Page 34 of Use Me Up

I look down and I read what I can see. …think about that time when you and I were out in the woods on the compound and you promised me that you would never leave me, and I wonder why I keep pushing you away. Andrew slept at his mother’s last night. We fought and fought and he was crying again, and I just don’t even understand why I’m like this, why I make everyone who cares about me hate me.

Do you have your phone on do not disturb or something?

Text me back, dammit.

For fuck’s sake, if I find out that you’re fucking Hannah right now, I will never forgive you

He yanks the phone back from me.

I could see that the texts went on for a while after that.

“She just…” He squares his shoulders. “It’s confusing. She says she doesn’t want anything to do with me, and then it’s three pages of her being all, ‘Console me, Ellis,’ and I’m in love with her, and she never gives me a chance to—” He shoves the phone away. “This is why I left, do you get that?”

I shake my head. “I don’t. I don’t get anything about either of you. Or my stupid brother.”

He nods. “Fair.” He runs a hand over his face. “So, you’re leaving.”

“Yeah,” I say. “Thanks for popping my cherry or whatever. Obviously, no one else was going to.” I push past him on the stairs.

He catches me by the arm. “Hey, don’t say things like that about yourself. You’re, you know, great.” He leans in and kisses me on the forehead. “I’m sorry, Hannah. You deserve better.” He lets go of me.

I stand there, feeling stupidly weak-kneed. A surge of emotion for him goes through me, and I feel an echo of him inside me, all the way inside me, and it drags a noise out of my lips, a noise like the way I sound when he’s fucking me.

He meets my gaze, and his expression goes possessive.

I swallow.

He gets his phone back out. He scrolls and shows me the screen.

It’s Callie’s Instagram, a picture of a brunch place. Meeting the girls here at 10:00, says the caption. Warm ups at the bar. It’s been a hell of a weekend.

“She’s baiting me,” he says. “Andrew, too, of course. It’s, like, ‘I’m here, drinking mimosas at eight in the morning. Somebody save me from myself. Or somebody come drown yourself with me.’” He scratches the back of his neck. “I’m obviously going.” A pause. “Come with me.”

I shake my head.

He leans closer. “You know, maybe I actually want it over with her, and I just don’t know how to do it. Maybe I went to your apartment the other night because that’s what I wanted. Maybe if you’re there today, it’ll help.”

“I was there last night when she called you, Ellis,” I say. I had my pussy in your face. You were licking it. I don’t think I’m any kind of distraction from her, at all.

“Well, we take one car,” he says. “And that’ll keep me from abandoning you.”

I scoff. “No, it won’t.”

He hesitates. And then he nods. “You’re right. You should go home. This is not your train wreck. You should get back to your life.”

Yeah, it’s a Sunday, and I have nothing to do, actually. I would have spent the day trying to read, but I haven’t been able to read anything lately, actually. Since I started reading slush manuscripts, somehow, reading has been translated in my head into a chore, not fun. I still try. I buy books and I download them and I get everything ready, and then I read two paragraphs and check my phone, scroll through TikTok for a half hour, read two more paragraphs, pick up my phone again, and then—

Anyway, I don’t have a life.

I sigh. “Fine, look, I’ll come, but we each take our own car. I’m not getting stranded there.”

“We’ll take your car,” he says. “So, you can leave if you need to, and I’ll get an Uber if things go sideways.”

“Which they’re going to,” I say, sure of it.

So, that’s how I end up sitting at a high-top table at The Mill at 8:45 AM on Sunday, the brunch menu in front of me while Ellis glares at Calliope’s back, and she sits at the bar and pretends not to see us.

“Coffee,” Ellis tells the waiter, looking at Calliope, “and breakfast martinis. They’re good here. You want one, Hannah.”