As I step closer, I can tell her cheeks are splotchy and her eyes are swollen. Hopefully she wasn’t crying all night. I set my bag down and go straight to her, wrapping my arms around her anddropping my head on her shoulder. I feel her inhale deeply, but she doesn’t say a word, and neither do I.
Simone comes out of our room and sits on the coffee table facing us. We lock eyes, and she winces and shakes her head. Something in me breaks for Annika.
Annika sniffles and turns to address Simone. “Should I check if he’s called or texted?”
Simone pinches her eyes closed for a second, disappointed by the question. “Does it matter, Annika?”
“I’m just wondering if he’s going to apologize or explain it. I mean, there could be something I’m missing.”
I peel back and she turns to me, hope brimming in her usually tough expression.
“Don’t you think, Elle?”
“She doesn’t even know what happened, babes.”
I don’t bother correcting her. If I were Annika, I wouldn’t want to know people were gossiping about me, not maliciously or anything, but still. I play dumb while Simone explains to me what I’ve already been told. Annika was working Ethan’s section when she saw him kissing a girl.
“Didn’t even bother to apologize, the git! Annika sees them and all he does is shrug like that’s that.”
Fury ignites inside me. Ethan and Annika have been attached at the hip the last few weeks, and I know they’ve been hooking up. For all her pep talks about keeping feelings out of it and remembering that we’re just here to have fun, Annika forgot to take her own advice. Or maybe she was only ever fooling herself, pretending she had the strength to stand against fate.
“Just please will you check my phone?” Annika asks Simone.
Simone sighs and heads to where it’s charging on the kitchen table. She turns it over to look at the screen. “Nothing.”
Annika wilts beside me.
“What does it matter, though? Annika, heknowswhere you are,” Simone says, somewhat sternly. “If he were keen to talk things through or say sorry, he’d have been here by now, wouldn’t he?”
“But—”
She cuts herself off and drops her head into her hands, breaking into a sob. Simone comes over and together we loop our arms around her, cocooning her while she cries.
“Is it silly that I was falling for him?” she asks once she catches her breath.
I’m the last person she should be asking that question.
All morning, we stay in our apartment, letting Annika wallow while we go through the cycles of mourning with her: pep talks about girl power and strength, furious discussions about the despicable existence of men like Ethan, followed by soft reminders that Annika is only human and this too shall pass.
By late afternoon, she pushes off the couch with a resolved groan. “That’s enough. I’ve had it. My eyes hurt and I’m not going to keep crying like this. I’m rounding up the troops. Someone let Mia and Thalia know we’re going to get ready for this stupid dance party thing at Solaría and we’re going to look sofuckinghot that all the men are going to swoon when they see us.”
Simone throws her fist in the air. “Yes! Cracking job. Get yourself cleaned up and we’ll go down to this little gem of a shop just around the corner. They do the most amazing clothes. I’ve been meaning to grab something from there for ages!”
I smile. “You guys go on. Grab something for me and I’ll pay you back. I really need to call my family and catch up on a load of laundry.”
Simone just stares at me. “Have you gone mad? Laundry? When Annika is in mortal peril?”
I laugh. “I’m like one day away from having no clean underwear!”
“You’ll make do, babes. Now get off your arse and let’sgo. And by the way, don’t think I haven’t noticed that T-shirt you’re wearing. God, I can’t wait to hear about what it was like to fuck the hottest man on this island, but NOT TODAY. Today, we hate men and I don’t even want to hear about it, though just for curiosity’s sake, how big are we talking? Show me with your hands.”
I ignore her question.
“Oh, you’re no fun. I’ll get it out of you eventually.”
On the way to the boutique, I text my parents and Lita, apologizing for the fact that I’ve been so hard to reach.
My mom is the first to respond:Lita’s been giving us updates so we don’t feel so out of the loop, but Dad and I miss you. Call when you can.
