“So… What’s news?” Eden asked.
Cheryl gave her a hard look through her cigarette smoke. “Nothing.”
“Okay, I’ll cut to the chase. Psycho’s a mess.”
Hearing his name was like a backhand to the face. She absorbed the blow as best she could and pointed at her third-hand TV. “Commentators keep saying he’ll play the best football of his life next season.”
“I’m not talking about football. He’s lost weight. He’s at our place all the time. He’s fucked up and he misses you.”
Cheryl walked back to the windowsill and took a seat, curling a knee into her chest. “I hate that, but everything’s going to be okay for him.”
Eden studied her. “You are acting like a bag of cashews right now.”
“Huh?”
“You’re acting nuts.”
“Cashews are seeds.”
“Yeah, that’s relevant.” Eden sat up. “I don’t get it, Bernie. You’re clearly miserable and I know you’re lonely—”
“I’m not—”
“You are. I know you don’t like taking chances, but Patrick’s a good guy and he thinks you pee craft IPA.”
“He looks up to me. He’s so youn—”
“He’s not that fucking young. You’re freaking out, aren’t you? Not sleeping? Not eating?”
“Did you come here to lecture me about dating Patrick?”
“Nope. I came here to say this is your last chance.”
“What?”
“This is the hour of honesty. You be real with me, and I’ll be real with you. What’s happening with you and Psycho?”
Cheryl studied her cigarette. As much as she didn’t want to talk, the memories of what happened in Heavenly Stays were weighing on her like a tonne of bricks. Eden was right, she was losing it. And as much as she hoped she’d just snap out of whatever mood she was in, if she didn’t, she might not be able to work or care for her mother. She exhaled smoke. “Do you know we hooked up? Me and Patrick?”
“I do. What’s he like in the sack?”
Cheryl remembered him kneeling over her, his muscled chest rippling as he pushed his cock into her mouth. “I… Great. Really great.”
“That checks out. He’s a killer in the midfield. He probably works twice as hard in bed.”
“George!”
“What! These are observable facts. Anyway, are you, like, addicted to his seed now?”
Cheryl wrinkled her nose. “Do you listen to yourself talk?”
“No.”
“You never used to be this gross. Willow’s rubbed off on you. Don’t make a sex joke.”
Eden wiped the goofy smile off her face. “So you banged Patrick Normal and it was awesome. Now what? The sky’s gonna fall in because he’s twenty-three and a good lay?”
Cheryl took a quick drag on her cigarette. “No.”
