It makes me uncomfortable in a way that watching her fuck him and suck his dick doesn't.
"Did you miss me, baby?"
"Nope."
"Liar."
She is lying; I can tell by the way she closes her eyes and breathes him in. Which, again, is okay. I missed Dax, too. I love Dax. But I know she wanted me to hold her last night, and I couldn't do it. I know what it feels like when someone wants more from me—I'm more than familiar with the weight of the dead air between us.
It's painful.
Still, I'm glad she took her sunglasses off. It's nice to see her eyes.
"How was the wedding?" I ask.
"It was fine," Dax tells me. "Dude is still a douchebag, but Juliette is kind of a high maintenance…you know what, so maybe they'll have a couple of asshole kids and be just fine. Your parents were there, Saige. I told them we've been hanging out."
"What? You're joking, right?"
"Nope. I told them we ran into each other at a party, and we've gotten really close."
"Dax,whywould you do that?"
He shrugs and takes a bite of the bagel in her hand. "I thought it was funny. They wereveryshocked."
"Whatever. I'll tell them you made it up."
"Yeah, good idea," he says. And then he holds out his phone and snaps a selfie of the two of them.
"What the hell? Delete it."
"No way. I'm posting it and making it my background."
"Well, I look terrible. That'll be just as bad for you as it is for me."
"I think you look really pretty, Saige," I tell her.
Finally, I get her sad brown eyes back.
She presses her lips together before she says, "I think you're pretty, too."
"I think so, too," Dax says, and then takes a photo of me. "I'm makingthat onemy lock screen. I don't know if it's the whole rainy-patio-hipster-café-vibe or what, but you look especially broody in this one—it's hot. I'm going to send it to you, too, Saige."
I look especially broody because I am especially broody.
Dax goes on about who he saw at the wedding and all the Aurora Cove gossip he learned from his younger sister, Nadia, while we finish our bagels.
And when we leave, he suggests Saige ride back with him instead.
"You don't mind, right?" he asks me.
"Nope," I lie. "That's fine with me."
And so Saige goes with Dax, and I get to take Arcadia back alone. I turn the music up as loud as it can go, but it still doesn't quite drown out the silence.
16
confessions of a sociopath
