After my last boyfriend, Brady, couldn’t handle reality, I’ve worked hard to hide this part of my life from Connor and my friends.
No one likes a Sad Girl™.
Pulling out my phone for a distraction, I scroll through Insta, hearting a few things I don’t like, and—oh my god, no way, Taylor’s new haircut looks terrible on her.
My manicured claws clack over the screen.Love the new look, girl. Living your best life!
Suddenly, the bell perched above the bookstore entrance chimes. My stomach flips with a groan as I glance up from my scroll-and-bitch—you’ve got to be kidding me.
It’s official. This store is a special level of hell, and I’m being punished for wearing novelty socks with crocs in a former life or something. There is no other explanation for my present predicament.
Chapter two
Gremlins
Maddie
Muchtomywanderingeye’s disappointment, Jenny Farrow appears beneath the jingling bell in her signature baseball hat, an accessory employed to hide her frizzy nest of hair. Attached at her hip like always, Mr. Thorn-in-my-Side, Seth Aarons, follows behind.
Last year, Seth caught me singing to a squirrel, and he’s lorded it over my head ever since. Something about how it’s a sign that I’m not as close to the “Satanic Barbie” moniker he refers to me as and that there’s hope to save me yet.
He’s wrong, of course. I don’t need saving, especially from a spindly man desperate for a haircut and a wardrobe update. Those flannels and beanies aren’t doing him any favors.
I sometimes sing “Uptown Squirrel” to my furry friends when stressed, which shouldn’t be held against me.
Since I’d rather dye my hair a putrid green than interact with either of these individuals, I whip around and pluck a book off the winter display.
“Oh my word, you’re buying them all?” Jenny’s voice bounces off the cracked wooden walls of the store.
“Of course I am. You made them sound amazing!” Connor replies.
Don’t turn. Don’t start, and they’ll go away.
The light along the cream-textured page of my book recedes as a shadow crawls over my shoulder.
“I was unaware anyone in Phi Sigma Lambda Chi could read. I thought the act would rip a hole in the space-time continuum,” the cold, clipped voice of Seth Aarons says behind me.
“Don’t you have something better to do than be in a bookstore on a Sunday, Seth?” I sigh with a pivot and lean against the bookshelf, carefully keeping my attention on the pages in front of me. Seth isn’t worth a glance.
“This may come as a shock to you, Ms. Finch, but—” A finger latches on the top of my book, tilting my shield. “You’re in a bookstore on a Sunday, too.” His stern balsam fir stare bores into me, and the hideous nature that is Seth Aarons churns my stomach.
The first time I met Seth was, surprisingly—given his dour personality—at a party. Armed with an outfit curated by my influencer idol, Kennedy Spruce, I approached him—still on speaking terms with Jenny and knowing him to be her new friend. He stared with disgust at my extended hand and then opened his pinched mouth to utter one word. “No.” Brushing past my shoulder, he downed a glass of punch before disappearing for good.
The whole interaction confused me for a hot minute until I learned more about him, and everything crystallized. Seth’s a pretentious asshole who thinks he’s better than everybody just because he’s not a Swiftie or watches the latest streaming show—he’sdifferent.
It’s grating at its best. Infuriating at its worst.
Pile that with Seth’s sanctimonious BS about how I devastated Jenny when I left her, and well, let’s say he’s not my preferred company unless duct tape is involved.
And not in a kinky way.
Because besides his personality flaws, he’s gross.
His semi-curly brown hair is way too long and scraggly under the dilapidated grey beanie he continues to sport even though it gave up on life three winters ago, and he insists on wearing a flannel every damn day, regardless of the weather, like it’d be improper of him to expose more than his wrists to the world.
Honestly, I might die of equal parts fright and surprise if I ever saw his forearms.
“Glad to see you haven’t lost that marvelous fashion sense yet.” I snort, returning my eyes to the page in front of me.
