“I don’t even know if you could say Lucas was my boyfriend. We dated for what, four months?”
“You labeled your relationship.” He laughs. “I’d say it was pretty real.”
“I’d put it more under the summer fling category. We started dating in June after sophomore year and were broken up by homecoming in October.”
“Shit, you’re right. He went to the homecoming dance with Casey Hill. I forgot about that. He was a douche, anyway; I mean, breaking up with you three days before the dance?”
“Luckily, I had a best friend who had my back.” I poke his arm, and he grins.
I don’t bother adding that our breakup probably wouldn’t have happened when it did if Fletcher and Ester hadn’t broken up a week prior.
“And they stayed together all of high school. They might actually still be together, so it all worked out in the end.”
“Back to my point, neither of us dated someone after that, and then you met Ryan during freshman orientation and started dating him, and by the end of the first semester, I was with Maddie.”
“Ah, Ryan. The reason I will never date someone in my major again.”
“He wasn’t that bad,” Fletcher argues. “He got along with the guys pretty well.”
“He wrote me a song for Valentine’s Day.”
“And?”
“Sang it to another girl two weeks later to ask her out. We didn’t even technically break up. He said he neededspace—”
“He did… permanently.” He cackles, and it takes everything in me not to punch him in the gut.
I don’t know if I thought Ryan and I would last longer. He was the first person I ever slept with, but I knew from the beginning it wasn’t a forever type of love. I just didn’t expect us to break up so quickly. I was rooting for it to last at least a year.
The following year, he tried to sleep with Brinley, and I knew the breakup happened for a reason.
“Why are we talking about this?” I pull my legs up to my chest. “I don’t think making me relive my past relationships is going to help your screw-up from last night.”
“I don’t know. Last night, after I found out you went home, I had all this time to think, and one of the things I thought about was how we’re always in a relationship at the same time. I thought it was weird.”
“Maybe if you didn’t completely forget about me when you started dating Ester, I wouldn’t have found Lucas in the first place.”
“Are you saying you were jealous, Tatum Lewis?” he teases, wiggling his eyebrows.
“No.” I lie. “I’m saying, like last night, you completely abandoned me when you started dating Ester. You’re lucky I haven’t pulled a Brinley and icedyouout completely.”
“Fair.”
“Now, it’s time to get back to our movie marathon.”
I mindlessly choose our next movie, not necessarily because I want to watch another one, but because I’m hoping it ends this conversation.
“I thought you didn’t like this movie?” I freeze, glance at Fletch, and then look back at the TV.
“No harm in giving it another try, right?” I sigh, sinking into the couch as we sit through one of the worst rom-coms I’ve ever seen.
Fuck my life.
nine
Tate
Why’d Jeremy need to drive you home from the Halloween party?” Brinley tosses a fry in her mouth. We are sitting in our usual booth at Greystone Diner, waiting for Ember to get here after class. “Where was Fletch?”
