Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 158848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 794(@200wpm)___ 635(@250wpm)___ 529(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 158848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 794(@200wpm)___ 635(@250wpm)___ 529(@300wpm)
Episode: Something Big Happens
FlockingFab20: “I hope his girlfriend knows he didn’t cheat. The photo wasn’t there.”
SUF36: My theory is he removed the picture before Kiki came into the room. Probably stashed in his nightstand so he wouldn’t get the guilts.
FlockingFab20: That makes zero sense. It looked too spontaneous.
On and on the speculation continues. Hundreds of different users. Two thousand different comments in this thread alone. They seem split fifty/fifty on whether Griff actually cheated.
Why would any normal person care this much about people they’ve never even met?
Bile burns the back of my throat. Strangers on the Internet stuck up for Griff more than I did. I was his girlfriend. His friend long before that. I didn’t even let him explain. I wouldn’t hear him out.
Worse, I destroyed the car he gave me for my birthday. The car he bought for me and so lovingly poured many hours into restoring.
How am I supposed to fix this?
Can it be fixed?
He still chose the show over our relationship. He still told that awful woman intimate things about me. The humiliation burns every time I remember her mocking text. I was so embarrassed, I never told Remy—or anyone else—about it.
“Molly, what are you doing?” Remy’s sleep-rough voice sends my heart rate spiking to the sky.
I whip my head around. “You scared the crap out of me.”
He opens his mouth to say something, then stops. His eyes widen in horror as he takes in the television screen. I left it frozen on that scene.
Shame stings my skin. Why’d he have to catch me watching this? Now he’ll know for sure I’m not over Griff.
Remy hurries closer and snatches the remote off the arm of the chair. “Why would you watch that again?” He clicks the television off. Darkness descends around us.
I reach over and tap the lamp next to his chair. A weak pool of light pushes the shadows in this corner of the room away.
“I had to know for sure. To see it again.” I can’t tell him what Torch said. Remy’s always been oddly silent on the topic of me dating Torch. I thought he would’ve blown a gasket the first time Torch asked me out but maybe he finally realized I’m old enough to make my own decisions about who I date.
He stares at me with his unfathomable blue eyes—a mirror of my own. Pity? Concern? I can’t tell what he’s thinking. “And what do you think now?” he asks carefully.
“I’m not sure.” I don’t want to tell Remy my photo-on-the-nightstand theory. It sounds so desperate and childish.
“You should at least have a conversation with him,” he says.
“I did.” I shrug, striving for the indifference I’m having trouble holding onto. “It didn’t change anything.”
“You’re breaking his heart.” His voice drops to an anguished whisper.
How dare Remy try to guilt me. “He broke mine first!”
He holds out his hands like he’s trying to tame a wild bobcat. “I know how bad it looks.” He glances at the black television screen. “But it’s not him. We watched it together not long after he came home—”
“You did? Why?”
“He wanted to see it. I don’t think he understood how bad it was until he watched the episode.” He shrugs. “It sounds like all sorts of things were taken out of context and edited to fit a certain narrative.”
As if I give a cracker about the show’s “narrative.”
“Did he hear the awful stuff they said about me?”
“Yeah, he saw some of it. He was pissed, Molly. I told him when I talked to him, but I think it was different seeing it for himself.”
None of this changes anything. “It doesn’t matter now.”
“Of course it matters.” He drops his shoulders, relaxing his posture from protector to comforting big brother. “If you really don’t think you can repair things, that’s fine—”
“But?”
“No buts.” He gestures to the television again. “Maybe tell him you believe him, though.”
My face hardens.
“Or not.” He holds up his hands again.
“What about you two?” I ask. “You’re not really selling your part of The Castle, are you?”
“Nah.” He shrugs. “I thought about it for a second.”
“I never wanted…I don’t want to be the reason you two aren’t friends.”
He’s quiet, thinking that over. “I really hate that he hurt you. Even if it wasn’t intentional.”
“Grief’s the price we pay for love. I’m fine now.”
He tilts his head, silently calling me out on my big, fat lie.
“Okay, maybe not fine. But I’m getting there.”
He nods slowly. “I’m proud of you. Just focus on school, for now. If you two are meant to be together, then it’ll happen.”
I shake my head. “I think Griff was only meant to be a chapter, not my whole story.”
Why does saying that feel like throwing the whole book in the fire?
CHAPTER TWENTY
Molly
I’m up and getting ready to leave for Hayden’s early the next morning. If Griff decides to drop by our house like he used to do on the weekends, I’d rather not be around.