Kacey’s eyes dropped to the floor, and she no longer looked like she had anything to say. She stared at the floor in silence for what felt like hours, never budging the way I wished she would. When she finally looked back up at me, her eyes were filled with tears and her face was pale. “I’m just happy you can move on now. You always deserved better than me. I hope now you can find that.”
Without another word, she turned on her heels and walked out of the bathroom. I listened as she made her way down the stairs and out the front door. Not even a minute later, the door opened back up.
“Kari?” Bo called out hesitantly.
I rushed down the stairs, still fuming from what had just happened. When Bo saw me, he put both hands in the air, his face just as pale as Kacey’s had been. “Listen, I had no idea. If I had any clue that was going to happen, I never would have -”
“Just stop,” I interrupted. “I have no interest in anything you have to say to me right now. For once, just mind your own goddamn business and stay out of mine.” I shoved past him and ran out the front door.
I should have felt bad for how I was treating him, but right now I only had one thing in my mind. The date June eighteenth and the events of that day and the days that followed, kept playing on repeat inside my head.
***
“We should go on a trip to celebrate you graduating and me starting my senior year.” Kylie stared at me as I stared down at my phone.
This was what my life had become since Kacey dropped out of school and moved back home. Watching my phone and waiting for the call or text that didn’t even come some days. When we did talk, it felt strained most of the time. I knew there was so much she wasn’t sharing with me, and all the secrets were driving a wedge between us.
“Earth to Kari,” my sister’s voice interrupted. “I was saying we should take a trip together. Maybe a long weekend at the beach?”
When I reluctantly looked up from my phone, Kylie looked between the silent object and me. “You can ask Kacey to come if you want. Maybe it would be good for you guys to get away for a bit. If Kacey wants to come, I’ll ask Jeremy to come along. I know things are pretty new between us, but I’m sure he’d love to come.”
Before I could answer, the sound of a text message coming through stole my attention. I smiled in spite of myself as Kacey’s name popped up on the screen. My smile, and my phone, fell when I read her text. We need to break up. That was it. No explanation, no apologies. Just those five words.
“Kari? What’s going on?” Kylie’s voice sounded so distant as I sat there frozen, unable to move or speak.
“I…” I shook my head, unable to say the words.
Kylie picked my phone up off the floor and read the text. “This has to be a joke, right?”
I shook my head again as my whole body started to shake. “I don’t think it is.”
Within seconds, Kylie was by my side with her arms wrapped tightly around me. “What can I do?”
My breaths came out ragged as I tried to swallow my tears. “I don’t know. I think… I need… I need to call her.”
I quickly stood from the couch and clicked on Kacey’s name as I walked out of the room. The phone rang only a few times before sending me to voicemail. Thinking this must have been some kind of mistake, I hung up and called right back. This time, it rang even fewer times. I thought about leaving a voicemail but hung up when I heard a text come through. It’s for the best if we just cut this off completely. I’m sorry.
I walked back into the room my sister was in, unsure what to say. How could I explain what had just happened? What I felt right now?
“How did it go?” my sister asked.
Only I couldn’t answer. Tears streamed down my face as I continued to shake my head back and forth, unsure what else I could do. Before I knew it, my sister was standing right beside me and I fell into her arms and wept.
Chapter 4
I groaned when I heard my doorbell ring, assuming I didn’t want to talk to whoever was on the other side of the door. A week had passed since dinner at Bo’s and I had successfully avoided everyone in that time. Even all of the apologetic calls and texts from Bo weren’t enough to get me to respond to him.
“Who is it?” I yelled through the door.
“It’s me,” Bo’s voice answered. When I didn’t immediately answer, he continued to yell from the other side. “Listen. I know you don’t want to talk to me. It’s pretty obvious since you’ve been ignoring me all week. But we need to talk, and I’ll use my key if I have to.”
I reluctantly opened the door and let him in. As soon as he was inside, I noticed how tired he looked. His hair was sticking out in every direction and his eyes had rings around them. I immediately wished that it wasn’t because of me.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
Bo placed both hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels. “Well, my best friend won’t talk to me because of a really stupid mistake I made, so I guess you could say I’ve been better.”
“That’s really why you look like you haven’t slept in days?”
Bo looked at me, his expression more sincere than I had ever seen it in the past. “I look like I haven’t slept in days because I really haven’t. And, yes, it’s because of you. I might act like an immature asshole about ninety-five percent of the time, but I really do have a heart.”
I reached out and grabbed his hand, hating to see him look so fragile. “I know you have a heart, Bo. Why do you think I’m friends with you?”
A small smile finally came onto Bo’s face. “I always thought it was because of the fact that I’m devilishly handsome.”
I laughed, starting to feel good for the first time in days. “Well, that is a big part of it, but I also think you’re pretty cool.” My face became serious as I squeezed his hand again. “I’m the one who should apologize, though. I haven’t been fair to you. I’m not too happy that you tricked me into that dinner, but I have to admit that it actually was going well before the bomb dropped. And it’s not your fault that happened. You had no way of knowing that she cheated on me or that I would find that out during dinner.”
Bo blew out a breath. “Yeah. I definitely didn’t see that coming. I knew things ended badly between you two, but I didn’t know it was that bad.”
“You and me both. I was shocked when Kacey dumped me and even more shocked at how she completely cut me off after that. But never in my wildest dreams did it cross my mind that there was someone else involved. Never in a million years did I think she would be the type of person to cheat.”
Bo shook his head and moved past me to sit down at my kitchen table. “I just don’t get it. I don’t know why she would go to some guy when she had a hottie like you. Don’t get me wrong, I love what God blessed me with in my nether regions, and I do a good job with it—”
I put up my hand. “Please don’t say nether regions ever again.”