Footsteps echo across the tile.
“Sam… are you in here?”Lola’s voice filters through the stalls, gentle and careful, as if she already knows I’m cracked right down the middle.
I stay quiet.Words are a luxury I can’t afford at the moment.
A second later, Aubrey’s voice cuts through the silence, razor-sharp.
“Out.All of you.I don’t care if you’re crying, pissing, or plotting your next fuckboy disaster.Get the fuck out.”
Footsteps scatter.A few whine softly.No one dares to talk back.Aubrey’s name still holds power after what she did to Tia.
But that’s the thing about Aubrey.She’s fierce, not cruel.She can be mean when she has to, but she’s kind where it really counts.And right now, she’s both for me.
A door slams shut, hard enough to rattle the hinges.Then silence.Thick and pulsing.The quiet built on girl-loyalty, fury, and the friendship that bleeds when you do too.
I exhale.The kind of breath that fights its way out, kept inside through heartbreak and humiliation.
I hear two taps on the stall door.Gentle.No force.Just a quiet backup waiting to catch whatever mess steps out.
My fingers tremble as I fumble with the lock.It clicks open.
I step out.
Eyes red.Pride in pieces.Heart barely hanging on.
But still standing on my damn feet.
Lola’s face shows pure fury.Aubrey stands next to her, gentler but just as intense, her gaze sweeping over me as if she’s checking for bruises that aren’t visible on the skin.
Lola tilts her head, disgust evident in every word.“That motherfucker, Jace, he’s a dick.You know that, right?”
A laugh slips out of me.“What because he said out loud what I already knew was happening?”
She stills.Completely.
Aubrey blinks, the color draining from her face.“You knew about the bet?”she asks, voice soft.
I nod once.That’s all I’ve got.
Aubrey moves closer—careful, gentle, like you would when approaching something already broken.“Sam…”
“I heard them at Michaela’s party,” I say, lowering my voice because if I raise it, I might start screaming.“I was going to the bathroom.Reece didn’t know I was there.He said something to Jace about a bet.”
“That was weeks ago,” Aubrey says, horrified.“Why didn’t you tell us?”
I lift one shoulder.“I was embarrassed.Then, when we hooked up, he told me there was no bet.And when he didn’t go around bragging that we fucked, I convinced myself…”
Lola doesn’t hesitate.“You believed him.”
I meet her eyes, shame burning hot in my chest.“Yeah,” I whisper.“I did.”
The bathroom door swings open again, and the air quickly turns rancid.Thick with cheap perfume and hostile energy.
Nicole struts in as if she’s on a runway nobody asked for, her two backup dancers flanking her, both trying too hard and failing even more.She doesn’t bother hiding the smirk ripping across her face.
“Well, well,” she purrs.“So much for Little Miss Virgin.”
My stomach flips over.
