“Get it now, slut?” I breathe through clenched teeth.
She’s silent. Staring. Her face locked in a stoic mask.
I twist to face her. “Good angle, huh?”
“Where’d you get this?” she whispers, her eyes still locked on the screen. But then she taps again, exiting the zoomed-in photo to check who sent me the picture.
There’s a twinge deep inside, but I guess it doesn’t matter. She hates Ezra as much as I do. Not like I’m ruining their relationship or anything.
Then she starts laughing.
Quiet at first. Barely a chuckle. Then louder, and louder, until I clamp my hand over her mouth so she doesn’t wake up the entire fucking fraternity. She doesn’t stop me. Maybe she can’t, because the hand holding the phone falls onto her chest as if the laughter has turned her muscles to water.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I whisper, scowling at her.
She lifts the phone again, points, and starts laughing more. She licks my palm when I don’t take away my hand, and I pull away with a grimace. I’d let her lick me anywhere, but somehow that’s gross.
“Ezra sends you a picture of me having an orgy, and you think it’sreal?” She’s speaking quietly, but there’s a wheeze in her voice like she’s about to laugh again.
“It’s not fake.”
She holds out the phone for me to take, dismissing it. “Well, that’s not me, so…”
I grab her fingers, forcing the phone back in front of her face. “That’s not you?” I point at the photo that’s so obviously her.
“Nope. Unless someone drugged me, andI got amnesia. Because I have absolutely no memory of fucking…” She squints at the phone. “Six? Seven…guys? Who even are they?”
“Jesus, you’re fucking delusional,” I mutter, trying to pull the phone away. “The fact that you’re still trying to deny this is?—“
“That’s not me, Kai.”
“Ofcourseit’s you. That’s your fucking hair, and your fucking face, and your fucking tits, and your?—“
“Huh. Did this birthmark I apparently have on my shoulder just disappear?” She stabs toward a dark splotch on her shoulder visible in the photo.
“Could be anything,” I mutter, still trying to pull the phone away.
“Yeah? Did I shrink a few inches too? Because whoever this is, she’s at least six inches taller than me.”
It’s like that rabbit or the duck photo.
Once I see it, I can’t unsee it.
The photo I’ve stared at a thousand times, used to fuel my rage and justify my cruelty, is so fake it’s ludicrous.
How could I have been so fucking blind?
Still, I can’t stop myself from trying to hold on to some sliver of my current reality. “It’s just the angle?—“
She jerks the phone out of my hand, and then tosses it across the room. We both flinch as it bounces off the desk and lands on the carpet.
I wish she’d thrown it out the window instead.
All these years…
“No, Kai. Youwantedto believe it’s me.” She turns her back, letting out a frustrated sigh. “Now I’m going to sleepbecause I’m fucking exhausted.” Then, as if she just realized how unpredictable I am, she adds, “If you try to wake me up before that alarm, I’ll scream.”
But I don’t wake her up.
