Page 31 of Just My Type
“Mkay,” Hannah says absently, reaching for her phone with one hand while she picks up the fresh drink that just got delivered to our table with the other. But the second she looks at the screen, her face falls, and she sets the drink back down on the table with a heavy sigh. Even in my drunken haze, I can see the weight land right back on her shoulders, all the lightness from before gone in a flash.
“What is it?” I ask, reaching over and touching her hand.
Hannah shakes her head. “Fucking Brett. Goddammit, I hate him so fucking much.”
The thing is, her eyes don’t say hate. They say anxiety and something darker. Something that reminds me of the way I saw him put his hands on her three years ago. Of the bruises on her wrists when she showed up at my parents’ house. Something that has worry piercing my drunken haze.
“He’s still texting you?” I growl. I don’t like that at all.
“All. The. Time.” Hannah pokes a finger into my chest with each word and then slams her phone back on the table face down.
“Why?” Suddenly this seems like the most important question I’ll ever ask.
“Who the fuck knows.” Hannah takes an angry sip of her drink. “No. That’s a lie. I know. Because he wants me back. And he doesn’t know how to do laundry.”
“He what?” I say so loudly that I see people turn to our table despite the practically deafening music coming from the karaoke stage.
Hannah shrugs so casually it makes me want to scream because I don’t feel anything casual about that asshole wanting to get her back. I feel like I want to hurl him into the sun. “I mean, I don’t think he actually wants me. More, he doesn’t like that I walked away from him and doesn’t know how much laundry detergent to use to wash his damn underwear. Did you know he’s the reason I can’t write?”
“You told me on the roof.”
Hannah shakes her head vigorously. “No. But did I tell you why?”
I take another sip of my drink, squint my eyes, thinking back. Braining is hard right now. “Because he didn’t treat you right. That’s why I promised to show you how you deserve to be treated. I think I’m doing a pretty good job.”
Hannah’s eyes go stormy. “Well, you haven’t told me that writing romance is a silly girl’s hobby and my books will never be widely respected in the publishing industry, so you’ve already got a leg up on him.”
I clench my jaw so hard I’m shocked my molars don’t disintegrate into dust. Good thing I’m an oral surgeon and I can fix that shit. “What the fuck, Hannah? We need to come up with a better word for asshole.”
Hannah laughs darkly. “Every time I sit down to write, I hear his voice in my head, and I can’t write a single fucking word. Until…”
I feel my eyes sharpen as much as they’re capable of with ten gallons of alcohol swimming in my bloodstream. “Until what?”
Hannah reaches across the table and boops me on the nose. “Until you came along to hang out with me and show me what a nice guy is like. Now I can write words. Not a lot of words, probably not even good words. But words anyway. And you never get angry and grab my wrists until I get bruises, and Ibet you give really good orgasms. Brett never gave good orgasms.” Hannah closes one eye and tilts her head like she’s deep in thought. “That’s a lie actually. He never gave any orgasms. I’m really happy I’m hanging out with you and not with him.”
Hannah sighs and leans back in her chair, glancing casually over at the two girls performing “Defying Gravity” on the karaoke stage as if she didn’t just drop thirty-seven bombs on me in like seven seconds. Fuck, I really wish I was sober.
“How many times did he hurt you?” My voice comes out more sharply than I mean it to, and Hannah’s head whips back around.
“What?”
I grip the edge of the table. “He hurt you.”
She shakes her hair back casually. “Not that badly.”
I toss back the rest of my fourth drink. Fifth drink? Who could say, really. Slamming the glass back on the table, I lean forward as far as I can until I see the gold flecks in Hannah’s green eyes. “He. Hurt. You. How many times, Han?”
“Just twice.”
I don’t know how, but I know she’s telling the truth, and breathe a sigh of relief, flopping backwards. Twice is twice too many, but at least it wasn’t more. “The night at the bar three years ago, and then once the day you came to Boston this past winter. When I saw you at my parents’ house. You had bruises on your wrists then.”
“You mean the day you went all caveman and dropped to your knees in front of me, demanding I tell you who did that to me?”
I point at her. “Listen, Han. Anytime. An. Ny. Time you want me to get on my knees for you, I will do exactly that. Sounds like you don’t just need someone to show you how you deserve to be treated out of bed. I think you need someone to show you what it feels like to be worshipped in bed too.”
Hannah downs the rest of her drink. Her fifth? Sixth? I lostcount of hers and my own. “Are you volunteering as tribute?” she asks dryly.
The server drops another round of drinks at our table, and I down mine. “Don’t test me, Gorgeous. My inhibitions are low right now, and you are the most beautiful woman in the entire world.”
