Get Lucky
Gracie
Present
“Tonight, I’m going to get lucky,” I announce as I slide into the booth, bumping my hip into Kirsten hard enough that she yelps.
“Rude,” she says, but she scoots over anyway.
She’s my best friend.
Well, best girlfriend.
I have a best friend who’s a guy too.
Or…I did.
Trish leans around Kirsten, squinting at me. “Lucky?” she asks, slurring the word as she sways just a little. We pre-partied back at the apartment Kirsten and I share. The one Trish moved into two months ago and immediately turned into a frat house with pastel throw pillows.
It’s March 17.
St. Patrick’s Day.
Which is why we’re crammed into an Irish pub off Harvard Avenue in Allston, already packed even though it’s barely five and most people haven’t left work yet. Green beer sloshes onto the floor every time someone bumps a table. College kids stand shoulder to shoulder, beads tangled in hair, voices raised over aggressive but jaunty Gaelic music.
The kind of place where no one checks IDs too closely and absolutely no one’s parents would ever step foot.
“Hold still,” Kirsten says, swiping her thumb across my cheek. “Your clover’s smudged.”
“Is it?” I pull out my phone and use the camera as a mirror.
She’s right. The glittery green four-leaf clovers we painstakingly drew on our cheeks have blurred at the edges, probably from the heat. Outside, Boston is buried under snow, sidewalks with a layer of ice so slick and slippery we’d linked hands on the walk over, half laughing, half bracing ourselves so we wouldn’t die dramatically before happy hour.
Inside, it’s hot and loud and sticky, the air thick with cologne, sweat, and bad decisions.
I shake out my hair until the long auburn spirals fall back into place and brush leftover glitter from my fingertips.
“Better?” I ask.
“Hot, Gracie.” Devon grins from across the table, flashing the dimple that has half the campus in a chokehold. “The green matches your eyes.”
My cheeks warm despite myself.
Devon is one of Brandon’s friends.
Brandon. My ex. As of last week.
They play hockey together, which means Devon knows everything. The yelling. The crying. The things Brandon said about me afterward, privatethings I didn’t realize he’d shared with half the team until the rumors made their way back to me.
Asshole.
For half a second, I consider Devon. Taking him home would be a deeply satisfying screw-you to Brandon. After all, Brandon called me a whore more than once during our final fight.
Might as well lean in.
But no.
That’s not what I want.
