Page 27 of Be Mine, Sweetheart (Something Borrowed 3)

Before he got ready for bed, he shot off a text to Kelly.

Hey, sorry, wasn’t ignoring you. Just had a rough day. Not up for talking. Off to bed. Will text tomorrow. Night.

Chris put his phone on vibrate and stripped down to nothing. He downed some ZZZQuil to aid the sleeping process. Then, he crawled under the covers and took a deep breath, trying not to think of anything heavy. His brain grew fuzzy and before long, he was drifting off to sleep.

Chris found himself in the middle of a crowded dance floor, surrounded by couples swaying to a slow country song. All of it was eerily familiar and he realized as he pushed through the wall of bodies that he was at his senior prom in the Sacramento Hilton Ballroom. Streamers, twinkling lights, and giant silver stars decorated the dark ceiling. It was supposed to create the illusion of a “Starry Night,” which was the theme they’d voted on three months earlier.

He looked for his date, Zoe, but she was too busy making out with her ex-boyfriend in the corner.

Fan-freaking-tastic.

Even in his dreams, he still didn’t get the girl.

Chris headed over to the separate room with linen-covered tables to sit. When he walked through the archway, he realized the room was now completely empty except for Ray. Even the cheesy love song had evaporated, leaving an almost chilly silence.

Ray sat facing him on the other side of a white table covered in half-eaten chicken and steak dinners and a beautiful flower centerpiece with silver stars poking up between the white roses. Ray looked just as he had that night. He’d had his mom braid his afro, creating clean even rows on his scalp. He was decked out in a white tux, his top hat sitting on the chair next to him. It was funny that before high school, Ray had been the shy one, and Chris the extrovert. Not anymore.

Ray nodded at him. “Hey, man, where’s your date?”

Chris sat down next to the hat chair and sighed, forgetting for a minute this had all happened before. “Getting back together with her ex, apparently.”

“That sucks. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I knew that they had just broken up and I was an idiot to ask her.” He looked around, noticing several men in the corner breathing fire. Another was doing back hand springs from table to table, drawing nearer and nearer.

Chris frowned when a couple of clowns raced by on mini bikes. “Where’s Kelly? And I thought our theme was Starry Night? Why are those guys tossing torches at each other?”

Ray ignored his question about the performers and lifted a water glass in his hand. “Kelly is most likely at home. Probably sleeping.”

Chris was surprised by how casual Ray was about it. “What? Kelly wouldn’t ditch you.”

Ray shook his head. “I ditched her, remember?”

Chris frowned. Ray had never deserted Kelly on a date. Besides his one crisis of adolescence their sophomore year, Ray had been the perfect boyfriend. At least, according to Kelly.

With a wry smile, Ray opened his white jacket and four red circles formed on the white dress shirt beneath. Blood ran down from the holes, turning his suit crimson.

“Are you up to speed now?” Ray asked.

Chris stared at him, horror flashing through his body as rationality broke through fantasy. “You’re dead.”

“That I am.” Ray pulled his jacket closed, then brought the water glass he’d been holding to his lips. “But forget about my problems. Your love life sucks, right? How can I help fix it?”

Chris wasn’t about to tell his dead best friend that all his relationships seemed to fail because of his friendship with Ray’s former fiancée.

Or that he’d recently been fantasizing about her naked.

Ray set his glass down and waved his hand casually. “If you’re worried I’m going to get mad about you using Kelly to chase girls off, don’t be. If you two want to live in a lonely little bubble for the rest of your lives, more power to you. I just think you aren’t being fair to each other.”

“What do you mean?”

Ray sat back in his chair, pushing the front legs off the ground. “I mean that neither one of you are moving on with your lives. You have your careers and each other, but where is the love? The happiness? What else do you have?”

Ray’s observations hit too close to the points Trevor and Maria had been trying to make.

“I had a girlfriend.”

His friend scoffed. “Who dumped you. I knew that was going to happen, but not you. You actually thought she was going to share her dessert with you?” Ray laughed uproariously before ending his mirth with a sigh of, “Dumbass.”

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