Promise Me
Lex
Dropping my bag onto the passenger seat of my car, I reach up to rub my neck. It’s been sore for the last few days. I’m convinced it’s because of the tension I’ve carried there since the event at the start of the week.
My phone vibrates, and I pull it from my pocket. I am an hour late leaving, and Lane is asking for my ETA.
I quickly type out, “Roughly an hour,” before throwing it into the cup holder in my center console. I jog back inside and press the elevator button at least half a dozen times before the door slides open. Heading back into my condo, I ensure my sweet cat Mildred has a large bowl of water and food before dropping to my hands and knees to pull her out from under the bed. She protests, mewing and squirming.
I hold her to my chest like a baby, peppering her neck with kisses as she continues to protest. I swear she likes me. She likes me when it’s convenient for her. Usually, when it’s cold. I drop her onto the bed, and she curls around to glare at me.
“Love you, Millie! I’ll be back on Sunday.” I say, bopping the top of her head once more, then heading for the door.
The elevator seems to move at a snail’s pace, and by the time I reach my car, 15 minutes have passed since I told Lane I was an hour out. At this time, the drive will take me just shy of two hours.
I text my house sitter to let them know I’m leaving and when I’ll be back, then scroll to my playlist and crank up the volume. By the time I merge onto the highway, I feel the tension in my shoulders release. What a bizarre few days. I stop my brain from drifting back to the dimly lit hall—to Adrian’s hand on my throat, to how I accepted whatever was coming without a fight. That will be something my therapist can help me dissect later.
An hour and thirty minutes later, I pull into Lane’s driveway. Her daughter sits on the couch under the window and lights up when she sees me. She turns to call something over her shoulder, no doubt alerting the family I’ve arrived. Soon, two more faces press close to the window, and I’m struck with guilt at seeing how much bigger her boys are since the last time I visited.
I grab my bag and rush up the steps to the front door. It flies open, and three sweet faces greet me with excitement. Lane is standing just behind them and leaning against the wall.
Lola smacks the storm door handle, and I narrowly dodge getting clobbered in the face.
“WEXY!” she squeals, wrapping her arms around my legs.
I look at Lane, confusion on my face. Lola has never greeted me like this.
Lane shrugs, chuckling, “She recently figured out that she gets more flies with honey, and now we have to stop her from hugging strangers in dark alleyways.”
I let my bag drop to the floor and wrap my arms around her. Her hair smells like strawberries. Before I can let her go, her older brothers attack from either side, knocking me backward and creating a pile of giggling arms and legs. Lane’s kids are bright, kind, and polite, but holy fuck, there are a lot of them.
Luke and Enzo lifted Lola from me, then jumped and grabbed my hands to pull me up. I am dusting myself off when Lane pulls me into a warm hug. Everything about her is warm and maternal. When she releases me, I pull three chocolate bars out of my bag and hand them to the kids. There’s no hesitation as they tear into them, and she groans.
“Guys! Dinner is on the table.” Her tone is whatever you would call her version of stern.
The three kids are already stuffing a bite of chocolate in their mouths as they run toward the back of the house where the dining room is located. That’s when I smell the fresh sourdough bread and whatever she’s cooked for dinner.
I am kicking off my shoes when she comments, “Dinner was ready 45 minutes ago, but you must’ve cured that lead foot of yours.”
I grimace and laugh, about to apologize, when she continues, “I knew you hadn’t left home — today wasn’t the day you would magically start arriving on time.”
Anyone else and I may have felt like it was a scold, but she’s never been judgmental — not of me anyway — and the comment has me shrugging while we laugh and follow her kids.
We take our seats, and I notice we’re missing her husband.
“Where is Dave?” I ask.
“Some emergency computer thing. He had to go to the city. We have the house to ourselves tonight,” She says while dishing food onto the kids’ plates.
The house is warm, and I pull my sweater over my head and then reach for the fresh bread on the table.
“Did the great and wonderful Lane actually bake me fresh bread?!” I tease, slathering way too much butter onto it.
I stop mid-chew when I register the look on her face—concern, lines forming between her brows as she stares. Assuming I’ve made a mess of myself, I wipe my hand across my lips and chin.
Her warm eyes shift to meet mine, the worry still present. Tucking a lock of her thick brown hair behind her ear, she leans toward me.
“We’ll talk about that after the kids are in bed.” She signals with her fork at my neck/chest area.
It takes a few seconds to realize she’s not talking about food on my face but about the bruises on my neck—from Adrian’s grip. I reach up, running my fingers over the area on my neck that I know she sees, the area left a light purple from the strength of his grip. Instantly, I feel the tenderness there. I choke down the food I’d been chewing. My mouth feels full of ash, and my stomach is full of rocks. I cough before I can reply, looking around the table for water. Instead, she slides a wine glass toward me and fills it nearly to the brim.
“This doesn’t feel like a water conversation,” She says, a small smile returning.
The rest of the dinner is quiet. Her kids tell me about the sports they’re playing and who’s who at school, and Enzo teases Luke about his new girlfriend. I resist asking Luke what happens with a girlfriend when you’re in the fifth grade and turn to Lola instead.
She is all business when she says, “I’m going to be a boy when I grow up. Just like my brothers.” She pulls a baseball cap out from under the table, puts it on backward, and crosses her arms high on her chest.
Luke laughs and loudly whispers, “She tried to pee standing up yesterday. Ask mom how it went.”
I am shaking with laughter when I look at Lane, whose face is fixed into a straight line. She moves her hands in an outward circle and mouths the word everywhere. The table dissolves into laughter, save for Lola, who screams that it’s not fair that her brother can stand to pee and she can’t.
The kids are in bed an hour later, and the house falls quiet. Lane emerges with the bottle of wine and tops off my glass before sitting beside me on the couch. I swallow a healthy mouthful, hoping to ease the edge of telling her about the altercation with Adrian.
She’s silent as she reaches for me, tilting my chin to the side to inspect my neck.
Sighing, she says, “You can tell me anything, you know?”
I smile slightly before replying, “It’s not what you think.”
She drops her hand to her lap, offering a humorless laugh.
“Oh, excellent. Because I was thinking some man dared to put his hands on you hard enough to leave you black and blue.”
Adrian is deranged, but… I don’t want her to worry—which is weird, right?
“Well, okay. It is exactly what you think, but—” She cuts me off before I finish.
“But you gave him permission to get rough?”
Biting my bottom lip, I can’t even respond.
“Okay, so he did this without permission? Did you know him?”
I am overcome by the desire to defend the situation. I am not entirely sure if it is for Lane’s peace of mind or to protect the violent, out-of-control man who accosted me at work. I drink down the rest of my wine.
“I know him. I’ve known him for a few years, kind of. We reconnected a few weeks ago?” The question at the end has her eyebrow quirking upward.
“Why do you sound so unsure of that?”
I explain the situation at the highest level. We’ve been friends for a long time, but I never told her about the night I met Adrian or saw him at the restaurant. Now, she is learning about him while also getting an up-close-and-personal view of his handy work.
“Babe,” she starts, pausing for a second. “From an outsider’s perspective, this sounds incredibly problematic.”
I scoff, the sound dripping with disdain.
“Problematic. I think if you looked up ‘psychopath’ in the dictionary, you’d find this guy’s photo next to Ted Bundy and Richard Ramirez.”
Okay, maybe comparing him to serial killing rapists is a little dramatic.
She leans her head back against the couch, eyes searching for something to say about this mess of a situation. When she sits back up, she’s smirking a little.
“This is why you wanted to visit, isn’t it?”
I shrug and say, “I love you so much.”
She places a loving hand on my shoulder, offering comfort and support with the simple gesture.
We chat a little more, and I pull out my phone and search for Adrian’s name. In the last few weeks, he made his account public and much more active. He now has over 15,ooo followers and posts at least once per day. I click a video that shows him and a few other guys in the gym cracking jokes. I hand the phone to Lane, and she scrolls through, looking at me every few seconds and making a face that lets me know that while she might think he is a lunatic, she also thinks he’s easy to look at.
She clicks on his stories, and I lean over to watch with her. The stories include photos and videos from their game today, ending with them in a bar celebrating their win.
“Bushy Beavers?” Lane questions incredulously.
I shake my head, rolling my eyes.
“I know. It’s some stupid beer league team that blew up on TikTok.” I comment.
“Well, at least he is in the public eye. Maybe a little safer than some random guy who lives in the shadows.”
She goes silent for another minute before bursting into laughter. I lean over to see what’s funny, and she’s in the comments of a gym post shared 18 hours ago. The video shows a sweaty Adrian doing leg presses, and fuck—I can’t help the way my body responds to seeing him like this. Heat courses through my veins, and a dull throb starts between my legs. I fucking hate how attractive he is; how much I love seeing him like this.
“Oh my god,” She says, covering her mouth as she continues reading.
“What?”
She is scrolling through comments, but I can’t see what makes her giggle like a little kid; she is fully entertained by whatever she’s looking at.
She briefly spins the phone toward me before turning it back and reading aloud.
“‘Daddy?’” She continues to laugh, “‘Respectfully, I’d let him ruin my life.’ and ‘He could commit war crimes, and I’d still let him hit it.’ and ‘I’d let him snap my spine like a glow stick.’ and ‘I didn’t think anything would get me wetter than that TikTok video, and here we are.’”
She’s wheezing now.
“Jesus Christ, does he know his fan base is 90% women who want to be thrown through a wall?!”
She continues to scroll.
“What TikTok video do they keep talking about?”
Perfect.
I had intentionally left that part of the story out. Groaning, I reach for my phone, open TikTok, and search for the video. It has over 100 million views now. I hand the device back to Lane. A pit forms in my stomach as I wait for her reaction.
“Holy shit!” She exclaims when she notices how viral it is. There’s a beat of silence as she processes what she’s seeing, then her head snaps up, “Is that…that’s you?!”
Her eyes shoot up to mine; her eyebrows are so high I’m shocked they don’t disappear into her hairline. I hold my breath, nodding once.
“Yeah…that’s me.”
We’ve finished two bottles of wine, and our yawns come regularly. I am about to suggest we tuck in for the night when Lane clears her throat.
“Lex, you are a smart girl. Promise me you won’t let his looks distract you from his terrifying and problematic behavior.”
I roll my eyes and take another sip of wine. “You sound like a concerned mother warning her daughter about dating a guy with a motorcycle.”
She doesn’t laugh. “Lex, I’m serious.”
That makes me pause. Lane is almost always joking and teasing. But not now.
I exhale, feeling the weight of her stare. “I promise,” I say, knowing I’m lying. Already distracted.
She slowly stands up, reaching for my hands to pull me up. I untwist my fingers, silently praying that crossing them had somehow absolved me of the lie I told one of my best friends.