29. Mia
TWENTY-NINE
Mia
“You look sexy as fuck,” he tells me, the wrong color eyes roving up and down my body possessively. I’m the number one blonde for him now. I’m wearing the heels. I’m wearing the dress. I got it dry cleaned just for this.
I grin the grin. “Thanks,” I tell Adam, dragging him by the hand towards the fancy cocktail bar Leo wants us all to gather at on Friday night.
Is this a little petty? Maybe. Is this pretty trashy? Yes.
I just don’t believe Elias. There’s no fucking way. He just needs to realize it. I’m not a fucking wallflower, and I refuse to be second best to Leo for this . This is something worth fighting for. Maybe he’ll realize it when he sees this soft-looking emo kid.
Until then, though, the wrong sized hand cups my ass in this dress without permission. The wrong fingers grip my waist and tug me towards him with the wrong amount of pressure. Ugh.
“I’m glad you texted me,” he says, as we stand just outside the bar. “I haven’t heard from you in months. I thought it was because I came on too strong with those texts…”
I think way back, months ago, to another set of texts, to what started this whole situation in the first place. “I… sorry. Something came up. School got really busy.”
He shrugs. “No problem. We’re here now.”
“I…” I gather my Hot Girl energy. “I’m not looking for anything serious, Adam,” I tell him. “This is just for fun. Is that okay with you?”
He smiles, and it’s sexy, but it’s all wrong. “We’re on the same page,” he says.
“Great,” I say, turning and dragging him into the bar.
Immediately, I spot Leo and a familiar head of light brown curly hair sitting at the bar.
I turn around towards my date, leaning into him. He’s too slender, lean and wiry muscle instead of thick mass. He’s the wrong height. With my man-eater heels on, we’re at eye level. He grins at me. It’s all wrong, and it’s a little leery. I drag my finger across his bottom lip anyway. “This mouth is just as hot as I remember.”
He sucks my finger into his mouth, and it’s too wet when his tongue wraps around it. “It’s gonna look even hotter wrapped around your nipples later.” Ugh. How unoriginal. That was my line.
I glance back towards the bar, knowing the look I’m waiting for. Sheer devastation, a wreckage?—
Elias is looking at me, frozen on his bar stool… but the look is all wrong. His eyes are fixed on my face with a… vacant sort of eagerness. It’s empty. He waves at me, at us, with a vapid smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. Indifferent. As if I were just another member of his Blonde Brigade that just so happened to be here, and he is forced to be diplomatic or considerate for the sake of civility in public. I want to claw it off his face.
Fuck that .
Even more determined, I start my little Hot Girl march over to them, dragging Adam behind me.
“Hey, guys,” I tell my brother and Elias brightly.
“Hey, Meems,” Leo says, narrowing his eyes at Adam behind me.
Elias smiles at me as if it’s a courtesy, waving at me again, with a cold, fake familiarity, and I’m about ready to chop his fucking hand off.
“Remember Adam?” I say.
Adam steps forward to put his hand on my waist. I track Elias’s eyes when they flick down to where Adam touches me. Get mad. Give me something . I watch his face, his hands, for the twitch he gets when he wants to touch me. His hand starts to reach out…
To Adam. “Hey, man. Nice to see you again,” says Elias, voice falsely enthusiastic as they shake hands.
No .
“Hey,” Adam replies. He turns to my brother. “I hope this is okay?”
Leo shrugs. “Just don’t be a dick. If you are, we’ll have to kick your ass.”
What the fuck is happening right now?
I’m ready to scream at everyone, blow up Elias’s and my spot, kick Adam to the curb, something, when there’s movement from the corner of my eye.
A slender blonde woman steps between Elias’s knees where he sits on the barstool, with confidence, as if she is convinced that she belongs there.
His face breaks from his cold mask. He grins at her, giving her everything , everything that’s mine , that belongs to me —green eyes sparkling, flashing her the Dimple, my Dimple, slipping two fingers into the waistband of her pants and pulling her closer.
A knife buries deep into my sternum, twisting.
Her fingers press into his cheek, into my Dimple.
“Hey, Gorgeous,” he greets her. Authentically warm. In that voice, using my nickname.
“Mia?” Leo is asking, maybe repeating my name, but his voice and the ambient noise of the bar sound far away and like we’re all deep underwater.
Elias’s eyes flick towards me.
It’s then that I realize that I’m crying, because I see him tracking the tears running down my face. His jaw clenches briefly, but that’s all I get. He turns back to his blonde. He tugs on her hair, smiling at her again, saying something I can’t hear over the blood rushing through my ears.
“Okay,” I whisper, but I don’t know who I’m talking to. Him? Myself? Adam? I feel my body folding into itself. I take Adam’s hand and slump out of there, a sad little insignificant wallflower, second best blonde in the bar, crushed beneath Elias’s shoe.