“What did Claire, my sworn secret-keeper, tell you?” I grumbled.
Rose fell against me, knocking our shoulders. “Oh, don’t blame her. She was worried.”
I was too afraid to meet the gaze of the enthusiastic woman beside me. “About?”
“Well, all she mentioned was that you’ve been chatting with this gamer forever, and she thinks you maybe have a teeny-tiny crush.”
Claire, why?I sighed and closed my eyes, removing my glasses to pinch the bridge of my nose before the onslaught of questions followed. While I could trust Claire with my life, wanting her to keep information like this to herself was expecting a lot, and I suppose she could get credit for lasting years.
As if reading my mind, Rose continued. “She wanted to know if any of us knew anything about her, and while I agree that pancakes are elite, we’ve never interacted. Claire said you found her in your old engineering gaming group. The gaming community is pretty tight-knit. We could find her.”
“Idontwanttofindher,” I rambled out as though it were one word.
William growled at a troll on-screen. An actual troll in the game, not one of the commenting viewers, which he was also known to growl at from time to time.
“What do you mean? Surely, after all these years, you’d want to meet her. What if you already know her without knowing? You’re both engineers.” Rose was not going to let this go. Neema, Shaun, and William might have, Claire knew not to press… but Rose? Rose was unstoppable.
“She could also not be ashe. She could be a man for all I know.” I kept looking down at Lily’s message. My brain was pinging and would continue pinging until I replied.
Rose hummed for a second before wiggling her eyebrows. “What if she’s a hot man? I’d like to see that.”
My lips curved upward. Rose was nothing if not entertaining.
“Could we rather focus on your hot man, who is growing angrier by the second?” I pointed at my screen, where William was flashing the camera his most charming smile while a string of colorful and creative curses flew out of him.
“I’ll tell William you called him hot. He loves flattery,” she teased, and turned her attention back to my laptop screen. A little red ONE appeared at the chat box icon. “She sent another message. You better reply! Don’t leave Pancakes hanging!”
“No peeking.” I turned my laptop away from her and opened the messages.
@pancakesareelite:
I’ve been MIA because of work. And I’ve been working hard. Play with me, Link. Pretty please.
@pancakesareelite:
We could even play League.
She must be as desperate as I am.
Rose eyed me above my laptop screen but made no move to intrude.
I shot back a text:Will you be up in about two hours? It’s game night.
@pancakesareelite:
Forgot it’s Wednesday!
I feel like I’ve lived a thousand lives since Monday. But yeah, of course. I’ll be up if you want me to be.
My chest heated in a strange and unfamiliar way.
@theanswerisno:
Snap. See you then.
“I don’t suppose you’re the type to tell me what she said…” Rose hopped off the couch and grabbed another samosa.
“Not even a little bit.”
