“Yes!”Daisy screams from the other side of the fire pit, her arms up in the air in what I can only guess is a celebration of her throwing her flip-flop further than the others in whatever ridiculous game they’re playing right now.
“I think your girl might be drunk,” Owen says beside me, half-teasing, half not.
I’ve stopped correcting him on the ‘my girl’ thing because he pretty much ignores me, even though we both know Daisy is not my girl.Not anymore anyway.
“Sloane!”he now calls, grinning like the fool he is when she turns around.“Babe, come here for a sec.”
Sloane skips over to where we sit, a huge smile on her face that is there way more often since she and Owen got together.“Yeah, what’s up?”she asks, standing in front of him.
He reaches for her hand, pulling her down into his lap as he nuzzles her neck.Sloane giggles in a way I’ve never heard before as she curls her arms around him.“On a scale of one to wasted, how drunk is Daze right now?”he asks, kissing his way down her neck and along Sloane’s shoulder.
Sloane sighs, her eyes fluttering closed as she murmurs, “She’s drunk, yeah.”
“Are you drunk?”Owen asks, kissing his way back up to her mouth.
She smiles now, her eyes a little glassy but still focused on her boyfriend.“Not that drunk,” she says.
Owen chuckles, his hand sliding down to her ass.Beside them, I clear my throat, and Owen looks over at me, a huge grin on his face like he’s the cat who ate the canary.Which I guess he probably thinks he is these days.
“What?”he asks.
I wave my hand at the two of them.“I’m not sure if I like you two more or less now that you’re like this,” I tease.
Owen laughs, turning back to Sloane as he says, “Where are you on the scale of let’s stay here or let’s go home and do dirty things to each other?”
Sloane grins, glancing over at the girls as she says, “I’m good with option two.”
Owen turns back to me, a wicked grin on his face as he says, “Yeah, gotta say, I love us like this.”
I laugh because the truth is, I do too.It’s taken them a while to get to this point, but there is no denying that my friends are ridiculously fucking happy together.Everyone is.Nate and Sage, Alana and Flynn, Owen and Sloane.
It’s just Daisy and me who aren’t.And while normally my brother is here to stop that obvious non-couple third-wheel thing, tonight he’s off somewhere, probably with some girl he just picked up at the beach.Meaning it’s all loved-up couples and then Daisy and me, the ex-couple who no longer are.
“We’re gonna go,” Owen says as Sloane now slides off his lap.He wraps his arm around her shoulders, holding her close.“You good?”
I blow out a breath, standing.“Yeah, I’m good.See you guys later,” I say, smiling at my friends as they turn to say goodbye to the others before heading out to the street to walk home.
When I turn around, Daisy is chatting and laughing with Alana and Sage, and Flynn and Nate are watching me, easy smiles on their faces.These two couldn’t be more different, but they’ve become great friends since Flynn moved in.He’s become good friends with all of us, actually, easily fitting into the group and definitely keeping Alana on her toes.She needed someone like him, and like with Owen and Sloane, I’m glad these two found each other.
“You wanna crash here?”Flynn asks, jerking his thumb at his house.
“Nah,” I reply, shaking my head.“I’ll call an Uber.Thanks, though.”
“What about Daisy?”Nate asks, chuckling when he sees all three girls hugging each other.
I turn to the girls, shoving a hand through my hair, sure I am going to regret saying this.“I’ll drop her off,” I tell them.
“You sure?”Nate asks.“You guys can just stay.”
“Right,” I say with a laugh.“Not like either of you have much room, and I absolutely do not need to listen to any sex stuff either.”
Flynn bursts out laughing at that.“Yeah, my girl can be pretty wild.”
“No shit,” Nate says.“We’ve heard you from up there,” he adds, gesturing to the apartment above the shop where he and Sage live.
Flynn laughs again, and fuck me, if that’s not my cue to get the hell out of here.It’s not that I’m not happy for my friends; I am.It’s just I’m also insanely jealous because everything they have is what I want too.
With Daisy.
