Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 108049 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 540(@200wpm)___ 432(@250wpm)___ 360(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108049 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 540(@200wpm)___ 432(@250wpm)___ 360(@300wpm)
Until Wednesday night.
He’d been reassuring at the time. He’d said all the right things to put me at ease. But looking back, I wonder if that was only to get me to finish him off. Because once he had that, he bounced.
I let out a shaky breath.
“What?” Sasha pushes her notebook aside and questions me with concerned eyes. “Whatever’s spinning around in your head, just spit it out, girl.”
“Maybe this is…” My teeth dig into my lower lip. “Maybe this is what everyone saw coming?”
She hesitates to answer.
“He told me the night we met he didn’t do girlfriends. That he hadn’t dated anyone for more than a few weeks.” I ignore the sharp clench of my heart. “We’re pretty much pushing that timeframe.”
Her eyes soften. “Is that what you really think?”
“I think he’s gotten tired of blowjobs and at this point would dump me for eight seconds of missionary sex through a sheet.”
Sasha cringes. “Thanks for that visual.”
I swallow my bitterness. “He wouldn’t be the first guy to dump a girl because she doesn’t put out.”
“Never heard of a guy dumping a girl for too many BJs,” she points out.
Which brings it back to the question of monogamy. “Maybe it isn’t the BJs, but who’s giving them…”
“Taylor. I think you’ll just drive yourself crazy trying to imagine what’s going on in his head,” she says.
“Well, I wouldn’t have to imagine if I could get him to return my texts.”
“Listen.” Sasha tries to mask her tone of frustration with something comforting, but it just comes out sounding impatient. She’s trying, but consoling isn’t her thing. “I don’t know him, so I can’t be your dick whisperer, but I will say this: if you really thought he was that guy, you wouldn’t have been wasting your time on him. So that tells me maybe something else is going on.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, maybe he’s having his guy period. My point is, whatever his deal is, it isn’t you. That isn’t the first place your head should go.”
“No?”
“No, babe. Seems to me like he’s been crazy for you since the moment you two started fake dating. So either he’s dealing with some shit or he’s just an asshole. And if it’s the latter case, you’ll be lucky to be rid of him. So stop stressing. You two will talk at some point and then you can decide. Until then, let it be. You’ve got to start backing yourself, Taylor. No one else can do that for you.”
On the one hand, she’s right. Assuming I’ve done something wrong, that I’m not good enough, is the first place my head always goes. That’s just what happens after you’re bullied and fat-shamed in your formative years.
On the other hand, I don’t know how to be as chill as Sasha. I don’t know how to not let shit get under my skin. How to just turn off the part of my brain that is clawing at the walls.
She has no idea how much I started to care about him, even though I warned myself not to. She doesn’t know all the ways he’d steeped through the layers of my life. You can’t un-dye fabric, dammit. Breakups are destructive and it’s impossible to completely bleach someone out of your existence. There’s always that tint they leave behind, a stain that never leaves you.
I had really hoped I could avoid Conor becoming one of those stains.
“With that said,” she announces, getting up to grab her car keys from her nightstand. “If he does you dirty and you want to set his car on fire or sabotage his skates so he snaps an ankle, I’m here for you, girl.”
A smile touches my lips. I love her. Sasha’s the person I’d want standing beside me with a shovel in the pouring rain while we bury the body.
“Come on, you dumb bitch.” She sticks out her tongue. “We can ride by his house one time on the way to the bar.”
Malone’s is slammed for a Sunday night. There’s a dart tournament going on, and a few minutes ago the entire Sigma Phi house crashed through the doors after clearly pre-partying somewhere else. So far, Sasha’s had to fend off three droopy-eyed drunks, shooting down their pathetic pickup lines like Wonder Woman deflecting bullets with her golden bracelets.
“Remind me why we’re here,” I shout over the group of loud guys chanting “chug, chug, chug!” in a nearby booth.
Sasha pushes another Malibu and pineapple at me and clinks our glasses. “You are in need of dick saturation.”
“I don’t think that’s my problem.” Glumly, I suck down almost my entire cocktail in one long sip, then lean against the bar and people-watch.
“Yeah, well, you’re wrong.” She tosses back her vodka and Red Bull. “Thorough scientific study has proven that when a man has your head messed up, only significant quantities of both dick and alcohol can cure your malfunction.”