. And right now, they think I’m scamming them.”
“So what? Who cares what they think.”
“I care, Paulie. Without their support, my app won’t make any money.”
“You know what would prove them wrong?” she asked with a wily twinkle in her eye.
“What?” I grumbled, already fearing what she was going to say.
“If you and Jax just saidfuck itand went to that party together anyway and had a great time.”
“Why would we ever do that?” I asked rhetorically. “There’s no point now. Besides, it’d only fuel the speculation that I was scamming everyone in the first place.”
“Um, because it’d prove that Soulmate actually worked? Duh. You won the promo after all. Screw the haters. They’re just jealous that you matched with him.”
“But Jax is my … my …” I struggled to say the words; my throat had gone bone dry.
“Your number one match?” she asked with a sneaky smile.
“Yes!” I blurted out in a fit of excitement. “Er, wait—no,” I stammered, trying to maintain control of the narrative. “He’s just my best friend.”
“Still sticking with that story, huh.” She rolled her eyes. “Anyway, can I just say how sweet it was when Jax picked you up and carried you away? I loved that! My heart turned to mush. Jax is so sweet.”
“Yeah, um, he always takes good care of me when I fall …”
“I can tell,” she said. “I could really hear it in his voice afterward, too.”
I gulped. “W-what do you mean?”
“Well, after he carried you off camera, I could still kinda hear him being sweet with you.”
Suddenly paranoid, I jumped out of bed.
“Hold on,” I said.
I stepped through my bedroom’s sliding door and went out onto the balcony, where Jax wouldn’t overhear us. “Okay … so how long were you watching the stream?”
