18. Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Eighteen
Allie
I am never drinking again.
I say this every time, but this time? I mean it.
Of course, all it took was making a complete and utter fool of myself.
Kissing Jax? What the hell was I thinking?
The one guy who’s shown me nothing but kindness and patience, and I had to go and mess up the entire thing.
Now everything is going to be an awkward mess.
It’s not like I can just avoid him. Not with Gareth and Nora basically screwing like bunnies now, and James and Ana becoming instant best friends.
So now, every time I see him, I’ll have to carry a brown paper bag to hide my face.
Or a dunce cap for that matter.
My bedroom door suddenly flies open, startling me so badly that I jolt upright in bed.
“Hey, are you ready?” Nora asks, waltzing right in.
My eyebrows pull together as I stare at her, trying to remember what today is supposed to be.
“Ready for what?”
“The zoo?” Ana chimes in, crossing the room before plopping onto my bed. “God, I’m still mad you got this room. This bed is freakin’ huge .”
I flop back onto my pillow, dragging the comforter up to my chin. “I don’t really feel like going. You guys can go though,” I mumble, hoping they’ll just leave it alone and get out of here.
But knowing them…
“Nope. Not happening.”
There it is.
Ana looks around the bed, patting the comforter all over the place.
“Ah, shit. I forgot my phone downstairs. Nora, would you mind grabbing it for me?”
She says it so sweetly that I have to pull the comforter down just to check if she’s okay.
Maybe she’s still drunk…
“Oh!” Nora exclaims, already halfway to the door. “Just don’t leave without me!” she calls out as she heads down the stairs.
Ana laughs, shaking her head. Then she turns to me with her phone in her hand.
“But you just asked her to grab—”
“I know, I know. I just needed to talk to you without Loudmouth for a second,” Ana interrupts, waving off my confusion.
My mouth falls open. “Ana, yo—”
“Listen,” she says, her tone shifting, cutting me off. “I know Jax is the one who brought you home last night. I saw him sneaking out this morning.”
Of course she did. Back to my turtle shell I go. I pull the blanket up over my face to hide my growing humiliation, but she yanks it right back down.
“Oh, stop it,” she says with a chuckle. “I just want the details. No judgment—I promise.”
I pinch my eyes shut, the headache already settling in from having to remember the embarrassment that was last night, along with the world’s biggest hangover pounding deep in my skull.
Dragging my hands down my face, I force myself upright, leaning back against the headboard.
“There are… no details,” I admit with a shrug.
“Oh, come on, Allie,” she says, tilting her head. “No guy stays the night and sneaks out the next morning for there to be no details.”
I roll my eyes. “Well, that’s where you’re wrong. There are no details to be had.”
“Are you upset that nothing happened?”
“Oh, I didn’t say nothing happened. I just said there aren’t any details. ”
She narrows her eyes, turning her body toward me like she’s settling in for the world’s biggest gossip session. “Alright. What happened?”
“I’m just stupid,” I say with another shrug. “Simple as that. I kissed him last night… and he pulled away.”
She chuckles—and it takes everything in me not to kick her straight off my bed.
“Did he pull away because he didn’t want to kiss you?” she asks. “Or was it because he has enough human decency not to put you in that situation while you were plastered ?”
I scoff, shaking my head. “Well, isn’t that the same thing?”
“No!” she exclaims, laughing. “It’s not, Allie.”
I grab a pillow and toss it at her. “Whose side are you on here?”
She catches it effortlessly and lays it across her lap.
“Yours, obviously. But I’m willing to bet you’re not seeing this right.
” She leans in slightly, her tone softening.
“Would you rather he took advantage of you while you were drunk? Or waited until you were sober, comfortable, and knew exactly what you wanted?”
Nora appears in the doorway, leaning against the frame as she looks between the two of us.
“I couldn’t find your phone anywhere down there,” she says, gesturing toward the stairs.
Ana pats her pockets dramatically, then slowly pulls her phone out and holds it up.
“Silly me. It was right here,” she says, standing from the bed like nothing happened.
She and Nora head for the door, but just before stepping out, Ana glances back over her shoulder.
“We’ll talk more later. But right now, it’s flamingo time. We’ll meet you downstairs.”
The door closes, and I let out the world’s most dramatic grunt, collapsing face-first onto my pillow.
The pillow that smells like Jax.
The mix of sandalwood and warm lavender instantly soothes me, making me want to sink even deeper into it and pretend he’s still here instead of it just being… empty.
But I know if I do, Ana and Nora will barge back in and drag me out by my hair like a misbehaving child.
Stupid freakin’ flamingos.
I don’t know whose bright idea it was to add the zoo to the itinerary, but I’m going to fight them.
Between the mile-and-a-half hike it took just to get to the entrance, and now walking all over this place, my feet are already killing me. The heat isn’t doing my hangover any favors either, but I’ve swallowed every complaint for one reason, and one reason only:
I decided today was going to be a good day.
Trevor let me talk to the girls for a few minutes before we left, and although I still get emotional at the reminder that they’re not with me, I didn’t cry this time.
Not a single tear. And somehow, that feels like a small win.
It’s still something I’m slowly getting used to, but I know the second I get back home, all the emotions will hit me at once when I see their things and realize they’re not there.
Sweat lines my forehead as the hot, muggy July sun beats down on us. Every movement feels like it might be my last, but really? I don’t regret coming.
I still want to fight whoever thought this was a good idea though.
Just when I’m about to drop and plop down on the nearest bench, I spot Ana up ahead— skipping down the pathway.
Show off.
“Whose idea was it to add the zoo to the plan?” I ask, hands on my hips while I try to catch my breath and not die.
She laughs, turning around to walk backward. “Yours.”
My mouth drops open as I glance over at Nora for confirmation.
“It’s not a lie,” she says with a smirk. “It really was your idea this time.”
Great, well. There’s another reason to fight myself.
It seems like I’m caught in a constant loop of stupid decision after stupid decision.
But today’s a good day. So maybe I’ll save the round of fisticuffs with myself for another time.
At the rate I’m going, there’s bound to be another dumb decision right around the corner anyway.
“I found them!” Ana suddenly exclaims, breaking into a run.
I’d like to know where this girl gets all her energy after a night of drinking. I swear she had way more than me last night, and yet she somehow wakes up totally fine, while I feel like I woke up in a dumpster.
I pick up the pace, my heart pounding in protest with every slap of my feet against the pavement.
By the time I catch up, I practically throw my backpack to the ground like it’s filled with bricks and grab my water bottle.
“What did you find exactly?” I ask breathlessly, not even bothering to look since I’m too focused on trying to rehydrate and not die.
“Jerry,” Ana says, her voice low, like she just found the holy grail.
I look up with my eyebrows pulled together, watching her stare into one of the animal exhibits. “I’m sorry— who ?”
She points into the pen filled with flamingos. “Jerry!”
“Why do you keep calling flamingos Jerry ?” I chuckle. “You did that when we were looking over the itinerary too.”
“Oh, now you remember,” Nora chimes in, laughing.
Ana shushes her, holding her fingers up. “Shh. You’re going to scare them.”
I shake my head, completely lost. “Seriously, what the hell is a Jerry ?”
She turns to me, grinning. “One of the bands I listen to has a flamingo on their album cover. The fans named him Jerry. It’s a thing.” She shrugs like that explains everything.
Before I can even begin to ask the hundred questions racing through my mind about that, my phone buzzes in my pocket.
Jaxon
Hey. Did you maybe want to talk about last night?
No . Absolutely not . Is he joking? Although my heart clearly didn’t get the memo. It’s just pounding more out of rhythm the longer I see his name lit up across my screen.
Or maybe it’s the near-death experience of this hike.
I stare at the message for a few minutes longer before sliding it into my backpack and zipping it away.
Out of sight, out of mind, right?
“Nora wants to go see the sloths, so I’m sitting this one out,” Ana says, dropping onto the bench behind me.
I slide in beside her, shoulders slumping the second they hit the backrest.
“You don’t want to see the sloths?” I ask.
“No, those things freak me out. They literally live in slow motion.”
I laugh, shaking my head while my eyes drift to the people passing by. I watch for a minute, maybe two, before my gaze gradually drops to the ground and stays there.
“Alright, what’s wrong?” Ana asks, turning to face me.
“Nothing.” I scrunch up my face. “Why?”
“Don’t give me the ‘nothing’ spiel. You’re literally frowning at the pavement, and I know it beat the hell out of you today, but something’s going on.”
I roll my eyes and push my backpack under the bench with my foot. Then, I turn to face her and sigh.
“Jax texted me,” I admit quietly. “Asked if I wanted to talk about last night.”
“Do you?”
I scoff. “No. I don’t want to relive that, thank you very much.”
Ana shifts toward me and grabs my hands, squeezing them gently. “Okay, listen. I want you to know I love you before I say what I need to say.”
She takes a deep breath, her face straight and serious, before blurting, “But grow up.”
My mouth falls open. “ Excuse me? ”
“You heard me,” she says, not even flinching. “You kissed a guy. A guy you like, for that matter. One who clearly likes you back, and now you’re spiraling like you committed some crime.”
I blink rapidly, fully stunned at how blunt she’s being right now.
“You didn’t ruin anything. You had one vulnerable, human moment, and now you’re acting like he’s going to put your picture in his burn book,” she continues when I don’t respond.
I cross my arms, sinking deeper into the bench. “You make it sound so simple.”
“Because it is. He texted you, didn’t he? That means he’s thinking about it too. He wants to talk. That doesn’t strike me as a guy who finds you repulsive after what happened last night.”
My eyes sting with tears, threatening to spill if she keeps pushing.
She doesn’t get it. Any of it. How much I want to be that confident person, the one who believes they deserve the rock star, the happiness, the love, any of it.
I want to believe I deserve these things.
I just don’t. At least not right now.
She places a warm hand on my back, rubbing gently before leaning in closer.
“You’ve got to stop telling yourself you deserve anything less,” she says.
“I know Trevor spent years making you feel invisible, but that’s not your life anymore, Allie.
You left, remember? Because you knew you were capable of so much more than that.
You deserve to have the kind of future that doesn’t make you feel small.
And it’s right there in front of you.” She shrugs. “So take it.”
I nod, then look up at her with a small smile. “I’ll think about it.”
She throws an arm around my shoulders, pulling me closer before resting her head against mine.
“Everything’s going to be okay, Allie,” she says softly. “One way or another.”
We sit like that for God knows how long. Long enough that I start to wonder where the hell Nora is until we finally hear her running up to us.
“Guys! They let me hold it!” she gushes, clutching her chest.
She pulls out her phone and spins it around to show us a picture of her cradling a sloth like a newborn baby.
“Aww,” Ana drawls, leaning in for a closer look. “He looks just like you!”
Nora’s mouth drops open, and my head falls back in laughter. By the time I’m done, my ribs ache, and they’re both looking at me like I’ve lost my mind.
I truly feel sorry for anyone who doesn’t have friends like mine.
There’s so much good in my life that it easily outweighs every bit of the bad, making it all worth it. My daughters, my friendships, my career—all of it.
I’d never tell her this, but Ana is right about me needing to grow up.
Maybe I made a bit of a fool of myself last night, but at least the cat’s out of the bag now, and I don’t have to worry about accidentally letting it out that I like Jaxon Owens—a little more than I probably should.
And maybe that’s something I should take a chance on.
Maybe it’s not.
And maybe, just maybe, it’ll figure itself out on its own by the time this vacation ends in three weeks.