Page 38

“Hey, whoa, what’s the matter?”

“What’s the matter?” I yell, loud enough to wake up our roommates and possibly even our neighbors.

“Calm down,” Brody says, trying to fight the oncoming attack of my pillow.

“Don’t fucking tell me to calm down, when you so clearly invaded my space and privacy, you dick!” Brody manages to take the pillow away from me and I dig my knee into his stomach, my hands wrapping around his neck. I don’t want to actually hurt him, but I add enough pressure that he stops and actually pays attention to me.

“Brody, you can’t do this—you said I could have the bedroom for the night but that doesn’t give you the right to join me and touch me. We’re not together anymore, which means you don’t have the right to act like this. Do you get how you messed up?”

I feel him swallow and nod and I let him go, jumping off the bed completely.

“I’m sorry, I thought it’d be fine. I mean, you said we’d still be friends. It’s not like anything happened, we just shared a bed and cuddled, like, platonically.”

“Maybe if you had asked for permission beforehand it would have been fine. But you didn’t.”

He sighs and opens his mouth to respond, but then the door swings open and Nick and Jack are there, eyes wide and panicked.

“Jesus, is everyone okay? I thought you were murdering one another in here,” Nick says, placing a hand over his heart when he sees we’re both fine.

“She tried to strangle me,” Brody complains and I glare at him.

Jack takes a step forward and puts a hand on my shoulder. “Are you okay? I told him not to bother you last night, that he should just take the couch.”

“I’m fine. I’m just baffled that you thought this would be okay, Brody.”

In the face of my disappointment and the fact that his friends are not taking his side on this, Brody hangs his head, chastised. “You’re right, I’m sorry. I just…” He trails off, looking up at me from under his flop of dark hair.

“What? Just spit it out,” I say, exasperated.

“I think we should get back together,” Brody says.

Both Jack and Nick groan at the same time, telling him not to go there.

I shake my head in frustration, tears prickling at the corners of my eyes. “Brody, we’ve talked about this at length. You and I are done. Staying in the apartment was a bad idea. I need to get out of here,” I add, frantically looking around for my stuff.

I quickly get dressed and gather my meager belongings, ignoring Brody’s apologies and pleas to stay. Nick and Jack watch me wearily from the dining table, but I ignore their stares and mild concern as I struggle to get my suitcase through the doorway.

“I’m sorry,” Brody says again. “Please don’t leave because of me. I was just being petty, and I’m truly sorry.”

“Brody, you’re my friend, and one day I’ll probably get over this. But right now, I need to get out of here. Good luck with everything,” I tell the three of them, closing the apartment door behind me and making my way to the car.

I don’t cry. I don’t rage. I honestly feel a bit numb. With a long sigh, I pull my phone out and call Rosie on video. It rings for the longest time, and just as I think about hanging up, I see her disheveled red hair and flushed face on my screen. She closes a door behind her, but I still catch a glimpse of bare legs tangled in her sheets on the bed.

“Rosie, tell me you did not hook up with him after one night!” I say, my jaw hanging open.

“Shhh,” she whispers. She holds the phone so close that all I see is her face and mop of messy red hair. She looks like she had one hell of a good time last night and—is that a hickey on her neck?

“Where are you?” I ask, looking more closely at her surroundings. “Are you sitting on the toilet now?”

“Jesus, Hazel, stop yelling.”

“Oh my god, are you still naked? It’s almost eight in the morning. We have to be at work soon.”

“I’m calling in sick,” she says, head held high like I’m going to fight her on this. Good lord, is she taking a day off to have more sex with Ezra?

“Girl, what happened to your ‘no sex until the third date’ rule?” I turn the key in my ignition, hoping it starts. I sigh a breath of relief when it does.

“Wellll,” she says, voice quiet, “we left the taco place not long after you did and went to the arcade. We played games and had a couple of drinks until they closed at one in the morning, then we came back to my place to watch Spider-Man because he didn’t believe me when I said Green Goblin was the best villain and kept insisting Loki was, which, come on, he’s not truly a villain, I mean just look at⁠—”