“The gentleman doth protest too much, methinks.”
“We were friends for a while before we started dating. I was an intern in their marketing department, and she worked on the social media team. I knew she had a crush on me, so we started dating. But I realized pretty early on that I didn’t like her as much as she liked me. So, I was about to end things because I respected her too much to waste her time. But… her dad ran the internship program. And knew the powerful executives of all of the sports teams in LA,” he said, looking guilt-ridden.
“Oh, this isreallybad,” she said.
He looked mortified, but he carried on speaking. As if it was too late to turn back.
“So, I decided to postpone breaking up with her untilafterI got a reference from him. But then she said I love you…”
“Oh no,” Ari said, her eyes widening. Drew’s face was a portrait of regret. But he couldn’t stop talking.
“I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, so I said… I love you, too.” He grimaced and held his head in his hands.
“Then what happened?” she asked, grimly curious.
“We were together for a year.”
“Wow.” It wasn’t nearly as bad as her secret, but it wasn’t great, either. “Youweretogether, as in you no longer are?”
Drew shook his head and looked back up at the stars.
“She cheated on me with a football player. According to Instagram, they’re in love.”
Ari put her hand over her mouth.
“I know. Itiskind of funny,” he chuckled sadly. “What goes around comes around, I guess.… Wow, this is a terrible first date.”
“Our first and last,” she laughed. “You can’t stop thinking about Sade, and I can’t seem to avoid Harrison.”
“Harrison?” he asked gently.
She debated telling him about her ex-boyfriend, but she didn’t want Harrison to take up any more of her night than he already had, so she changed the conversation. “Okay, my turn to share a secret.”
“Do your worst. But I think I might have set the bar too low.”
“Oh, I can go lower,” Ari said. She hadn’t told her next secret to a single soul. “My dad broke up with my mom when my sister and I were kids. And then he started a new family on the other side of the world, so I kind of hated him.”
Drew looked over at her and nodded. Encouraging her to carry on.
“He knew that I was never going to forgive him, so he stopped making an effort with me. Which is fine.” She shrugged, even though it wasn’t fine. “He kept sending my little sister birthday cards. But I didn’t want to let him keep getting her hopes up, because I knew he wasn’t going to stick around long enough to make things right… so I hid every birthday card he sent her from the time I was thirteen until I turned eighteen.” She was a little shocked at her own honesty.
“That’s…” he said, rubbing his temple, momentarily lost for words.
“A little messed up?” she suggested. Still feeling guilty about it.
“Yeah. But I think I’d probably do the same,” he said. “My grandma has Alzheimer’s and it’s getting worse, way faster than we thought it would. But my sister, who lives on the other side of the country most of the year, doesn’t know. Me and my grandparents are hiding it from her.”
“Why?” Ari asked softly, noticing him tensing up.
Drew took a deep breath. “Because my sister is about to have the most important few months of her life. She’s under so much pressure that I can’t risk making it worse.”
“But?” she asked, sensing there was more.
“But we’ve always been really close, so it feels strange to be hiding the truth from her.”
Ari wanted to ask whether Drew thought he might be denying his sister’s right to make her own decisions. But she couldn’t ask that without sounding like a hypocrite. So, she just nodded. Tonight was about sharing secrets, not giving advice.
“I guess we all do things to protect the people we love,” she said after a moment.
