“Liar,” Kennedy snaps.
Discomfort creeps down my spine. “Am not.”
“Are, too. I read the Valentine’s Day poem you wrote to Johnny L. in second grade and?—”
My stomach sinks. “It wasn’t a love poem! Oh my God.”
I cringe at the memory of the cheesy card I wrote him:Roses are red, violets are blue. Puppies are cute, and so are you.
Kennedy smirks. “Seemed romantic to me.”
With a huff, I snap, “You haven’t read anything I’ve written.”
“A-ha.” She pumps her fist in the air. “So you admit you write.”
Eyes narrowed, I give her a look that I hope will shut her up. I should know better. So I abandon the effort and turn back to Sophie. “It’s more of a hobby than anything. And not one I’ve participated in in alongtime.”
Kennedy may roll her eyes at my self-deprecation, but it’s true. No one’s ever read my writing, so who is she to say it’s more interesting as an Ikea instruction manual? And I haven’t written much of anything since I graduated from college over six years ago.
“I’m sure your writing’s great,” Sophie reassures me with a warm smile. “Want me to give you guys a tour?”
“Yes,” I nearly shout, desperate to change the subject. “I need to know the inspiration behind that cyclops statue.”
Sophie leads us around the space, pointing at some of her favorite pieces and sharing tidbits of juicy gossip about the artists. Van Gogh’s removal of his own ear has nothing on the guy who made the marble statue of Cupid on one side of the gallery. The cherubic angel is wearing a bandit’s mask and holding a bomb instead of a bow and arrow. It’s all very representative of the artist’s “love me or die” motto, considering that, according to rumors, he was stamped with a few stalking charges and still wears his ex’s hair around his wrist like a bracelet.
“I need to say hi to a few more people, but then I can leave. Do you guys want to stick around for a few? If so, we can grab a drink after.” Sophie smiles, her blue eyes full of hope.
“Absolutely,” Kennedy answers before I can object. Coming out on a Tuesday was wild enough for me. Adding drinks on top of that is really going to push my social battery to its limits.
Sophie claps, bouncing on her toes, her contagious smile making it difficult to wish I could head home now and curl up with a book.
Once she’s out of sight, Kennedy turns to me with a twinkle in her eye. “You made a friend.”
I meet her expression with a glare. “I’m not incompetent. I know how to make friends.”
“You just choose not to,” she points out, chin lifted.
“There’s nothing wrong with choosing quality over quantity.”
I can count on one hand the number of people I trust enough to have ingratiated into my everyday life.
“No, there’s not, but it’ll be good for us to branch out,” she replies with a look that dares me to disagree. “It can hardly be considered a girls’ night out with just two of us, you know.”
When I don’t respond, she sighs and flings her arm around me.
“All I’m saying is that putting yourself out there is a good thing.”
We both know she’s right. With the way my mom has always disappeared and then suddenly reappeared just to stir things up, I’ve grown uneasy with change. I can admit that my hyper-independence means being alone is my default. I tend to assume that the people I meet will all become footnotes or short chapters in the story of my life rather than reoccurring characters.
“Yeah, yeah.” I grab a fried mac and cheese ball from a passing waiter and shove it into my mouth to discourage further conversation.
Thirty minutes later, the three of us are huddled at a high top at a nearby wine bar with a carafe of their house wine, chatting as if we do this every week. Our conversation flows easily, moving from funny stories about bad hookups to tales about a Facebook Marketplace meetup gone wrong. We spend far too much time guessing who Pete Davidson will date next, which somehow leads to a conversation about how Kennedy’s parents named her and all of her siblings after presidents.
“Have you talked to Cole lately?” Sophie asks with a tipsy giggle. Her question lacks even a hint of subtleness, which I blame on the wine. “You guys seemed to hit it off.”
I take a sip of my drink, having known this would come up at some point tonight. “We haven’t talked since the game.”
She waves her hand as if it’s no big deal. “I wouldn’t worry too much. My brother goes MIA when the team travels. Their schedule’s insane.”
