It’s not always bullshit. Sometimes I feed our source things.
JULIETTE:
Pax, just because it’s your bullshit doesn’t mean it’s not still bullshit.
ALEX:
I can’t believe we finally got Lance to text back.
I scroll back up to the screenshot Juliette attached.
BenchGate: The Calloway Throwaway and Arthur Penngrove’s Girlfriend At It Again.
The photo makes my stomach drop.
It’s us on the bench. Her shoulder pressed against my arm. My hand reaching toward her hair—the leaf, I was getting a leaf—frozen in time to look like something else entirely. She’s smiling up at me, and I’m looking at her like…
Fuck.
I’m looking at her like she’s the only thing in the world worth seeing.
Because I’m starting to think she is.
I toss the phone on the counter and drag a hand down my face.
Genevieve and I talked about it this morning, briefly. Damage control, mostly: Act normal, don’t overcompensate, don’t avoid each other in ways that make it look like there’s something to hide. Because there’snotsomething to hide. But I’m used to tabloids following me around, and she isn’t.
She nodded through all of it with her arms crossed and her bottom lip between her teeth, and she didn’t look at me once.
My phone buzzes again.
ART:
Round Table tonight? Got something to tell you.
It’s phrased like a question, but feels like a summons. Still, I’m not passing up the opportunity to talk to him when he’s been feeling like a complete stranger ever since I brought Genevieve to my place.
The tavern smells like fryer oil and spilled beer.
Genevieve’s behind the bar pouring a draft for some guy who’s leaning too far into her space. She makes him laugh, and she throws her head back and laughs in return, and something green gusts through my middle and squeezes.
“There he is.”
Art’s voice pulls my gaze away, and he walks over to the booth, slides in and claps me on the shoulder.
He looks different.
It takes me a second to place it. Button-down, sleeves rolled,suit jacket he tosses on the booth beside him like he just came from controlling a room.
He looks exactly like his father.
And that loyalty I’ve felt since we were kids cracks, because the Art I grew up with never looked like this. That Art wore band shirts and laughed too loud and couldn’t sit still in class. That Art would have been behind the bar with Gin, stealing fries and making her roll her eyes. He’d be bringing me take out and making sure I’m okay, and making me laugh with his goofy smile and sarcastic jokes.
ThisArt is watching me from a corner booth like a politician calculating his next move.
“Got your text.”
“Wanted to talk.” I pass him a glass of bourbon that I ordered for him, and he takes a sip, watching me over the rim. “You always show up when she’s working anyway.”
