Page 40 of Green Flag
I could feel my feet on the floor, but it didn’t feel like I was connected to them. My chest tightened as everything around me, including Bella excitedly prattling on, was outside my hemisphere.
Everything narrowed to the screen.
Of course he’d commented and messaged with a fake account but liked it as himself. Wanker.
I read the words over and over again. Pedro called me cute.Cute?
When he’d gone, I was twenty, and yeah I was cute. But I wasn’t the twelve-year-old he’d first met. I wasn’t the fifteen-year-old he’d called mature. It had been four years since I’d last seen him. The first thing he could say to me was that I wascute?
All the happiness from the day was suppressed by a horrible knotting low in my stomach as I struggled to swallow. What had I expected? What did I want?
Because there was the slightest spark of hope in my chest that I wanted to extinguish. And I didn’t know what that meant anymore.
I wasn’t in love with him. Somehow, despite all the time that had passed, I had love for him. He was my first and only.
But he was also the reason love and sex were twisted in my mind. I could rationalise that far, at least.
And he didn’t deserve my damn time or thoughts orlove.
“Is that…” Bella’s eyes widened at my screen and she lowered her voice. “Is that Pedro Velazco?”
I locked my phone immediately and begged her with my eyes to stay silent.
Her head leaned back and she nodded slowly, lost in thought. “You’ve got some explaining to do.”
What explanation was there to give? He was a mostly fond memory, which was where he should stay.
If only he didn’t hold some of the key information I needed.
I’d have to befriend him for a while. But knowing him and his likes, it wouldn’t be as straightforward as a hook-up. He liked what he couldn’t — and shouldn’t — have because I’d been underage when we first got together.
And it wouldn’t be smooth sailing to persuade him I was on his side.
“What’s going on here?” Luca asked over my shoulder, bringing me back to the present. He was chipper, as always.
Bella spoke so fast that Luca raised a hand and said, “Woah, slow down.”
“Ev wrote a song about StormSprint—”
“I was careful not to name the championship,” I added a little louder than usual, noticing that Livie’s eyes were intent on her iPad, a headphone in her ear. She made no sign that she heard me.
“Oh, that little old thing?” he teased, eyes crinkling as he leaned over me, his arm snaking over my shoulder as he peered at the screen. “Yeah, I’ve had a few DMs about it.”
I turned to face him, but he was still leaning. My mouth was inches from his face, like when he’d kissed my cheek as he’d made me finger myself.
“Why have you…?” I started, very aware my breath was on his chin.
“I shared it.”
“You did?”
“Got to support my grid girl,” he said with a boyish grin. “Especially when she’s so good at supporting me.”
I searched for his profile and felt a crackle of shame when the blue button said, ‘Follow Back.’ I hadn’t noticed him follow me. I would have followed him back. I pressed the button so violently that my finger almost knocked my phone out of my hand.
“Or maybe she doesn’t support me if she didn’t even follow me,” he drawled with a shake of his head. “I’m hurt.”
“I didn’t—”
