“So you wish you’d let people smother you more?” I let out a loud huff, pulling my legs up and tugging the throw across me.
“No, darlin’. I wish I hadn’t self-sabotaged so much. But,” she says, carefully nestling beside me, “I reckon that’s somethin’ you can’t learn from advice.”
My mind wanders back to the inception of this conversation, and I remember the way Andy’s hands melded themselves to my skin, the drag of them against my hips like he was desperate to hold onto any part of me. I know what he wants:he wants me to surrender, to concede the part of me that craves being kept. That’s scared of being inspired.
No one’s ever kept me, is the thing. I am not the kind of person someone keeps; I’m the kind of woman who wanders, who runs, who gets left. I tried to let someone do that—keep me—and he shoved me right back to myself. Literally, all my shit in a duffle.
Here you go, Sloane. You actually weren’t worth the trouble. You could’ve been so much more, but now I realize you never will be.
“What happens if they leave you?” I ask her, cuddling into her frail body as I spread the blanket across the both of us.
“Mmm,” she hums, nodding her head. “Well, Sloane. Everyone’s gonna leave you. That’s life.”
“I hate that,” I chuckle, holding her hand in mine. I flip it over, tracing the lines there to staunch the emotion welling in my eyes.
“Me too, baby.” She presses her head against mine, and we sit there for a long moment. “You’ll be okay. You’ve got people who love you, if you’ll let them.”
29
Sloane
Olivia jingles so loudly, I can hear her from outside the bathroom where she’s waiting with Gen and Jean. A heavy knock sounds on the stall as I shimmy my vegan leather bootcut pants back on, hiking them up to my waist and holding my breath to snap them shut, slightly wobbling in my heels, before Jean boisterously yells that “someone’s in here.” When I reemerge into the smoky haze of the club, Gen’s smile is mischievous while Liv emphatically shakes her head no.
“Eroding my nasal cavities? For what?”
“Live a little,” Jean rolls his eyes. “Sloane?” He lifts his brows, expecting me to follow but I shrug apologetically.
“Gives me a headache. But go, have fun my little snowbirds!” Patting Jean on the butt, I press a kiss on Gen’s forehead, giggling when she spins and her mirrorball dress floats around her. They disappear into the bathroom, leaving Liv and I to absorb the bass radiating from the dance floor a few yards away.
Head falling back, she closes her eyes, a dreamy smile flitting across her face. “Everything’s so different,” shesays before turning her head toward me. “You know, I didn’t even kiss anyone at midnight last year.”
“Not Will?”
“No,” she exaggerates. “He disappeared. And I didn’t have…friends,” she laughs, but it's sadness and relief all in one.
“Well. Now you have Ben.” I rub her arms brusquely, and the gold plates on her skirt make music again. “You can kiss himunder the starsand make a wish and be…stupidly happy,” I beam at her, only to find her crying. “No. No, no, no. If you don’t get it together I’m shovin’ you in that bathroom and?—”
“I’m fine,” she mumbles, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. She’s the weepiest drunk I’ve ever met. “I just was thinking about how I love Ben, so much, but how I’m so grateful that I have you. And Gen. And I guess Jean,” she laughs, and it’s garbled as more tears run past the waterproof liner I forced her to use in case something like this happened.
My chest constricts as I pull her into my arms, forcing myself to breathe. It hurts when people tell you they need you, doesn’t it? Fear grips me when they do, because I know I’ll never be exactly what they need or enough of it, and it’s only a matter of time before they realize it, too. That no matter how much I love them, they’ll notice all the ways I don’t quite measure up.
“You’re goin’ to have your best year yet, Olivia Beckett,” I whisper into her hair.
“I think you are, too,” she pronounces. “I think Andy’s in love with you,” she slurs on a whisper, like we’re two girls at summer camp swapping secrets.
“Definitely not,” I laugh, remembering the bottle girl who hasn’t stopped making passes at him all night. “And I wouldn’t have told you if I knew you were gonna make this a thing.”
“I’mmaking this a thing?” She gasps as our friends burst out of the bathroom, their irises larger than when they went in.
“Do you think he’ll notice?” Gen says rapidly, blinking one two many times.
“Grant will live,” I tell her as we all link hands like a human chain before wading back into the crowd of Bostonians, natives and transplants, who’ve gathered to shout down the new year together. Grantwill, in fact, be furious, but he’ll also blame me and love Gen anyway.
“Look at him,” Liv says to me, meaning Andy, and Gen mouthswhoto Jean, who knocks his head in the direction of the table the men have commandeered.
“No.”
“Leave her alone,” croons Jean, who is, for whatever reason, maybe the most emotionally intelligent member of this little group.
