She shoved my hand away.You didn’t even know me,she snarled.Is that really all it takes for you to fall for someone, Mandie? Someone to walk up to you and give you the tiniest bit of external validation? Then you’re just ‘no thoughts, head empty, it’s you now, fuck everything else’?
Tears welled up in the corners of my eyes, just like they had that day in bed with Jac.
She’d been right. She hadn’t been kind, but she’d been right. Because here I was, doing exactly the same thing allover again. Dylan had told me I was cool and interesting and fun to talk to, and how had I reacted?
No thoughts. Head empty. It’s you now. Fuck everything else.
Fuck the fact I’m not over my ex. Fuck the fact that we’re both here dating the same man. Fuck the fact that we’re friends and you’re straight. It’s you now.
You know who thinks like that?Jac had said.Children.
I am not a child!I’d protested.
Then why do I feel like I’ve lured you into my van with a lollipop?she’d snapped.Seriously, Mandie, do you think at all about the consequences before you do things?
I bit down on my pillow.I am not a child,I recited to myself.I am not a child I am not a child I AM NOT A CHILD.
There was a rustle of bedcovers. I froze, terrified it was Dylan.
But Dylan’s breath was still slow and even beneath me. I turned my head to the side slightly, just in time to see Lily’s satin robe trailing behind her, briefly illuminated as she slipped quietly out the door.
I was scratchy-eyed and sleep-deprived the next morning. I drank two cups of coffee at breakfast instead of one, but all it did was intensify the scratchiness, making me feel like the nerves behind my eyes were made of wire. Heather and Naya got into an argument over who had the right to the last of the frozen berries (one of the most precious commodities inthe Villa), and I was snappish with both of them when I waded in to mediate. To put it mildly, I had not woken up as my best self.
And so of course, when we sat down on the couches to hear who had today’s single date…
‘Roses are red, I’ve been to Uganda,’ Kumiko read, ‘we can’t go that far now, but come with me, Amanda?’
‘What?’ I said, blinking, as some of the other women politely applauded. ‘Really?’
‘I can’t believe this,’ Heather said, sinking back into the couch. ‘I’ve had one date with him. One! A group date! And it was that sucky obstacle course date!’
‘Just be grateful you didn’t have to play Love Jockey Hockey,’ Naya said.
‘Don’t tell me what I should or should not be grateful for,’ Heather said. ‘I don’t appreciate being told how to feel.’
‘I’m not telling you how to feel!’
‘Yes, you are!’
‘Amanda, you’d better hurry,’ Kumiko said, turning the card over. ‘This says he’ll be here to pick you up in fifteen minutes.’
‘Oh God,’ I said, jumping up. ‘Okay.’
‘Seriously,’ Heather groaned. ‘What’s Amanda got that I don’t? We’re basically identical! Why her and not me?’
‘She’s a nice person?’ Dylan said.
‘If you like her so much, why don’t you marry her?’
A sudden wave of nausea rose up in my belly.
‘What are you, five?’ Dylan snapped back. ‘Come on, Mandie. I’ll help you get ready.’
Given my mental state, this didn’t seem like a particularly good idea, but there was no easy way to say no.
Dylan and I were both quiet as we went through my suitcase together, trying to pick out a good date outfit. ‘I wish he’d told me what we were doing,’ I said at last. ‘I don’t know what I’m supposed to dress for.’
‘Men,’ she said. ‘They never think of these things. Try this one?’
