CHAPTER FORTY-THREE #2
“We sent Savannah in first, but now you can give us all the rundown,” Meredith says plainly.
She’s sitting criss-crossed in my desk chair, fiddling with the hem of her pajama shorts. Every time I’ve looked at her in the past few weeks, I feel a chill run up my spine. I can’t point out exactly what it is—which bothers me to the greatest extent—but I know something is going on with her.
It just feels like there must be something lying underneath the surface to give her that vacant look in her eye. I’m going to figure it out sooner or later. I know I will.
Kara is with Savannah on the bed. She must have just gotten back from wherever she was. Eden is lying on the floor with her legs propped up against my dresser.
“Get talking,” Kara urges.
Eden nods enthusiastically. “Yeah, please make this quick. I have to leave in a few minutes.”
All eyes fixate on her. It doesn’t come as a shock, considering she’s the only one of us not in her pajamas. We’re just confused as to why we haven’t heard about it until now.
“Where are you going?” I ask.
Something flashes in Eden’s eyes. She’s looking at me, and I’m the only one who sees it. Before I can even decipher what it means, though, her face quickly morphs into one that says, “ Please don’t ask any questions.”
“I’m hanging out with a friend,” is all she says to the rest of the room. Vague. Intentional. End of discussion.
So much has been happening between everyone in this apartment over the past few days, I can barely keep up.
“All I care about is hearing if Grant’s dick is really as good as we’ve all heard it is,” Kara says, quickly brushing off all other topics. At the same time, she’s flipping through the textbook she has sitting on my bed in front of her. The girl can multitask like no other.
“And now that more of the people in this room have fucked him than haven’t, I think we can finally make a final assessment,” Meredith adds.
Eden doesn’t look happy about her word choice but doesn’t say anything.
It doesn’t take much more convincing before I’m climbing on my bed, somehow landing with my head resting against Savannah’s thigh and my legs thrown over Kara’s lap.
“I can confirm the rumors,” I say as my lips curve into a small smile. “He knows what he’s doing.”
“I knew I had a good feeling about him.” Kara grins, looking away from her textbook to give me a smug look.
Meredith lets out a low whistle. “Damn, so being emotionally unavailable does equate to being good in bed.”
“I really hate the fact that I have to leave before the full debrief,” Eden says, pushing herself up from the floor. “But let it be known, I’m so happy for you.” She smiles, grabbing my hand and squeezing it for a quick moment.
“I’ll fill you in later. Promise.”
She nods as she exits the room.
Savannah let out a content sound, resting her elbow on my shoulder like I’m a couch arm. “I’m so glad I was able to force his head out of his ass.”
“You were literally fucking him up until like last week.” Kara chuckles, narrowing her eyes at her.
“Yeah, but everyone knows that didn’t mean anything. Honestly, I think the only time Grant ever touched my hair like it was made of gold was when he was trying to get you off his mind.”
That makes my stomach flip in a weird, twisted way. I’m not jealous—at least I don’t think I am—but the idea of Grant using someone else to forget me makes something tighten in my chest.
I don’t say anything.
I don’t have to.
Kara’s eyes meet mine, just long enough to register the silence.
And then she turns the page in her textbook like she didn’t notice a damn thing.
Savannah catches the shift in my expression immediately. “Hey,” she says, looking down at me with a firm expression while her hair forms a curtain around her face. “That boy would crawl on his knees if you asked him to.”
Kara raises her brow at me. “Maybe you need to test that theory.”
“Hold on!” Meredith holds her hands up. “We haven’t even gotten full details about the first night.”
“She’s right.” Savannah gives me a fake solemn expression. “I’m sorry, Lina, but we can’t exactly make a game plan for where to go from here when we don’t have the full picture of how everything went down last night.”
“Oh whatever.” I roll my eyes. “There’s really nothing to know.”
“There is so much to know when you come practically skipping back into the apartment with a freshly-fucked glow.” Kara deadpans, snapping her textbook shut with dramatic flair. “You looked like a woman who just discovered the full capacity of her dopamine receptors.”
And that is exactly how I get roped into laying out every explicit detail of my night with Grant.
Somehow, some way, being in this situation has never felt so comfortable before. I used to cringe at the idea of talking about the sex I had with Gage when my friends in high school asked.
Now, I’m realizing that maybe it was because I didn’t want to admit that he was bad.
There’s a huge pressure taken off your shoulders when you can freely tell your friends things about the guy you’re seeing without feeling like you need to cover for them.
I would even go as far as to say it feels like a relief. Because I’m finally experiencing something that doesn’t need justification.